June 1 – Depart from California

As I procrastinated updating my blog, more and more of the season progressed, making for more ground to cover and the post to come that much more daunting. So, here I sit at LAX waiting for a flight and will likely continue this lengthy post in the air, somewhere between Los Angeles and Montreal. But, without further adieu, here it is.

I am unsure of where I left off last, so I will do a brief re-cap. I drove down to Los Angeles to race for a Southern California based U25 development team, NOW MS-Society. Racing began early, with the first criterium on January 25. The level of racing has been high with many American based professionals calling Southern California home. On any given weekend I will line up against at least a few riders representing their respective Continental/Pro Continental/Pro Tour teams. The early season saw racing mostly in SoCal, but travel was in store with Valley of the Sun in Arizona and Merco Cycling Classic in Northern California. Other highlights of the early-early season would be racing through the vineyards of the Santa Ynez Valley near Santa Barbara against a full Team Type 1 squad, Ted King of Cervelo Test Team and Brian Vandborg of Liquigas and getting snowed on in the mountains East of San Diego with Floyd Landis and Rory Sutherland among others. That all was a build up to the first big block of the season in March.

Mid-March came around pretty quick and before we knew it, two of the team’s biggest races of the season were upon us. First came the San Dimas Stage Race which would serve as a final preparation for the Redlands Bicycle Classic. San Dimas proved to be an eye opener and a disappointment for most everyone on the team. Only one of us would finish the entire race, the ever-strong friendly giant, Brock Curry. For the two races, Kurt Stockton (former DS of Sierra Nevada/Kodak Gallery and retired professional) was brought on to direct our team. His experience proved invaluable and with his direction I was able to turn around an ugly performance in San Dimas to have a great ride in Redlands. Redlands has a unique atmosphere to it and I enjoyed it thoroughly. It was my first NRC level race and was incredibly hard. On the second stage, pushed along by a tailwind on a newly paved false-flat descent I managed to hit 95 + km/h while in the peloton. The speed was incredible and survival every day was the goal. In the end I finished just better than top half of the 200 some field, happy with my ride and the knowledge gained.

In April came the Long Beach Grand Prix which brought the excitement of racing a sinuous criterium through the streets of Downtown Long Beach. It became a party for cyclists and non-cyclist spectators alike. My claim to fame in the inaugural event was flipping through the air and finishing the race sliding on the road across the line. Next was the Sea Otter Classic in Monterey. The reputation of this race speaks for itself although the entirety of it was impressive. With a combination of every form of mountain biking and road cycling, the festival was a cyclist’s dream. The racing proved tough with a large, powerful Bissell team in addition to Levi Leipheimer. I found the legs for a result in the Road Race, but the Circuit Race on the Laguna Seca Raceway took many victims and unfortunately I was one. To elaborate, I believe 15 riders remained at the finish with everyone else being pulled. The following week, I made the long drive to Bisbee, Arizona for the Vuelta de Bisbee. The eccentric town provided a unique back-drop to an exciting race. For once, my appetite for climbing was satiated. This was a first encounter with the Tecos-Trek Mexican Continental team, although I will make a point of mentioning their lack of sportsmanship. Not only did they attack when the Yellow Jersey and a handful of favourites stopped for a brief nature break, but once again attacked through the feed zone. Overall, I felt stronger and stronger after each stage and ended up 35^th.

Sitting up on the finish line of the Long Beach Grand Prix

Finally there is one more race worth mentioning, the Ventura County Stage Race. It felt almost like a “home” stage race being so close and having ridden in Ventura a few times. The race had a great turn-out for its inaugural edition. Each of the courses was fantastic and challenging. After an unfortunate prologue, I saved face by riding well in the brutal crit and circuit race stages. In the crit, I managed to survive and settle long enough to be in the mix when the attacks were deciding the race. I was in a move with Roman Kilun (Ouch p/b Maxxis), the Yellow Jersey and a handful of known strong local riders. It looked promising, but we were brought back after a few laps and the counter attack is the one that stuck. Neil Shirley was the instigator of the winning move and essentially dropped everyone who had been off the front with him. My teammate Tyler Locke went with the initial move, but it was only Rudy Napolitano who could ride with Neil. Eventually he was dropped as well and Neil soloed in. The pack that came in after had been reduced to maybe 25 riders. The Circuit Race in Ojai was incredibly tough due to a hard climb and the immense heat. The group fragmented when the screws were tightened, but it wasn’t until Roman Kilun and Neil Shirley respectfully attacked that the final selections began to take shape. I found myself in the largest group on the road, behind 6 riders off the front in various combinations. Feeling strong on the climb, but not strong enough for a bridge to seasoned pros, I bided my time to wait for a suitable time. When it came, I manage to hold a gap for close to half a lap before the catch, but further dwindled our group. Coming to the line, our group consisted of 8 people, still the biggest on the road. With Rudy taking the sprint for 7^th, I ended up 12^th on GC.

