The Flat and The Fast

So I am back in Europe, and I am back to the real world of bicycle racing. I arrived in Belgium last Wednesday and to no surprise it was raining. After a lengthy delay at the airport we were on our way back to the house in Izegem. After unpacking and eating a hearty meal of horse, we were off to bed. On Thursday we competed in our first race, but we didn’t exactly race to win. Winning is always on the mind, but what can you expect after 12 hours of fly time, and only ten hours of sleep from the past forty hours of traveling. So instead we raced to get rid of the “jet lag” in our legs and too actually make us more tired so that we would sleep the entire night in order to get over the time difference. The race was a Belgian kermmese. These are local/close-to-home races that are considered to be “real races,” but in actuality they are Belgian training rides. There were about sixty guys in the field, and the course consisted of nine 7k loops. Around lap five a twenty man break went up the road, while I stayed in the pack. On lap eight, I decided to stretch my own legs and went up the road to place 21st for the day. We had one rest day before we had another race on Saturday. The Saturday race was known as an inner club race. This is an actual “race” in Belgian terms. I was joined at the line with about 120 other riders. The course consisted of twelve 9k loops. Around lap 6 a break of about twenty riders went up the road, and remembering the way the kermmese went, I quickly got to the front and made a huge effort to bridge the gap. It was everything I had to drag myself up to the leaders, averaging about 52k’s to make the jump. Once up to the leaders I got a slight rest as we entered the town and I could use the corners to my advantage. We then entered into a smooth rotation which we held until two laps to go. At this point all hell broke loose, and we started to attack each other. We went into the last couple of k’s in groups of two’s and three’s, but each group was only separated by a couple meters. I made a last ditch effort with about 800 meters to go, but the futile attempt was quickly consumed by the much faster sprints of the Belgian riders. I ended up placing seventeenth. I made some serious tactical errors upon reflection on this race. I noticed that about three teams had three riders in the break, others had two, and only a few of the break riders were solo. I should not have rotated through with the pace line, I should have hung on to the back and rotated through only once in a while. Therefore I could have conserved energy and perhaps done better at the end of the race. The teams that had three riders in the break were able to organize and execute efficient attacks that took a lot out of my legs. I am quickly regaining my knowledge of European racing. These flat races are tough, and are really not my forte, so I can’t wait to get to a course with a climb. We race again on Tuesday, another flat circuit style race that should be the fastest and hardest yet (of this trip). Then on Thursday we leave for Switzerland. For those of you that have been asking me to continue the blog, thanks for waiting, and I will try to be more on top of it as the trip progresses.