Where're we going today?

In Mark's downtime, and while we await Lindsay's work visa still - it's due next week - we have managed to get out for some good riding. So while we chill out recovering from our multiple heart attacks incurred on todays ride, we'll give you an oversight of what it's like riding around the roads here.

Firstly, Belgium is flat as a tack, if we haven't told you before. Mark is craving a trip to the alps, or just a few hours away to the Ardennes or Germany, to stretch the legs on a climb more than 500 metres long. However, there occasionally pops up a hill, something you's would call molehills compared to mountains, but when you see how flat Belgie is, it's a hill. There are a few of these so-called hills around here. South of here. North, east and west of here, it's flat. So, we ask, 'what kinda ride you wanna do today?' "somewhere with some excitement".


(oh yeah, this hill is steeper than you think!)

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, is that Belgie is known to have the highest concentration of roads per square km in the world. This means that there are endless backroads (oh but they may end or turn into gravel without warning) and you may never go for more than a kilo without making a turn, unless you're on the main roads. Some main roads have excellant bike paths and go for ages, allowing a good solid constant work effort, but this is very boring on the flat, straight main roads. Fortunately, there are so many cyclists here, there is an endless supply of marked routes through the back roads you can follow. These are marked by symbols and arrows on the road about 50 m before the corner/intersection.


(major interchanges have so many symbols, like this)


(straight ahead!)

They are very useful, you just go out and say, 'we'll follow the x road today'. You can jump on and off them like a train, and they follow backroads 99% of the time. Sometimes a road may have been resealed over the marks, so you're stuffed, but you take a punt and ride for a while until you come across more markers.

So. We're still learning the roads and our bearings, but I guess we could get to Leuven following the '5' road better than we could in the car with a map. Mark has strapped a compas to his stem, just so he knows how to get home if he gets lost.



Today we rode the 5 road. This is a 5 and an arrow beside it, painted on the road. It's popular with the boys in the house because it's hilly, and you just snake around for a hundred or so km (if you wanted) but are never more than 15 km from home. Today we followed it up some hills and down some hills, and found ourselves going up one, down the one beside it, then up the next one beside that, coming out 500 m from the top of the first one. So we turned around and went home, we only wanted a short ride. On the way home, we picked up and followed the 'i' road, which takes us past our door. It took us through some nasty hills in a very nice residential area, before putting us on a known road home.

Thirdly, the road surfaces are sometimes so poor lawyers in America would be jumping at the number of law suits that could be filed against councils for injuries and damages from the uneven surfaces! Combine this with both random pave/cobbled sections and sudden resurfaced roads, and you're getting the picture.

(Lindsay learns to go fast over flat cobbles)

Occasionally, a road section may be cobbled, just to make things interesting. One of the sections of a hill on today's 5 road was cobbled.



(Then she learns to climb the cobbles! This is after a 500 m standing climb on a smooth road. Sorry for the blurriness, Mark was riding the cobbles when taking the photo)

Let me tell you, it was very interesting and fun to attempt. While not steep, it was about 150 metres long, and after a steepish hill 500 m long. Lindsay went up thanking she had her 38 on, averaging for the section 15 km/h. She rather enjoyed that particular challenge, but not the decent back down it about half an hour later on our way home. At least she was prepared and knew to be on the drops to decend. She didn't know to actually stay seated properly and pedal a bit to keep the bike steadier, and went down just off the seat, maxing out at 20 km/h! She's not the most confident descender on the smooth straight roads, let alone a cobbled section!. And her replay on the smooth flat to what it was like descending on cobbles was worthy of funniest home videos! Here's also possibly the smoothest road in Belgie - brand new hotmix. Though the section out the front of our house is also brand new hotmix, so it's a contender also.



