Its rest day time today for me so time for a new post. I didn't have such a busy race schedule this week just two races, one on Thursday and one on Sunday.
There was a race on Thursday as it was Bastille day here in France which is a big national holiday which I'm not even sure why the celebrate it. Someone from the team told me it was celebrating democracy or something to do with war I'm not really sure. But anyway there is always a massive celebration in Paris with the military and stuff which was really impressive to watch on tv. In Lyon there were lots of fireworks every where. Martins and I went to a big firworks display with some of the guys from the team which was cool and we had planned to go to center Lyon after to check out the street parties that were supposed to be really good, but we didn't end up going unfortunately. So anyway during the day we had an elite national race only 10km down the road from the apartment, so was cool to just ride to the race for once. Was on a flat course with a stacked field. from the start i got into a promising break but only stayed away for a lap and when we were caught the next break to go was the one that stayed away and nobody from the team made it so we had to work on the front. From there I just thought I would ride the rest of the race for some good training and drill myself on the front with some of the team to catch the break. We ended up catching them with 3 laps to go and the guys we had sitting back didnt even attempt to make the next break which was so frustrating and none of the team got in the next winning break.
On Sunday I had another flat race just a regional cat 1. not to much to report except it poured with rain and it ended in a bunch finish and I rolled 21st in the sprint.
Monday, July 18, 2011
Monday, July 11, 2011
Tour du Pays Roannais and Tour de la Dordogne
So I have had a heap of racing after my break, I think 8 stages all together in 2 weeks, so I am going to keep this post short and summarize a lot as no one wants to read a novel and I don't want to write one.
Ok the Tour du pays Roannais (elite national) was my first race back after my holiday so I didn't have very high expectations as its always hard to get racing legs back after some time off the bike. first stage was a night criterium which was good fun and super fast think we averaged 47km/h, everyone finished together.
2nd stage was 160km and was incredibly hot around 35degrees and it wasn't ideal when I ran out of drink with 60km to go and wasn't able to drop back to the car for water as there were a few hills at the end that were important to stay at the front. Anyway last climb I was really suffering without any drink and I ended up in 2nd group ended up 32nd.
3rd stage was short and hilly and I just had no legs finished 40something.
4th and last stage was hilly again and I suffered a lot, same story no legs.
Ended the tour in 36th GC.
Next up I had an elite national tour in Bordeaux which I actually got the last minute call up for as a few riders decided to pull out for some reason, which was a bit annoying as Brad was still staying with me and I had to leave on Wednesday and he had a train back Holland on Friday. But Iv just heard from Brad that he loves staying at my luxurious apartment so much he is coming back for a week next Monday, hopefully this time I wont have to ditch him for half the week to go race...........
So had 5hour drive across France to Bordeaux where we were staying with all the other teams in a boarding school as all the students are on holidays at the moment.
The tour started on Thursday with a 160km stage with an undulating parcours. I was originally only supposed to help the "roulers" of our team but in the middle of the stage I was quite active in attacking on a hilly section and I found myself in the front group of 40 and the only one from my team. Unfortunately a group of 9 got off the front in the final 40km and I didnt get into it, so I rolled 32nd in the stage and all the rest of my team mates had lost 4 minutes or plus.
2nd stage was a 10km time trial and normally I would be really excited for a time trial but not so much when I have to ride an average tt bike and without shifters on the end of the aero bars. But I tried to forget about that and focus on a good ride. didnt feel to bad and ended up 40something about 30seconds down on the winner and moved up into the top 30 on GC.
Stage 3 was 160km and undulating again with a hard finishing circuit with 2km climb that we did 3 times. Most the stage I just sat in waiting for the finishing circuits and the peloton was controlled by the yellow jersey team. In the circuits I had a few good attacks off the front but never managed to stay away but the bunch splintered a bit and the group was down to 30 odd riders left to sprint for the win. I finished mid group but moved up to 23rd GC.
