Another race day when absolutely nothing went right!

I took Friday as another easy day, too late to train now, so I did the same country loop as yesterday.  I didn't think my legs felt as good as the day before but I guess they were since I did the same ride a few minutes quicker. A beautiful day 26c but with a cool breeze running, so it was perfect for riding. My dodgy throat has gone to my chest, either that or I have a bad case of 'pursuiters cough', but I doubt if its that two days after the last race, apart from the occasional cough I don't actually feel that bad so I'm hoping that it won't impact too much.

Finished the day with a Chinese meal, although I think I must be too predictable since the nice little Chinese waitress didn't even bother to give the menu!  I guess I did have the same meal as last weekend.  Afternoons with no racing can be a bit slow now with no TDF to chill out with, I think I'm ready to go home now, usually happens in the last few days when I start thinking of what I have to do get ready to leave, can't wait to see Hilda.

We had a Swiss team staying at the hotel for the weekend, Jurgen had said to me that Fabian Cancellara's sister had called to book the accommodation, so we had both expected it would be a women's team staying for the big women's race in the village this weekend. They arrived quite late I was in bed reading but did hear the cars pull in, I was a little surprised how quiet they were I would have expected 6 female riders to make more noise than they did.  All was revealed at breakfast, they were boys, juniors in fact.  What did strike me when they were all sitting at one big table for their breakfast was how quiet they were, there was virtually no chat, they weren't on their phones they were just very quiet. Thinking back to VC d'Or days I can't imagine any six of our riders being that quiet for that long, just impossible!

Well another race day, this time Ertevelde, which is just North of Ghent, an easy journey on the freeways according to Google. Well that's where it all started to pear-shaped!

My SatNav took me to a ferry at the back of Ghent sea port, unfortunately the ferry was out of service!  So I had to go off a find another route. I'm sure everybody has had the experience, despite telling it we needed to detour, the bloody thing just kept calling for U turns or trying to send me round a block to get me back to where I had just come from, at one stage I was hammering along a freeway for 10km  only to be turned at the next junction to go back, I was starting lose it at this point. Even though I had allowed extra time and it was Saturday and lighter traffic it was now eating into my comfort zone for getting ready to race.  I'm not good at rushing and thoughts of just heading home were starting to encroach into my thoughts.

I eventually arrived, got parked up and signed quick enough and headed out for a couple of laps, the first was just to find my way around what was quite a complicated circuit with a mix of wider, hotmix and concrete roads connected with narrow cobbled and broken surfaced lanes, it was actually a very a fast circuit. That was the good news, however I felt absolutely crap on the exploratory lap, then even worse when I booted it up, or at least tried, on a second lap, I could feel my throat wasn't very good but it was a warm sunny day, I had driven all the way to get there and finally as Hilda will tell you when I say I feel crap, it usually means watch out.  I tried to convince myself that this was the case today.

It was quite a big field, as was the younger age race lined up behind us, which did surprise me a little given that Sunday is the ICF championship and also the WAOD version of a championship, I had thought that some riders at least would be saving themselves.

Anyway we got underway and I started at the front so held good position through the first lap, I started drifting backwards a bit on the second lap, my legs seemed fine but I was having a little trouble with my breathing  and there was some unusually dodgy riding going, some riders were getting severe 'ear ache' from the bunch in general for some very erratic riding. I must admit thoughts of the time I crashed here with a only week left and had to travel home with a severely chewed up hip and elbow, very very unpleasant spending 24 hours on a plane, even in Business class, with weeping holes in your body!

So I found myself at the back, however we had already lost a lot of riders, knowing that's not the place to be so I moved up into the middle, which is far less stressful than swinging on the back on quite a technical circuit. Half way through lap 3 the other race came up, couldn't really pass us very well on the narrower sections but eventually came streaming past, I was surprised that it was their whole bunch, much more normal is for a break to come through which splits our bunch and the whole thing becomes much more manageable.  Today we had two fairly large bunches fighting for position on the narrow roads, to be honest I usually prefer it since it puts the whole thing in a line and people just get 'popped' continually.

