An Post Race travelling

A soignees live

We just went thru the first four stages of the An Post Ras. That means we’re half way.

I have to admit that I had a great job compared to what the riders got to do. Fighting against a 90km per hour headwind along the Atlantic Ocean coast line is an enormous task. A battle in rain and wind against the nature. I don’t think a pro soccer player would survive this. My opinion? Cycling is sport, soccer is a game. You do not agree? Try it out! Some of these climbs in a hectic storm weather look like a mixture of the Belgian spring classics (rain coming down buckets full and wind blowing that hard that you cannot wear a cap, I’ve lost mine by the way. Probably a fish is swimming around with it in the ocean) and the Tour de France (seen some nice walls to climb).

What this got to do with soignees you think. Well for example the young woman (in her 20s) wakes up around 6.30.She goes for a daily run of about one hour and comes back for a shower and a quick breacky. That is about all she does for herself that day! Next job is jumping in a car and go shopping, dead easy of course if you do so in your home town, but more difficult is you are in Castletownbere in the County of Cork somewhere in Ireland. Looking for ham, cheese, fruit, sweets or Vegemite is not easy at all; you can lose a lot of time if you don’t know where to go. Also important are bread rolls. In Ireland it is very normal to walk in a shop or supermarket at 8am and they still have to bake the rolls. Anyway, after getting this, race back to the hotel and prepare the rolls for the staff, and the riders (they need them after the race). I can say they are delicious. Ham, cheese, rucola salad and pesto, is a great combination. She scored high points in the rider’s room with the Vegemite jar! A big yeaaah from the boys. (most of them are Aussies, and I like the stuff too). I was happy to get some orders from Sarah! I had to make the drinks (a job that saved her a bit of time), but remember usually she does that as well. I only jump in at the European Tour. At the moment we have only rainy days which means we only prepare 40 up to 50 bottles per stage. This is enough for 5 riders. Next is loading the cars. Eski’s (Sarah is a Kiwi) and food bags all at their place. Ok we’re off to the start line. Putting all the bottles in the right bikes. One rider likes it sweet, another wants it a bit salty others plain water etc…Don’t get wrong, the boys don’t like it! Extra food is prepared for the riders.

As soon as the race is on, you would think, stress is over. No way, we jump in the car. GPS set for the feed zone. We race to stay before the bunch. It would be great to find the feed zone right in front of a coffee shop. Today in the fourth stage we are lucky. On top of a mountain, a stormy wind, raining and no shelter! Freezing cold to! Isn’t this the end of May? Not to believe, some smart Irish lad builds a coffee shop on top of Moll’s Gap. Wonderful. Handing out feedbags and bottles and back in the van driving like hell down the hill, taking a shortcut to get to our hotel before the riders. We hoped to bring all the suitcases in the rooms so the riders could find all their gear without too much delay. Nah, police always thinks different. Our B&B was 1km behind the finish line and they wouldn’t let us go thru. Sarah and later, myself argued but a no was the “Garda’s” answer.

Sarah then waits for the riders to come in with rain jackets and drinks at the finish line, at the same time giving directions towards the hotel or B&B. As soon as we arrive at the accommodation she starts giving the boys a well deserved massage, that takes about 30 minutes per rider. By the time she finished this job it is time for dinner. A shower and sometimes a quick drink in the bar and her day is over. In the mean time I have washed and cleaned the bottles and the protein shakers for her and refilled them with water for the next day. If I am not there that is also her job!

You call this an easy job? No way. There is no such a job in a professional cycling team that is easy. Being in a tour looks fun, don’t misunderstand it is fun but hard work too. But the fun is made by the people in the team. With a great bunch of good riders, a top mechanic and a DS who knows to run the show and If you’re on the road like a family, like the Drapac team, it is great.

O and didn’t I forget the soignée?? She deserves the flowers after the race!

An Post Race travelling

An Post Ras day 1 and 2

No racing so far cause day 1 and 2, Friday and Saturday were travel days. I drove from Destelbergen at 6.15am to Leupegem. From the B&B of Christ and Hilde it was about two hours drive to Calais. Once on the boat we could enjoy a nice cup of coffee (not bad the coffee brand on the vessel). A long drive (approx 600 km) across the UK, passing London, Birmingham and Wrexham. Staying at the Travellodge in Holyhead could be a mistake after what Ago and Sarah told me about this village. And they had right, the woman (read: b…..) was not in the mood to be helpful. Explaining us ten times that you cannot book a family room for three persons unless you ask for a twin room if only two people want to sleep in that room. Or something like that. Lachie got a bit nervous and raised his voice a bit. Finally she sorted it out and we got three keys. At the beach of Holyhead Sarah knew a nice restaurant. For lunch I had fish and chips in one of the motorway resto’s in England. I thought mmm not bad. Bud that was nothing special compared with the dinner we had in the restaurant at the beach. A nice piece of hake with scampi’s and wonderful al dente cooked veggie’s. Combined with a nice white wine this was perfect. A shame Lachie didn’t get his dessert.

The next morning, Saturday woke up early for a five minutes drive to the docks. Getting on board took only ten minutes. Missing the breaky (on purpose) in the hotel, we we’re happy to order eggs and bacon on the boat. Looking forward to a almost three hours of sailing across the Irish Sea, we got some comfy seats with view on the water.

Just before entering the port of Dublin we hit our first rain cloud. And a strong wind too. A nice surprise was waiting for us when we arrived at our hotel in Dunboyne. Dunboyne Castle Hotel is set in a splendid location, surrounded by countryside, about 18km from Dublin.

As we arrived, we had some nice rolls, thanks to Rhys who went shopping in the morning, thanks for that mate.

