SHREWWWS and roots MTB racing.

Sunday I did the Midi Libre MTB race in the Gard area of France. It was a return to my roots… remember… roots… shrews…?! No? Well, you had to be a part of the Subaru MTB series with me back in 1999. Oh well.

So I was up at 4am to get to the race over in the middle of noplace in the Seveen something region of France. It was a big race (I found out once I got there)… I was just going to ride around with my buddy Alphonce. So, there were some good guys there, guys from Lapierre, Maxxis etc. I guess some of the guys who didn’t want to go to the World Cup in Canada. There were 170 of us on the start line. Wow, for an MTB race… and that’s just in my category. Seeing as the race was part of a series, I had to start way back on the start line as it was my first race. It was one big loop, and get this, it was such a hard race, that it took us almost 3.5 hours to do the 45km loop!!! Anyway, I surprised myself and managed to finish 12th. I was very happy with myself. Maybe I should put the result down to my careful choice of equipment. I got my bike loaded with all the aerodynamic advantages I could… I used spinergy wheels.. etc… OK fine, so I went down to the basement before the race and pulled up my dusty MTB, it just so happened to have those wheels on it… great, they are heavy and it was a very VERY hilly course. Duh!
Maybe I’ll start MTB racing again….

My thoughts go out to Jeremiah who flatted while in 4th place at the Canada World Cup on Sunday…. That’s gotta suck!!! I’m gonna be looking out for the big man himself at the next round this coming weekend… lets all hope he has a flawless ride and pulls of the result he deserves! He’s obviously in good shape, so… Go JB.
If JB stopped fucking around on his MTB though, I bet he could save himself some serious electricity bills with the watts that bastard puts out! Hook his turbo-trainer up to a capacitor… use his wheel as a fan to cool the house down… ecologically sound Bishop housing.
Have I been drinking?

hoooooooooo..........

Shit me… Have I mentioned it’s hot over here…?!

Summer Plans

So… I’m trying to figure out my summer. Right now it looks like I’ll be working following the Tour in July, then coming back home and doing the Ronde du Gard Elite stage race here in France in August. It’s a 5 day event… but it’s a French style stage race… none of your crits or circuit race bullshit! J It’s 5 days of 130kms per day… in a hilly area of France… and in bloody HOT weather… OUCH.
Then it looks like I will be going to the US where I will do the Virginia State Time Trial Championships as well as the MABRA Time Trial Championships. This will be interesting as my thing is more short Time Trials. These are both 40k TTs. Although our road races are longer here, our TTs are shorter, so it’ll be interesting to see how I do. It looks like I will only arrive in the US 2 days before the TTs (they are back to back Sat, Sun) so the jetlag will no doubt have an effect. Then it looks like there is a small chance that I might do the Green Mountain Stage Race in Vermont, and then the Univest Grand Prix, a UCI event in Pennsylvania.
Of course the main reason for my going back to the US is for Tim’s wedding.. yep.. that’s right.. the “drunk” is getting married… “who’da thunk it.” J
So.. that’s the plan for now… of course I’ll probably change my plans a hundred times between now and August, but that’s normal… some things never change.

July

I will be away again in July, working for Bikestyletours.com during the Tour de France. I have to get myself and my bike up to Paris for the 8th. I’m looking forwards to riding around and sharing this great riding country with the people on the bikestyletours.com trips. It should be a great TDF… I can’t wait!

Grounded

My thoughts go out to Greg who’s lying at home with a dislocated arm that he sustained upon his return from Airbus training a few weeks ago. Poor Greg is going to be housebound during the Tour de France… I’m sure we all feel really bad for the poor guy. We’ll be thinking of you there Greg, sitting in front of OLN, watching the Tour with a big old Belgian Beer in your one good hand. Maybe we should all come round in case you need to change the volume on the TV and your hand is already filled with a beer bottle.

Sadly Greg is unable to ride his beautiful carbon Lemond bike however… It’s Ok Greg.. I’ll put in the miles for you. :-) (well.. actually I think John Parks is putting in the miles for all of us!)

