Carcassonne Crit.

As most of you know crits are NOT my strong point, and they are about as far from my favorite type of event as you can get. But never the less there I was on the start line of the Carcassonne crit. 70km was the distance, and that should have spoken volumes to me about the event. Crits here are usually 80km minimum, so for an Elite crit, 70k was short. And here's why... it's hard!

2.2km loops, through this tiny town built on a hill side just outside the main town of Carcassonne. 12 corners per lap, tiny little streets with big walls and buildings on either side, a steep climb up to and past the finish line, and some of the worst roads I have ever seen.

80 riders stood at the start line, including the AG2R development team, 2 guys from the Asian Bridgestone Anchor Pro team, and a field of mainly french riders from all over France. Now although we have had a bad summer and a week of rain, the weather for this crit was a blisteringly hot 35 degrees, which after the past couple weeks was quite a shock to the system.

But the weather wasn't the only thing that was blisteringly hot. From the gun the pace was hideously high. I was a late registration for the event, and so I started right at the end of the pack. Starting positions aren't something you normally care about on the road, but with such a narrow course, it made a big big difference. The first 5-8 laps were SO fast and painful I thought I was going to drop out after only a few laps. Riders started dropping out from lap 1, and at least 2 or 3 dropped out every lap.

After a while things settled in a little bit as a group of 4 or 5 got off the front, including 1 or maybe 2 AG2R development guys, and 1 Bridgestone Anchor guy. I was sitting in the second group on the road. Already by this stage there were riders absolutely everywhere on the course. At about the half-way point I attacked off the 2nd group on the road and 3 of us went away, but only for 2 or 3 laps, then we were caught again. Even though we were caught there were still gaps in the group that consisted of about 20 riders... so I kept the pace high on the front and attacked round a couple corners, hoping to take a couple riders with me. I was alone. I quickly opened a considerable gap and was off towards the leaders. At first the crowds was cheering me on, but with the race in pieces all over the course, and with me frequently passing dropped riders, it wasn't long before the crowd obviously started to think I was just another dropped rider.

Sim went it alone... While Bridgestone Anchor had one guy off the front.

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After 12 or 15k off the front alone, and thankfully more recognition from the commentator than the crowd, I was suddenly caught again. I was caught by about 6 or 7 guys from the group I had attacked, everyone else was dropped in ones and twos all over the road. It was absolute carnage. My 15k off the front had been a little easier than in the group, because I was able to keep a steady pace and not deal with the stop start accelerations of a group, but that said I was maxed the whole time, way above my threshold. As the group caught me on the steep climb they attacked me directly. I held onto them for a few laps but was soon gapped. My efforts from earlier were taking their toll. So after a few more laps and a couple quick calculations which told me I was no longer going to be able to score any national ranking points, and that I was out of the money, it was time to pull over and get off the bike. By the time I stopped I think there were as many riders along the side of the road as there were crowds. I don't know how many people finished but it wasn't many. The winner lapped everyone at least once, except for 3 guys, and he lapped all but the top 10 riders twice. The guy was unbelievable. Bridgestone Anchor only had 1 guy left in the race, AG2R had maybe 3 out of 6 or 7 starters...

Well there, you go. Crits are crits. I actually enjoyed this one a little more, and thought the high HR workout was probably good training for the upcoming TTs.

Monday is an early start as I need to get in some intervals and pack my bags. We are headed up to northern France to find an apartment for my girlfriend. We only have 2 days to find it before she has to start work. It's going to be a crazy week. Sadly not the best preparation for the TT on Saturday. I'm not even sure I'll have time to ride this week (hence the intervals Monday morning).

Next week is TT and a northern road race on sunday, followed by the Pic de Nore hill climb the next weekend with a 1 day, 2 stage stage race on the sunday.

Fast approaching TT

Only a week to go until the Chrono Catelraudais, this Time Trial in northern/central France, (in the same are as the famous Chrono des Herbier TT). Actually I am making the most of having to go up there to accompany my girlfriend who has been sent up to that area for work. She passed her teacher's qualification and in France they send you to a school like they send soldiers to barracks. So we'll be moving her up to Chateauroux. It's going to be busy couple weeks. We're going to have to find her an apartment within 1 or 2 days. They only tell her where they are sending her 5 days before she starts work.