Finally, cars are extremely cautious of cyclists. I'm not sure if cyclists have absolute right of way on all roads here like they do in the Netherlands, but we find that, for example, when we're on small roads crossing a main road, the cars on the main road slowdown/stop to give way to US! Yes, the drivers are 99% very aware if a cyclist is there and they give way at all times. Sometimes they are too cautious. Especially in round abouts, and when a car turns right (or left in Australia), and when a cyclist/s are on the inside right (left in australia), the car will stop to wait for the cyclist to go wherever they're going (straight or turning). Weird really, if you understood that. The cars also, like this one, will park on the roadway and keep the bike path clear (yes this car is parked, the tractor has had to go around).



Mind you, there is a limit to 50 cyclists per bunch, over this requires a lead and follow car. We've seen bunches from shops/clubs out riding, looking good all in the same kit, and usually looking professional with a follow car/van with spares. I guess this is able to be done with the backroads here, but it does make things a helluva lot safer.

We've said previously how many Belgians ride 'town bikes' around, rather than taking the car. Helps when there are so many bike paths. Also helps if you can afford one. We found these outside a bike shop one day. Second hand town bikes, but almost as expensive as a new one! New ones that are top of the line cost upwards of 800 Euro (~$1500)! They come with dynamos on the front wheels, so that you don't need to worry about batteries in the lights, you just flick the dynamo on and you're lit up. Not to mention a whole stack of whiz bang gadgets you get for your money. Some are quite stylish too, would look good on Beach Road's paths...


So we'll end it here today, keep riding till we post again!

2 tours and not much sleep.

I must be honest and say how tired im getting, and the tours for the team have just started.
First it was 4 days of Dunkerque [which is really 6 days].But before we even left the team house, we had a problem of too many cars and not enough drivers, normally the riders dont do any driving, Michel was handing keys to me, but last time i checked i could only drive one vehicle at a time. We arrived at the hotel in Loon Plage with winds of 100 knots i reckon, i had carbon wheels blowing all over the hotel carpark. I had to make sure all the TT bikes were in working order and within UCI rules for each rider. Tuesday was the prologue, and Nico was the first rider from us to start at 2:34,Matti was the last at almost 5:30, so it was a long day, the most of it spent at the start looking after the riders with bike adjustments.
Then it was back to the hotel to clean the bikes and store them in the van where they would stay all week as we would return to the hotel at the end of the week.
The next moring, bags are loaded into the truck for it to get to the next hotel. I had a friend of Nico's help me at Dunkerque, he's not a proper mechanic, but he looks after Nico's bike between races, so he knows the basics, and he was perfect for the hotel job. We would arrive at the hotel with the truck all set up, parking roped off to park the other team cars and all our hoses connected up ready for washing. Now the week before Dunkerque i was busy installing the washer and dryer into the truck, cos on a tour you need to do washing, so all the hoses were all set up for this as well. It's good to have everything set up so you can start work on the bikes as quick as possible, so you get to eat before the kitchen closes.
One of the hotels we stayed in was a pro tour team hotel, teams like us dont normally stay in these 'right in the center of town, flash' hotels, but it was something Nico arranged with the organisers. In this hotel were teams Canyon [Unibet] and FDJ, next door were Astana,Milram and AG2R, pro conti teams usally get the hotels on the outskirts of town [or further]. It was a good change, especialy the fact that we were only 800m from the start line instead of 80k. So with a 12 o'clock start, there was plenty of time, which was lucky as i slept in til 9.
Otherwise the tour was fairly quiet, the tour was reasonably quiet for the team and for me. Dan.L pulled out sick on stage 5, Nico pulled the pin after stage 5 and the other guys battled on to finish respectively in the field.
So returning from one tour, i had one day to prepare for another one, this time to Germany, which is good cos the hotels are usally better and the food is for sure better. The first place was really nice, although a little weird, it had a mexician look to it and it felt like i was under ground all the time [maybe it was the grass on the roof that you could see from the 5th floor]. Lindsay joined me on this tour cos we had the room and Stephan needed the extra help with soigneur duties, our room at this hotel was huge [almost the size of our house]. The set up for this tour was a hotel the first night and then a different hotel for the next 3 nights and back to the first hotel for the final night. Its alot of running around, not to mention that some are good and some are crap. It ranges from the bed, the food, the service, but you learn to live with it and roll with the punch's. To give you an idea, the first hotel was good rooms, good beds, good food but not quite enough, althuogh our last night there they fixed that problem [they realised cyclist eat alot]. The next one was, rooms good, bed crap [it was a waterbed with way too much water in it] and the food was fair. The next one was first class, everything excellent. The 4th night was a ok room and bed, the food was good but the service crap. We were arranged to have dinner at 7:30 but didnt get served until almost 9pm, overall the 3 course meal took over 3 hours. Now for a cyclist thats raced 190k, its too long to wait, Eric had to complain several times that his riders were hungry. The upside was the hotel had a adults only channel free. Then it was back to the first hotel, even the same room. So its alot of moving around and you have to take the good with the bad, but it sure beats dry chicken and over cooked pasta, which is what we get every time we go to France. All in all, it makes it even better when you get home to your own bed. Besides this its the rush to get to the hotel the quickest to get the best position, first access to water and electricity and the rooms on the lowest floor. On some days the truck was leaving to the hotel that early, Koff would arrive there just as the race has started at 12pm, so it plenty of time to get things organised, but thats something i cant go into as this post would never end.
As for the tour it was again quiet, i didnt have a wheel change til the last day, and it rained for two days. It was also Gert's[Scruffy] first comeback after his horrific crash at tour of Med, appart from being a bit nervous on the decents and lacking a little race fittness he finished the tour.
So a quiet tour of sitting in the car looking at the teriffic scenery Germany offers [im going back there with my bike one day], talking to Eric about this and that. By the last day its a bit boring, but i still enjoy it.
Now i have over week off to do some more improvements to my truck and most importantly to do some riding, and usally the guys need something done to their bike which keeps me busy.
Next week is the tour of Belgium, which i have off, but i go to the tour of Luxemberg at the end of next week. Til then im checking out some local racing so i might fill you in on that and what the boys are up to in the team house now everyone has settled in.