Ventura Road Stage in Ojai

I have only really covered the big races I find are deserving of a mention. I raced plenty of criteriums; a SoCal specialty, as well as a few road races that there is just not enough print room to talk about. Right now I am on my way up to Saguenay for the U23 Nations Cup Ville Saguenay where I am proud to say I will represent Canada in international competition once again. Following that, I will briefly return to Alberta and while there will race the Banff Bike Fest. Then it is back to Quebec for the Canadian Road National Championships. I will travel even more after that. I believe I am in for a cyclist’s summer, aggressively pursuing the future I want for myself. It will surely be an exciting time.

In a break at the Barry Wolfe Grand Prix

The Early Season

Well, I have once again fallen into the trap of laziness and excuses preventing me from frequent blog updates. In fact, I have raced 12 days this season already, but this is my first real post of the season.

After the drive to California and the frustration of trying to find a place to live were over, I jumped right into the early season racing scene that SoCal has to offer. I did a crit on January 25th, albeit a low-level one, but still the earlisest in the year I had ever raced. The strange thing about it was that while it was club-level racing, Tony Cruz (BMC), Brad Huff (Jelly Belly) and a handful from Rock Racing showed up. There has been a minor adjustment period since then and I now expect at least a few pros to show up to any race I am at. The weekend after I went up to Santa Barbara and stayed at a teammates house on University of California, Santa Barbara campus (as did 5 or 6 others). The Poor College Kids Road Race was the opening Road Race of the season and with the course about 15 km north of Solvang, it attracted a lot of strong riders. Of note on the start list was the full Team Type 1 squad (who were doing their training camp there), Ted Kind of Cervelo Test Team and Brian Vandborg of Liquigas.

The race season rolled along with the next notable race the Boulevard Road Race about an hour south east of San Diego and just a few minutes from the Mexican Border. The race was up in the desert mountains and it was quite cold. The race is typically a big race due to the turnout from pro teams getting in some final prep before the Tour of California. So, on the start line were teams OUCH, Jelly Belly, Fly V Australia, Team Type 1, plus a couple of Bissell and BMC guys. As we lined up to start, adding to an already freezing temperature, it started to snow … heavily. It turned into a full on blizzard as we sprinted away only to start descending on the large loop we were to race. I hung near the back on the descent because I couldn’t feel if my hands were braking and with the carbon wheels I was running, if the braking was having the desired effect. After climbing back up to the start/finish for the first time, about 50 riders pulled off the course and called it a day. Being Canadian, and having done rides in similar weather, I could not do the same. By the end I finished 25th, just a bit back from Floyd Landis (16th) and Rory Sutherland (17th).

The team itself has been great. All of the riders are easy to get along with and it makes racing with them that much more enjoyable. All of the Elite Team is U25 and is made up of Cat. 1’s : Eric Bennett, Brock Curry, Michael van Eerd (Dutch), Nick Martinez, Peter Rennie (Kiwi), and myself. Cat. 2’s: Cory Greenberg, Erik Losak, Tyler Locke, and Aaron Schneider. There is also Junior Kit Karzen who will soon be a 2 on the road and is an extremely fast on the Track (ie. Junior US Points Race Champion). Between us all, we make up a strong team with riders that can net some real results.

The team got together a few weeks ago for a ride from Eric Bennett’s place in Ventura. After a solid 3 hours with some good climbing, we headed to the start of a crit in Santa Barbara. We had a large contingent of strong guys there and made it known. On the start line, Eric and I clipped in and leaned into each other right on the line. The gun went off and we attacked from the line. Within a lap, we hap 4 more riders with us, Cody O’Reilly of Bissell, Danny Finneran of Rock Racing, someone from SLO – Nexus, as well as Kiwi Pete. We worked well together and kept the pace high and steady. Just before the half-way point in the race, we lapped the field. This is where the rest of the team took to the front and set tempo/chased down attacks. In the last 10 laps I was marking the other break riders and getting ready to set-up for the sprint. I found myself in the sprinter’s spot in our lead-out train. I was feeling great and all seemed perfect until 3 laps to go when we ran out of riders. Strong guys, but tired from all the work, re-cycling the lead-out train wasn’t working out. With 2 laps to go we were swarmed by the pack and I had to push my way through to find a spot out. Coming onto the finishing straight, I was maybe top 15, but let my sprint go, found a gap, and jumped out to claim fourth in the bunch sprint. The team was 3rd, 4th and 5th.