The last couple days

Well here we are again.. it’s summer! The weather is blisteringly hot… the roads are melting and my bike tires are dragging tar back into the house after every ride. I’m getting through litres and liters of water a day, and the sunscreen has become as vital as the air we breath.

I thought that once I had finished with school, I would have a lot more time to catch up with this sort of stuff.. but that hasn’t been the case.

Yesterday I went out on an MTB ride in the morning (I’m racing the MTB Midi Libre this weekend) and I discovered a stunning view. After riding through a bunch of fields, I found myself on the edge of a cliff, overlooking the Tarn, with a view that covered everything from Albi to Gaillac. In the distance I could see the heat hazed Mazamet Black mountains. I couldn’t see the Pyrenees though, it was too hot.

So after my MTB ride, I came home and had lunch on the balcony. Even though I sat in the shade (of course) it was a sweat fest of a lunch. Then I relaxed a little bit with a coffee to digest, before heading out for a 50k ride on my time trial bike in the afternoon. I chose a hilly loop as I wanted to really get a feel for the TT bike on hills (it sucks). So I headed out in possibly the hottest weather we’ve had yet, with only one water bottle. I did the hilly ride in 1h30, but when I got home I actually got a little scared. I was in a bit of a state. My body wasn’t reacting too well to the effort and fatigue from the ride in such heat… I think I pushed a bit too hard considering I was already tired and obviously dehydrated… still.. it was fun and a cool ride. So to cool off, I went over to hang out in a friend’s swimming pool in the evening.

After a stifling night, I woke up this morning feeling crappy. I’ve consumed VAST quantities of fluids since yesterday evening. It’s stupid hot again, and I’m about to head out for a ride. I was planning on doing my very hilly 100k loop, but seeing as there are no places to stop and get water on that loop, I’m going to do a different one.

Dead Tired. Need rest.

Well here we go again. The seriously hot weather is back. I love it.. it’s so hot you can’t do anything.

After 2 straight weeks of intervals, TT intervals, uphill sprint intervals and motorpacing, I rode Plateau de Beille and col du Chioula with my buddy Alphonce on Friday. I was so so tired. The intervals really took their toll. I was totally totally dead Friday evening. Yesterday I did 2 hours easy, and now today I’m heading down to the mountains again to watch the Route du Sud (where TIAA-Creff are racing) but mainly to ride the Col du Portillon with Stephane. Depending on how he feels, we might do it twice, and we might add the col de Peyresourde. After that I think will force myself to take 2 much needed and deserved recovery days.

Next week I plan on going down to Limoux for a couple days, and hanging out with James Hewitt, a British cyclist racing for the Bouygues Telecom development team Castelsarasin. We’ll hang out, drink coffee, and ride a little… but we’ll mainly do some relaxing and “battery recharging”.
So until next time.. A bientot.

still alive?

woahoooo.. it's about time I updated this thing!!!
I've busy as a .... erm.. well.. I've been busy! University, training, racing... drinking coffee... you know how it is!

Rick MArtinez emerged the other day... so it was good to hear from him...

Ok, I'll try and keep this thing unpdated a little more...

Later y'all
Grim Seen

Return to the USA countdown.

Only a few day before I jump onto a plan with my beloved bike to leave some quality Michelin rubber on the roads of Virginia. The weather here has turned a bit crap, and it is chilly and wet again. It’s OK though, I’ve been getting in some big rides, so I was planning on a slightly easier week anyway. I’ll also be doing the Carlo Dolan Crit on the 17th in the US. I’m looking forward to getting into the US peleton again. I hate Crits, but it’ll be good for me. It will be interesting to see how I feel, racing just 2 days after getting off the plane.
Sunday I am doing a 140k race down in the foothills of the Pyrenees. I was looking forward to this, but they are calling for snow and rain. I need to race, and I really want to race. I also really want to get in a couple of longish races, but I don’t want to crash and risk messing up my trip. If anything goes wrong, I’ll only have 3 days to recover. So my plan is to sit in and get some miles, I’ll pull out after 100k if it is too hairy… ie: if I see 4 or 5 crashes by the 100k point, I’ll get in the car. (I say that now, but I’m when it comes down to it, I’ll really think “Oh good, I’m staying in, 5 crashes means less people…”)

Stay Tuned.