So having established a position I was happy with, not near enough to the front to get involved in their race but far enough from the back to avoid being behind 'dead' wheels. Then I got stung in mouth by a bee!!! I react badly to bee stings and I could feel the inside of my mouth swelling quickly "oh ****' as if I didn't have enough problems focusing on the race, I really wasn't totally in to it already but that was just about it, sod it I'm going home, drifting right to the back.  I didn't quite sit up and I'm having this conversation with myself in my head.  stop, don't stop etc etc,  I eventually compromised with myself by staying on the back with the intention of finishing the bike race.

So that's what I did, there were numerous little splits in front of me but I managed to stay vigilant enough to bridge them quickly each time somebody 'died' in front of me.  I was so not into the race, I didn't even attempt to sprint, to be honest I don't actually think it was good sprint for me anyway, out a corner is not my favourite since I don't really have a 'kick', just good top end if I have time to get there.  Got changed quickly, collected my money and headed home, the SatNav deciding to take me through the less salubrious areas of the Northside of Ghent, very interesting on a hot day.

                                                               Ray not sprinting!


Got back in time to see the big women's race, a UCI 1.2 I think, 1.1 is the top, so reasonably big deal, so its ongoing and I'm ducking out every 15 minutes as they lap around the hotel, I've been cheering Kristy Glover 'guesting' for her Dutch team, possibly not the best thing for my throat but she was holding good position until the last lap where she slipped back a bit.

Best race yet and the best result too

Yesterday afternoon (Wednesday) the race was in St Laureins very close to the Dutch border.  A sunny day but very windy on the open course mostly out in the country side except for a small section through the township. The name didn't ring any bells on the way there but as I pulled into the town I realized that I raced there in 2013 and remembered the day very well. It was windy the last time too although from a slightly different direction, I was just starting to hit some form in 2013 and the boys were trying to psych me out by telling me how many ex TDF riders there were in the field, there was also a guy making  a nuisance of himself in the sprint, swinging right and then left, still that was all history.

I was there nice and early, I'm not letting the traffic or poor directions hold me back for the last few races, parked up where I did last time down a nice quiet side street.  I signed on early and opted to do two laps of the 7.5km circuit as a good warm up already suspecting that the race was going to be hard in the strong wind.

I'm not sure whether I've mentioned that with the WAOD they usually put two races on the course at the same time, on a longer course like this one it's not so much of a problem but on shorter ones it can be a real pain.  Normally the younger (faster) race starts first followed 2 minutes later by the older (slower) race which is usually enough to keep the races separate.

With us it can be three races on the course, my race, the next age group down (younger) and a women's race if any women sign on. However with us they start us first then the younger race 2 minutes later!  If and when they catch us it becomes one race with two prize lists, the WAOD are the only ones to do it this way, everybody else starts the younger race first, I'm really not sure why.

Today there were four women who nominally race with the younger race but start with us, a sort of two minute head start but they also race for a separate prize list. Confused? Me too it gets quite difficult understanding where you are in the race, number colours are different which helps but when two large bunches merge it can be difficult to check all the numbers, I usually just race for the best result I can and hope that it works out in my race.

I should also mention that when I say women I mean young women, teens or early twenties, usually good racers that I assume would normally race in UCI races but racing with the old guys gives them a good hit out, two of the girls in todays race were very strong, at least until three laps to go when it really got lively!

Our race got underway, almost immediately lining out almost from the go, I rather foolishly started at the back, chatting!!, it took me almost the first lap to get into position where I wanted to be, the race split on the second lap (of seven) for the first time, I managed to make it, just as the last one to cross the gap, into a group of eight that went clear. I was still trying to recover from crossing the gap on my own when half a lap later the break from the race behind us came roaring through taking a few of our race with them. I was in a small group trying to get back, the group comprised those of us that had been shaken out of the lead group and a small number of riders from our bunch that had managed to hang on for a bit, this included two of the Dutch girls, one of whom was pulling turns, quite impressive into that wind.  This went for a lap or so and we could see a small group holding just in front of us, I wasn't sure who was in it but we were pulling them back especially into the wind.

Coming around to two to go the rest of the younger race came up with a good number of our race in tow!  I got quite cross at that point since about 10/12 riders in our race had been trying to race the other 25/30 followed their usual tactic of saving themselves to hang on with the other race and in so doing get a decent place. Since I'd been bashing my brains out trying to earn a decent result I wasn't best pleased when I was now in a bunch with maybe 12/15 of the race behind us and about the same number of my own race, 8/10 of whom had just been dragged around. we lost the two girls at about the time the junction was made since there was a flurry of attacks which did shake out a small number of weaker riders.

