An Experience

Its been a while since my last post so thought I better get round to letting everyone what is going on.

Over the past month I have been building for Fleche Du Sud a UCI 2.2 tour in Luxembourg which started on the 9^th and would end on the 13^th of June. Most weeks building up to it I have been racing twice, with two longer rides and some short recovery rides. Had some decent results with some top 10s, but mostly finishing in the pack feeling pretty smashed by the end.

Fleche came around pretty fast and thought I was well prepared for this race but by the end of it I found out that these guys are on a completely different level than what I am. Most are a lot older than what I am and a lot more experienced. The racing was a lot faster than I thought it would be. I was ok of the flat and rolling terrain but once we got to a serious hill I didn’t have the extra gas needed to get over the top with the leaders. By the time id got to the 3^rd road stage I was so tired and sore that I couldn’t turn the pedals with about 40km to go, I stopped on the side of the road and pulled the pin. Its always hard when you have to pull out a race, especially one that big. I was so disappointed in myself. But there is always a positive to come out of these types of things, I am still young, still have a lot to learn but now I know what I have to do to be competitive at that level of racing.

Now that im back in belg, I have two interclubs this week and then I will have mid year break before I start building up for the last half of the season. Lets hope it’s a good one.

Until next time, im out.

A Good Week

Since my last post things are starting to get a lot better for me. Finally starting to feel good on my bike again and racing a lot better too.

Last week started off with a rest day where I, the two other kiwi’s in the house and Alex Frame (another NZer who races for u19 Isorex team) went into Kortrijk for the day to look around and drink a coffee or two while spinning a few yarns. Fun day all round really.

The next day I was the only one in the team who wanted to race and as David had to work I had to ride there and back, which really didn’t bother me too much at the time. Once I got on the bike was feeling rather average and just pottered along slowly to the start in Aalbeke. The race had quite a technical but long course and the strong winds wasn’t gonna make it any easier. Thought id ride into the race and feel better once I got going but never really happened, had to dig deep and just slogged it out till the end. Finished about 16^th which I thought wasn’t to bad considering the way I felt…now for that ride home, lets just say it took some time.

I had another race coming up on Saturday. So in between the two I had on this week my training consisted of a long ride, which I did with some other boys from New Zealand, then a couple of shorter 2-3hour ones hoping they would freshen me up a bit.

Woke up on Saturday feeling a bit tired so thought this may be a long day. Had on one hour drive to the start which was in Vilvoorde, Brussels and the course was a very open and fast 8-9km circuit and would do so many laps to add up to 140km. At the gun I went blocks, put myself into debt straight away and didn’t come right for a few laps as the break rolled on up the road. Thought it was my race over right then and there. But after 45km or so I found myself in a 15 man group riding across to the break. Took us about 40km to catch them and once we did attacks went here, there and everywhere. Luckily I had found my legs and was still at the front after it settled down. The 18 of us left at the front rolled nicely until a lap and a half to go, and then the attacks started again. Was starting to feel the lactate creeping into my legs as two guys got off the front with 3km left to race. With 1km to go I thought id take a chance and hit it as hard as I could getting across to the leaders with 150metres left, unfortunately I was done for and had towed another rider across with me. So ended the day in 4^th my best result since I have been here in Belgium and I’m pretty happy to say the least.

With a trip to the Muur on Sunday which ended up being 4 hours, it topped off a very solid week for me here. With a few more races and weeks like these I’m hoping to be on the top step of the podium quite soon. Lets hope I can do it before my next post, until then see ya!  

My First Post

Thought I better start one of these, start going along with the trend and let everyone know how my cycling is going.

Well where to start…this season didn’t get off to the greatest start in New Zealand, with a ute pulling out infront of me whilst riding. This resulted in me breaking my nose and severely bruising my knees, quads and hips. Had some trouble for a few weeks with walking and riding a bike just wasn’t gonna happen for a bit. Once I was all healed up, which took about 6weeks i did some major panic training to get the condition up to a decent standard before I shot off on a jet to Europe, leaving the important people in my life behind…and of course my dogs!

Have been in Belgium for 6-7weeks now and have a pretty sweet set up. Team director David Baert conveniently owns two houses in Zwevegem, so Simon Finucane, Yu Takenouchi (both team mates), Ruaraidh McLeod (another NZer who rides for the Dunkerque cycling team) and myself all live in one of them. We all seem to be getting on quite well. When I arrived here it took me a few weeks to get in the swing of things with the jetlag, getting settled in, getting all my team gear sorted etc. A recent head cold in the last week hasn’t helped but now everything seems to running smooth.

So far I have done 8-10races, mostly kermesses and its definitely different to racing in NZ…its so much harder, faster and a lot more people. Have finished with the front group majority of the time but haven’t been able to get up there to go for the win as im usually ‘poked’ by the end of the race. So I haven’t had any overly great results to date, but im sure they will come with time as im getting stronger every week.

Well I think that’s enough for my first post, until the next one im out.