Crazy times at the Tour of Languedoc Roussillon

Over the last week I have been competing in the UCI 2.2 Tour of Languedoc-Rousillon, in the south of France, and it is fair to say, it has probably been one of the strangest, unpredictable weeks in bike racing.

The week started badly, when, half an hour from arriving at the race hotel, after a 6 hour drive from Spain, my team mate received a text from a another cyclist, saying that the organiser had decided to cancel the tour! It was then confirmed once we got to the hotel that the organiser did not have the money to pay the police to set up the race courses, so the race was not able to go ahead. As you can imagine, none of the teams were too pleased about this, as everyone had spent a lot of money and time getting to the race, and as a UCI ranked race, it was ridiculous that it could be cancelled less than 24 hours before the start of the first stage. Anyway, after several meetings, the money for the police was somehow found, and it was decided that the tour would go ahead, but would start a day late, reducing it from 6 stages to 5. However2 of the big teams- Rabobank and Dolmans, who could obviously afford to write off the money spent getting to the race decided to leave the anyway, in protest about what had happened.

So after an extra day chilling at the hotel, the race started on Saturday, with a relatively easy stage of 120km. However, to show that we were not pleased with what had happened, the riders decided to stage a protest before the start of the race. So instead of starting when we were told to, all the riders dismounted their bikes and sat on the ground for a minute, before getting up and beginning the race! The stage consisted of 3 climbs, with the longest only being around 3km, and it finished in a bunch sprint.

protest before stage

The next day was the mountain stage of the tour, and it was one of the coolest race courses I have ever ridden. During the 130km stage, we climbed 3 hors-categorie climbs, and finished on top of a mountain, at a ski station. On the second climb of the day, I unfortunately had a bad moment and was dropped from the front group. However, I recovered and over the next 40kms was able to pass a number of riders from the decimated group ahead, to finish in 14^th place. Team mate Belen Lopez also had a great ride, finishing in 9^th place and winning the combativity jersey for the day. That night we stayed in a hotel in the mountains, which had pretty amazing views.

View from the hotel after the mountain stage

Day 3 was, on paper, a much easier stage than the day before, consisting of 2 5km climbs and a 10km climb. However, just to add a wee bit more excitement to the tour, we were re-routed during the race, to avoid the longest climb, as there had been an armed robbery in the area that day! On the last climb of the day, our GC rider unfortunately missed the breakaway. Not wanting to lose her top 10 position, the 4 riders from our team got on the front of the 2^nd bunch and hammered it for the last 25km to try and get back to the riders ahead. With 25km to go the gap was almost 2 minutes, but we managed to catch the girls in front with 2km to go! It was a really awesome display of teamwork, and showed how different this team is from any other teams I have been in before!

Day 4 was the day I was dreading- a 30km time trial, which was not only the longest time trial I had ever done, but was also on a flat, very windy course, not suited to me at all! However, the team had kitted me up with all the flash gear- including the time trial bike of a former world champion, all painted up in the world champion rainbow stripes, which I found quite funny. But, to my surprise, I actually felt really good in the time trial, and with the additional motivation of kiwi star time trialler, Georgia Williams chasing me, I managed to do one of the better time trials I have done, and was able to keep my GC place from the day before.

The last stage was my least favourite of the tour- flat and extemely windy- it was one of those races which seems to go on forever, and you spend the whole race wanting it to finish. A small breakaway of 4 riders, all low on GC escaped near the start of the stage, and the rest of the peloton arrived together to the finish for a technical bunch sprint.

So overall I was very happy to finish the tour in 14^th place, with my team mate Belen in 10^th and team 5^th in the teams classification. We now have 2 days rest before a big spanish race on Saturday- hoping my legs will recover a bit by then!!

Emma

Update of the last few weeks

HOLA from Spain!

An update on what's been happening over the past few weeks...