Aside from racing I have enjoyed my time here as well. I made it out to the Tour of California Stages in Solvang and the one finishing in Passedena. It was exciting to watch, but I am less interested in the presence of big names these days. It felt strange watching teams I race against every weekend line up with Saxo-Bank, Astana, Columbia-Highroad, Quick Step and Rabobank. Even then, I had Mark Cavendish walk in front of me when no fans were around and all I did was politely nod. The circus that follows the ToC around and how many people swarm the pros for autographs is unbelievable. It is great to see so many people out watching a bike race in the US, even if 60% of them were there just to see Lance Armstrong. All in all it was fantastic to see the domestic and Tour de France caliber fields married in a place that seems very applicable to my own career right now.

In the next couple of weeks I have some very big races coming up. This Friday-Sunday is the San Dimas Stage Race and then next Thursday-Sunday is the Redlands Bicycle Classic. I am excited to line up against some of, if not the best domestic racers in North America and show my stuff.

2800 kms to Santa Monica

On January 16th I began the drive down to Santa Monica from our new house in Devon. Along with me to split the long drive ahead was my mom. We left in the morning, planning on ending the day somewhere in Montana. As we made our way South the snow slowly started to get thinner and thinner. By the time we were in Lethbridge it was above zero. We crossed the border around 3:00 pm and set out into new territory. For some reason I was expecting wildly different lanscape as to warrant the border, but it looked just the same as Southern Alberta for many kilometers. As the Sun went down I was unfortunately driving through a mountain pass and the fatigue off travelling all day coupled with unfamiliar and unpredictable roads was a bit stressful for me in the dark. So at around 6:00 pm we entered state capital Helena where we would spend the night. The whole experience was a bit interesting starting with the kind girl at the front desk of our hotel bringing us freshly baked cookies while I was on the rollers. Later we dined at a restaurant that intentional or not, looked identical to a Montana’s Cookhouse. I found this quite humorous. Then as we were leaving town the next morning, in the middle of town were a herd of deer waiting at a traffic light.

The next day of travel took us across 3 states. We entered Idaho where we once again found an abundance of snow. Idaho was a bizarre, seemingly deserted place with parts looking like the moon. There was also a strange haze near Pocatello that seemed out of place with the snow on the ground. This same haze reappeared, but stronger as we made it to our next state, Utah. At this point we could not see much save for a 10-15 kilometer radius around the Interstate. As we continued to descend further South, the traffic became worse and worse. This was of course due to the Salt Lake City population. The traffic became very heavy, with lanes beginning and ending and people going every direction in every lane. For over 100 km I had to deal with this new mess, having never seen traffic like it before. It was a big relief when it finally dissipated and it felt even better when we ended out day in Cedar City.

We woke up in Cedar City, which looked to be quite a cool and unique place, and were on the road quickly. It was not long before we saw the last snow of the trip and came upon the bright red rock and arid desert characteristic of Utah. This provided a great sag-way to Arizona and the Virgin River Gorge. I was amazed by the sight of these massive red mountains, driving a narrow road through gigantic foreign rocks. As we left the Virgin River Gorge we almost immediately were upon Nevada. Crossing through Las Vegas, we took a brief detour down the strip before heading back on the I-15 and what seemed like the home stretch. From Vegas on, the traffic was thick. We entered California, which wasn’t as big a relief as I expected, however the burritos we had from the Mexican stand in Baker were the best I have ever had. Continuing on, I expected some valley to open up into lush green fields with fruit trees as was my vision of California. Instead, around each bend was another open desert with minimal plant life and a town or two that looked like they have a hard time sustaining themselves. But soon we dropped down to a lower elevation and were just a massively populated space of land from our destination. We made our first real turn of the trip (from the I-15 onto the I-10) and this is where we once again encountered the traffic. To put it simply, Los Angeles freeways are crazy and illogical. One lane is going far too fast and another far too slow. But wait, they have just reversed roles. You can go from a standstill to 80 mph (~130 kmph) very quickly, but don’t even bother trying to change lanes. So, we eventually made it to Santa Monica in one piece and it was beautiful. Sitting at an uncharacteristic 28 degrees Celsius, I went for my first real road ride of the season.

