All for One; Team Tactics in Gatineau
Posted on June 10, 2014 1 Comment
The Chrono Gatineau was by far the most technical time trial I had ever raced: three u-turns, a bike path, round abouts and a half dozen turns all in 11.5km. I would be rocking a brand new Fuji Norcom, one size smaller than the old one. It felt fast, powerful, aggressive and aero……perfect, but unfamiliar. With over a thousand kilometers on my old, larger Norcom, I knew exactly how it would react to every twist, bump, shift and pedal stroke but the new bike felt different. It felt good, but unfamiliar making me both excited and nervous to test it out.
“Red Panther Hot Sauce” valve sticker good for at least an extra 10 watts
Time sped up, like it always does before a race, and before I knew it, my warm up was over, bike check was done and I was clipped in watching the familiar countdown, anticipating the start and the pain. BOOM! Go time. As soon as I came down the ramp I was in love with the new bike. Curtis Cramblett had worked his magic once again and the new bike and bike fit felt amazing! Looking back now I should have trusted myself and the bike a bit more but, at the time, flying towards the first corner, I had this vision of miscalculating the corner and taking myself out in the most spectacular fashion. Road rash and broken bikes were NOT on my to-do list that weekend and so I slowed up and erred on the side of caution.
Onto the next straight and, with a slight downhill and smooth asphalt, I was quickly cruising along at 70kph. My legs and lungs were screaming but it was a good pain; the pain of power and speed. Just as quickly as it started, it was over. Despite taking zero risk, cornering like Grandma Moses, it was still enough for 7th. I was going to do some serious damage with this bike and couldn’t wait to race it again. The beast was back!
While I was playing it safe, my team mate Jasmin Glaesser was racing like a rockstar. She has been training hard this past year and it is very obviously paying off now. She had finished 6th at the Tour of California Folsom Time Trial and was improving on that performance with a third place finish at Chrono Gatineau. The whole team was stoked to see Jas up on the podium, well earned trophy in hand. Watch out for this girl at Commonwealth Games! She is on fire these days!!
Originally the plan for the GP de Gatineau, the circuit race the following day, had been to set up our sprinters, Sam and Jo, for the finish. However, Jasmin had been racing strong all season, working hard for the team and delivering ever improving results in time trials. If the opportunity presented itself we all agreed that Jasmin had earned the chance to go for the win.
The new plan was for the team to cover threatening attacks, keeping it together for a bunch sprint where we had the horse power for a solid lead out and the sprinters to seal the deal. The only break away we would let go would be one with Jasmin and a number and composition of riders that gave Jas a reasonable shot at a win. Patty, our Swiss Miss, would be captain, calling the shots, communicating with the director and organizing the team during the race.
Personally, I was feeling strong and confident and so I made it my own goal to cover as many attacks as possible so that Jo, Sam and Jasmin could save their legs and have the best shot possible at a win. Being near the front and covering most moves had the side effect of putting me in position to snag a prime as well as ending up in several short lived break aways. Just after the prime lap things got aggressive and attack after attack went off the front. Steph Roorda attacked with Jade Wilcoxson hot on her wheel. I bridged up and a break of seven riders, including time trial power horse Annie Foreman-Mackey, formed.
I knew that the composition of the break away was not in my favor, Jade was a far stronger sprinter than I was. Furthermore, the break away was not a part of the team’s plan. I knew that our team would organize and bring the break back and so I sat in as best as I could, letting my legs recover for the inevitable catch and counter attack. Glancing back I saw all five of my team mates lined up on the front of the peloton quickly and cohesively pulling us back. Sure enough they caught us just a few moments later and the counter attacks started going.
Not too long after that another break away formed and this one was very much in our favor: six riders including Jasmin, Denise Ramsden, Lex Albrecht and three local riders. Confident in Jasmin’s ability we let the break go, the gap quickly opening up to almost two minutes. The rest of us stayed in the peloton, covering attacks and thwarting any attempt to bridge to the break.
The rest of the race ticked by without incident and, with 3km to go, I worked my way to the front, increasing the pace and starting the lead out. In the end, Jasmin had a bit of bad luck in the final kilometer getting caught off guard by Denise’s attack.
With a gap to close and the course running out, there was not enough time for a win. Denise took the victory while Jasmin had to settle for third place. Still a spot on the podium, some UCI points and big smiles. Way to go Jas!
While Jasmin sprinted her way onto the podium, our lead out worked well getting Jo and Sam 8th and 9th. Overall a fairly successful day for the team.
Two races and two podiums later it was time to relax and celebrate. TIBCO founder, Linda Jackson, treated us to a wonderful dinner out at the Byward Market in Ottawa. What a great way to end a weekend of racing!
Just a few hours later I was in another airport on my way to another bike race. Time to sit back, relax and catch up on the latest Hollywood gossip before winding up for more racing. Next up: North Star Grand Prix in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Dear California, I love you
Posted on May 22, 2014 Leave a Comment
Another three weeks in California and I am more in love with it than ever. After finishing Joe Martin Stage Race in Arkansas, I flew straight to Los Angeles to spend some time training in the SoCal sunshine before the Amgen Tour of California two weeks later. The race report for ATOC is down at the bottom, but I thought I would take some time to talk about more than just bike racing this time.
Having spent most of the past 6 months in the Los Angeles area, it felt like coming home: familiar faces, favorite roads, the best coffee shops (Intelligentsia in Venice Beach, seriously, it will blow your mind!) .
How can you not love this place?!?!
I had just received my brand new Fuji Norcom Straight time trial bike and so I left my road bike in the team trailer to focus exclusively on my new “spaceship”. My last time doing any real time trial training was July of last year, but as soon as I got on the new bike, felt the familiar power and speed and burn, I remembered why I loved time trialing. I have a long way to go before I’m back in tip top time trial beast mode but I did get some solid hours in over the two weeks in California.
Aside from the several hours of training per day, I tried to make the most of every day I was in LA by exploring the city, meeting new people, and just generally getting out and doing things. Of course staying with the Maynard family was wonderful; it always is. So many fun coffee shop stops and a couple lulu shopping sprees with Carolyn and Jaqui, midnight chats and sushi with Brian, martinis served up by Bernie, and of course Larry’s awesome stories. You guys totally rock!
The Maynard family bar; every home needs one of these!
Nancy was also kind enough to make some time in her super overbooked schedule to take me on the coolest tour. Even though I have spent months living in Los Angeles, I had been so busy with training that I had never seen Hollywood or Beverly Hills or any of the other famous sites. I had never even seen the Hollywood sign. Nancy picked me up and, after an obligatory iced americano stop, she showed me all the sites before taking me out to the most amazing sushi restaurant. Of course we had to stop and get the super tourist-y picture in front of the Hollywood sign.
At the observatory in front of the Hollywood sign with crazy tan lines (#TheOriginalStrava)
Far too soon is was time to pack up and fly to San Jose for the final race preparations. Some physio and another awesome bike fit with Curtis Cramblett and I was ready for Tour of California to start. The rest of the squad arrived and we had some fun with different sponsor events before racing. The TIBCO squad for this race would be Jo, Jasmin, Kendall, Sara, Paige and myself; a pretty solid crew.
First up was a group ride with some of our amazing sponsors from Silicon Valley Bank (SVB). After a wonderful breakfast meet and greet, these guys (and ladies) proceeded to drop the hammer up some of the more sizable hills in the Bay area. Seriously impressive! We would see a lot of these people again that evening at the annual SVCF Gala Fundraiser for women’s cycling. Thank you for your support!
The fundraiser was a beautiful catered dinner hosted at a breathtaking home and spandex was therefore definitely not a clothing option. Having literally existed in nothing but spandex and sweat pants for the past year “high heels” were not in my vocabulary or my closet and I had all but forgotten how to “suit up”. Luckily I had Sara and Kendall come to my rescue. A borrowed dress, some new shoes and Kendall’s magic makeup skills turned me from bike racer into girly girl…….which apparently was quite the change because when I walked into the main house my manager stared at me blankly for a solid 20 seconds wondering who the stranger in her house was. All done up in our little black dresses, we spent the evening enjoying a wonderful meal and mingling with some of the local supporters of Team TIBCO and women’s racing.
The following day was race day; back to work. First up was the Amgen Tour of California Circuit Race: a 50 minute high speed slug fest around the Capitol building in downtown Sacramento. The atmosphere when we arrived was incredible! Huge crowds, media, horse mounted security, music and even the Rapha espresso cart. We warmed up on our Kurt Kinetic trainers across from the Team Sky bus and watched the festivities around us before sitting down for a quick team meeting. The course was flat, wide and square with a fair amount of wind and a long sprint to the finish. The field was big (115 starters) with a wide range of skill so, if necessary, Sara and I would be setting the pace at the front to keep the field strung out and our sprinters (Jo and Kendall) safe. We also each had marked riders on other teams that we would cover. I was covering a couple strong time trialers with the hope of getting in a break away with them. If none of the breaks stuck, the team would organize in the final laps to lead the sprinters out for the finish.