Tour of Shenandoah:

I’m coming over to the US to do the Tour of Shenandoah with the Trek VW team. I’m really looking forward to the race. Usually this would be my kind of race, long point-to-point mountain stages. If only it were later in the year, and I could have spend some serious time in the Pyrenees riding my favorite climbs. Sadly that’s not the case… so I’m a little unsure about my fitness.

I’m really excited about the race. This is going to be one of the first times we have a clear leader, and everyone will have a clear job to do. This is more the kind of racing I like and look for. I don’t like racing for myself, that’s not how I think. I hope I’ll be strong enough to put my climbing experience to good use.

Thanks to Jeremiah Bishop for spending a LOT of time putting this composite team together and taking care of so many things.

Scott Gibbons:

Scott Gibbons has come and left. We had a great time riding and racing. We did a TimeTrial and a stage race. Scotts first few day here saw us ride in the rain and SNOW… only to get suntans a few days later. We did some great rides, Scott managed to crash every day he was here… well… almost… Scott saved it every time, but it was close. I don’t think a day went by without Scott either running into my rear wheel or going off the road into the ditch. See what happens when you mess around Scott.

The racing was good. We got to stand next to each other on the podium of the TT we did. Good start to the season for both of us. In the Stage race we did, we finished pretty much next to each other, and had fun doing Borat impressions. Pour French guys didn’t know what was going on. Scott has returned to the US and has been racing well. This is the second time he’s been over to race here in France, and he says racing here has taught him to be far more aggressive in the races back home, and see racing in a totally different light. Go for it Scott… attack! It’s better than sitting in the main field and finishing in anonymity.
Hope you can come back over here soon Scott!

1st 1st in 2005

Scott Gibbons and I went out to Carcassonne to do a Time trial, that was part of a team style duathlon sort of event.
The cold weather has started to move out now and today was a warm and sunny one.
The course was really hilly, with lots of STEEP climbs and lots of courners. It was very hard to ride the course on a Time Trial bike.

We ended the event by standing on the podium. Scott was 2nd, and I was 1st. It couldn’t have been a better finish with both of us so close to each other.

The event was a reassuring test for next week stage race (also very very hilly).

After the race we headed in to the old city of Carcassonne for some tourist activities. That means some visiting, photo taking, but mainly coffee drinking in the cafes.

Stuck in Airport.

Scott Gibbons finally got here today, after spending something like a 12 hour delay sitting in Amsterdam airport stuck by the snow.
It was a total nightmare trip for Scott.

To make things worse, his bike was even more delayed, and didn’t get here until a few days later.

Stuck in Airport.

Scott Gibbons finally got here today, after spending something like a 12 hour delay sitting in Amsterdam airport stuck by the snow.
It was a total nightmare trip for Scott.

To make things worse, his bike was even more delayed, and didn’t get here until a few days later.

Running away from a fake winter.

Well, winter plods on. Although I’m not sure you can really call it winter. We’ve had over a week’s worth of really nice weather. All the windows in the house are open, and it is so warm that I was even able to take a shower with the bathroom window open.

Sadly, I haven’t been able to make this most of the weather. I’ve been sick. I felt better for a couple of days mid week, but have now come down with something different. Add that to the fact that this is exam time… and the result is that my bikes are starting to gather dust.

I went on for a a few rides last week. I tried to ride alone as I really wasn’t feeling good and wanted to be able to come home if I felt bad. I was then talked into running a 10km race last Sunday. There were 240 people on the start line… it was hard and fast. The winter is ranked 5th in the world… or in France… I don’t remember, they’re runners, if there aren’t any wheels involved, it means little to me.

The big road races start soon, about a week after my last exam, so I’ll really out of shape and hating every minute of the race… I can’t wait. :-)

Well… I’d better go and stick my nose in some books, while the sun shines on others out hitting the blacktop.

Better late than never

Wooow.. how long has it been???

Sorry folks. I’ve been away in the UK for x-mas… and I’ve been sick for a little while.