From then on I met the team who are all nice and very accommodating and later found a room in an apartment after a few hard days of searching. My place in Santa Monica is great; only about 10 blocks to the Pacific Ocean. It sits between Wilshire and Montana which are both streets with a lot going on. I am maybe 6 blocks from Third Street Promenade and Downtown Santa Monica. Basically what I am trying to say is that I really like it here and after a long journey this is the type of place where I would like to be.

New Team Kit

Here is the preliminary NOW/MS Society 2009 kit which I will be wearing this season.

End of Season Post – On to New Things

It has been months since my last post, but this one has been in the works and I needed to knock it off before 2009. I guess I have left it a little late, but no better a time than right now. So, the nature of this post is an end-of-season wrap as the title gives away, but I have been stuck trying to find the aspect of my season I want to capture in this post.

To be blunt, my season was not what I expected, and a bit of a let-down. I over-trained in February and continued to do damage without rest well into April. In May, after some time off the bike, I had some successes, but never had a feeling of freshness again in the season and my form was all-over, with excessive fatigue being the main feature I could bring to the bike. I did not reach a new potential that I was excited about leading into the season and it took Track Nationals to bring my love of the sport back to the forefront. Now that I have covered that, I can leave negative-town behind and move on to what I really want to say.

Going to France this year was an experience right from the moment I met the new team. It was unexpected and a new approach to a sport I thought I knew really well. We all hear about how European racing is the ‘real deal’ and here I was about to join a high level amateur team and experience a season learning my trade. The racing and atmosphere were pretty removed from what I had done in the South of France in 2007. First of all, I was no longer a junior and second of all, the team was large jump up from the Sprinter Club de Nice. The biggest thing I can take from this season was learning to race. I say that with all respect to the strong and developing Alberta scene. Competing against ex-pros and riders who will have professional contracts with ProTour teams at the end of the season, in an environment where you must attack, be a strong climber, and be tactically astute to finish in the top 15 on any given day. It is apparent that this will teach you how to race. Beyond that, my time in France taught me the cultural differences and how they relate to cycling in a broader sense.

So now is time to move on to next season. I spent the latter part of the season talking to team directors domestically (North America) to see what options lay in front of me for 2009. I ended up settling things with the Los Angeles based NOW MS-Society. The team caught my eye with results in the Tour of Pennsylvania and after talking with team director Eddie Monnier, their goals and focus on development were in line with what I was looking for. One title sponsor is “No Opportunity Wasted” (NOW) run by Phil Keoghan (host of “The Amazing Race” reality TV show) with the philosophy of ditching excuses, living NOW and with few regrets. The other sponsor is the MS Society who is more of a reverse-sponsor as we raise money and awareness for them. The team has produced 6 professional riders in four seasons and in 2009 we will have two previously professional riders joining the roster, one from Successful Living and the other from Rock Racing. As well as myself, there will be another few international riders with Dutch rider Michael Van Eerd and possibly Kiwi Peter Rennie and Australian Chris Steffanoni going stateside with us for part of the season.

I am excited to join the new team and am leaving for LA in a few weeks. The race schedule set in front of us is something I look forward to with some very high level races planned. Something I am really happy about is the ability for me to continue to train and race on the track as Los Angeles has two velodromes in the area, one an indoor 250 m of UCI standards. It will be another new experience, but I am more motivated than ever, and feel that I can use 2008 as a superb launch pad into a stellar 2009. I have set my eyes on some meaty goals and I believe that with intelligence, strength and desire I can achieve them and do some real damage.

Bike Alberta #13

It has been roughly a month since my last post and so understandably a lot has taken place. I finished my time in France with a tough week that left me fatigued and I was more than glad to be returning home. August 12th was when I made my trip from Lyon to Frankfurt to Calgary and finally Edmonton. There was a strange déjà vu feeling to being back home as I slowly remembered the minor details of the environment surrounding me. I was not, however, done my season as the reason for my early return was to prepare for the Track National Championships in Burnaby a few weeks later. Roughly a week after my return I headed to the track for the first time this year for motor-pacing with Alex Stieda. This was an exciting endeavour and I was forced to find my track legs behind the motor-bike. A few more trips to the Edmonton velodrome helped me build on the good sensations of riding track. Before I knew it, I was on another plane, albeit a much shorter flight, to Abbotsford.

