Last thoughts

I'm packed and waiting, and nothing seems worth looking at on the net. Micheal Barry gave me a little last motivation. The wind is nuts out there. Belgian styles. Bring on the suffer.
Side note: Bunny rabbits are delicious. Sorry Bugs.

Weird.

So the race last night was super fun, and pretty much a 1 hour moto pacing session minus the motor bike. It is literally run on a 900m outdoor velodrome. Banked corners and all. Needless to say, it is some fast and fun racing. It was a small pack and a hot evening, about 40 riders showed up to start with a few strong boys. We raced well and I attempted to stick myself into as many moves as possible and be off the front as much as I could. See, the thing is... the race is run as a points race. Basically just like track riding, but with gears. But you only really use your 53x11-13. Got in a few moves to claim some sprint points, botches my finishing sprint (hard to figure out how the pack moves) but had a good time. Was solo for a while before being worked over by a 3 time Irish National champ (Junior & Espoir). No one told me at the time, but he flies when he wants to. Rolled with him in what I was sure was the winning move when we left with 12 to go only to be caught with 5 to go. It is hard to stay away on a track that fast. Next up was the arrival of Chelsea's parents for a visit (the first of many visits for a busy month) and a wicked stop by the local market for some fresh goodies.
Today marks the start of Tour des Vallees, what is a pretty important race for the team and I'm pretty excited to mix it up in search of some results. We kick things off with a mountain road race today, tt tomorrow morning, another mountain road race in the afternoon, followed by one more hard day in the mountains Monday morning. 3 days, 4 stages. No crit! I won't have a computer with me for the race, so you'll have to wait for a full report come Monday or so. Enjoy your weekends as well, if I remember correctly its Charlevoix weekend. Ouch.

A crit in France?

Where to begin. It has been a couple of days. On Tuesday, Ed swung by for a long ride in the mountains. With Tour des Vallees this weekend, we were looking for a long ride in the mountains to prepare and do a little reconing. Ed had a route worked out and the map, so all that was left for me was to ride. Not the most beautiful of days, in fact one of the only overcast days I have experienced in the last month here, but that made for better riding in fact as it kept the heat in check. Over the next 5 hours we climbed many thounsands of feet up into the mist and clouds with 2 sustained cols of 1 hour + each. Up first to Caussols, down to St. Cezaire, straight up to Mons, rolling to Andon, and then back along a nice rolling descent home. Of course with a nice final little 5-6km kicker at the end. The "little kicker" also became a good ol' fashioned half wheeling contest to see who could crack the other after 4+ hours in the saddle. No real winner/loser on the climb though I did manage to put him in a spot of bother in the last km. A little rain blew through during my afternoon nap (or so I'm told) before the sun re-appeared in time for dinner on the patio. Yesterday was an easy 2 hours to prepare and recover for today's race. The afternoon was spent in the sun doing chores as laundry needed to be done, bikes to be cleaned and cheese to be eaten.
Preparations are ongoing here as there is another Canadian arriving today (Jannes from Sask.) as well as Matt's parents. Needless to say, it is going to be busy. Did I mention we are all racing a major stage race starting Saturday? Oh, and Chelsea's parents arrive bright and early tomorrow. Speaking of which, I have cleaning to do. A qucik spin first though to prepare the legs, as the crit is an evening affair with an 8pm start time. And as we ARE in France, I have no doubt 8pm has an asterix next to it and we'll be up and running closer to 9pm. Better bring some clear lenses for my glasses!

GPM on the road up to Mons.

French style parking spot ont he Mons climb. Road is max the width of a standard City of Ottawa bike path.

Gourdon. Along the climb up to Cassols.