I’ve also got a load of work that I’m getting behind on… so… I know… I really need to keep this thing up to date.
Sorry.

More soon

All the best to all of you.
Happy New Year.

Job at University?/Birthday Monday

Yep, today is my birthday… and to celebrate I have a full day of classes! Great stuff.
I did get an interesting offer from the head of the English Department today though. The University has offered me some lessons there… Giving lessons this is, not getting them.
So, I might be both a student and a teacher at the University in Albi, a bit of a strange situation, but it could be an interesting one. I’m not sure I’ll take the offer, but it is something to think about, and more to the point it is very flattering to be offered something like this. I guess I’m not such a muppet in their eyes as I am in yours! :-)

Now I need to go catch up on all this work I am so behind in… (oups)

Sunday Raceday

I awoke to a wet and cold Sunday morning today. Luckily there was an Elite Open Cyclocross race in Montauban. I say luckily because if it weren’t for a Cyclocross race I wouldn’t have ridden in this weather. It’s strange to see it wet after a few weeks of really nice weather.

So I loaded the CX bike into the car, drove down to Gaillac to pick up my friend Stephane (and ex-tri-athlete) who wanted to come and watch and headed for Montauban.

It was nice to see one of the FFC (French Cycling Federation) officials there who I know. He interviewed us at a race last year and has been looking out for Evolution Cycling and has been really friendly ever since. It was lucky because I had forgotten my Foreign Permission Letter that allows me to race in France, so technically I wasn’t allowed to race. He smoothed things over for me and I headed off to warm up on the trainer.

The race hard. There were some big name there, and some Cyclocross specialists. The guy who won is aiming to be selected for the World Championships, and has finished in the top 20 of all of this year’s National Cup races. Then there were some other names like Azmaker, Estadieu, the usual local ex-pros/big guns.

Seeing as I have had this bad back for the past week, I found that I had asthma warming up and couldn’t get rid of it. I was also on the last line of the starting grid because I haven’t done many of the rounds in the series. As usual they shot off really fast from the gun. The course is boring and mainly all flat. This kind of course really kills me, I catch people up on the technical stuff, but then I suffer on the flats.

Still it was nice to get out there and race. I really felt it in my legs afterwards though. There was another reason other than my back, Asthma and bad start position for me not doing too well (sounds like I am listing off excuses doesn’t it?!) I crossed the line (having sprinted it out with another guy) with a totally flat rear tire.

It’s all good. I need to do a load more CX races to get myself back into shape and force my body to work hard. Sadly there aren’t too many left this year…

Telethon

Saturday: Today is a special day; it is a national fund raising day for charity and medical research. The Village of Cadalen organizes a bike ride that goes around the area and gives out balloons, collects money etc. I did this ride a few years ago, and there were very happy to have me join them… in fact I gather from what people have told me, that they have been talking about it ever since. 2 years ago I didn’t make it as I was racing, last year I was laid up in bed sick… so this year I showed my face. They were once again really happy that I had turned up. It’s a very slow ride, but it’s fun. We stop at every village in the area, the Maire comes out, and they put on coffee and cakes in the village hall. It was a fun group of guys, with lots of joking, and of course the inevitable questions about racing, the season etc etc. Again people where out clearing woods and yards, burdening stuff etc, so the smells were magnificent. In the morning, the smells lingered in the misty morning air, as we plodded through the vineyards, past awakening houses and into sleepy towns. After a thousand coffees, lots of cake, something like 3 hours and 40km I was back home to do some shopping and usual boring life stuff. In the evening there were some things going on in the town hall… there was a demo of country dancing… “YEEEEHAAAA”. My buddy Stephane joined us and we spend the evening drinking wine and shooting the shit over a good meal!

My body works again

Friday: A perfect night’s sleep… now that my back is better I thought I should get back on the bike. So I did an easy ride this morning before going to class, then in the afternoon and spent an hour and half on the Time Trial bike to see how my body felt under a little pressure. It was a nice day out. In was in the 50s. In fact yesterday it was 60 degrees… not back for December!!! People were out cleaning their yards before the winter, and burning wood and weeds, so the air was filled with loads of beautiful smells of all kinds of different wood…