Upon arriving at the track I had mixed emotions as I was both excited and a little nervous. The last time I had been to Burnaby, some two or three years ago, I crashed twice with tires that wouldn’t stick to the wood. My first 10 minutes spinning around this year were a bit tense as I could remember the exact feeling of the tires slipping and getting caught by the grooves below. I had no issues this time and soon found myself very comfortable with the trac

k. The first event was the Elite Men’s 4 km Pursuit. I was somewhat unsure of what to expect with this as I had never before done a 4 km individual pursuit in training or racing. So I set a goal of what I thought would be a good time and planned to ride the splits accordingly. I started well, but after the first km, my split times were slower than I wanted and continued to slow until I was passed by the rider opposite me. Once passed, the gap opened to the mandatory 10 m and then stood still. Later I began to bring in the rider, Emile de Rosnay, although the CCA stated before the race that once a rider is passed, he cannot pass that rider back. I understand this is so no drafting occurs, but what are you supposed to do if you are gaining on them? So I almost rode into Emile, just as he was pulling up from finishing. I then accelerated the last lap and finished with a time of 5:07. I wasn’t thrilled with that, but I recognized the causes.

The next and final race in this event-light national championships was the Elite Men’s Points Race. This has always been my favourite track event and I was excited to see how I would fare. In the morning, around 9, they held two qualifying heats, each with 13 riders and 10 moving on. In my heat was Svein Tuft, just back from the Olympics. As the race started, I began to hurt substantially, but after a solo attack where I took points off the front, somehow my legs came around. I set into the aggressive intuition that sometimes happens to me in a points race and I knew where to be and what I had to do for points. I finished with a few good sprints, most just sitting behind Svein as no one could match his speed. I finished placed 6th, but only 10 finished, so everyone from our heat qualified. A full 12 hours later was the final with both Svein Tuft and Zach Bell. From the start I found myself hanging around at the back of the pack, not knowing quite what to do. I couldn’t match the speed of some of the others to get points in a sprint and was slightly under-geared. As Zach and Svein lapped the field for the first time, I moved up and became more aggressive. Large gaps would open and each time I would be able to close them without much trouble. I began to get back into that intuitive feeling. Soon I moved up under the strung out peloton after a chase had let up and found myself off the front. When I realised people were hesitating to chase, I accelerated hard. Within a few laps, two riders (Danielle Defrancheschi and Emile de Rosnay) had bridged up to me and we began to work efficiently together. We gained steadily on the peloton and contested two sprints between ourselves before coming back. At one point we were 40 m from lapping the field, but just then was our second sprint and we blew up soon thereafter. Back in the pack, I continued to ride aggressively, making a few more rather futile efforts to get away, but without any more points. The finish came fast and I really didn’t feel too spent until I got off my bike. I ended up 11th with 6 points and should we have taken a lap that would have been much better.

I left Burnaby feeling great and am glad I made the effort to race there. My season is now over and with the excitement of the track in my blood, it has ended differently. Instead of ending with my return from Europe, spent mentally and physically from a long and demanding season, I ended wanting more. I am sad to be missing the Cyclo-Cross season, but I feel better knowing I will recover fully to take on a new season in a couple of months. I am also back at the U of A for another fall semester which will be rejuvenating in itself.

In the next couple of weeks I will do my final Bike Alberta post of the season. I am planning on tackling a summary of my time in Europe packed with all the gritty details.

-Spencer

Bike Alberta #12

As August nears, my race schedule fills and I near my return to Edmonton. The past two weeks have seemed like life as usual here in Le Creusot. Training, racing and watching the Tour have been the highlight as living alone can be quite dull. My roommate returns, however, on the 3^rd and my race schedule is about to become a little heavier, so I have less time to be bored. I meant to make it to a stage of the Tour while it was close, but those plans fell through when I tried to figure out a means of transportation. My racing picked up again after recovering from the travel and resumed as normal. The weather here right now is considerably great with lots of heat and much less rain. All in all, France at this time of the year inspires a pleasantly relaxing feel. In accordance with this, the race schedule becomes thick with races to be found on pretty much any given day.