Having worked out that the sprint would certainly be for a place in the top ten or better, given the tough racing I would have been happy with that so did nothing but swing on the back, or near the back for the last two laps, vigilant for any splits but otherwise being a 'sprinter'.  The final straight, from three corners out, was all into the wind, along the narrow 3m wide straight I managed to move up quite well, riders tried jumping into the second last corner but were closed pretty quickly, there is only a short straight before the last corner which gave us a dead straight headwind run in for somewhere between 800/1000m.  Riders jumped out of that corner, I just followed wheels, about half way up the home straight there was a very stall as the riders that had gone for it out of the corner died, the stall was only for a second as a new wave of riders hit out for the line, 400/500m to go. I stayed on the wheels, moving from wheel to wheel to keep going forward looking for an opening to start my own sprint, a lot of riders seemed to be dying so I hit out down the right hand gutter, maybe 200m out and took it all the way to the line to win the sprint.

 

Hanging around the back for the last couple of laps!

Bit of a surprise, one of the reasons may have been I chose to sprint in 52*15, I'm pretty sure most of the others were 53*12 or 11, so although I was dying at the end just like everybody else, in the lighter gear I was able to keep the legs turning over to maintain momentum.  I usually put a sprint win down to being one of the riders that uses his head better, not necessarily the quickest, today I may have been both. So very happy with a win, don't really care how the last races go now.

Today Thursday was another wet one to start with, so after breakfast I had almost resigned myself to no ride even though I only wanted to a max of 90 minutes to keep the legs ticking over.  But at about 11am the skies cleared and I went looking for a minimum of 60 minutes in the countryside.  In the end I managed a dry 75 minutes in the dry and about 20 minutes after I got back it rained on and off for the rest of the day.  The forecast for the rest of the stay is good though, 30c at the weekend.   

Taking a breather, now ready to race again.

Got  soaked on my ride on Monday, I was only going to cruise around the countryside for a couple of hours, too late for training now, it was overcaste when I started but the roads were dry so I went out, my throat seemed OK after a good sleep.  But this is Belgium, it started drizzling, then it started raining, I wasn't even half way around my proposed loop so I turned around, home for a hot shower, wash my clothes and clean my bike again!  Hopefully I didn't aggravate my sore throat.

I was quite surprised that my legs felt reasonably good, I didn't really test them of course but I still won't race until Wednesday.

 

Crossing the finish line for the final time

 

 

I was quite impressed with my power numbers from the race yesterday, nothing spectacular at the top end, nothing over 850 but my best average for 10 minutes was 325 watts, 20 minutes 320 watts, 30 minutes 320 watts and 60 minutes 310 watts, pretty happy with that shows I was trying pretty hard when I was on my own.

 

Cracked them at last

I don't think I mentioned that the over 60 races are now over 58, not sure why, doesn't make them any easier that's for sure.  Again for reasons I don't understand the reigning Over 60 ICF world champion race in his WC jersey, first time I've seen him wear it and possibly a bit cheeky since the race was with the WAOD who withdrew from the ICF earlier in the year.

 

Quick visit to the Aalst criterium in the evening, Aalst is a pig of a place to park at the best of times but with 60,000 - 70,000 coming to watch, Froome, Sagan and Roche plus a host of local pro's 'race' it was a nightmare.  I arrived late and left as soon as it was over.  Sagan just managed to get over Froome in the sprint, yeh right, but with the amount of beer being consumed everybody seemed happy. 

 

 

 

Today, Wednesday the weather was still pretty average but I managed 2 hours easy missing most of the showers. A headwind out and tailwind home so the first 27km in just on 40 minutes, the return 27km in just under an hour! Of course I wasn't trying! 

Four races to go, came close but not quite.

Think I've worked out why it might have been taking me so long to recover from Tuesday's race, I woke up this morning (Saturday) with a sore throat!  Not a bad one but definitely not right.  Given that it was also a pretty stormy, wet day I opted to stay in bed and watch the Alpe  d' Huez stage of the tour and what a stage it was, epic, but unfortunately more spitting morons out there and I did wonder at the single policeman I saw trying to control the drunken Dutch men, I've always liked the Dutch having spent quite a lot of time there over the years, but after their antics with the Sky team car and riders I need to reevaluate that.