After the short lunch break the boys went for a ride, Lachie, Stu, Rhys, Floris, Adam and Ago. They left the park just when it started drizzling. In the mean time I could meet Mister Dawson and Miss Brona. Tomorrow we have our first stage and we are looking forward to it. Our riders are keen. The staff Is ready, so……thumbs up and good luck to the boys.

The team: Lachlan Norris, Rhys Pollock, Stuart Shaw, Adam Semple and Floris Goesinnen.

The staff: Agostino Giramondo, Jonathan Breekveldt, Sarah Blake and meself.

About a fortnight in the life of Dirk

About a fortnight in the life of a fanatic cycling fan.

The month of May should be a rest period after the Spring Classics. I should take a break after Paris-Roubaix just as my mate Mitch did. But he had good results and great rides in every single big race so far. He has been on television at the right moment and that is what the sponsors, the fans, the girlfriend likes. We’ve been even witness (live!) to see Dockers smiling at his Lydia on cobblestone section number seven, 27km from Roubaix. Still don’t know where he gets the courage to do this. I wonder if that was because of the “stoverij met friet” or the Westmalle Triple few days before.

Anyway, no rest cause after picking up Tom Palmer, Alex Smyth and Matt Bishop, the reds were about to fly in. Only Matt arrived on a descent hour, somewhere in the arvo. The other two boys preferred to spend six hours at the Heathrow airport in London before flying to Brussels.

Airport pickups are always a kinda thriller, will they be on time, and will the luggage arrive at the same time? But more important, will the bikes be there too. So Sarah and I could drive the whole family back to Oudenaarde. Riders, bikes, suitcases, bags all packed in two vans and off we went.

In the first weekend we travelled to two races in Holland, Omloop der Kempen and the Ronde van Overijssel. The temperature on both days was far above the normal value this time of the year. And some of our Drapac boys loved it. With good results of Floris, Rhys, Adiq we could look back to a good start, not to forget that these guys just got off the plane after a 40 hours trip. By the way in the Omloop a motorbike rode into Floris (pic of bunchkick) with less than 10 km to go and still managed to get back on and take part of the bunch kick. The bad news in this sunny weekend was that Tom got ill.

A nice meal was deserved. Sarah booked a Japanese “wok” restaurant in Sint Martens Latem I admit that this meal was a lot better than the Egyptian stuff we (read: Jono, Craig and me self) had to eat in Eindhoven. Lucky Ago did not join us that night.

Also, do you know Adam Semple of the Drapac team? No? He is not only a good bike rider, he is also a great water bottle carrier and what is even more spectacular is the way he’s taking them from the car. Never seen such a confident rider picking up, was it eight or nine bottles, from the car. Not even paying attention on the cobblestones neither speedbumps nor even 90° bends. Just brilliant, I was impressed by this action of the young Western Australian.

While the team goes training all week (with few coffee stops at Or in Ghent) I went back to work as usual, counting down the days to the next race. I missed the race in Houthalen but was present at Verrebroek last Sunday,where Ago “upgraded” me to DS. Probably he had enough “klicks” on his mileometer. I bet you could see on my face that I was happy to do this, but what really made my day was that I draw team car number 1 in the convoy. That is almost the dream of every DS to get that number. 150 riders at the start with some old friends as Loh, Tobyn, Bert de Backer, Dan and others. Although everybody was talking and expecting rain, it stayed dry all day. But the wind was the spoilsport. Every lap (10 of 16.9km) had a long straight with headwind which created echelons in the bunch. Almost every lap about 20 riders got in trouble because of this. We had at least 3 riders in every break except…. in the last one. No matter how hard Rhys, Stu, Floris and Adam tried, with the help of Greg Van Avermaet, they couldn’t catch the 16 leaders.

Tomorrow, Wednesday our boys race in Puivelde, one of the biggest kermesses in Belgium. Hopefully Tom and Adiq are back after their cold. We go to Puivelde with the full team and hope a top ten placing.

Never mind, we’re looking forward to the An Post Ras in Ireland that starts on the 22^nd, the riders fly to Dublin (Rhys, Adam, Stu and Floris) while Ago, Sarah, Jono, Nokkers and me self drive all the way. First catching a boat from Calais to Dover and then the next day from Holyhead to Dublin. We come back on the 30^th with hopefully a bag full of jerseys, flowers, cups and whatever a winner gets!

You think this is all I did this week, no? I also checked every result on the net! Looking for Australian men and women who finished races. What started as a joke became really serious. The Aussie Cup is full on. (The women’s is sponsored by SCM !) So I have to stay attentive cause some of the riders really follow this competition seriously. One of the ladies already messaged me that I made a mistake in the points score. I must admit that she was right too!

Matthew Goss is still leading the men’s Cup. Since the last update on May the 1^st not much has changed in the top 5, but right behind the top it is really moving. Sutherland, Sulzy, Richie are slowly moving their way up.

1. Goss Matthew – 120 pts

2. Haussler Heinrich – 112 pts

3. Renshaw Mark – 11O pts

4. Matthews Michael – 107 pts

5. Evans Cadel – 96 pts

First Pro Conti rider is Rory Sutherland (8^th – 74pts) and first Conti rider is Adam Semple (14^th – 64pts)

Rochelle Gilmore still leads the women’s Cup with a comfy lead, but the battle is on behind her with some of the girls coming closer. Only Ruth hasn’t been scoring points since the Dutch Ronde van Drenthe.

1. Rochelle Gilmore – 113 pts

2. Shara Gillow – 61 pts

3. Ruth Corseth – 57 pts

4. Vicki Whitelaw – 47 pts

5. Bridie O’Donnell – 43 pts

Oh! if you’re really interested in a full ranking, just let me know. A short e-mail is enough to following address: thealice40@gmail.com