Nearly French

Nothing like a race to improve a day! I am understanding, and appreciating, the early mornings here for racing. At first, coming from a land where Senior's race early afternoon, I was unimpressed with the 8-9am start times. Now, I am realizing that racing at 1pm here in the mountains would probably kill you. By 8:30 am yesterday, I was quite warm on the start line in simply shorts and and jersey. By the time I was home, I tried to pick up a white plate from our table outside and nearly burned my hand. It had been in the sun for about 10 minutes apparently. Who needs an oven? But back to the race. A rolling race I was told, about 100km (no one ever knows an exact distance). A race of tactics. Either way I felt good. The one climb was about 1.5km to 500m, again depending on who you asked. Side note, the climb was about 3km and we did it 3 times. Plus the "other" climb in the random extra loop. More on that soon. Rode aggressively and was very happy. Bridged up to a small break on the first lap up the climb with my team mate Ed. Misjudged to the length of the climb (damn wrong info) and nearly blew myself, but suffered on. By the descent our group had grown to about 20+ with little groups scampering across. Too many to work. Stayed at the front and set tempo the next time up the climb cresting 2nd to launch Ed in a solo bid for freedom. Not my ideal move, but he wanted a dig. Stayed at the front again and Ed was still on his own out front the last time over the climb. Saw 8km to go. Sprint time. Side note, that was supposed to show 25km to go. 8km was for after the next random new loop. I really wanted to sprint and was felling strong and motivated. Suddenly a sharp right hander and then a wall. Attacks and a lead group forms. Shit, big ring up the wall and up to the leaders. The wall keeps going. And going. Little ring, boom. Where did this climb come from I wonder, drifting backwards. Into a small chase group now, recovering a bit before setting back to the chase. I got over simply based on the fact that I was certain (for about 5-6km of climbing) that the climb was ending just around the next bend. On the descent into town, a few more got onto our group and we all pedaled through holding the pace high in the chase. Coming into 2km to go, I positioned myself well. Suddenly traffic. Downhill run-in to the finish, with on-coming traffic (move up to 4th wheel), into a 180 degree turn around a turning circle (which I power slid through as the volunteer "forgot" to tell us to keep turning), into an uphill 300m sprint for the line. I got 2nd in the sprint. About 15th overall. Oh, Ed got caught on the final climb then dropped his chain. Poor guy. I had some stomach cramps that nearly crippled me on the way home and then spent the afternoon realzing in the usual manner. Race a cool downtown crit Thursday, then off to Tour des Vallees Saturday-Monday. Boooya.

How big a deal am I?

I go places. Like last night, we went to Cannes (Chels, Ed, & I) to check out a free concert on the beach put on by the film festival. We decided to eat some pizza for dinner, and as we were checking out a menu a lady asked us an odd question, "Are you english?". Canadian, I replied. "Great, what are your plans tonight? As I am here for the Festival and really want to head home tonight but have these 4 tickets for the big party on the beach tonight if you are interested? I have been waiting here to here someone talk english to give them too." Needless to say, we declined and went home. Wait, no. We took them with many thanks (she really wanted to get home quick as she wouldn't even sit for a drink with us) and ate some pizza. After some exploring of fancy areas, we found the Hotel Magestic directly next to the red carpet and Palais du Festival. Not in tuxes and dresses as most, we walked up, handed our tickets to security and were waved through with a "bonne soire monsieur et madame". The beach party was rocking! Probably half a dozen open bars were we took advantage of free Champagne, wines, liquors and beer on the beach, on the dock... Amazing. Plus the free munchies! I didn't really spot many famous people, but I also wasn't really looking too hard. As the party wound down (pretty late) we figured we may be out of luck for getting home, so we headed back to sleep of the festivities on the beach. My neck hurts, but I'm still pretty happy. Watched the sun rise over the Med this morning from the beach before hopping back in the car and heading for home. Ed took photos, so I'll try to get some if they turn out. Now I need to spin the legs and nap a bit to help prepare for the race tomorrow.

Resting up

Today I awoke more tired than yesterday. It was also the day for the local market, so that provided some excellent non cycling morning activities. By lunch, I was still tired and a little lethargic so decided to have a nap before a very simple bakery ride and then the Giro. I race again Sunday, so it seems more important to stay healthy and fresh leading into this and then the next few weekends of big stage races and plenty of climbing. Looking like a quick trip in to Cannes for some closing festival events may be in order tonight.