As soon as the race started it was clear that we were not the only team that wanted a fast race: it was full gas right off the line. It took me a couple laps to work my way into the front part of the bunch and so I got a good look at the chaos that was mid-peloton. The racing in Europe had seemed so scary with huge pelotons crammed onto tiny roads and so I had thought that North American racing would be “easier” in the sense that there would be more space. That race definitely made me change my mind! Yes, there was loads of space……loads of space for people to be unpredictable and dangerous. In Europe, everyone took the same line through corners because you literally went into the corner sandwiched between the riders on either side so there was no space for creativity, you just went with it. Here there was space to be creative and “creative” is not an adjective that bodes well in cycling. Exhibit A: halfway into the first lap I watched the two women in front of me take completely different, and intersecting, lines through the corner precisely because there was so much space to play with. Sure enough they made contact and promptly wiped out about twenty people.
That was all the motivation I need to hurry up and get myself into the front of the peloton and stay there. Attack after attack was going off the front, with several attempts by Sara and myself as well, but the peloton was not going to let anything get away today. Nothing stuck for more than half a lap before being brought back. The speed was high to begin with and lap after lap we cranked it up more. The crowd was incredible, screaming and cheering and pounding on the barricades creating a deafening roar through the finishing stretch. There was also no shortage of excitement in the peloton: the non-stop attacks, abundance of crashes and competing team tactics took every bit of focus I had. With four laps to go the speed started increasing again and teams began to organize for the sprint. Then disaster struck: three laps to go and a massive pile up happened in the front part of the bunch. Three of our riders were in front of it, three (myself included) behind it. Luckily non of us went down.
There were no more free laps and the carnage was blocking off most of the road and so a sizable gap had opened up before I had picked my way through the bodies and bikes and could start chasing again. Despite my best efforts I ran out of laps, catching the front group just as we crossed the finish line. Jo had done the best she could, finishing 5th despite missing half her team. A good result but we couldn’t help but be a bit disappointed in how the finishing laps had panned out for the team.
This was my first real individual time trial since National Championships in 2013 and it was a star studded field so I was pretty nervous going into it. We pre-rode the course early the day of the race and it looked like it was going to be a fast one: no wind, no technical corners, smooth asphalt and wide roads. There were a few hills but nothing too steep. The way back was mostly downhill with several long, gradual descents that would keep the speed high.
Several hours later I was on the ramp watching the familiar countdown, clearing my mind and preparing for 20km of suffering. The course started off perfectly, a slight downhill helping me quickly get up to speed. I found the familiar rhythm between my cadence and breathing and pounding heart and settled in. Then I almost died.
Actually, I actually almost died. I came flying into a 90 degree right hand turn in my areo bars (no brakes) thinking I had the whole road to come out of the corner. A media tent and large crowd meant that I couldn’t actually see around the corner but I remembered it being really wide. Just as I hit the apex of the corner I realized that I did not in fact have the whole road and that I was about half a second away from going face first into an orange metal barricade at about 55kph. I resisted the urge to slam on the brakes knowing instinctively that attempting to stop abruptly would cause a spectacular wipe out. I eased on my back brake ever so slightly and laid the bike down as far as I could praying to whatever higher power may be that it would be enough to make it. My wheels hit the feet of the barriers and my shoe scuffed against the metal and I resigned myself to the fact that I was going to go down. Hard.
What would hurt less? The metal barrier on my left or the asphalt on my right? Asphalt, go for the asphalt…..less chance of impalement and I was leaning that way anyways. Now clearly I have horseshoes stuck up my butt or something because there is no way I should have remained upright and yet, somehow, after skidding over three or four barrier feet (lucky for me they were the flat kind, not the angled kind) I was through the corner and still upright.
I had made it through death corner and was now only a few kilometers away from the turn around point, the adrenaline definitely helping me get back up to speed. As soon as I flipped it at the turn around point I realized that the wind had picked up. Significantly. Uh oh. I had been banking on the way back being the easier part of the course and had used up most of my tank on the way out. It was now painfully clear that the headwind on the way back was going to require much more power to overcome than the uphills on the way out and I was already running close to empty. Never have 10km seemed so far. The wind was merciless and I was soon cracked; sheer will power and a stubborn determination not to be a “quitter” were all that was keeping my bike moving. After what seemed like an eternity I crossed the line, 11th place.
Thank you California, it’s been amazing and I can’t wait to see you again. For now it’s back to Canada for a week of R&R before gearing up for Gatineau.
Time Trials, Team Work and Thunder Storms at Joe Martin Stage Race
Posted on May 4, 2014 4 Comments
Last week I arrived in Fayetteville, Arkansas, for my first North American race with Team TIBCO: Joe Martin Stage Race. First up was an uphill time trial, followed by two days of hot and hilly road racing, then an eight corner criterium to finish off the weekend. After months of fast, flat racing I was definitely nervous about how my legs would feel on the hills. I was a domestique for this race so my job was simply to work for the team, but I had to make it over the hills if I was going to be of any use to them.
Stage 1 – The Hill Climb
Stage one would soon tell me exactly how my legs ranked compared to the others. Now, as a time trial aficionado, I do not think that “uphill” and “time trial” should ever be in the same sentence. If you’re riding a road bike and your average speed is under 30kmh it’s a hill climb, not a time trial. End of debate. Unfortunately, the race organizers did not ask my opinion on the matter and so I reluctantly skin suited up for 10 minutes of slow suffering…….which is not nearly as much fun as 40 minutes of fast suffering. As I stood in line the wind picked up and it started to drizzle; the drizzle grew into torrential downpour as my start time approached. The course started on a flat, went on a slight downhill for several hundred meters and then pitched up into the climb. I had put my bike in my usual starting gear: big ring and just below mid cassette. As I stood there waiting, one of the guys hanging around looked at my gears and commented that it was way too big, it was a hill climb and I’d never be able to start that gear. Distracted by my impending start and definitely outside of my comfort zone, I actually listened to him…..rookie move. There I was two minutes before my start letting a total stranger pick the gear he thought I should start on. Fast forward 90 seconds and I was on my bike, clipped in listening to the familiar countdown: 5, 4, 3, 2 stand up, 1 swing back, anticipate aaaaand GO!
Except I didn’t go. My right leg pushed down, my left leg pulled up, my hips thrust forward and my arms reefed on the bars. Problem was that my bike was still being held so it wasn’t going forward and all that power and momentum went straight up instead. I popped a full on wheelie, Sagan style, on the start line. I then followed that up by fully spinning out my back wheel (thank you rain and tiny gear), barely staying right side up, before heading down the opening stretch. The tiny gear, downhill and huge surge of adrenaline had me spinning out seconds later, scrambling to find a good gear and rhythm. But, disaster somehow avoided, I did eventually find my groove and crossed the line a respectable 13th place. Not a bad start to the weekend. As a team, we were clearly the ones to beat. Lauren had won and we had three more in the top ten.
Stage 2 – The First Road Race
The first road race was just over 100km. There were two short, steep climbs in the opening kilometers, a 13km climb in the middle followed by a long descent into a flatish, windy section. The race finished with a couple more short, steep poppers and an uphill sprint. With Lauren in pink, our plan was to race aggressively. Sara and I would cover early attacks and launch counter attacks in the hopes of getting into a breakaway. This would hopefully do two things: give us a head start on the long climb, and put the pressure on the other teams to give chase right from the start. On the climb, the climbers on our team would set the pace to shed as many riders from the peloton as possible. Once the climb was over, Sara and I would keep the speed high to ensure none of the dropped riders could come back. In the last hour we would take turns attacking, forcing the other teams to chase and hopefully tiring them out enough to give Lauren and Jo an advantage in the finishing sprint.
My legs were feeling heavy and sore and I didn’t fully trust them. Sure enough they were screaming in protest just minutes into the race. It was going to be a long day. The rest of the peloton was clearly ready for a day of aggressive racing. Countless attacks were launched forcing Sara and I to put in effort after effort to cover. There were so many attacks that some of our other riders had to pitch in and help cover as well. Sara put in a couple attacks but was quickly chased down and counter attacked. I had my own hands so full covering that I never got a chance to actually attack before we reached the base of the main climb. Here Andrea “Dre” Dvorack went to the front and set a pace that made me go cross eyed. All I could do was to stay out of the way of my team mates and not get dropped. The climbers continued to push the pace as I fought the urge to puke on my top tube. 13km. Suck it up Buttercup. It had been a long time since I had suffered badly enough to get the tooth tinglies but by kilometer 6 or 7 up that hill my teeth were tingling, my face, fingers and toes were numb and I was seeing stars……if I had a stroke, maybe my director would let me get in the car? I shook my head and forced myself to focus.