Last stage was 160km again much the same as the 2 previous road stages but an even harder finishing circuit with a small hill maybe 800m but really steep about 15percent, a real leg breaker. The stage was controlled by the yellow jersey team again with a break of 12 getting away at the start. I waited till the finishing circuits again. Was feeling ok but on the 3rd of 6 circuits I didn't have the legs to make it into the front 10 that got away on the hill which caught the remnants of the breakaway and stayed away till the end. I finished in the 2nd group but still managed to move up to 21st on GC, but still gutted I couldn't make the front group as I would have moved into the top 10 on GC.
In other news I'm pretty excited about my parents coming to France to visit me for a week on the 24th of July.
And also my Latvian team mate is the new Latvian National champion!
Ok the Tour du pays Roannais (elite national) was my first race back after my holiday so I didn't have very high expectations as its always hard to get racing legs back after some time off the bike. first stage was a night criterium which was good fun and super fast think we averaged 47km/h, everyone finished together.
2nd stage was 160km and was incredibly hot around 35degrees and it wasn't ideal when I ran out of drink with 60km to go and wasn't able to drop back to the car for water as there were a few hills at the end that were important to stay at the front. Anyway last climb I was really suffering without any drink and I ended up in 2nd group ended up 32nd.
3rd stage was short and hilly and I just had no legs finished 40something.
4th and last stage was hilly again and I suffered a lot, same story no legs.
Ended the tour in 36th GC.
Next up I had an elite national tour in Bordeaux which I actually got the last minute call up for as a few riders decided to pull out for some reason, which was a bit annoying as Brad was still staying with me and I had to leave on Wednesday and he had a train back Holland on Friday. But Iv just heard from Brad that he loves staying at my luxurious apartment so much he is coming back for a week next Monday, hopefully this time I wont have to ditch him for half the week to go race...........
So had 5hour drive across France to Bordeaux where we were staying with all the other teams in a boarding school as all the students are on holidays at the moment.
The tour started on Thursday with a 160km stage with an undulating parcours. I was originally only supposed to help the "roulers" of our team but in the middle of the stage I was quite active in attacking on a hilly section and I found myself in the front group of 40 and the only one from my team. Unfortunately a group of 9 got off the front in the final 40km and I didnt get into it, so I rolled 32nd in the stage and all the rest of my team mates had lost 4 minutes or plus.
2nd stage was a 10km time trial and normally I would be really excited for a time trial but not so much when I have to ride an average tt bike and without shifters on the end of the aero bars. But I tried to forget about that and focus on a good ride. didnt feel to bad and ended up 40something about 30seconds down on the winner and moved up into the top 30 on GC.
Stage 3 was 160km and undulating again with a hard finishing circuit with 2km climb that we did 3 times. Most the stage I just sat in waiting for the finishing circuits and the peloton was controlled by the yellow jersey team. In the circuits I had a few good attacks off the front but never managed to stay away but the bunch splintered a bit and the group was down to 30 odd riders left to sprint for the win. I finished mid group but moved up to 23rd GC.
Last stage was 160km again much the same as the 2 previous road stages but an even harder finishing circuit with a small hill maybe 800m but really steep about 15percent, a real leg breaker. The stage was controlled by the yellow jersey team again with a break of 12 getting away at the start. I waited till the finishing circuits again. Was feeling ok but on the 3rd of 6 circuits I didn't have the legs to make it into the front 10 that got away on the hill which caught the remnants of the breakaway and stayed away till the end. I finished in the 2nd group but still managed to move up to 21st on GC, but still gutted I couldn't make the front group as I would have moved into the top 10 on GC.
In other news I'm pretty excited about my parents coming to France to visit me for a week on the 24th of July.
And also my Latvian team mate is the new Latvian National champion!
Friday, July 1, 2011
Brad Tilby: Part 2 - Marseilles, Montpellier and Sete
Brad Tilby: Part 2 - Marseilles, Montpellier and Sete: "This is part 2, if you haven't had a read of part 1 do that first For Part 2 of our trip we headed down to Marseilles. This is about a 2hr..."
Brad has written the 2nd part of our trip on his blog so you can have a read there
Brad has written the 2nd part of our trip on his blog so you can have a read there
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
South of France - Monaco, Nice, Antibes and Cannes
On Monday Brad came down to Lyon to start our summer vacation.