Early night to try and shake the cold.

Sunday and a race at Lendelede, about 30 minutes easy drive to the event, given recent difficulties finding race HQ's I gave myself a little extra time but found it OK so had plenty of time for sign on formalities. The weather was good to start but went downhill quite quickly as the rain came on starting with a bit of drizzle deteriorating to steady rain by the finish.  The course was good for me, a bit exposed to the wind in places, basically a slow downhill into the wind and a tailwind uphill straight.  Probably the only 'interesting' bit was a cut through what I can only describe as an alley way, maybe 2 meters wide, to connect the downhill straight with the uphill straight.

All the 'usual suspects where there and the race was held on the line for quite a long time waiting for the Police to give the OK, they basically go around the course and remove any cars that are parked (illegally) on the course.  By the time we were released to race I felt like I hadn't taken the time to do three laps of the course to make sure I was fully warmed up, I think everybody else probably felt the same since it's the first race where we started sedately.  Coming up the uphill straight for the first time a rider came through quite briskly, I was second wheel, when I glanced back we had a gap so I went over him tapped him on the behind, lets go, we did, I pulled to the top of the hill, swung over and he moved over with me even though we had a 100m gap!  That was going to be the story of the race unfortunately, I wasn't feeling that great but I wanted to race, but the others, the strong ones at least wanted to race me first. 

In a nutshell three went away, nobody but me was interested in chasing, they weren't that far up the road but every time I tried to get across I had company that wasn't interested in cooperating.  Eventually two riders went out to chase, I gave them a gap to make sure they were committed and then jumped across.  I don't they were too happy but we had certainly gapped the bunch who were probably 30 seconds back at that point. The ploy then was to keep me at the front and then jump through to try and dislodge me, this tended to piss me off a little so after a lap or so of this I thought I wonder how strong they are and went at the top of the uphill straight where the speed really picked up  and I got a gap, they never came back, quickly dropping out of sight behind me.  I don't think I was gaining on the front three but nor was anybody going to catch me, so I did four laps on my own.  Not my favourite way of racing, I'd rather be in a small working group and sprint for a win at the end.  But there again anybody that's raced with me recently will know that I'm not the guy that's going to attack uphill at the end of a race either, but that's what I did in Tuesdays race.  Obviously getting old and confused!       

Nice Chinese meal for dinner, several glasses of 'medicinal' red wine to help with my sore throat which I've managed to push it down on my chest!!!

Tomorrow evening, weather permitting is the Aalst criterium, which is the first of the post tour criteriums, allegedly with Froome and Porte same as the last time I was there, plus Sagan etc, but I'm only going if its not wet, I still have three races to ride.

A couple of (much needed) recovery days

Wednesday was a recovery day, 90 minutes on the bike in the morning just turning the legs over, to be honest that's about all I could manage anyway, definitely feeling Tuesday's race.  Looking at my 'numbers' from the race I'm not surprised, 10 minutes @ 350 watts, 5 minutes @ 375, 20 seconds @ 1000 watts is a bit tough on old legs, not to mention  my lungs!  Mind you not much compared with Chris Froome's 414 watts up the Ventoux in 2013, there are  key differences of course where Froome's climb was around 40 minutes and he weighs around 12 kg less than me!

When I was driving back from the race I was thinking that when I was sprinting and diving through the gaps I probably ought to have knocked it off when I started 'nudging' people, you'd think I should know better, you don't bounce very well as you get older!

Thursday was a training day, 2 hours with a couple of my interval laps at the midway point.  My legs certainly felt better than yesterday but they were still a bit heavy.  I guess I did race hard on Tuesday, I haven't fully recovered which makes me think I really need to think about my remaining race programme. I'm two years older than the last visit and I don't think that I quite have the training base I had last time either.

So the session was loads of 'sweetspot''/threshold with the combination of one and two minutes intervals interspersed with 15 second sprints.  I felt quite sluggish at the longer intervals but the shorter one and two minute ones were hard but up to power, the sprints were definitely sub standard, I was barely putting it over 1000 watts although on the positive side they were all over that number.