Sometimes you just have to suck it up
The crest of the hill was in sight and I was still there in the top ten. I looked around for the first time since the start of the climb and realized that we had whittled the peloton down to only about 20 riders, and seven of the eight TIBCO riders were still there. The descent went by without much excitement and then we were into the flats; the last hour and time to start attacking. I drifted back to about 15th position to give myself some space to get up to speed and surprise the bunch, and did a quick check of who was where. Jessica Cutler, currently third in GC and a powerful rider, was on the front. Perfect. Amber, second in GC, was following Lauren and paying no attention to me, even better. I moved to the edge of the group, stood up and put it all into the cranks. I thrashed my Fuji into a full out sprint peaking at 69.9kmh and quickly establishing a several hundred meter gap. With the gap big enough to discourage most people from spending the energy to bridge I paused, maintaining the gap and catching my breath. Time to wait and see how the peloton would react. Olivia Dillon was bridging up to me solo. Behind her, Anna Sanders was starting to bridge with my team mate Patricia Schwager on her wheel. No one else was reacting. This was perfect! Olivia, Patricia and I were all strong time trialers, none of the top GC riders were there, and it was two TIBCO versus one Colavita and one FCS. Confident in the composition of the breakaway, I started working. 28km to the finish.
Slowly but surely the gap opened wider and wider. All four of us were working well together and we now had almost a minute lead over the peloton. 15km to go. With two TIBCO riders and no GC threat in the breakaway I was pretty sure that my team mates in the peloton would do nothing to catch us, but rather simply keep the gap small enough to keep Lauren in the pink. Patricia had been riding strongly all day and was a rock star on the hills so between the two of us she was definitely the one that had the best shot at the stage win. I knew that if I could give her a chance to recover she would bring home the win and so I pulled…..and pulled…..and pulled. I was burning through matches fast but the final kilometers were also counting down fast. 10km to go……9km to go……8km…..then I blew. I cracked. My legs had nothing left to give and I was unceremoniously dropped from the break away. I sat up waiting for the peloton and doing my best to recover enough to jump in with the group for the finish.
I had barely sat up when I looked back to see Dre flying towards me. She had obviously attacked solo. I stood up, accelerating to jump on her wheel as she flew by. My legs were still completely thrashed but I tried my best to work with her for as long as possible. I was beyond cracked by this point and in the final kilometers it was all I could do to keep pedaling my bike. The peloton came screaming past me, quickly closing on Dre and the breakaway but Patricia managed to hold them off to the line taking the stage win. I was beyond stoked for Patricia. She was an amazing rider but always worked for others, rarely got the chance to win for herself. She had actually been Marianne Vos’ team mate for a year and on our ride, Marianne had talked about what a selfless rider Patricia was, always giving 100% for the team at the expense of her own results. When I caught up with Patricia after the finish she was smiling from ear to ear and knowing that I had helped put her on the top step of the podium made all the work I’d done totally worth it. Patricia took the stage, Lauren held onto the pink and Jasmin stayed in white (best young rider jersey). Another successful day for the team.
Patricia “Patty” Schwager taking her well deserved win
Stage 2 – Another Road Race
The second road race looked a bit like a lollipop. We would ride two laps, each with several steep but short climbs, then turn left off of the circuit onto a flat 8km finishing stretch. The finishing stretch had a strong cross wind and so we decided to race defensively and then use the team to blow up the pack in the cross winds and set up Lauren and Jo for the finish.
TIBCO in the pink, green and white jerseys on the start of stage 3
The race started off aggressively and a large breakaway of 8 riders went. Dre was in the group so we let the break go. The peloton settled into a comfortable pace. It was a stand off, each team waiting for the other to make the first move. After one lap the breakaway was down to three riders and Dre was still there. They had opened the gap up to 4’35” though and that was too big for our liking. Additionally, the two riders with Dre had started working together, against Dre, and there was a big risk that they’re joined efforts would successfully drop her.
At the start of lap two we organized on the front and started pulling the break back. Coming into the finishing stretch we had caught the break away and shattered the peloton. With the miles counting down things were heating up. Attack after attack went but nothing was sticking. In the crosswinds of the finishing kilometers the team dug deep, pushing the pace and putting it in the gutter. We had all been working hard for the last hour to close the gap, set up the finish and protect our sprinters. It was now up to Jo and Lauren to bring it home.
What was left of the peloton shattered in the last two kilometers and Lauren and Jo were exactly where they needed to be earning themselves first and second place respectively. Another successful day for the team.
Stage 4 – The Criterium
After two grueling, hot and hilly road races as a work horse, I woke up the morning of the criterium feeling like I had been run over by a truck……literally: I was as sore and stiff and achy as that one time when I actually did get run over by a truck. After consuming enough Peet’s espresso to cause heart palpitations the prospect of racing another day was seeming a bit less daunting, which was good because we were soon en route to the downtown start. The weather forecast was calling for thunder storms and, as we warmed up in a line on our Kurt Kinetic trainers, the morning drizzle turned into torrential downpour. Luckily the shower was short lived and the skies had cleared a bit by the time we rolled over to the start line.
Patty and Dre all on the start line
Our tactics for the day were pretty simple: Sara and I were to set pace on the descent and wide sections to keep the field strung out and our leader’s safe, the other six TIBCO riders each had one or two competitors they would cover. The first few laps were fairly spicy, the roads were wet and slick and it was taking me a minute to get comfortable on the technical 8 corner course. Olivia Dillon, who clearly consumes rocket fuel for breakfast, was on the front setting a break neck speed. Jasmine and Lauren were on her wheel and I was several positions back from them waiting for an opportune moment to move up. Right now Olivia was doing a fantastic job of keeping the field strung out and our team was positioned well so I wasn’t in a huge rush to move up.
Olivia setting the pace and stringing out the field
We came flying into the seventh corner of the lap when disaster struck: The asphalt was slick as ice from the rain and, before any of us even knew what had happened, half a dozen riders and bikes were sliding across the road in an ever growing pile up. I barely managed to swerve around the crash, almost taking myself out in the process. The crash had happened at the front of the race and it couldn’t have been worse luck for Team TIBCO: Jasmin (white jersey for best young rider) and Lauren (GC leader) had both gone down and most of the team was stuck behind the crash. Sara, Patty and I regrouped and started chasing while the others rushed to the pit before rejoining us on the following lap.
As the laps started counting down the racing got more and more aggressive. A breakaway including Lauren, Jo and Scotti went and would become the winning break away. Behind the break the main group was also starting to splinter into several smaller groups. A gap opened up several riders in front of me and I tried to bridge across but failed. My attempt had however put me in no man’s land: solo between the two groups, which is how I spent the last laps of the race.
Some solo time with my Fuji Supreme
At the front of the race, Lauren brought it home yet again with her third victory of the week. Team TIBCO had won all four stages, the GC, team GC, Points and Young Rider classification. We had put in some solid team work and I’m looking forward to our next race together…..although hopefully with less hills and more time trialing.
Monkey See, Monkey Do, Monkey Race Much Better Too
Posted on April 7, 2014 2 Comments
Over the past month my lack of racing experience has put me at a major disadvantage in the Euro peloton so, while the rest of Team TIBCO returned to America, I stayed behind in the Netherlands to live, train and race like the dutch girls.
I would be living with Harrie van der Horst just outside of Rotterdam for two weeks of training and racing. One of the best parts of staying with Harrie is that he owns a scooter so lots of motor pacing was on the menu. Motor pacing, aside from being really fun, is an awesome way to work on speed and cadence so I really loved those workouts.
Before I delve into the stories of racing, I just wanted to take a moment to thank all the people that allowed me to stay in Europe and have helped make this such a rewarding, positive and valuable experience. Special thanks to the van Kessel family and Harrie for opening their homes to me; you all made me feel so welcomed! Also, a huge thank you to all the people that have offered their support in one way or another: Global Relay Bridge the Gap, Marianne Vos, Svein Tuft, and all the riders that have been helping me learn the ropes of Euro racing.
Dutch Criteriums
The following weekend it was time to start racing again. First up, a couple of dutch criteriums. I have raced about a dozen criteriums ever so, like with everything else in cycling, I’m not exactly an expert. Nothing I had experienced back in North America could have prepared me for these criteriums. On paper they look simple: longer laps (1-3km compared to the 0.6-1km laps typically found back home), fewer laps so fewer corners, and a field composed mainly of local riders. However, the laps were over brick and cobble roads, along windy dikes, through narrow and twisting streets lined with a wide array of road furniture and punctuated with gaping potholes and gaps…..not exactly “easy”.
Oh, and “small local field” means between 80 and 100 women including a handful of national champions, the occassional world champions and a dozen or more big pro riders.
In my first crit, it took me a few laps to find my “crit legs” and by that time a strong breakaway of five had already been established. I spent the next hour chasing and, despite my best efforts, finished in a bunch sprint with a less than spectacular 37th place.
The next day I knew what to expect and had a much better experience. The field had many of the same riders, including three strong women from Rabobank, a Giant-Shimano rider and a few from Hitec and Boels. My goal was to stay in the front 15 spots and be aggressive. Over the next hour I did exactly that: no matter what, I made sure I stayed near the front, I attacked, I covered other rider’s attacks, railed the corners and strung out the field to inflict as much suffering as I could.
Despite managing to get into a half a dozen breakaways, only one rider managed to stay away from the field and sadly that one rider was not me. With two laps to go I shook out my legs and positioned myself near the front on the wheels of the riders I thought would give me chance in a bunch sprint. With 300m to go it was all lining up perfectly: I had picked the right spot, I was close enough to the front to make it, and there was a gap starting to open up that I was just about to accelerate through. Of course nothing can ever go that smoothly and, just as I was rising out of my saddle to give that last little kick, some idiot decides that she really, really wants to try to go for that same gap and, without warning, jerks her bike hard left towards it.