The plan for the first 6 days from there was full on as we were both having a week off the bike because its cycling nationals over here and of course foreigners can't race. We had decided to do a whirlwind trip of the South of France
On Tuesday Brad and I took the TGV fast train from Lyon to Nice. Its about a 4 hour train ride that cuts through the middle of France and then follows the coast from Marseilles up to Nice. The plan was to stay in Antibes. Antibes sits half way between Cannes and Nice and was to be our base for the next 3 days.
Brad managed to find a camp ground that was 50m from the waterfront, 50 meters from the train stop and most importantly wasn't expensive.
On the Wednesday we headed to Monaco. From everything you hear and see, this is the place to go. Everything is on a grand scale and within 5 minutes of arriving there we saw 2 Porsches and a Ferrari. The place is most famous for its wealth, its marina and the Formula One.....the later had been on just 2 weeks ago.
The view looking down on the city
One of the boat marinas
Our plan was to do a city tour as its such a hilly place. They have noddy trains that give English commentary so this seemed the easiest option. From here we walked to some of the key attractions. One place that was on the must do list was the Oceanographic Aquarium. This is both a museum and a aquarium and was run by Jacques Cousteau for 30 years. They had some really crazy fish in this place.
The museum is built on the cliff side
Transparent fish
Moray Eel
For the afternoon we continued to walk around more of the city and the marinas. This place is really hilly and you end up doing a lot of walking
It got so hot in the afternoon that we decided to take a swim in the sea. The water there is clear and pretty amazing. Nothing says class than 2 people from NZ just going for a lazy swim in their boxers.... Oh well
We went swimming just around from this place on a little beach
On the way back from Monaco we stopped in at Nice for dinner and to have a look around. This is really the hub of the Cote D'Azur region and one of the most recognised places. Our thoughts however were its a little overrated to the other places we visited. The beach was horrible and the shops were like any western city
On Thursday we headed down to Cannes. This place is most famous for the Movie festival so it was worth a stop through the cinema area to see the red carpet. I had done a fair bit of reading before we went and we decided to take the ferry over to the island of St Marguerite. The beaches here were supposed to be less crowded (summer time and school holidays here) and free (most nice beaches in the Cote D'Azur are not free and can cost up to 30 euro a day pp). This area didn't disappoint and we found a pretty cool inlet that had only a few people. One of the funniest stories from our trip was when 2 french girls turned up and decided to do their own modeling shoot in the water. Priceless....and we were in tears watching (yes, photos below)
Cannes red carpet
Island of Saint Marguerite
Me noticing the girls.....they are in the background and you need to zoom
One of the many modeling pics, they other girl has the camera around the corner. Sorry we missed the pic of the moody head turn....while lying the water but believe us when we say it was some funny shit.
Again more walking. I think we racked up close to 10k a day
Back in Cannes we did some more sight seeing, monuments, castles and churches. Leaving Cannes we managed to get the wrong train. We got on the direct train to Nice and not the local stop train. This meant another trip to Nice so we decided to stay and have dinner and another look around. The great thing about France is the train conductors are useless and you can ride the trains for free quite often. I think out of the 8 or so times we took the local train we never got asked for tickets
This is part one to our trip. I will write the next 3 cities in the next day. Hopefully that is a small insight in to what we did and saw. There is so much you could write about. I also have a post below with a link to the whole album from the trip.
The plan for the first 6 days from there was full on as we were both having a week off the bike because its cycling nationals over here and of course foreigners can't race. We had decided to do a whirlwind trip of the South of France
On Tuesday Brad and I took the TGV fast train from Lyon to Nice. Its about a 4 hour train ride that cuts through the middle of France and then follows the coast from Marseilles up to Nice. The plan was to stay in Antibes. Antibes sits half way between Cannes and Nice and was to be our base for the next 3 days.
Brad managed to find a camp ground that was 50m from the waterfront, 50 meters from the train stop and most importantly wasn't expensive.
On the Wednesday we headed to Monaco. From everything you hear and see, this is the place to go. Everything is on a grand scale and within 5 minutes of arriving there we saw 2 Porsches and a Ferrari. The place is most famous for its wealth, its marina and the Formula One.....the later had been on just 2 weeks ago.