For the remainder of my stay there are races this Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday. The ICF world championships is on the last Sunday, currently I am not planning on riding it.  I know there is no possibility of riding all those races, physically speaking and I'd rather have a few good races where, like the last one I can really get into it, so I need to spend some time evaluating the races and possibly the courses. I'd always considered that flatter fast courses suited me better, but Tuesday's course was definitely 'lumpy' so now I'm not sure!

Friday (today) was going to be an easy cruise through the lanes, maybe a couple of burst to be ready to race tomorrow, however my legs felt really heavy again at the start which sort of helped me decide on my remaining race programme.  I think I did too much yesterday not being fully recovered from Tuesday and set myself back a little, so I turned the ride into an easy endurance ride, one up on a recovery ride in my vocabulary, so is was mostly tempo with a few pushes up some of the small 'bergs', at times I felt OK at times I felt very sluggish.  So decision made, I will race on Sunday, Wednesday, Saturday and the following Monday, four races and 'll try and have a good crack in each one.   

That's more like it, feel like a racer still.

After yesterday's debacle of not being able to find the venue (and missing out on what turned out to be a bit of a soft race in terms of field size) I had no problem with todays HQ having been there before, albeit in 2009 I think.

No question I was very strong in 2009, I won three races in Belgium, but when I turned up to this race in 2009 and tried to sign on in the correct race, I was told that I had been 'promoted' to the 50 year race, which was obviously beyond me, having said that I still finished in the 'money'' and had gone particularly well up the climb.

The course was fairly straight forward the start/finish straight rises steadily from Wulvergem on a concrete surfaced road, turns right across 50m of cobbles to get on to the climb, which has a reasonable hot mix surface, if a little broken in places, with decent hot mix all the way up and around to the finish. The climb itself is the back side of the infamous Koppenburg climb, famous in various of the Belgian spring classics and the tour of West Flanders amongst  others. The Koppenburg is a steep cobbled brute, fortunately no cobbles today.  Having got to the top of the climb, the course turned right across the top of the ridge which had a nasty crosswind before another turn took us downhill back into the village, the down hill was unfortunately head wind so not an easy bit of the course.  Back through the village was a 90 degree right, a left, another right, a bit of a dogleg right which bought us back onto the home straight with 200m to the finish line.

Having had a day off yesterday I opted to do two laps before the seven lap race, first one I just rode, second one I booted it up a bit thinking my legs are not usually so good initially after a no ride day, I'm consistent there, my legs felt distinctly 'blocked'.  

Back to normal size field today around 40, maybe 40+, lead car goes off and of course there's an attack straight away but only one guy on his own, fortunately the field ignores him until we hit the hill for the first time when the pace picked up and he was dangling about 50m off the front, the climb is narrow and twists and turns a bit so the race is pretty much lined out, there's not a lot of room to bunch.  About half way up I'm thinking that I was really easy and others look like they were laboring quite a lot, so with a rush of blood (obviously in my subconscious I must have been thinking how well I was climbing the last time on the course), I powered it up, not savagely just lifting it incrementally, I rode clear passed the early breakaway and shot around the right hander clear, hoping that there would be group coming across.  No such luck, a single rider came across and having got to me, he then wanted me to tow him down the hill, I did keep going because I could see a group of 5 also coming across too, however by the time they got to us the majority of the bunch had also closed the gap to them. Break over and I'm already thinking that maybe I should have waited a lap or two before committing.

The race went on like that, I was in every split that looked like it had a chance until one six man group slipped off the front after the two to go board had been shown.  For some reason I couldn't fathom I was having more trouble with the lesser incline of the concrete surfaced road up to the climb proper, which is where they went.  They were only ever about 200m clear and as we hit the hill for the last time I went on my own about half way up, I was joined by 3 others who arrived one at a time, so we hit the right hander to cross the ridge closing on the front group clear of what's left of the bunch which has dwindled to about 15 due to attrition of the constant attacks. Unfortunately the bunch caught our little group before we caught the leading group which effectively stopped our momentum.