Screams, squealing brakes, cursing, chaos……I somehow managed not to go down but I had lost a lot of speed and position and there was less than 200m to go to the line. With a 13th place finish it was definitely the best result I had ever gotten in any European race, but I couldn’t help but be a touch disappointed at how the race had unfolded at the end.
Dwars door Vlaanderen
Week two in the Netherlands brought with it a change of pace; I was driving down to Belgium for an 80km circuit race – Dwars door Vlaanderen. It was a completely flat 11km loop with some wicked headwind. Giant-Shimano was definitely the strongest team there and, given the course and conditions, I was fairly certain they would do their best to keep the bunch together for super-sprinter Kirsten Wild. I decided the best course of action would be to sit in and play sprinter for the day; stay close to Wild, stay close to the front but out of the wind, only go with breaks that had more than one Giant rider unless the one Giant rider was Wild or Pieters. I was willing to bet that anything else would be brought back.
Two laps into the race I had successfully defended my position and my predictions seemed to be coming true: the bunch was staying together and Giant-Shimano was pulling back any attacks that were going. On the second lap a small breakaway formed: 2 club riders, one Lotto-Belisol and one Giant-Shimano rider (not Pieters or Wild). They had 5 laps of mostly flat and windy, non-technical racing left and none of the favourites were in the group. I looked around and no one seemed to be terribly concerned so I gambled, betting that they would get pulled back long before the finish. Over the next couple laps the break away widened the gap to almost about 45 seconds and it the peloton started getting a bit more nervous. Problem was that no one was willing to work to pull the break back, but rather everyone was trying to either bridge up or stop someone else from bridging up so the race turned into a series of relentless attacks and counter attacks.
I covered every rider that I thought had a chance of getting up to the break away group and, at one point, managed to get a good gap on the peloton along with Wild and another strong dutch girl riding for Futurum. Unfortunately we got pulled back about half a lap later.
Almost immediately Pieters attacked solo. We were on a windy section of the course, the break away was about 40 seconds away, and Pieters didn’t seem to be getting away from us very quickly. Somehow she actually managed to bridge up to the breakaway . I later found out that it took her 15km to do so, but she did it. With two riders in the break away, Giant-Shimano successfully took the win. For the rest of us it was a bunch sprint, a good chance to practice the aspect of road racing that I dread the most. Coming up on the last lap my legs felt good and I positioned myself well and managed to still place in the top 20. Things hadn’t happened the way that I wanted them to but, all in all, it was still a good race and an excellent learning opportunity.
Racing the Boys
The last week in the Netherlands there were no women’s races that I could go to, so I decided to race a couple of club races with the boys instead. What’s really cool about the Netherlands is that cycling is such a popular sport that most towns in the area had cycling clubs that had private circuits used for club races several times a week. These club races will attract anywhere from 50 to 150 riders each time so it’s a great training opportunity. Furthermore, racing with the boys is always good because it’s just that little bit faster and more aggressive, especially through the corners and in the sprints.
We were racing 90 minutes and I was the only woman. The course was 1.2km on a space approximately the size of a football field so, to get that distance in, the course basically looped back on itself several times. 1.2km with four 180 degree corners would make for some excitement. I had forgotten how much more aggressively the boys take those corners and it took me a couple laps to dare to lay my bike down that hard. I did eventually find the groove though and was comfortable rotating through the front 10 or so positions. There was one guy there who was very obviously not impressed by the fact that a chick was keeping up with the big boys. After about 30 minutes of racing he started being a real jerk. He would attack every single time I was at the front, refuse to pull through if he was on my wheel, physically push me out of the line and into the wind, cut me off through the corners. Basically anything he could do to make my life really difficult.
At first he was making me nervous. He was about twice my size, completely jacked and was physically shoving me all over the place. Then I remembered: I’m a bad ass mother who won’t take no crap off of nobody! Why was I letting this twat waffle push me around? That’s when the tables turned: I pushed back, I let him attack and sit out in the wind before countering as viciously as I could (and successfully dropping him). I was pissed and with that anger I found the aggression that I had lost over the past few months.
Suddenly I was racing the way I had at the very beginning: before getting a pro contract, before being worried about results, before the national team projects and selection camps. It felt good to race that way again because at some point over the last year I had started believing that I was in over my head, doubting my ability and not trusting my legs. I had climbed the ranks in cycling very quickly; literally going from total amateur to pro in only 3 months of racing. With that success came many opportunities, but also many doubts. Lots of people doubted if I was ready for this, that or the other thing. Many times I was told that I didn’t have enough experience; that it was too early. The comments were not meant to be negative; they were totally logical observations and assumptions. Yes, I was brand new. Yes, I had about zero experience. Yes, I was racing way outside my comfort zone.
I let all of those comments get in my head, I let them intimidate me. I stopped racing the way I had always raced because I didn’t trust me to be able to do it. In that club race, surrounded by chiselled legs, facial hair and testosterone, I found that old pizzaz again. I could do this! I had earned my spot and I belonged there.
The beast was back and I was putting it all out there and, with three laps to go, I had laid down more attacks than I could count and had whittled the field down to just three surviving riders. We were coming up behind the peloton, about to lap them, when a massive crash blocked off the whole course.
The race was stopped making a disappointing end to the day, but it had been a break through for me. For the first time in a long time I had totally trusted my legs and put it all out there. I’m going to be a whole lot more confident and aggressive in the coming races.
Sunshine Spin with the World’s Greatest Cyclist
Posted on March 25, 2014 7 Comments
A month ago Team TIBCO was invited to see Marianne Vos’ trophy room and I thought that was pretty much the coolest thing ever. Our European director had been Marianne’s coach when she was a junior, and was still good friends with her and her family. Marianne was in Sri Lanka at the time, but her brother, Anton, and parents invited us over anyways to see the trophies and watch some old racing videos of her. I thought that was as close as I was going to get to meeting Marianne but, after deciding to stay in Europe to train, Anton asked Marianne if she would ride with me……..and she agreed.
I was over the moon! For me, it would have been cool just to meet her, let alone ride with her. For those that do not follow womens cycling, Marianne is arguably the greatest cyclist of all time. She has won numerous World Championship titles on the road, track and cyclocross (I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before mountain biking is added to the list) and has Olympic gold medals from London and Beijing on the road and on the track. And that’s in addition to the shed full of trophies, medals and leader jerseys from national championships, European championships and esteemed UCI races.
Now, one would think that Marianne is simply stronger than everyone else, that some physical difference is the reason for her domination in the sport, but she’s actually average height, average weight, average build. Furthermore, she has never been World Champion in the time trial, the purest measure of strength in the cycling world. So what makes her so special? Anyone that has ever watched her race will see what sets her apart. She has a will to win that is so strong it sets her apart from the rest. Every race she is more aggressive, takes more risks, and suffers more than anyone else. Just watching her dare devil descents on television makes my palms sweat. Just watch the video (below) one of her fans made to see what I mean.
Having idolized Marianne since I first became involved in cycling, I was pretty nervous about meeting her and riding with her. When her and Anton arrived I quickly forgot about being nervous; she was not at all what I would have expected. Instead of having the superior, somewhat arrogant attitude that many of the big stars have, she was totally normal, kind, approachable. It didn’t take long before the conversation was flowing easily, which was good because I had a lot of questions to get through in just 2 hours so there was no time to be wasted!
Quick photo with her former and my current Euro coach
So what did I learn from the legend?
- Base miles, base miles, base miles. Throughout the season the base miles (long, steady miles) give you a solid base layer that will allow you to bounce back quickly if you take time off because of injury, illness, vacation, etc
- Take time off. When the racing starts you have to be willing to give the extra 2% becuase you WANT to, not because you’ve trained really hard all winter and feel like you HAVE to
- Build a reputation in the peloton, it makes life much easier. If you are known as a good, strong rider you are accepted at the front of the race, which makes it much easier to position
- Switch it up and keep it fun. Marianne trains and races on the road and track, mountain bikes, does cyclocross and even runs
- Running is totally fine as a winter hobby so long as you do not over do it. Remember that you have the endurance and fitness to run hard and far, but the musculature you develop from cycling is different so you have to take it easy to minimize the risk of running-induced injury
- Be relaxed when you’re descending, look far ahead and through the corner. Brake before you enter the corner and then accelerate out of it. Go in wide, cut the apex, then out wide (think “outside, inside, outside”)
- Be smart. Understand the race; the course, conditions and competitors. Find “The moment”and then go for it
- Challenge your mind, not just your body. Keep using your brain, even as a professional athlete. Analyze the races, think about training, learn and grow
- Never be angry with anyone but yourself. If you get crashed out, YOU were in the wrong place. If you get dropped, YOU weren’t strong enough. If you miss the winning move, YOU didn’t read the race properly. When you are angry with yourself, put it all into the pedals. Use the energy to race harder
- Be confident. Marianne told me about her first world championships, as a junior, and she said that they (the Dutch junior women) knew that they were the best. They didn’t know anything about any of the other girls, but they knew that they were better. They finished first (Marianne), third (Ellen van Dijk), 5th (Roxanne Knetteman), and 10th (Suzanne van Veen) that year.