The view looking down on the city
One of the boat marinas
Our plan was to do a city tour as its such a hilly place. They have noddy trains that give English commentary so this seemed the easiest option. From here we walked to some of the key attractions. One place that was on the must do list was the Oceanographic Aquarium. This is both a museum and a aquarium and was run by Jacques Cousteau for 30 years. They had some really crazy fish in this place.
The museum is built on the cliff side
Transparent fish
Moray Eel
For the afternoon we continued to walk around more of the city and the marinas. This place is really hilly and you end up doing a lot of walking
It got so hot in the afternoon that we decided to take a swim in the sea. The water there is clear and pretty amazing. Nothing says class than 2 people from NZ just going for a lazy swim in their boxers.... Oh well
We went swimming just around from this place on a little beach
On the way back from Monaco we stopped in at Nice for dinner and to have a look around. This is really the hub of the Cote D'Azur region and one of the most recognised places. Our thoughts however were its a little overrated to the other places we visited. The beach was horrible and the shops were like any western city
On Thursday we headed down to Cannes. This place is most famous for the Movie festival so it was worth a stop through the cinema area to see the red carpet. I had done a fair bit of reading before we went and we decided to take the ferry over to the island of St Marguerite. The beaches here were supposed to be less crowded (summer time and school holidays here) and free (most nice beaches in the Cote D'Azur are not free and can cost up to 30 euro a day pp). This area didn't disappoint and we found a pretty cool inlet that had only a few people. One of the funniest stories from our trip was when 2 french girls turned up and decided to do their own modeling shoot in the water. Priceless....and we were in tears watching (yes, photos below)
Cannes red carpet
Island of Saint Marguerite
Me noticing the girls.....they are in the background and you need to zoom
One of the many modeling pics, they other girl has the camera around the corner. Sorry we missed the pic of the moody head turn....while lying the water but believe us when we say it was some funny shit.
Again more walking. I think we racked up close to 10k a day
Back in Cannes we did some more sight seeing, monuments, castles and churches. Leaving Cannes we managed to get the wrong train. We got on the direct train to Nice and not the local stop train. This meant another trip to Nice so we decided to stay and have dinner and another look around. The great thing about France is the train conductors are useless and you can ride the trains for free quite often. I think out of the 8 or so times we took the local train we never got asked for tickets
This is part one to our trip. I will write the next 3 cities in the next day. Hopefully that is a small insight in to what we did and saw. There is so much you could write about. I also have a post below with a link to the whole album from the trip.
Monday, June 27, 2011
Le Tour des Pays de Savoie
Finally I am doing a write up for this.......It was a bit of a mixed bag.
Well I went into this with some great form and was a little unsure how I would go as it was a classed as a UCI 2.2 and the only other UCI 2.2 i have done was the Rhone alps isere tour, and that was effing hard.
So the prologue was cool as it was the same course as the Criterium Dauphine a couple weeks ago. It started in the evening and it poured with rain and being on a short technical course staying upright on my bike was my biggest priority, as I thought it would be better to lose a little time not taking the risk rather than risking it and crashing and lossing alot of time. I ended up losing 40 seconds to the winner so not the greatest.
Stage 1 was flat for 80ish km then 2 mountains to finish it off. I expected a small break to get away on the flat and I thought the peloton would be controlled by some of the bigger teams, but this didnt end up happening and a massive split of 30 odd guys got off the front and I didnt make it. Up the first mountain the peloton set a real hard pace which was good and it whittled it down to about a bunch of 30 and we pulled back a few guys that had dropped of the back of the break. On the last climb at the bottom the yellow jersey attacked and he took about 3 or 4 with him, I went after but was a bit late to react and didnt have the kick to hook on to them so I was stuck between them and bunch for a bit so ended up sitting up for behind. We pretty much stayed together most the way up and with about ten in the group and we werent getting much closser to the front break away so near the top their were a lot of attacks and we all split up a bit. It was then downhill to the finish and i ended up in 28th was a bit gutted as if there was no break i could have made top 15.