Results

Quality time and suffering is paying off. In a hard race over 3 cols (Col de Nice, Col de Brosse, & Col de Brisse) I managed to pull off a 11th place finish out sprinting my chase group companions. The race shattered as usual with some incredible tempo and accelerations on the first col, I had placed myself well and fought hard at the base of the climb which helped a lot. About halfway up (it was about 10-12km) I succumed out of the lead group of 15 under some heavy accelerations and found myself in a small (3 man chase group). The last 5km of the climb set pace and suffered more than I can remember doing for a long time. 3km of switchbacks followed by 2km of pretty steep finished off the climb. Over the top we were a group of 4 chasing through the descent and through the valley. By the final climb my legs were starting to roll better and better after a lot of pace work through the valley below and the other climb. We caught a couple more guys along the first pitches before I realized that our group was back down to 4 of us with the leaders about 1 min up the road. Over the top things got a little hairy as 2 of the Frenchmen decided to take some risks on the descent and one of course promptly bit it in the first corner. He got back up and continued with us. I left a small gap and followed along. With 10-12km to the finish after we hauled through into Italy looking for the signs to anounce the end (there was spray paint saying 600) or the leading group. Never caught them but I took the sprint over the little 1km finishing flase flat. Oddly, I wished it were longer. Yannick was so happy after he hugged me. Fair enough. Ate a little, changed up and then hopped into the pool at home. All in all, a good day on the bike. Hopefully followed by a good dinner. Chels bought some bunny to eat this week, but more on that later.

hot hot heat

Its been pretty hot here. Sun, blue skies, nothing much to complain about. Sometimes while dripping on the way up some cols, I may wish for a tad less sun or heat, but overall I am adapting and my tan shows it. Did one of my favourite types of rides here yesterday after the solid beach rest day (which also involved my first venture into the aquatic oasis known as the Mediterranean), the hard mountain ride. This type of ride involves writing down names of towns/villages off my map in the order I wish to ride through, generally trying to link climbs together, stuffing some food and clothes in my pockets and heading out with a vague timeline. This leads to lesson 1:

-When riding in the mountains, always bring extra clothes. Don't worry about the weight, and you may curse them while really sweating up a col. But its often more than worth it.

Yesterdays main feature col was the col de Vence, and maybe col de Bleine - if I could find it and time allowed. After rolling over col de Vence I continue along the ridge through beautiful scenery until while wondering which direction to turn at a fork, some serious weather blew in. Not a big deal, I was on schedule, but was not willing to test my exploration skills in the mountains with lack of vision beyond 50 ft. and some pretty chilly temperatures suddenly. Lckily, I had followed rule #1 for mountain riding and therefor vested and arm warmered up. Made my way back down Vence and then found a new climbing heavy route home. 4 hours of tempo climbing leaves that nice ache in the legs, and a solid feeling of accomplishment in the head. Today will be an easy 1-2 hours to prepare for tomorrow's hard day in the mountains, which I am most deffinately looking forward to with great anticipation.
"La velo, c'est une sport de suffrance."

Du progresssion

That's what its all about, learning, adapting and improving. My legs seem to get better every day, which was a good thing today. Big field started on a rolling course with some good wind and one long-ish climb. We went from the gun single file all the way to the climb and then field shattered a bit on the climb. I was riding well, but positioned too far back at the start of the climb so had to put my head down and bleed out the eyes for most of it. Ended up just off the back of the lead over the top and after a tough chase got into a chase group and made it back to the pack just in time for the base of the climb again. Lost track of how many times we went over the damn thing... By the end our group was down to about 50 guys with a small group of 4-5 away as we motored the last 10km back into town for the sprint. Only 3 of us from the team were left in the front group so we were pretty unorganized and I did my own thing. Complicated thing this French sprinting it turns out. Basically everyone in the pack swarms towards the front, driving the pace up at least, gets swapped and then swarms back up again. A bit of a rythym, and I tried my best to stay top 20 watching for signs of how much more was left. I was sure were getting close (saw town signs) and then suddlenly 200m to go sign. Merde alors! Sprinted with the pack, but no way to move up much. Finished just behind the break in about the top 20 of the sprint. Not too bad I guess, though a couple of signs denoting KMs to go would have been nice for us foreigners. Had to dig deep a couple of times today but the legs are feeling better and better under effort. Got a col filled race coming up on Thurday in Nice, then Tour de la Faylede this weekend. 31km ttt the first day and then 138km road race the next with 4 GPM points. Time to turn up the suffer. Needless to say, tomorrow will be an easy day. Maybe a bit of beach relaxation?