The Vos siblings (Anton is the guy behind all the awesome race pics lately)
And perhaps the coolest thing I learned about Marianne: she was studying biomedical sciences in preparation for medical school applications when she won her first World Championships and was offered a pro contract. She decided to pursue cycling instead of medical school and, having recently made exactly the same decision myself, I asked her if she ever regretted her choice. Her answer: No. At first she felt like she had changed her life path from being a doctor helping people and giving back to the community to a selfish, athletic endeavour. Since then she has found a way to give back through sport. She inspires and mentors people around the world, is a driving force in the movement for equality in womens cycling, and an amazing role model for young women everywhere.
Thank you Marianne for taking the time to come ride with me! Best of luck at Fleche Wallonne!
Ronde van Drenthe: A World Cup, a Euro Cup, and a lot of Lessons Learned
Posted on March 19, 2014 6 Comments
Are you afraid? I am.
Every race is terrifying. Every corner, every obstacle, every descent, every bit of gravel or dirt. The sound of brakes squealing and the screams. The sirens and horns honking. The feeling of bumping bars and hips. The sight of bloodied bodies and broken bikes. The sickening sensation of your wheels sliding out from under you. The searing pain that shoots through you when you take a hit. The fear starts to creep up days before and reaches a crippling level by the start of the race. Sometimes it’s so bad it makes me physically sick and I don’t think I will even manage to get on my bike, let alone race 140km.
But what exactly is so scary? I had never really thought about it beyond the fact that racing a bike in a bunch was categorized under “terrifying things” in my mind. Leading up to the Ronde van Drenthe weekend, I was talking with my sports psychologist and she asked me exactly that: what are you afraid of? It got me thinking about it and I realized that I wasn’t really afraid of anything except for the fear itself. It was an irrational, fight or flight, survival instinct type of fear. The kind of fear that is an overwhelming panic triggered by a vague set of circumstances, rather than a well defined fear of a specific thing. I rode in a group all the time and that wasn’t scary. Sirens and horns and screams are just sounds so those aren’t scary. Corners and descents and gravel aren’t scary. Going down hurt but no worse than the pain I was inflicting on myself anyways. If anything, it hurt less than a hard sprint or the final kilometers of a time trial or steep climb. It hurt less than Peter’s sadistic interval training sessions and I survived those three or four times a week. As I thought about it more and more, the less afraid I was until it wasn’t scary at all.
Day 1: Drenste 8
Suddenly I was calm and, until now, that was the last thing I was the night before a race. No longer afraid I slept like a baby, enjoyed my breakfast and felt excited standing on the line at Drenste 8. The race started and I was suddenly comfortable in the chaos of the bunch. It was a whole new experience.
I was relaxed and aware, able to move confidently through the masses. The bumping and yelling and crashing was still happening but it no longer distracted me.
I was able to move up to the front exactly when I was supposed to, 10km away from the selective cobble section and, having been protected in the draft of the bunch rather than fighting in the wind off the back or the side of the group, had the legs left to do what I was supposed to do when I got there: time trial.
I slipped through a tiny gap that opened ahead of me, made sure Joanne was on my wheel, and pulled.
Legs fresh and head clear I quickly settled into the rhythm of my cadence, bringing the speed up and up, stretching the group further and further as the miles to the cobbles counted down. I pulled until my legs were screaming and I could taste the blood in the back of my throat before rotating to catch my breath on Jo’s wheel. Newfound confidence and aggression in place, I managed to stay there, defending my position and recovering before slipping through another gap and pulling again. A couple turns and we hit the cobbles , both in the front 20 positions. Perfect!
On the cobbles the race developed exactly the way we had expected: the front set a leg destroying pace over the narrow cobble path and people started popping. Gaps opened and there was no room for the riders behind to come around. The group shattered and I was still there in the front. Cobbles over and back onto the asphalt where it was a drag race to the next cobble section only a few kilometers away. At least two thirds of the peloton were gone and the tempo being set at the front was ensuring they were not going to come back.
The next cobble section was a disaster. The cobbles were rough and narrow, the dirt around them was loose and we were flying over them. My Reynolds wheels were proving to be indestructible and my Fuji frame was stiff enough to withstand the thrashing it was getting in the crossfire between my legs and the cobbles. Others weren’t so lucky. All around me equipment was failing; riders were breaking wheels and frames, getting flats, losing bottles and crashing. Within seconds of entering the cobbles there was a literal obstacle course of carnage to weave through….because clearly the cobbes and ridiculous speed weren’t hard enough to manage on their own.
It seemed my luck had run out for the day as I found my path barricaded by wrecks.
Forced to slow down I watched the front of the group pulling away, now whittled down to about half of what had survived the first cobbles.
A group of about 40 of us came togther and gave chase for a bit but it was too late. The lead group and caravan were long gone. With less than 30km left to go we were unceremoniously dismissed from the race by the flag and whistle of the commissaire. Game over, time cut, better luck next time.
Day 2: Boels Rental World Cup
From a strategy point of view, this race was much the same as the previous day: use the team to stretch the group and secure positions before the first selection. This time the first selection would likely be on the VAM berg, a super steep 500m climb followed by a short descent into a hard, open windy section.
The first part of the plan went fairly smoothly. We got to the front at the planned point in the race, did our pulls and earned our front spots into the climb.
That got most of the team, myself included, safely to the first cobble section, which is where I made the mistake that cost me the whole race.
Alongside the cobbles is a smooth asphalt bike path that is off limits. Venture onto it and you get disqualified. Halfway through the first cobble sections the pain was so great I was allowing myself to zone out, to somehow shut down amd dampen the suffering. Buried in the pain cave I forgot about the 90 degree right hander at the halfway point on the cobbles and promptly overcooked the corner putting myself squarely on the bike path.
Unfortunately for me, everything except the corner was taped off to stop riders from getting on the bike path. However, the tape was also a sufficient barrier to keep me from getting back on the cobbles. Whoopsies. The only option was to stop and crawl under the tape.
There I was at a standstill in the middle of a World Cup watching the race fly past me. All the work and pain and positioning had just been wasted because of a few seconds of lost focus.
I was livid. How could I have been so stupid?
Of course the anger and panic wasn’t helping matters as I was struggling to find my composure. I couldn’t focus and I couldn’t get clipped in and I was struggling to find any kind of rhythm in my breathing or cadence.
To make things worse, I was already red lining before my mistake. Pulling and the climb and the cobbles had taken a significant toll on my legs, which were now failing me as I tried to chase back onto the group.
Not long after I got picked up in the broom wagon, exactly how I did NOT want my first World Cup to go. I did have one more day of racing though so it was time to refocus on tomorrow.
Day 3: Novillon Euro cup
This race was one big loop of about 100km and then ended with a couple local 20km laps. Because the finishing laps were so short, anyone that was more than a few minutes behind the leaders would be time cut at that point. The big lap included the VAM berg and seven cobble sections, three of which were several kilometers long. To make it through this race you would have to be positioned near the front at selective points and save your legs for the cobbles.
Things started out well enough and I startd the climb in the front 20 or so wheels. One look around told me I was in a good position: Wild, Johansson, van Dijk, Blaak and Armstead were all within a few wheels of where I was. However, luck was not on my side that day. A girl about 4 positions up from me couldn’t hold the pace being set and let a gap open halfway up the climb. The road was too narrow to pass and so the front group opened the gap up to a few hundred meters by the time we had descended onto the open , windy road.
I started chasing, working hard with Chantal and two other girls but the rest of our group wasn’t helping.
The cross wind also meant that the front group was spicing things up and so the gap was opening further and further. With only four of us working it seemed like the race was lost but we kept pushing anyways. At one point it was just Chantal and I taking pulls, which meant that there wasn’t much time to recover before you had to pull again. I was hurting and a glance at her face as she pulled through told me that she was suffering just as bad.
The next time I pulled through she yelled at me that we had to close soon or we wouldn’t catch them and I knew she was right. We wouldn’t be able to hold this pace much longer. I dug deep and slowly forced myself to bring the speed up and up, then she pulled through and brought the speed up more, then it was my turn and I brought it up some more. We had set a painfully high pace and I was barely hanging on but the gap was finally starting to close.
After what seemed like an eternity we finally reached the back of the lead group.
We were safe, time to recover before fighting for position for the first cobble section.
The first cobble section came and went without much excitement. I had moved up into the front 20 positions or so, which made life much easier.
It wasn’t until the second cobble section that I got into trouble again. I had picked a bad line through the corner onto the cobbles and it had cost me at least 30 positions, which put me at the back of the first group.
As the paced picked up over the cobbles the group stretched and stretched and I fought to dodge dropped riders but it was a long section and eventually a gap opened. Try as I might, I couldn’t get across it and so I was left chasing for the second time that day.
I chased and chased wih two other women but they were both suffering and barely contributing to the effort. Just when I thought it was over, Ellen van Dijk caught up to the three of us. Never have I been so happy to see someone. Ellen is the current world champion time trialer so if there was one person I could have picked to be there chasing with me, she would be it.