So the leading group got to sprint for the win, we were sprinting for 6th, I got into a good position through the beginning of the corner sequence, got a bit shuffled when a rider who was never going to make it stick (he's been yoyoing on and off the back for the whole last lap), went going into the last right hander with about 500m to go. I was happy enough with that, it was an uphill, headwind sprint so followed wheels around the corner and into the dogleg, jumping out of that I felt a bit like Peter Sagan bouncing off of a couple of riders who were doing there best to fall off I think.  Went hard up the right hand gutter passing riders all the way but didn't quite get to the front but was really happy with the race and result.

After collecting my money I visited two of the three WW1 cemeteries that were on the circuit. The area has literally hundreds of these small cemetery's and memorials as well as the bigger more well known ones. Both of the ones I visited where British and as I walk along the headstones, it has to be wondered what the world might have been like if these mostly very young men hadn't been there when they were needed.  I've been in a lot of them over the years, they still make me very emotional but when you see the care and attention with which they are maintained you can sense the respect that is given to these brave souls.

I was going to race today, but..........................

I had every intention of racing today with the WAOD near Zottergem, another wet day unfortunately but I've always been OK in the wet and the course promised to be interesting with some Flandrian bergs to climb on the course. In fact I think it was billed as some sort of hill championship.

Got all my stuff together, my bike in the car and set off, I didn't have far to go only 20 minutes, slow going in the wet but I had plenty of time.  I got caught behind some sort of oil spill that the fire brigade was dealing with that cost me a little delay but soon past it I followed the SatNav directions which took me through the centre of Zottegem, well that was a mistake since there were road works with a road closure and negotiating the one way system on very narrow was interesting for a few minutes to say the least. however I eventually came out the other side and continued to what I thought was my destination. Wrong! Wherever I was there was no evidence of a race HQ, other racers, or any sort of race preparations! Bugger! I assumed that the address I had jotted down was wrong so thought I would just follow signs to the village name I had noted. Well I did  this, effectively going round in a big circle following the signs without any evidence of a bike race, so I back tracked trying to follow the signs, same result. By now its raining more heavily, and my frustration was rising and my motivation was falling, I hate having to rush to prepare to race and you need time to fill the forms to be able to sign, get the bike out etc etc, never mind warming up/looking at the course.

Then I spotted a car with what looked like a race bike on a rack, thought beauty and followed him. It soon became evident he was doing the same as I had just done, roaming round the countryside hoping to get lucky. With the clock counting down, I finally thought no that's enough and reprogrammed the SatNav for home!  Of course 'sod's law' then kicked in and the bloody thing took me right past the race HQ, I had 20 minutes to the start of the race, the rain was as heavy as it had been all morning, I might still have time to get it done, then I spent another 5 minutes trying to get parked, we were at a busy commercial junction, which eventually was the last straw. With time running out I declared it a rest day and drove home.

I've been doing this since 2008 and that's the first time I have failed to find an HQ or get to the start of a race in time.

I had originally planned to race on Tuesday, which I will do now, but having been surprised to pull up pretty well on an easy recovery ride on Sunday so I decide on today's race and maybe Tuesday as well if I felt OK.     

Sunday was a much more satisfying day, even if my morning ride was wet, I kept the ride nice and easy through the lanes but surprised how good my legs felt.

In the afternoon I drove to Wevelgem to spend the afternoon/evening with an old friend, Steve Snowling, AKA 'bubble'.  For those that know him he's doing great, still a tool freak, enjoying his job hand building robots for I think some sort of secure pharmacy dispensing safe. He builds one each week staring from the base components and raw materials. He still does his bike mechanics from his garage which is jam packed with tools and old bikes, mostly for friends and work colleagues. He was kind enough to straighten the gear hanger on my bike for me, a simple enough job when you have the right tools and Steve does.

For those that don't know Steve, he was a valuable some time mechanic and always supporter for our little team, in real life he was 6 day mechanic (which was his favourite), pro team mechanic, TDF mechanic now retired from all the travelling.

We had a great afternoon in the sunshine and a BBQ while we chatted about old times, shared.  It was such a great evening, that when I got back at 10.30pm it was still daylight.

Just as a footnote the address I had written down was correct so I guess a little local knowledge was needed to interpret it.  Two races to choose from tomorrow, one very local, 5 minutes the other on a course I have ridden before so I know where I'm going!