Cheers

Funky

We haven't forgotten to post

(By Linds)

No we haven’t been slack and forgotten to post for a week or so. We are busy, and I’m writing this while sitting at the feed station of day 2 of the Rheinland Pflaz race, a 5 day stage race in Germany, near Mainz. We have an our before the riders are due, and the seat won’t go back far enough for me to get some z’s. We have this time because the new team soigneur is super organized and well prepared and efficient, meaning all the feed bags and bidons are ready to be handed out. They were ready last night.

So what am I doing here? Well, for the tours, the organizers provide accommodation for the teams, and this includes 8 riders, 2 directeur sportifs, 2 soigneurs, 2 mechanics, bus driver, doctor and VIP. For us, we only bring 1 DS, and no bus driver, doctor or VIP. So spare beds, and I got to come along for the week. I have work to do however, assisting the soigneurs in their duties. My main responsibilities are (given that I don’t massage) the daily bidons, washing and going with Stefan to the feed station. This leaves the 2 soigneurs, Stefan and Coff, to do as little else possible other than massage. However, Stefan, the new soigneur, having just come from a ProTour team, is super-organised and efficient and very professional, and is always doing other stuff, and giving the riders top quality high-energy food, so he’s up early filling little bread rolls with bananas and jam or pineapple and honey, wrapping them a special way for easy opening and then putting them in the bags. This is after he’s prepared the pre-race goodie bags for start, what the riders will carry with them at the start. Lets just say the riders won’t be going hungry!

The race itself is set in a very picturesque region of Germany, look in your maps and it’s around Mainz. The view I have right at the moment is (as you can see) somewhat spectacular, from this hill-top across a very deep valley to the opposite hill top. The race comes around the side of the other hills descending, then into the valley, then they almost switchback and come up this side. This stage is 145km long, but contains 4 categorised climbs. It’s been raining all morning, and only now just starting to dry out the road. At least it’s not windy like it was yesterday. Pablo, on his 50 cm frame, was asking Mark for some low-profile wheels last night, instead of the deep dish carbons he had yesterday, as you know what happens to a tiny featherweight rider on deep dishes in a strong cross wind!