It didn’t take long for Ellen to demonstrate exactly why she was reigning world champion.
We were in an open section with a strong side wind and, even protected in her draft, I was barely managing to hold her wheel. She flicked her elbow for me to come through and I did…..barely. I flicked my elbow but the other two girls were done. Tired of waiting, Ellen went back to the front so it was now her at the front and me at the back and she was clearly fed up with towing the three of us around. She moved to the right side of the road putting all three of us in the gutter. Without any appreciable amount of protection from the cross wind, and tired from having just finished my own pull, I was struggling to hold onto her wheel. Not long after that it was over: Ellen had time trialed off into the sunset where she successfully rejoined the lead group and I was fighting the wind alone in the dutch countryside.
Soon after Ellen disappeared the second group caught up to me. It was a decent group with several riders from big teams like Rabobank, Boels and Lotto Belisol. We were strong and working well together, but the gap to the lead group was simply too much. After 110km they had put more than the allotted 4′ time gap into us and we were cut. Another DNF for me.
I had made a lot of mistakes and the thing with these races is that they are so hard and the caliber of riders so high that you can’t afford to make more than one or two mistakes, it costs too much power to come back from them. However, I have learned more in the last two weeks than in the whole last year and hopefully that new knowledge will shine through in the races to come.
Eric, our mechanic, giving me good race advice: “Go really fast that way and if something gets in the way, turn””
Omloop van het Hageland
Posted on March 13, 2014 1 Comment
The sun was shining and it was an incredible 20C on the start line in Tielt-Winge. We would first ride one big (60km) lap that included a steep, selective cobble climb and then finish with 5 laps of a local circuit. The local circuit had a 500m GPM (think Strava KOM) cement climb followed by a short open section into a narrow, fast descent. My director had given me only two tasks for the day: be more aggressive about positioning, and be at the front to “make speed” into the cobble section.
Obviously the successful execution of task two was directly dependent on the success of task one. The thing with European racing is that the roads are so small and the pelotons are so big that moving up to the front is much more difficult than it sounds. Consider that you are fighting 160 of the worlds best cyclists for a section of road that only fits 6 or 7 riders abreast. Oh, and there’s road furniture, the Belgian crack, twists, turns, descents and collision avoidance thrown in to keep things exciting. In North America, where the pelotons are usually half the size and the roads three times as wide, moving up is generally as simple as going to the outside of the bunch, pedalling hard for 20 or 30 seconds then moving back into the bunch. Here, in Europe, you have to use your elbows and be aggressive and steal spots. With the cobble climb coming closer and closer, I noticed several Giant-Shimano riders forming a train and moving up on my right. I mustered up all my courage, crossed my fingers and stuck my elbow out. I made contact and instantly two things happened: a tiny gap opened up between the rider ahead and the rider I’d elbowed, and a slew of yells and curses erupted from the rider I’d elbowed. Oh crap. I had been so nervous about making physical contact while moving at 45 kmh on a 23mm rubber surface that all of my attention had been focused on staying upright and I hadn’t even bothered to look at who it was that I was playing bumper cars with. The second she opened her mouth I knew: Kirsten Wild.
Kirsten Wild looking huge and jacked as usual
Wild, a huge sprinter known for being an aggressive rider and, dwarfing me by a solid half foot and almost 40lbs, is probably the worst person I could have chosen to elbow. Lucky for me, she was so surprised by my suicide move that I actually managed to get my wheel in that tiny gap that opened. I could still hear her yelling from behind me but I was now safely tucked into the Giant-Shimano train pulling me to the front. Before I knew it I had made it to the front and, just as quickly as I had made it to the front, I was getting sucked back down the middle of the peloton right back to where I’d started. Crap! I shoved and yelled and pushed my way back towards the front and, en route, had the pleasure of coming across Wild again. This time I was at the receiving end and, while my earlier nudge had barely moved her, her nudge felt like getting side swept with a sledge hammer and moved me a solid foot across the road. Mental note to self: great draft behind Wild but stay clear of the other three sides of her. I got to meet her after the race and, standing side by side with her literally towering over me, we both laughed at the fact that I had actually dared to steal a wheel from her. She did show me some good tricks for future though and I will keep her rule in mind: 1, 60m tall and 50kg can be moved, anything bigger and you’re gonna have a bad time.
With only a few km to go before the cobble climb, the peloton was quickly gaining speed as riders were fighting harder and harder to be in the coveted front positions for the start of the climb. I could see Jo on the front, Sam just behind her to the right, I was one more wheel back and to the right, and Amanda was somewhere close behind me. Four of our team were close together in the front 30 or so positions and it was all coming together; then everything went horribly wrong. Front and center a scream erupted followed quickly by more screams, squealing brakes, thuds and the crunch of carbon. The pile up was huge and blocked off the whole road almost instantly. Someone had stuck their front wheel in the Belgian crack and gone down hard. I later found out that 19 riders had escaped the carnage but at the time it was just utter chaos. I had barely managed to keep my ass off the asphalt, skidding to a stop and getting my foot out of my pedal just in time. I saw Jo on the ground up ahead and quickly found Amanda and Sam trying to get trough the wreck back onto the road. problem on the right side of the road was a fence that kept anyone from moving around the crash and back onto the road. After what seemed like forever, albeit probably only about two minutes, we were finally back on our bikes.
No one knew what was going on other than that a large group was off the front. I didn’t know where Lauren and Emma were and precious minutes were wasted while the peloton pieced together who was where and what was happening. Turned out than Boels, Rabobank and Orica-Greenedge were represented in the break. Giant-Shimano was not. We were not. Time to chase. I moved to the front of the group and put my head down. I chased and chased for what seemed like an eternity. My legs had nothing left but the breakaway still had a 30″ lead on us. Luckily Jo and Lauren (who had a flat jut before the crash) had managed to chase back on. I was totally spent and managed to hold on for a couple more laps before being unceremoniously dropped on the climb. Amanda tried to help me, literally grabbing me by the neck of my jersey and pulling me up the hill but my legs were done. The next lap the commissaire pulled me and the race was over. Lauren had taken over chasing and , at one point managed to narrow the gap to only 8″ but the breakaway somehow still managed to stick. At the finish line Jo sprinted to 22nd despite having crashed hard but the 19 riders that escaped he crash had bested the efforts of the group to catch them.
It was definitely a disappointing day for us but such is bike racing; the one endurance sport where it is not the strongest or fastest athlete that wins. Now it was time to move on to our next destination: Drenthe.
Sweaty, salty, dirty day made me really happy I had my Zevlin BYOT with me
Keeping it Rubber Side Down at Samyn des Dames
Posted on March 6, 2014 1 Comment
After a rough start to the season (half a dozen crashes in my first race a few days ago) I was feeling pretty nervous about racing again. The conditions were definitely looking better though: the sun was shining and the roads were dry. The course was also less challenging than Omloop het Nieuwsblad. There was a 20km stretch out to a 20km circuit that we would do four laps of. The stretch out to the circuit was fairly flat and on wide roads, except for a construction zone around the 18km mark that wouldn’t allow more than 2 or 3 riders abreast. The circuit started on a low grade, 1km climb past the finish line then was uneventful until about the half way mark where a sharp right hand turn took us up a 750m rough cobble climb followed by a long, windy, false flat into a twisty, narrow descent. That descent ended on a steep, cement climb that leveled off after a few hundred meters into a leg destroying false flat. A few more tight corners through another village and you were back at the first climb up to the finish line.
The course was such that nothing could happen before the circuit and so my director decided it would be best for me to sit at the back, stay safe and then move up before the construction. It was a good call; wide Belgian roads (think potholes, grooves, road furniture, gaps etc) combined with 152 riders that were feeling safe and therefore not super focused because the roads weren’t technical meant that there was a lot of crashes. From where I was at the back of the field I could see them happening. Someone would catch their wheel on something or bump into somebody else followed by screams then the sound of carbon and flesh scraping across the asphalt. The carnage would start to radiate out as if someone had set off a bomb in the peloton. With that many riders so close together it doesn’t take much for a dozen or more riders to end up on the ground. Things did get a bit spicy a few kilometers in when a big Belgian girl attacked for no apparent reason. In dutch they called her a “Koedoder” or “cow killer”. With everyone still fresh, 110km to go and on a stretch of road that favored the peloton, she was not going to get away. She did, however, pop all the riders that weren’t fit, weren’t warmed up or weren’t paying attention. With the construction zone quickly approaching and tired of weaving between dropped riders I decided it was time to move up. Taking advantage of the wide roads I quickly moved to the front and inserted myself into the Wiggle-Honda echelon driving the pace.
Having made it past the construction zone and over the first hill onto the circuit I settled in a bit knowing that I would need my legs to feel good on the cobble section. Coming into the cobble section the first time I was in the middle of the bunch, a bit further back than I would have liked having lost a lot of positions on the corner coming into the cobbles. Lesson learned. I had to work hard but I made the first selection, the field had split in half over the cobbles and I was still in the first group. I knew I had to move up as more and more riders were getting dropped by the high speed being set by the riders at the front of the first group. Unfortunately they were doing a much better job of dropping riders than I was doing of weaving through said dropped riders. For almost 10km I fought hard to stay with the lead group and to move up but gaps were opening up faster and faster. Eventually several gaps opened at the same time and I jumped from group to group but not fast enough to get onto the tail end of the lead group.