TTs, "I love them" (in Jens Voight overly excited accent)
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I like Time Trials and I look forward to getting back aboard my TT bike. I haven't done a TT for a couple months... last time was at the Tour des Chateaux et Coteaux stage race a couple weeks before the Tour. I haven't actually spent much time on the TT bike recently either. Obviously I didn't ride the TT bike while on our Bikestyle Tour de France trip and since I've been back I've been doing mainly hilly races. So although I'm looking forward to it, I'm not as totally pumped up about it as I usually am. I'm usually like a little kid before Christmas when it comes to TTs... until I roll down the start ramp of course, then I'm it all turns into pain and tunnel vision. :-)


No TT bike on the BikestyleTours Tour de France trip... good thing too, wouldn't want to ride a TT bike up Alpe D'Huez
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Sadly my Power Tap isn't working at the moment so I haven't been able to do any tests before this TT. I feel like I'm in pretty good shape at the moment and the results have been there too, so it would be interesting to see what the power read-outs were like. But there's not much I can do about it.


I hope I can get a disk wheel from the team this time.
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15 mins of Fame

For those of you who haven't heard yet. Pro Cycling Magazine came out with us at Bikestyletours and rode the Port de Bales. This was a while ago of course, it was before the Tour. Anyway the article came out a little while ago, and so here is my fifteen minutes of fame... well, 15 minutes of something, not sure what but...






Spot the idiot: There he is on the left
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Anyway they did a great article, and it is available at your local newsagents, book store, friend's house, or bathroom if you are a bloke (why is it only blokes seem to read on the toilet...)

Anyone hunting for autographs please call my agent directly, his name is Bill Sheet, and you can e-mail him at B.S@FullOfIt.com
:-)

They also did another article, basically on us riding up a hill... that one should be out either in the Winter or in March 2008... so... don't hold your breath just yet.

The only way is up... unless you turn around of course!

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Intervals between the rain drops

Yesterday I slipped between the rain drops to get in a 2.5 hour ride. I had planned to go out again, but with the rain it didn't happen. Probably not a bad thing anyway, as I felt like crap on that ride.

So now onto today... rain rain rain. But I got out for a little under 3 hours and didn't get wet at all. I've been very lucky the past 2 days.

Some sun flowers are hoping there is still some summer to come

I headed out to the Cote de Boissel, the climb that heads out of Gaillac that was used in the 2003 Tour Time trial and that has also been used in the Midi Libre for example. It's not a proper "climb" but it's a nice steady 3km hill, and one I love to do hill reps on. Well... I don't LOVE to do them, but if I have to them, that tends to be my hill of choice.

I started off with 2 reps at full race pace, sitting down and keeping at very steady (though bloody painful) pace. I followed that with 2 reps at race pace again, but this time alternating between sitting fro 30 seconds, and standing for 30 seconds. That had been all I was going to do. That's usually hard enough. But for some reason I felt compelled to do more. So I did 2 more reps, this time in a big gear. 53x11 grinding up with a slightly lower hear rate... ie: just under race pace.

I felt pretty cooked by then, but felt like rewarding myself with an extra little 30 or 40k of easy spinning with some music.

I am quite happy with my day. This morning I didn't think I would get out at all due to this shocking weather... but it turned out OK in the end.

In other news, although I haven't heard from Giana in Austria for a while now, I finally got a hold of her World TT results from Wednesday, and I was VERY happy to see she finished 2nd. A great result considering she has only been back on the bike for about 2 months after a 3 year total absence from the sport and some serious health problems. I'm SO happy for her. I only wish I could have been there with her again to see her pull this off.

Congrats Giana, you rock.

Giana won the world title in 2004

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Ok, seeing as I am British I'm going to have to talk about the weather again. It looks like it will be clearing up and being somewhat summery again this weekend... which I bloody hope, because I have to stupid crits again this weekend, and crits are bad enough at the best of times, through in the rain as well... and Sim ain't a happy camper.

Belguim-Classic style August.

At this time of year you can race almost everyday of the week over here. Today I raced, and if I wanted to I could race again tomorrow, only I won't because I have an Osteo appointment tomorrow and it is usually best to rest after getting your back adjusted so as not pull everything back out of place right away.

So... It's August in Southern France, and continuing on from the worst summer we have EVER had here, we took the start of today's totally flat race under rainny conditions. Just to make things worse it was windy as heck too. Looked a lot more like a Belgian early season race than a soutern France August race I can tell you.

Race? in the rain, in August, you're having joke aren't you mate?
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I started the race with arm warmers, knee warners and a jacket. Within a few km I had taken off the rain jacket, and within about 25k I had taken off the knee warmers... Right around then it stopped raining and the wind was so strong that the road dries in no time at all, just in time for the heavens to open up again and soak us. :-(

Sim huffs and puffs at the bordom of going round in circles over an 8km loop in the rain and wind... "Is this thing over yet?"
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Anyway the race didn't go too badly, my plan had been to sit in and get in some training miles, which is exactly what I did. We had 2 guys in the 4 man break up the road and spent most of the time controling the field. Come the finish we put the whole team on the front and drilled it for the last 10km or so and lead out one of our sprinters for 5th place.

