Day Six

Today was the most ‘Belgian’ of days because the following criteria were met:
1. We had a race very near some of the cobbled climbs in the Tour of Flanders.
2. It rained, albeit lightly.
3. At no point was the road wider than two bikes at any point of the race.
4. Only one person on the team finished without getting pulled.
5. Wind; everywhere there was no escape.
We started the day with an easy ride hoping to spin out the legs before the race in the afternoon. Alex crashed, because one of his gears slipped when he stood up out of the saddle which resulted in the first cracked frame of the trip.
We left for the race in the team van. By the time we had registered we had very little time to warm up. This is okay because most of the European’s don’t warm up much before their races but this doesn’t stop them going out hard the last lap like it was their last. By the time I had warmed up and was at the start line I was at the back of eighty riders.
The course was 6.2K long and the race was ten laps long. It started out on a downhill for about 3k and then pitched up gradually for 3K. This under any other circumstances would have been a very easy course if it were not for a 200m stretch of cobbles, gale force winds, and 80 riders on roads narrower than the Iron Horse Trail.
As soon as the race started I began moving up until, by the end of the first lap, I was sitting inside of the top twenty riders. Unfortunately, on the turn exiting the cobbled section, felt my tire sliding, I barely saved it. I was thinking to myself at the time, “Hey this is strange. Why am I sliding? I didn’t take the corner that fast did I? It turns out I had a flat.
There are no neutral support cars or free laps over here so I knew that my race was done. I got of the bike and started wandering around in a somewhat methodical fashion hoping to find someone I knew. After about twenty minutes I found one of the team’s soigneurs Mario. He drove me around for the remainder of the race, so that we could watch. The flat was almost worthwhile because he shared a lot of his insights about racing in Belgium.
Today was not the team’s best day. Lawson got away on the second lap and had almost 30 seconds on the field. Five riders bridged up on the second lap one of which was Joel. This was to become the winning break, but Joel and Lawson were dropped and ended up being pulled with one lap to go. Alex flatted out of the main field with a few laps to go, and James was dropped in the crosswinds. Fortunately, Anders salvaged a good result. With two laps to go he bridged a massive gap between the main field and the break. In the closing Kilometers of the last lap he nearly got away but ended up finishing at the back of the break in seventh.
; The day ended up belonging to some ENORMOUS Belgian, ‘whose victory salute was, I have to say, completely over the top.