A group of ten of us came together and gave chase. I worked hard with a couple of the other girls, the lead group still in sight, but with only four of us working we weren’t gaining any ground on them and eventually they pulled out of sight. Luckily three of my team mates had made it into the first group: Sam, Lauren and Jo. Over the next lap the second group of about 40 riders caught up with the ten of us. I stayed safe rotating through the front 15 positions or so and letting my legs recover a bit after the pain of the first two laps.
Even when things don’t work out and you end up in the wrong group or get dropped or crash, the race is still important. Every race is an opportunity to learn, train, build confidence and get stronger. It’s the only time you can really try out the moves that you need to win. That’s how I saw the second half of Samyn; what would I do if I was in the front group? Now was the time to try it out. I definitely would not wait until the sprint and I would be aggressive, initiating moves rather than responding to other peoples’ moves. Coming into the last lap I thought about which point would be the best place to attack and prepared myself for the pain that was coming. I decided to go from the cobbles. If I could open a gap on the cobbles and hold it through the windy sections the descent and twisty kilometers before the finish would give me an advantage over the bunch. It was going to be a long effort; all or nothing.
Coming into the climb I positioned myself near the front but still protected from the wind and used that protection and momentum from the handful of women in front of me to slingshot myself into the hill. One of the riders from Rabobank clearly had the same idea that I had as I watched her stand up and hammer it off the front of the group, about three wheels up from where I was. The momentum of coming out of the pack gave me the advantage though and I flew by her. Past the cobbles and onto the false flat I threw my chain into the big ring and pushed hard wanting as much distance as possible before reaching the windy section. I glanced back to see a gap of several hundred meters. It was big but not enough. I dug deep and pushed harder getting as low and aero as I could. As I crested the hill into the open I was hurting. My legs were on fire, cramping ferociously with every pedal stroke and I could taste the blood and bile in the back of my throat. 8km to go and the pack was gaining. I dug deep, embraced the pain and managed to hold off the bunch into the descent.
This was on a narrow road with a series of tight corners and I knew that, if I took a few risks, this section would favor me over the bunch. I crossed my fingers, took a deep breath and railed the first corner. Still upright. The second corner I laid my bike down even further and still stayed upright. Gaining confidence as I went I took each corner faster and faster, quickly pulling out of sight of the bunch. The steep climb was coming up but it was short and so my momentum carried me almost to the top. A few hard pedal strokes and I was over the hill racing towards the next technical section. I was on another straight, open section and the peloton was gaining on me again but I fought to hold them off. Lauren Komanski from the USA national team was making an attempt to bridge up to me and over the next kilometer was successful. I could hear her breathing hard behind me. Time to make a decision. We were only a kilometer from the finish line, it was all uphill from here and the pack was gaining on us fast. I didn’t have anything left in my legs so attacking her wasn’t in the cards. I decided to let her sit on my wheel rather than risk having the pack catch us only a couple hundred meters from the finish. Sure enough she sprinted past me at the line but I managed to get my own wheel across the line just as the bunch caught us.
I had made some big mistakes and missed some key moves, but I had also learned a lot. The best part was that I managed to stay upright, which is a huge improvement over the last race. The race was, however, a big success for my team mate Joanne. She had gotten in the lead group along with Sam and Lauren and they had worked together all the way to the line where Jo sprinted to a tenth place finish. Good day for Team TIBCO!
Also a big thank you to Anton Vos for the super awesome pictures!
My First Spring Classic: Omloop het Nieuwsblad
Posted on March 3, 2014 9 Comments
This race was going to be my first Spring Classic, my first race as a pro, and only my second UCI elite race. With a modest 10 months racing experience under my belt, I was definitely feeling like I was in over my head. I had basically gone from Barry’s Roubaix to Paris Roubaix in less than a year. Once again I was jumping in the deep end; sink or swim.
The Spring Classics are a series of one day races in Belgium, Holland and France from March through April. They are different from the summer races for several reasons:
- March in Belgium is pretty much the worst imagineable weather conditions for bike racing: rain, freezing temperatures and bitter cold winds
- The only hills are short, steep power climbs or gentle rollers; no mountains
- Cobbles. Lots and lots of rough, treacherous, bumpy cobbles
- Huge fields of top level riders with fresh legs from the off season, all wanting to prove themselves in the first races of the new season
The first of these races is Omloop het Nieuwsblad in Belgium. We drove down the day before and pre-rode the course. It was pretty much exactly as I had imagined: pouring rain and freezing cold, the hills were super steep and the cobbles were super cobbly. It was going to be a tough day at the office. The race was a 130km loop that started off with an uneventful 60km southbound stretch. The roads were wide and the forecast was for headwind, which would keep the bunch together. After 60km the first of a series of climbs promised to spice things up. The climbs were all short but very steep and on very narrow roads. Several were on rough cobbles so standing would not be an option. The narrow roads meant that positoning coming into the climbs would be key. Moving up would be almost impossible so getting stuck in the middle or back of the pack on the climbs would guarantee that you would miss the winning break away.
The climbs ended after about 90km but that did not mean that it was smooth sailing from there. The course also had three long cobble sections that proved to be even more challenging than the climbs. Riding a race bike at race speed over cobbles is no easy task. Your hands will go numb within minutes, your arms will cramp from the effort of keeping a grip on your bars, your legs will have to fight to keep pedaling against your bucking bike, and you’ll get shaken enough that you’ll probably get a head ache from rattling your brains around in your skull. But once you survived the cobbles it was 19km of smooth asphalt and tailwind to the finish line. All I had to do was make it from kilometers 60 through 105.
As the time to the start counted down, I was getting more and more nervous. There were a lot of big teams and a lot of world class riders around me and I was definitely feeling like a very small fish in a very big pond. My director wanted me to sit in the pack until 5km out from the first climb when I wasto follow Jo into the front 30 positions for the climb. The race started and the nerves, like always, were replaced by focus. My heart rate immediately settled from the 200bpm it had been on the start line to a much more reasonable 130bpm.
Less than a kilometer into the race things took a turn for the worst: the woman in front of me wiped out hard ona slippery bit of paint on the road. I grabbed the brakes in an attempt to avoid running her over and felt the sickening sensation of my wheels sliding out from under me, followed quickly by the thud of flesh on asphalt. The adrenaline immediately rushed through me, numbing the searing pain that had shot through my right hip and leaving the taste of copper in my mouth. Wired with adrenaline, I jumped back on my bike and chased after the group.
Within ten minutes I found myself on the ground again. Another woman had slid out up ahead and wet conditions combined with a big field meant that about twenty other women, myself included, piled up on top of her. Again I was relatively unharmed, grabbed my bike out of the tangled mess and jumped back on. Jo had also gone down so together we worked to get back into the group.
The next ten kilometers or so were relatively uneventful and then, in the theme of this race, yet another woman slid out and, once again, this caused a massive pile up. I was closer to the edge of the bunch this time and was able to follow the women swerving to the right and out of the way of the carnage. This swerving put me on the grass along the side of the road, which would not have been a probem if it hadn’t been so wet. Unfortunately, the super wet conditions combined with carbon wheels meant my braking power was about zero so, instead of comig to a stop on the grass, I slid about 3 feet further. Problem with this was that three feet further was smack over the middle of a nice, deep ditch, which meant that I was airborne, superman-ing it into the gutter. I hit chest first and ended up still clipped in, stuck underneath my bike.
As I laid there in the mud stuck in my bike, all I could think was that I must be insane to be doing this out of my own free will. Why was I scraped, bruised and bleeding in a Belgian ditch? Seriously!?! The team car pulled up just as I had managed to disconnect myself from my bike. Our mehanic was running towards me to fix my bike but all I could think was that I wanted to quit this race and get in the car. He looked at me and told me to HTFU. I knew he was right and I knew that I would regret quitting and so there I was, on my bike chasing the peloton for the third time that day.
Again I caught the peloton and this time I was more pissed off than scared. Slowly but surely I fought my way towards the front. We were coming up on another village and there was a sidewalk along the road. For those that were willing to risk jumping the gap between the road and the sidewalk, it was a smooth, easy path into the coveted positions at the front of the bunch. Having already hit the deck three times I figured I had nothing to lose. By the good grace of some higher power I actually made it onto the sidewalk, moved up about a hundred positions and made the jump back onto the road and into the bunch all without incident. But don’t worry, things stayed exciting. Sure enough there was yet another whoopsie, more bikes on the ground and once again I had the good fortune of being smack dab in the middle of the whole mess. This time I actually managed to stop and unclip before getting run over from behind. Sure enough I got to see the Belgian roads up close and personal for a fourth time.
Somehow I managed to catch back on for the fourth time but timing could not have been worse. I was catching onto the back of the group just as I reached the bottom of the first climb. Sure enough the climb was steep enough to force a lot of women to billy goat it or even unclip and so trying to move up was a nightmare. By the time I had dodged my way between all the swerving stragglers, the lead riders were long gone. I had however managed to catch back on to the second group and, for my first spring classic, that would still be a pretty respectable result. Luck was definitely not on my side that day though.