Sitting at the back spinning the legs. It was easier than I had anticipated.
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The guys in the break didn't win and so they got yelled at by some of our guys. We could have cought them if we had wanted and maybe had a sprinter win or sent someone else off the front for the win (me?) :-) I felt bad for them. They finished 3rd and 4th but they gave it their all, it's not like they TRIED not to win. Besides.. it was just a flippin' circuit race. Admitedly my team was the organizer so you always like to win your own race.

So there you go... what next? Well rain ALL week.. can you believe that? Crazzy!!!

Around very early september I should be going up north for a big TT. I did it a couple years ago and it was pretty hard. I'll make the most of it to get in a road race the next day as well. Then it will be back down here for a race up the Pic de Nore. Usually a 2 day stage race I'll only be able to do the first day as my team is organizing a 1 day (2 stage) stage race the next day, and I have to go to that, esspecailly as I am Pyrenees Champ. Bit of a shame really, I like the pic de Nore stage race, I won the 1st stage last year and finished 4th I think on stage 2, which put me in 1st or 2nd overall (I don't actually remember)... but I like that sort of race. Kind of like the 2 races I won this past week... Uphill mountain finishes seem to suit me this year.

Well, until next time...

no race but race pace.

With only two days to go before the final round of the Pyrenean climbs series this Saturday a few of us got together for a little spin.

Thursday, the day after that grueling uphill TT Alphonce, Steph and myself got together for what was supposed to be a nice little endurance ride. Alphonce is doing the last round of the series, and so is Steph, but Steph is a little bit less fit than Alphonce and myself... so Alphonce and I were trying to test eachother out on every climb we came across to get a feeling of how things would go come the big day Saturday.

So at the end of the day we had 130km of climbs with proper, full on race pace accents. The ride is a GREAT ride taking you down into the Aveyron Valley and the walled/hilltop cities. But we came back pretty buggered. Steph got in a little over 100k seeing as he lives in Gaillac with is a little down the road, meaning he got in a little under 30k less than the rest of us.

Ahhh.. but what a great day it was. Really enjoyed it. It's a tough life. :-)

Today is a nice easy recovery day. I'll ride into Gaillac and spend some time setting up Steph's new computer, then ride home, have lunch, get my bike ready, maybe have a nap....

2 wins in 5 days.

Just got in from another race. A hill climb TT which was fucking hideous!!!! 21% sections and it was HARD. 6k uphill TT. Average Heartrate was 179 (my max is 188).
Don't really know how, I must be in OK shame at the moment because I won again. (despite terrible back problems at the moment, going to see Doc on tuesday).

So there you go. Another win, thus I am leading the Pyrenean Climb series; one round left (this coming Sat)... Hmmm.... this time no beret for the win, but lots of wine and sausage and pate and cheese.... !!!! :-) Great stuff... I'd better go sample it!

On the way home I picked up my mom from that airport as she has been in the UK since I got back from the Tour. The weather is great here, nice and hot and sunny. So.... off to have a beer and some sausage then.... "so long suckers..."

Back home!!

Hi all, I'm back. Have been back from the Tour a little while actually.

I look really moody in this pic. Not sure what that's about. Probably because Craig killed me up Alpe d'Huez a few hours earlier. (Killed me by going so slow of course ;-) )

I didn't do a very good job of keeping up the Bikestyle blog, but there were a couple of events (some bikes got stolen) that meant I really wasn't sure what to write... so I didn't write anything. Apart from that it was a really good trip.

Being back home has been great as well. A few days after getting back I did a crit, which I was very proud to finish. As most of you know I hate crits and usually drop out due to boredom.
Then on Saturday I won a race in the Pyrenees, which finished uphill (up a climb more like)... so that was very nice!

I'm going to another race in the Pyrenees tomorrow morning, again with an uphill finish, so hopefully I'll do well there also.

Right.. off to have a beer and sit on the balcony. :-)

I'll write more about the GREAT bikestyle trip at the Tour this year. No kidding I think it was the best trip yet. I had SOOO much fun... loved it. It was also GREAT to hook up with Craig from Aus again and shoot the shit, and great to make some new friends!

On a slightly different note a special thought goes out to Giana who should be in Europe (Austria I think) right now getting ready for the World's TT. "Go G, I hope you have fun, would be great if you won again, but above all enjoy yourself!"