Rain in provence?

Yesterday marked the first time I've seen rain, and apparently I should not get used to it. It usually only rains for the festival in Cannes a bit and then pretty much not again until later in the fall. Either way, it was pretty insignificant rain during the day by Canadian standards to I soldiered on. Local market in the morning for some fresh produce for the week and a few treats: goat's cheese, smoked deer (or "bambi" as explained the vendor) and wild boar sausage. Both are quite delicious. Then a long lunch and off for some solo explorations of the mountains. I was told of a long climbing route so gave it a go, up into Gourdon and then continue up to Cassols. Through the clouds, with wild views down and out to the Med all the way up. Eventually Gourdon appeared, perched on a cliff as any good old medival town should be. Good luck to any invaders, and I wipped my eyes to make sure I wasn't hallucinating. A tour of older folks arrived at the same time at then also did a double take at the weirdo riding up the mountain. I continued on to the top of the col (1120m) and then continue on through the rocky landscape up higher (not many trees here, and only stunted pine trees at that) to the observatory on top of the mountain. 25km, 1:15 of straight climbing. One of the most breath-taking rides of my life certainly. Threw on the cape and descended back through the twisty mountain roads. Note, when climbing alpine roads, always bring extra clothes for the way down - I could see my breath at the top. Wish I had a camera. Today the sun and heat is back, and I'm ready for the race tomorrow. Early though. Gotta ride to Cannes at 5:30 tomrrow morning for our ride to the race as the race is an early one. Finish my coffee with the Giro and we'll be ready to put the hammer down tomorrow. Cheers

Quality

Rest day: complete. A bit of walking, a bit of shopping, plenty of food. Grabbed the train from Mouins-Sartoux to Cannes (10-15 minutes) before a spot of exploration. Made our way to the morning market where I held back a bit (I only had a small sack) buying some fresh avocodo and wicked looking purple artichokes! Proceded along to the promenade to witness the chaos known as the Cannes film festival. Not terribly exciting in my books, though some pretty snazzy cars and suits, but well enjoyed by my female companion. We even bought some art from a crazy Italian painter on the beach who "liked our energy". A sales pitch I'm sure, but a pretty smoking deal on 2 cool paintings. Plus the entertainment value. A long french lunch was certainly the deal of the day at a small patio cafe in view Cannes. 12 Euro each got a starter (salads or tapas type plate), rack of lamb with small salad and patates Dauphinois, wine, and of course a dessert. I was stuffed. So ordered a cafe to relax a bit. A little more wandering and a few small purchases (I got some Aioli to try) and we were back ont the train. 2.60 Euro each way is pretty cheap. Such was the day, tomorrow back to work on the bike with a quick run into the local market in Valbonne to stock up on fresh produce.
Also, worth checking out is Micheal Barry's new diary on Velonews.com. The man is my hero. Any time you trun on Giro converage, there he is on the front. And everytime I point him out again to Yannick who is very impressed with the top proffesionalism of the Canadian. Hats off to him.
"During the first two stages I spent an accumulated 300 kilometers on the front with two teammates." MB