This past weekend I did two races. Saturday’s race, the Prix de la municipalite Frontenaud, was a Cat. 2-3-J race in the far east of the Saone et Loire. It was a circuit race with 16 laps of 5 km to total 80 km. From the start, Creusot set out to dominate, especially because we had the most riders of any team. On the first lap I attacked solo to start what I expected to be a large amount of early aggression, ultimately deciding the groups. I stayed away for another lap before being joined by two other riders, one of them my teammate Cedric. We worked together, pushing the gap over 2 minutes until at around 40 km to go, we received news of 2 more Creusot riders bridging up to us. We stopped working with the rider of a different team at this point for obvious tactical reasons and he seemed to understand quite well, driving the pace alone to protect his chances. Some laps later Cedric flatted, but got in with the bridge group, greatly aiding their work. With 10 km to go, the 3 Creusot riders made the junction and we began to work over the other rider. This was working well and on the final lap, I was feeling strong, but with 2 km to go, I hit a large crack in the road and flatted. What made it worse was that there were no more spare wheels. My teammates took 1, 2 and 4 on the day. I did not let this get me down, however, as the next day I had a tough race.

Sunday was the Elite Nationale GP Cours-la-Ville, a race in the Pay de Roannais. The course was difficult, featuring a 4 km Col each lap as well as a 1 km climb to the finish line and numerous false flat sections. At the start line were riders who will be professional next year after doing Stagaires with teams the like of Ag2r, Credit Agricole and Francaise des Jeux. From the gun it was a tough race. The climb proved difficult as riders used it to continually attack each other while the peloton tried to follow each move. The race went well for Creusot, with Jean-Cristophe Peraud making the front group of 12 and then winning. Jean-Cristophe is a mountain biker who rides for Orbea off-road and Creusot on the road. He recently won the French Amateur Road Championships in a solo breakaway and he is using these races on the road as a build-up for the Olympic mountain bike race. He also won the World relay championships with team France at this year’s World Mountain bike Championships. As for the others from Creusot, only Amyric finished.

Looking to the future, I have a race schedule full of races in the next two weeks and after that I am back home in Alberta. I am returning to prepare for Track Nationals in Burnaby at the end of August. After that I am almost immediately back at the U of A for another Fall Semester. Returning to the Track will be a great way to bring closure to a long season of road in France.

Bike Alberta #11

So, I sit here in my apartment back in Le Creusot after a two week return to Canada for the National Road Championships. The trip began after a difficult Tour Cantons de Mareuil et Verteillac. The espoir race was exceptionally tough not only because of the level of the teams, but the 36 degree heat. Unsatisfied with a DNF on the first stage (along with two teammates), I looked forward to the trip to Quebec where there would be friends, family and a familiar race scene. The excitement of this trip had been building for a long time and it felt relieving to finally see it through. Of course the trip itself was a painful experience, but so long as I got back to Canada I was happy.

Once I had landed, I went to visit family in Montreal and was soon off to Beauce to prepare for Nationals. To deal with the jet lag from a 6 hour time change and a 7 hour flight, I had arrived a week early. This way I could get acclimatized while finishing up

my preparation in the region. As the Juniors, Paracyclists and Masters were racing that week, I saw bunch of old friends, which felt great, especially considering I had seen only three Canadians from January until that point. So, as I got acclimatised, I continued my preparation training, the highlight of which was the leg of the Tour de Beauce to Mt. Megantic. The time passed quickly and before I knew it, it was time to race the Individual Time Trial.

The preparation for the ITT was covered well. My mom would be able to follow me with a support vehicle and my dad had all the equipment figured out so that I did not have to stress about any of the technical details or problems (which we experienced in abundance that week). So, I warmed up, checked my bike and waited to start, all the while exuding confidence in my abilities. As I started, I watched my power carefully so as to not go too hard and blow up. Up the hill and into the wind and I could see two of my minute men. I know this doesn’t mean too much as they could potentially be the two slowest on course, but it still feels good. My ride got a little more stagnant until the turn-around where I caught three riders in about 5 km. I had also put a large amount of time on the rider following me, so I was feeling good about my ride. I pushed through to the finish, wheezing as I crossed the line and was happy with my effort. My power was 15 watts more than last year over twice the distance. Despite all of this, a good result failed to materialize, and I was disappointed. At first I challenged the result as my SRM showed almost a minute exactly less the official time on the result sheet. The comissaires were helpful in showing me both the electronic and hand-timing numbers and re-doing the calculations which made sense. It was frustrating to have a ride you think is great, only to have the results tell you differently.