Coming up was the Paterberg, an iconic cobblestone climb so steep you feel like you’re going to fall over backwards if you sit up. I was grinding my way up it when suddenly the steep grade was too much for the rider in front of me and she swerved sideways, pushing me into the gutter. I managed to unclip before hitting the ground for a fifth time but there was no way to get back on my bike on a hill that steep, narrow and covered in swerving bike racers. As the second group pulled further and further away I was forced to run my bike up the hill along with all the others that had unclipped for one reason or the other.
By this time I was exhausted from crashing and chasing and racing for three hours; pissed off, cold, wet and muddy. I was also more determined than ever to finish the damn race. I worked with a couple others and slowly but surely the kilometers counted down. I finished the whole loop but unfortunately was a few minutes outside the time limit. The results might say dnf (“did not finish”) but it was still a really cool experience. I got to race one of the most famous races in women’s cycling against some of the top cyclists in the world. On top of it all I finished the race despite having some of the worst luck ever. And of course I have to be thankful that I didn’t get more than a couple bumps and bruises despite kissing the pavement half a dozen times. At the end of the day I was still smiling. Hopefully I’ll be able to keep it rubber side down at Le Samyn des Dames on Wednesday.
A Week in France
Posted on February 27, 2014 1 Comment
Our week in France has come to an end and, even though it feels like we just arrived, our bikes and bags are already packed and headed to Holland with our soigneur while we sit in the Carcasonne airport waiting to board our flight. It seems like such a luxury to be able to fly to the next destination rather than drive or bus like I had to last year. Just 90 minutes with nothing to carry except my backpack, versus 12 hours in a van packed to the brim with bikes, equipment, and luggage. Another example of why being pro is awesome! So what have we been up to this past week? And who is “we”?
The team sent a squad of six riders to Limoux, France, to acclimatize, recover and prepare for 17 days of racing in Belgium. Making up the squad is Jo, Amanda, Sam, Lauren, Emma and I. As the newest rider on the team I was counting my lucky stars to be here on a squad that has so much talent and experience.
The adventures started when we arrived in France, each flying in from a different city and on a different airline, to discover that three of us, including myself, had lost our luggage. 50% failure rate…..not bad! We were each given a small toiletry bag and 100 Euro budget by the customer service rep and told that our bags would be located and delivered to us as soon as possible. After almost 24 hours of transatlantic travel, all I wanted was to shower and sleep but now a shoppng spree for clothes and soap was on the schedule. Despite the lack of sleep I managed to have quite a bit of fun shopping. The French really have the whole fashion thing nailed and there were several little boutique clothing stores in Limoux where we were staying. Showered and dressed, we visited one of the restaurants in the village square for dinner; it felt good to be back in Europe. Despite having a really good dinner and being thoroughly exhausted, I woke up at 2am courtesy of my belly being convinced that it was dinner time. Yay jetlag!! I laid there wide awake until 3am before making a compromise with my belly: I wasn’t cooking a second dinner at 3am but I would give in to an apple and yogurt. 3am snack done, belly happy and I slept like the dead until late in the morning.
The next morning it was time to go for our first ride. It was also my first time on my race bike. Wow!! I thought my training bike was good but my race bike was a whole new level of awesome! Fuji Supreme frame, Shimano Ultegra di2 components, and 50mm carbon rim Reynolds wheels make for a fast bike! Not even the rain and wind and cold could dampen my mood: I was in France as a pro cyclist on an awesome bike only days away from racing some of the biggest races in womens cycling. Living the dream! We were in Limoux, which is in southern France. Almost every hill we crested therefore gave us a breathtaking view of the Pyrenees moutains only 100km away. The roads were tiny, winding through villages and vineyards. The area was, like most of Europe, rich with history. We saw monuments from the world wars, stone walls that had been there for hundreds of years, farm houses and elaborate churches.
While the geography and architecture of Europe is stunning, it is the culture that makes me fall in love with it. Limoux was the perfect example of this: somehow removed and protected from the corporate owned, materialistic, fast paced, 24/7 lifestyle that North America is so well known for. We visited the weekly farmers market in the sqaure for fresh produce then wandered around the square where you could find several small backeries, the windows lined with a tantalizing assortment of homemade pastries and breads. Meats were purchased from a small butchers shop where fresh cut steaks and smokey cold cuts filled the display cases. Grocery shopping and training done, it was about noon and time to truly indulge in the Euro lifestyle: the stores all close for several hours while people have lunch, meet for a coffee and spend time with friends and family.
That day, and every other day that week, I sat in the window of one of the cafes in the square watching the afternoon happenings and sipping on an espresso. This was especially fun on the weekend during Carnival. It’s a tradition where a group of people in masks will walk around the village playing music and throwing confetti. It started hundreds of years ago when the slaves were allowed to tease the slave masters once a year but would wear masks to hide their identity and protect themselves from later consequences.
The training in the area was also pretty great. The most memorable ride was definitely the adventure that Linda and I went on. We were going to go for a three hour easy ride but that’s not exactly how things worked out. I had only been in France a couple days and was not familiar with the roads yet so I spent most of the first hour terrified of getting my boss lost in the French countryside. That was definitely NOT how I wanted to start my first season with TIBCO. I managed to successfully navigate a two hour loop but we were both still feeling fresh so we decided to head out the other side of the village and see what those roads were like. Linda actually won the Tour de l’Aude during her pro career so it was pretty cool to hear her stories about the area and the races and the people. I knew she had won that race but what I didn’t know was that she had done it despite crashing and fracturing several ribs during one of the stages. Turns out she’s kind of a total badass! A few kilometers outside of Limoux we saw a sign for Carcassonne, a historical city that Linda had last been to about 15 years ago. She was raving about how beautiful the city was and so we decided to ride in that direction and see how far we got. This was at the 2 hour and 40 minute mark. I had a series of sprint intervals that I needed to complete so I did those along that road and, by the time I was done, Carcassonne was less than 10km away. We’d come this far so we agreed that we couldn’t turn back without seeing the city at this point. On we went! We made it to Carcassonne and managed to find “la Cite”, the historic walled city on the hill. It was every bit as beautiful as Linda had described and definitely worth the extra kilometers. We stopped for coffee before heading back towards Limoux.
Now this is where things got interesting: We had come in on a one way street and the one way street to leave Carcassonne was in a totally different direction than the one to enter. Add in that the streets are twisty and anything but the logical grid pattern found in North America and it wasn’t long before neither one of us had any idea which direction we needed to be going in. Oh, and don’t forget that we in southern France and neither one of us spoke or understood enough french to get real directions. What I managed to understand from my very, very limited vocabulary was that Limoux was far away, there was a big hill and to get there we would go straight for a very long time and then turn left, although I had no idea where this left turn was. Not only were we lost, we somehow managed to have a headwind almost the entire way. Not a small, harmless wind, but a strong, gusty, vicious wind that kept my heart rate up and threatened to throw you around the asphalt if you weren’t careful. Eventually we started seeing road signs directig us towards Limoux but these were intended to be followed by cars and so we found ourselves continuously being directed towards the freeway on ramp. Not up for playing real life Frogger on the freeway, we would try to find smaller roads that ran parallel and cross our fingers that another sign towards Limoux would be ahead. At this point we had been on the road for 5 hours and all either one of us had eaten was a bar. We were out of food, had spent our money on espresso, and I was starting to go from hungry to hangry. Fed up with he windy, twisty and confusing network of side streets, I lead us onto a main road to Limoux, which was about 10km away at this point and started time trialing it back home. Each passing truck would make me cringe but it would also block the wicked wind I was still figting and pull us along in its draft, easily increasing our already high speed by at least 5 kmh. Within 20min we had reached the outskirts of Limoux. Finally! What had started out as a three hour easy ride had turned into a five and a half hour adventure. I got back to the house just an hour before my scheduled massage and bee lined it for the fridge. Salty, exhausted and still in my kit I sat down to a giant bowl of salad and chicken and veggies which, at the time, tasted like the best thing on Earth.
Showered and fed, I was soon on my way to meet Geert for my massage. I hadn’t had a massage since August, and it had also been a week of training and travelling since I had last seen a physiotherapist so Geert had his work cut out for him. Slowly all the knots and kinks disappeared and after almost an hour I felt good as new. It is amazing how huge of a difference a good sognieur makes to an athlete’s training and racing. With over 20 years of experience working on pro teams, including huge names like Saxobank-Tinkoff, Geert is way better than “good”. I’m super excited to have him as part of our team during our time in Europe.
Far too soon the week was at an end. The excitement of the upcoming races was starting to stir the butterflies in my chest. Nervousness and fear were creeping in but I know that all that would disappear, replaced by focus and intensity, the second the gun goes to start the race and so I have learnd to embrace the pre-race jitters. As a farewell to France I indulged in the local culture and sat in the sunshine flooded window of a small restaurant sipping on wine from the local vineyards and enjoying a steaming hot crepe with coconut and dark chocolate as I watched the shops close and the locals go about their lunchtime routines; A perfect end to an amazing experience.
ANIKA (the beast) TODD 