tourist

Today is a rest day, and a tourist day. You see a lot of cool things riding a bike around, but sometimes its nice to slow down and look closely. That and if you have a significant other who does not race bikes, it can be appreciated to be doing non-cycling activities. So Cannes it is!
Yesterday did not go quite as planned, but turned into a good training day anyways. We were supposed to be reconing a course with several cols out by Nice, but ended up losing our guide on the first col. Long story short, he decided stopping for foreigners at forks in the road was over rated, and we were under strict low intensity orders on the cols. Rode around for a bit looking for him (apparently he never even looked around for us) before deciding against getting really lost in the mountains and riding back into Nice. Rode back along the Promenade des Anglais (which was pretty wicked) and then back up the hills home to Plascassier. Did some good efforts on the way home uphill to test my legs after 4 hours in the legs to end with alomost 5 hours in the saddle. Just a little short on the real climbing side of things. Col de Nice was pretty wicked though with tons of switchbacks and brilliant views. Had a bit of a special dinner planned so wipped up a French dinner of Canard with Patates Dauphinois and Pate au Sauge. Oh lala as they say here. My legs felt pretty awful yesterday with the exception of the col and the efforts home, so I am taking it is a sign of leftover fatigue from travel and the weekend's racing. Sounds like a double race day on Sunday in Brignoles with a morning tt and afternoon road race, so gotta rest up to improve from last weekend.

Promenade des Anglais. Nice, France.

Switchbacks of Col de Nice. 8-9km col. Ed shown in Pic.

Tourist photo/ Stevens advert.

How to recover

As I am in recovery mode, this will be a picture book type update. As a side note, today involved some solid climbing, and sun. But sun and heat is the norm, so that is not really worth rubbing in much anymore.

The beach by Cannes. This is recovery. And yes, the sun was out for a bit.

I make friends quickly and easily here. She's a blast.

Standard cycling recovery. Standard Sandy confusion.

Also, we have olive trees here. Awesome.

Race #1 & 2

My kits are coming (apparently). These are old and size L.

Two down, with the second most certainly better than the first. #1 found ourselves at the base of Mont Ventoux, for a surprisingly less than hilly parcours. Two climbs of about 1.5-2 km each and other wise rolling terrain, narrow farm roads (Belgie type) and plenty of wind. First of all, the French are awful starters apparently. I assumed late, but no one lined up close to the line. I got there early to be close to the front for the start, and eneded up about 100 people from the front. Merde! Even after pushing through for a bit. I had been told by some teamtes of the narrow roads, a bridge wide enough to pass only single file, and about the 150 man peloton. Got a good start and moved up quickly on the right side out of the wind as the pace wound up. 1:34 in, chute. Big crash clogging the whole road. I tried to thread the needle through 2 riders but my bars caught and I went down. Hard to brake at 50-50km/h. My foot got caught in a wheel, someone else landed on me.... Took a while to get my foot free, (the owner of the wheel was later taken away by ambulance so was of no help) straighten out the bike, and then begin the solo chase. Got soooo close to the pack after 1.5 laps of chasing (11km laps) before blowing sky high on the final climb. After that I rode for a bit before catching a few more dropped riders and then rolling in a little gruppetto to the finish. Like I say, hard day chasing. Stopped en route home for a nice big meal at the DS's aunt's house and got home around 12. Ouch.

#2. 8:30am race. Luckily, the race was running late as so were we. 2 cols, I was told. Ouch. My first forray into the mountans. A beautiful start through a windy valley with rock cliffs so tall they blocked the sun, and rock tunnels to ride through meant one thing... time to go up. I was a little to far back in retrospect for a man with iron legs but rode well. I did all I could to make the lead group riding past many riders only to fall just short over the top. A few more caught, and passed me on the descent. Apparently, I am rusty at switch back descents on tiny mountain roads. I did find my groove again on the later descents. The lead group apparently blew again into 2 groups so I eneded my day in group 3, somewhere around top 20-30. Not bad. But I had to suffer hard a few times to hold on. 3 cols later (liars), and a finishing climb (a little longer than Fortune) and I was done. Also, quite the incredible course to race on for my first alpine race. Happy with my ride all considered and ready to improve further next weekend. One race Sunday, then 2 weekends of stage racing. Including one with 3 mountain stages. Basically, this week I train in the mountains.