stage 2 I was confident of a good finish and feeling good after the day before. It was a super hard stage with 3 mountains and was just over the border in Italy which was cool. First climb a break of about ten got away and the peloton just had a steady tempo. Coming up to the 2nd climb I attacked from the peloton with 2 other guys and we bridged up to the front, also a group of 7ish behind us made it across. So was a fairly large group of us in the front and the motorbike was saying we had 4 minutes over the peloton. Basically as soon as I had made it across to the front there were constant attacks which wasn't ideal as I had already worked my ass off to bridge up, so it really cooked my legs and by the time we were 1/4 the way up the 2nd climb I completely blew to pieces, hit the wall as they say. I think it was also due to not eating enough early on in the stage which was a stupid mistake. I crawled to the finish and literally zig zaged my way up the climbs trying to shove as much food down my throat as possible. finished 40th i think.... I was pretty disappointed.
stage 3 I was hoping I could salvage my tour but it wasn't to be I just hadn't recovered well enough from my torture the day before and the legs were like lead and I couldn't get my heart rate over 85percent. Was just suffering in the bunch and ended up dropping and finishing a few minutes down.
In the end I was 32nd on GC
Even though I had the form I made some stupid mistakes that cost me.
I have just had a sweeeet holiday down in the south of France so that has made up for any disapointment. will have a post on it in the coming days!!!!!!!!
Well I went into this with some great form and was a little unsure how I would go as it was a classed as a UCI 2.2 and the only other UCI 2.2 i have done was the Rhone alps isere tour, and that was effing hard.
So the prologue was cool as it was the same course as the Criterium Dauphine a couple weeks ago. It started in the evening and it poured with rain and being on a short technical course staying upright on my bike was my biggest priority, as I thought it would be better to lose a little time not taking the risk rather than risking it and crashing and lossing alot of time. I ended up losing 40 seconds to the winner so not the greatest.
Stage 1 was flat for 80ish km then 2 mountains to finish it off. I expected a small break to get away on the flat and I thought the peloton would be controlled by some of the bigger teams, but this didnt end up happening and a massive split of 30 odd guys got off the front and I didnt make it. Up the first mountain the peloton set a real hard pace which was good and it whittled it down to about a bunch of 30 and we pulled back a few guys that had dropped of the back of the break. On the last climb at the bottom the yellow jersey attacked and he took about 3 or 4 with him, I went after but was a bit late to react and didnt have the kick to hook on to them so I was stuck between them and bunch for a bit so ended up sitting up for behind. We pretty much stayed together most the way up and with about ten in the group and we werent getting much closser to the front break away so near the top their were a lot of attacks and we all split up a bit. It was then downhill to the finish and i ended up in 28th was a bit gutted as if there was no break i could have made top 15.
stage 2 I was confident of a good finish and feeling good after the day before. It was a super hard stage with 3 mountains and was just over the border in Italy which was cool. First climb a break of about ten got away and the peloton just had a steady tempo. Coming up to the 2nd climb I attacked from the peloton with 2 other guys and we bridged up to the front, also a group of 7ish behind us made it across. So was a fairly large group of us in the front and the motorbike was saying we had 4 minutes over the peloton. Basically as soon as I had made it across to the front there were constant attacks which wasn't ideal as I had already worked my ass off to bridge up, so it really cooked my legs and by the time we were 1/4 the way up the 2nd climb I completely blew to pieces, hit the wall as they say. I think it was also due to not eating enough early on in the stage which was a stupid mistake. I crawled to the finish and literally zig zaged my way up the climbs trying to shove as much food down my throat as possible. finished 40th i think.... I was pretty disappointed.
stage 3 I was hoping I could salvage my tour but it wasn't to be I just hadn't recovered well enough from my torture the day before and the legs were like lead and I couldn't get my heart rate over 85percent. Was just suffering in the bunch and ended up dropping and finishing a few minutes down.
In the end I was 32nd on GC
Even though I had the form I made some stupid mistakes that cost me.
I have just had a sweeeet holiday down in the south of France so that has made up for any disapointment. will have a post on it in the coming days!!!!!!!!
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
quick update
So I have been rushing around a bit since I got back from the tour with brad arriving and now leaving to go down south today so I have had no time to do a race report from the weekend....... so will have to do it next week when i'm back home. But basically it was good and bad had a good first stage and then didn't eat enough the next and completely blew... so tune in next week for the full story.
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