Gert VDA made his comeback yesterday after his horrific crash at Tour of Mediteranne, and what a way to do it: pouring rain, hilly, and cross winds all day. While lacking a bit of race fitness, he did well to finish just off the main bunch after a split on the final descent. Robby Meul was the best finisher in 11th for the day in the bunch kick 16 seconds after the lone leader from Navigators.

While soigneurs get time to catch up with friend soigneurs from other teams at the feed station and at the finish, team life is very competitive here. At hotels teams don’t really interact with eachother. Riders generally hang around their rooms or at least with their own teammates, but while other good friends may be staying in the same hotel, there is no catching up and mixing up of teams. Words are rarely exchanged between teams during meals either. Also, there is a race within a race with the team trucks. The mechanics trucks all try to get to the next hotel the quickest in order to get the best spot for the nights activities (ie. Has best access to water and electricity, and best parking access, room access, work area etc). Otherwise it’s a fight to get anything at all.

Here we sit, waiting patiently. Yesterday I thought we had the worst job of all – longest hours, running around after everyone making sure they’re all sorted and got everything, and we spend so much time waiting for something to happen! Sometimes, we stand out in the rain and wind waiting (like yesterday) for the riders to get to the feedstation or the finish, we’re saturated, then when we get back to the hotel while the riders are able to get to the showers and dry first, we have to make sure they’re sorted first then we have work to do! If you’re lucky you can sneak in a hot shower and dry clothes first, but often you’re outside working away in the rain again, cleaning up and getting ready for tomorrow. Not to mention tasks like sorting washing out for 8 riders when nothing is named and it all looks the same! (I won that task this morning!)

It’s now time to get the bags out and stand in the cold some more, so I best leave it here. Till next time, keep smiling.

A week off

I'm just about to leave for the 4 jours de Dunkirk, which goes for 6 days. I've just had almost 2 weeks off, with only the Henninger Turn in Germany last Tuesday. So here's more of what I've been up to.

We left early Monday morning for Germany, it was only a 5 hour drive so we got there in plenty of time to get work done. The guys were all going out for a ride, so I had to make their bikes ready. The Rabobank guys were there as well doing the same thing. While the boys were out spinning we would sit and wait. The Rabo guys I think were more interested in working on their tan as they all had the shirts off, but I had a couple of the spare bikes to work on, change a chain, change a seatpost etc. When the boys returned it was time to give their bikes a wash, not that they were that dirty but it's just the pro thing to do, and I noticed the Rabo guys doing it, even though they washed the bikes before the ride too. So there I stood in the soaking sun washing bikes, while Wim was out picking up the two Dan's at the airport. By the time Wim returned I only had David's bike to work on, wash and fit new bar tape, swap cages, regrease bbkt etc, while Wim had to put together Dan Lloyd's boxed up bike.

When the work was done it was time to shower and eat. Now this apparently was a classy hotel, so even though it was a buffet style service (as it usually is) the meals were delicious and a huge breakfast choice - but no weetbix.

Race day I loaded the team car ready with spare bikes and wheels and was ready in a stack of time cos I was up early to change some of the cassette ratios to 11-23 instead of 11-21 (some of the climbs were a little steep). Soon after we were off to the race a little earlier cos wer had a presentation, which we missed cos we got lost as one of the signs that direct the teams to the depart area was turned the other way, so we drove around in circles for a while.