Ding Dong

1:34. Thats what my computer read. And yes, that is in minutes, the time until I hit the ground. Or more precisely a pile of twitchy Frenchmen. I am pretty much ok, a little bruised (we we're cruising off the start at 50+ after all) and somewhat tired as I chased solo the rest of the way to finish, but overall fine. I'll post a full report later, this is mostly for mom, as it is now midnight and I have learned this evening that I race again tomorrow. Up at 7 again for a morning race, but this time in Nice. More to come on also why I am up.

Early

It's almost 7am, and I'm off. We have a bit of a drive to Mont Ventoux this morning I hear for my first race of the year. A tough Cat 2. Luckily for me, I also get to race tomorrow. Time to find how my legs are. Ciao.

A few pictures

Today marks an interesting day, not only my third day here living 'la belle vie', but also my first pre-race day. Tomorrow, barring any issues acquiring my new license, I will be lining up for a Cat.2 race in Antrechaux. And if I feel well, Sunday will mark race #2 in Nice.

As a side note, I forgot a little story. Mildly embarrassing at the time really. On my first ride here, Ed (from the UK) and Matt took me out for a little spin. 1.5 hours real easy we said. Coming down the hill into Grasse after about an 1:15, I applied the brakes in advance of a turn. Suddenly I was skidding out of control. I knocked into Ed (very gingerly) and toppled over at .5km/h. "*#^%!" saide I. A little red in the face towards my new teamates, I attempted to explain, but there was no explanation. So I tried to ride away. Nothing. It would appear the lovely folks at Air Canada had smoked my rear wheel at some point and it basically gave out under me. Spoke tension was all over and the wheel was jambed into my frame. I tried an old mountain biking trick of wacking it on the curb, but only managed to get confused looks from some locals. So Matt had to ride the 15 min home to get the team car to pick me up. Even more fun is getting the turn around from the local Air Canada office who are generally either on brake or giving me new phone numbers to call. Either way, Yannick has lent me a new rear wheel and I'm rolling again.

Yesterday was an awesome day, as Ed drove us down to the coast to meet up with a couple of ladies from Moose Jaw, friend's of Matts. Matt and Ed dropped Chels and I off in Antibes to explore while they went to Nice to find the ladies. Chels and I spent a while driking coffee, and exploring the old town and port before heading on a little hike with the rest of the group out the Cape d'Antibes with our new friends. We then headed down the coast to Juan-Les-Pins and finally spent the afternoon lounging on the beach in Cannes with some cheese to work on our cycling tans. A great way to take in the sights and recover at the same time!



Me & big Ed working our tans by the Med. Chels on our little walk out the Cape d'Antibes.


The fresh market in Antibes, great stuff! Chez nous en France. Actually, just behind this.

Bienvenue!

Life is good. Cheese is cheep (3 Euro for a round of Brie) and wine is cheeper (2 Euro). Many things are expensive here, but not those. I told Yannick that a round of brie would cost me $12 at home. He was outraged. In fact, I think he still thinks I was pulling his chain. The place is great, our own little apartment by the house, a pool, a view of les bas-alpes, and plenty of narrow road riding. In fact, just got back from a little recovery spin before heading out for the afternoon wandering around Antibes & Cannes on the Med. Yesterday was my first long-ish ride with close to 4 hours and some pretty decent climbing. Myself, Matt (from Sask), and Ed from England headed out with Erik (an older guy from the club) for a nice tour. Erik knows these roads far too well so we had an excellent route with a couple of good climbs. Or flat, as Erik explained for here. Was unaware that 10-12km climbs were flat. Such is life. Got a pretty packed race schedule as well, with several Elite stage races coming up. First race should still be this Saturday, and then maybe Sunday as well. Just sorting out my new French liscence. I have a few pictures so far, but not many. So will try to post a few up tonight after our exploration.

hopping the atlantic

Packed. Ready. Its been quite the intense week of finishing stuff off, getting ready. But here I am. Airport, packed with a beer. Nothing like a cold beer to calm down after a long morning of running around. Tommorrow morning (1oam France time) I will be pulling into Nice and getting ready for my first ride. Exciting. Thanks to everyone out there for your support and encouragement, I'll be sure to update on a more regular basis with some ideally more exciting stories and whatnots. Cheers.