The next and my final race in Canada before returning to France was the combined Elite/U23 National Road Race. Using the same course as the St. Georges de Beauce circuit race stage in the Tour de Beauce, Nationals featured a 9.6 km circuit with a tough 1.5 km climb and few sections to really rest. We lined up for 18 laps totalling 172 km with Symmetrics taking control from the gun. The sun was out rather forcefully as felt through the humidity, making it tough without being exceptionally hot. My legs did not feel their best at the start, but as we worked into a few laps, they began to come around. Then on lap two a big surge on the hill as someone tried to get across to the early breakaway left me as one of the riders trying to get back on. It was not too difficult to do that, but that became a recurrence every few laps as the peloton whittled down. I would struggle low on the climb and then surge past people at the top where for some reason I felt much stronger and then rejoin the peloton with a small group. This happened three times in total. Then on lap 10 I began to cramp as well on the climb and this was the one that saw me go. At that point, the peloton could not have been more than 35 riders with a chase group in between us and the breakaway. This time I could not make it across and struggled alone, occasionally catching or being caught by other riders. I pushed hard alone until the 13th lap, when riding up the climb, I began cramping violently. With both legs, my quads, calves and hamstrings contracted forcefully and I was unable to move them. I tried pedalling softly to work it out, but would receive a kick of pain and another forceful contraction. I tried stopping pedalling, but the muscle remained locked and extremely painful. I didn’t know what to do, so I got off my bike to try and stop the cramping. This too proved a bad idea as I collapsed, unable to stand. So I pulled myself onto the curb, and then my bike and tried to de-contract these muscles so I could get back on and continue. As I lay there, the first riders on course came past and I was lapped. Like the other 100 some riders who were lapped or pulled out, I received a DNF. From counting the remaining Espoirs left in the race, I figure I was about 20th if I had been classified. I was fairly pleased with the day, however, as I definitely pushed myself hard. It was good to race with the best in Canada and my DNF doesn’t seem so bad considering the peloton was lapped and the chase group including Dominique Rollin and Charles Dionne just escaped being lapped.

The day after, I set out for another long day/two of travel to Montreal, then Paris and finally Le Creusot. I took a little detour into Paris between my flight and train, but was glad to arrive at the apartment that night.

Bike Alberta 10

I am nearing the end of the first part of my stay here in France as my focus intensifies on the Canadian National Road Cycling Championships in St. George-de-Beauce, Quebec. Lately I have had the time for some specific training directed at the National Championships and I feel both my form and confidence building to where I want them to be. This past week also marked my return to racing after two weeks of structured training.

The week was a rather tame one leading up to the race on Sunday. Bartosz was at the five day Tour du Nivernais Morvan leaving the house quiet. Gone were the strange events of the week before such as encountering herds of cattle on the road going both the same and opposite direction as me while I trained. This tranquility felt refreshing, however, and made sure I was well rested leading up to the weekend.

Sunday’s race was another 2-3-junior race rather close by, but featured a unique course with a circuit and a climb of both substantial length and grade. Of the 7 km loop, the hill covered 2 km with grades of up to 10 %. Creusot was represented by a mere 4 riders as most of the young riders were preparing for their final examinations (in France’s equivalent of High School and I believe further levels of education as well). We lined up to total 70 racers at the line and were soon off. In the first lap I led the pack up the climb wanting to both test my legs and see where everyone else was at. It felt great and I looked in my mind to stand as one of the strongest. I made sure I held a good position throughout the race and kept a close eye on the favourites I knew from previous races. After about a third of the race, I began to feel increasingly more uncomfortable. In my preparation for the race I had miscalculated the time and ate too close to the start. A substantial break rolled off the front at this point, though with no favourites in it and two teammates there, I decided to let it go. When the break started to gain ground quickly, the peloton opened its eyes and people either attempted to bridge or put in an effort to chase. In response to a bridge effort, I attacked and put in a large effort to bring back the riders. The effort brought me close to vomiting as I have in the past, but this time it was the food encouraging it. I was left with stomach acid in the throat and the chase was put on hold. The race continued and the bridge efforts made contact with the lead break, bringing the group to about 20. The gap grew substantially with no-one in the peloton wanting to chase their teammates down. During this time I witnessed a fight between two riders I know. I am not sure of the preceding incident, but one threw his bottle at another and in response the other elbowed the instigator while we were descending. It was interesting to watch as after the incident, riders of each team would chase each other down to prove a point. As the race entered the latter portion, I found myself with lots of energy and becoming frustrated with the increasingly tame race. So, on the approach to the start/finish one lap, I noticed the wave of a flag marking a prime, and took off. I set a tying or new record in maximum power in the following sprint and took the prime winning 5 euros! After this effort, the race grew even tamer, to the point of boredom. When we started riding 30 km/h and my heart rate was less than 150 beats per minute, I knew I had to do something as it was ridiculous. At this point we were over 5 minutes behind the breakaway and nobody in the peloton was taking the race seriously. I knew I needed and wanted more effort at least for training, constantly with the National Championships in the back of my mind. So I went to the front and brought the pace up to a reasonable speed. I spent the entire last lap pulling with a friend of mine from SCO Dijon. When it came to the final hill, I put in a big effort and intentionally or unintentionally separated myself and three others from the pack. I held this right to the line where I was caught in the sprint.