So not long after pulling the bikes out the riders were on the way to sign in, I had just enough time to oil the chains and check to make sure the guys computers were working. This race we also had to use a timing recorder which sat in their front fork. The race had soon started and after fighting our way through barricades and people we found ourselves in the convoy. But as we were driving up to the race, we found ourselves in amongst the public traffic already. Eric said it's always a problem whe there is a race in a big city. I noticed throughout the race that some of the road obstacles and sharp corners weren't marshalled, in some parts traffic was still on the road, there was plenty of police but they didn't seem to be doing much. Eric explained that that's how they run the races in Germany. In Belgium, you have the same police for every race, so they know what they're doing. There is a division of the Belgian police whereby their task is to marshal cycling races/events. That's it. That's all they do. No police investigations etc, just traffic control at cycling races. Mind you, I've never seen better organised races than those here in Belgium.

So the race went on without any flats, but I did have to hand our a few bidons as it was a very warm day. Then we packed pu and headed home. I think we got home in record time, as we only stopped once and I sat on 130 all the way.

(Sorry, no photos as I forgot to take the camera. But you could look at the race photos on cyclingnews.com)

Wednesday was spend washing everything, the rest of the week was to spend riding. Linds and I headed out on a planned ride but still managed to get ourselves lost. The maps either say there is a road and it's not there, or vice versa. We still have to learn our bearings and where each village is. Thursday we accidentally did 100km just from not knowing exactly where the towns are, but it was a good ride on a great day - we got sunburned.

I also got the job of installing the washer and dryer into the truck, which meant I had to change everything around again. So the arvos were spent doing that. The finished product:


This did take some engineering, as we wanted it so that we just had to hook up the garden hose at the hotel, and bobs your uncle. I drilled 2 holes in the floor, poked the hoses through. For the water intake, I attached a bit that had thread on each end so I could screw in the garden hose fitting and the washer hose (see it below). The water outlet was just the hose poking through the floor, attached to a longer hose so we could move it away from the truck.



On Saturday Linds and I went to check out a local race that Wim was doing, as this would be one of the races that I would do. It was not that far from us so we decided to ride as it was a nice day. Passing through one of the villages on the way there was also another race on. We arrived at the race, took a seat at the local cafe to watch the start that was right out the front. As the 112 starters in Wim's race (an earlier race had masters in it) took off, we thought we would go the some points on the course and watch, so we rode the ~5km course backwards. One of the corners we got to was almost at the bottom of the decent, turned right, off camber, across a gutter onto 2 metres of cobbles into a sort of dog-leg exit still downhill. Here's a picture, though you can't see it real well:



The chase is strung out for ages coming up this very gradual climb:



We watched on the bad corner for two laps with no mishaps apart from a few lockups. I was told that corners like that are common in Belgium kermesses, it's like they find a course with a tricky corner or a gravel road, and say lets race around there. But I think i would have managed, though I haven't raced for a while, and it's not exactly your club race. After one more lap we headed home, passing the other race again (it was a juniors race) that was still going, but we didn't watch.

We did notice at these two races though, that rolling road closures can be done and done well. What they did here, as they do in most races, is to have the lead car notify the corner marshal (all corners were right hand corners) to stop the traffic, wait for the bunch to go through, then the sweep car re-opened the course behind the race. How it worked was that the traffic was directed to go in the direction of the race only, not against it. It was good for 1 race at a time, but for kermesses, you could close the road and make diversions in place to allow traffic to move, with traffic marshals or cops directing the traffic. The Belgians are very used to this sort of thing happening, so they listen to the traffic marshal/cops. In Australia it could be done, with the cops initially taking regos of cars not-obeying their directions and fining them.

Sunday I didn't get to ride as I had to prepare all the bikes and equipment for Dunkirk. The tt bikes have to be ready and I have to make sure I take enough wheels. Also my truck had to be washed which I spent ages doing with a little scourer cos it still had bugs on it from the last France trip, so it badly needed a wash.

These months comign up we have a lot of tours, first 4 jours of Dunkirk, then I have a day in between, before the next week long tour, then tour of Belgium (which I have off), followed straight away by the tour of Luxembourg. So very busy but I'll try to keep you updated.

I have to go pack for Dunkirk now.

Keep riding.