This upcoming weekend will be my last race in France before I return to Quebec for the National Championships. I am travelling to the Dordonge region in the Southwest for the Tour de Cantons de Mareuil et Verteillac. It is a Federale Espoir stage race and will prove to be fast with many big teams attending. Teams of note are USA National Espoirs, Vendee U (Bouygues Telecom feeder team), Vienne Agritrubel (Agritrubel feeder team) as well as many other top ranked French amateur teams. It will prove to exciting and challenging.

Bike Alberta #9

It has been two weeks now since my last race. The Tour du Beaujolais saw higher level teams turn out for three road stages on roads that wound and climbed through the famous vineyards. The first stage on Saturday started in Villefranche-sur-Saone and after winding up and down the countryside, finished in Villie-Morgon. The race did a neutral start loop through downtown Villefranche that was spectacular and hilarious as riders would crash attempting to ride the wet cobbled sidewalk to gain a more favourable position. The “depart reel” occurred once we left the city and for the first half of the race, a strong tail/crosswind made the race fast and hard. It felt as if the peloton was on the verge of a split many times, but I was able to hold tight to the wheels in front and close all necessary gaps. The wind settled as we rode up the first GPM and my teammates Yanick and Anthony went in a move. They came back after maybe a kilometre, so I launched a counter-attack. I got clear with a few other guys, but the peloton started charging and I soon found myself dangling off the back. As we neared the top, I put in what seemed like a monumental effort to bridge the gap to the next group and was successful. Descending, we watched the peloton so close in front of us, maybe 10-15 seconds, but never managed to get across. I felt strong in the group and over the next two GPMs, helped to blow apart the group. Once again feeling the strongest on the flats, I dropped the group on the small climb to the finish line, albeit, a ways back from the leader.

Sunday held two road stages, a 55 km circuit race in the morning, and a climber’s delight of an afternoon road stage. In the morning, rain started as we made our way up and down the climb on the ~10 km circuit. The course proved more technically challenging than physically with a long, winding descent as well as cobbled sections and corners through old medieval towns. The only breakaway to get away came back quickly as the peloton rode by them scattered all over the wet cobblestones adjacent to a brasserie. This left the race demanding, yet kept everyone together for the most part. My teammate Lionel Joblot made it off the front in a solo effort (he was 14 minutes back in the first stage) after a failed group breakaway attempt and stayed away to the finish. He was 15 seconds ahead of the peloton (where I finished with the rest of the team) and was the only one to get away. It was his second victory of the season after a similar styled win in a crit.

It kept raining into the afternoon as we readied for the hardest stage. It started with a minor climb and I rode with seeming ease at the front as we descended and conquered more minor climbs. At kilometre 10, the invisible curtain dropped as we headed up a 7 km col. I slid back at about the half-way point where it seemed to hit me. At the top, I was in a group behind the shrinking peloton and once again in a position to aid the chase. The group grew as we caught more riders, but that was short-lived as the group separated on the steep second GPM. There were now maybe six of us pushing a decent pace up and down the never-ending hills. We caught a few more riders before the final climb to the line, where the group separated once again. At the finish I was surprised to see how many riders had abandoned due to the toughness of the stage. I finished much better than I had thought. Overall, the race forced exactly half of the field at the start of the first stage to abandon or finish behind time limits. The team itself did well with a stage win and 11^th overall for Emilien Broe, and 3^rd overall in team GC. It was comical to see Emilien trying to carry all the boxes for the 36 bottles of wine he won for kilometre 69 (department number prime).

After the Tour du Beaujolais, I expected to ride the Tour de Pays de Savoie, but the team list had been sent to the organizers and I was left without a race. While the concept of not racing on the weekend seemed confusing, it actually proved as a good opportunity to do some structured training. The highlight of the weekend was four hours in the light rain (which was more refreshing than anything) and riding up Mt. Saint Vincent, among other climbs, which offered a great view looking down on the clouds. This next weekend will be another without a race (Wow, scary) as it is the regional championships, which I cannot compete in, all over France.