Team talk before one of the races

I have been mostly been competing in races in the spanish cup competition. In these races, I am pretty much a work horse for the Spanish girls, as it is important for them to do well in this competition. So far we have done really well, winning all 5 of the races, beating the more highly ranked Bizkaia-Durango team each time. It has been really nice to be in a team that works really well together, and makes doing your job feel worthwhile, as you know you have a strong team mate who can finish it off at the end. Starting from next week, we will start riding in the more highly ranked UCI tours, and I will hopefully get a chance to ride for some results myself there. First up on the programme is the Tour of Languedoc-Rousillon, which is a 6 day tour starting next Friday. I am really looking forward to some nice hilly stages after all the hilly training I have been doing here in the Basque Country. However, I’m not too excited about the 30km time trial- not my favourite thing!!!

Pretty awesome team lead out

Racing last weekend

Apart from cycling, I have mainly just been trying to get better at Spanish. I am improving, but it is hard work! I also had a nice trip into Bilbao, a big city about 30 minutes from here, with my team mate who is staying at the team house at the moment.  Bilbao is a really pretty, old city, surrounded by big hills, with the main attractions being a big indoor food market, and a huge puppy made out of flowers (reminded me of house flowers day back in the day at St Cuths).

Unfortunately the giant puppy was getting its flowers changed

What the puppy normally looks like

People in Bilbao seem to like giant animals

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One of the cool old streets

The weather here has also been really strange. A few weeks ago, it was 27 degrees, and my team mate and I spent an afternoon sunbathing on the beach. Then 2 days later, as we drove to a race a couple of hours away from Urduliz, it was snowing! This week it has pretty much been raining non-stop, which has not been ideal!

Beach at Sopelana

Soon after this, the bikes nearly got swept away by the sea when we fell asleep on the beach!!!

and....2 days later it snowed!!

Well that’s about all my news..but to finish off, here is a story of one of the many confusing things that has happened since I got to Spain. On the way back from a race last week, we ran out of petrol in the team van on the motorway. We were only 1km from a petrol station, so you would think this was a problem that could easily be solved. However, in Spain, you have to pay a fine if you run out of petrol on the motorway (not sure if it’s the same in NZ), so to avoid having to pay this, the mechanic of the team decided he would fiddle around with the engine and remove part of it, to completely screw it up, so that if the police came, we would not get in trouble. So, the police showed up, and saw that the van would not start at all, so they called a tow truck to pick us up, and we ended up getting towed 100km home, rather than just 1km to the petrol station. I found it a weee bit difficult to understand how this would be cheaper than paying the petrol fine…but anyway we all got home in the end!!

Emma

Arrival in Spain!

So a lot has happened since my last post. I had a successful end to the NZ season winning both the Tour de Ranges and Avantidrome Rev Classic races, as well as taking out the QOM jersey at the Bev May tour for the 5^th year.

QOM Jersey at Bev May's Tour

Avantidrome Rev Classic

Then before I knew it, it was time to say goodbye to summer, and set off on the long journey to Europe. This trip turned into even more of a mission than usual, when, after stopping briefly in Australia to refuel, we were informed that there was a mechanical problem with the plane, and our flight would be delayed while this was fixed. So we waited on the plane…and waited…and waited……5 hours later, we were taken off the plane to sit in the airport, where we continued to wait….for another 3 hours! Finally it was decided that the plane would not be leaving the tarmac, and we were taken to a hotel for another 24 hrs of waiting. Needless to say, by the time I reached Spain, 3 days after leaving Auckland, I was beyond exhausted!!!!

I was greeted at the airport by one of the team managers, Miguel, who was very nice and chattered away to me in Spanish- I could not understand a word, so just smiled and nodded when it seemed appropriate!! Miguel took me to the team base, where I met some of the other staff of the team, and was given my bike and heaps of kit. I have to say I am pretty stoked not to racing in a bright pink outfit this year..that was really not my colour!! Then I was taken to the team house, where I will be living for the season, where I quickly met a few of my team mates, before collapsing into bed!

The next few days were spent exploring the area on my bike, and trying to get used to the cold weather. It may not be as cold here as further north, but for a kiwi coming from the most amazing summer in years, anything less than 10 is freezing!! The town I am staying in, Urduliz, is situated in the Basque Country, about 20km from Bilbao, and the only way to describe the landscape here is…HILLY..which of course I am happy about!!!

My new training area

On Saturday, 4 days after I had arrived, it was time for more travelling, as the team set off for France, to compete in the first French cup race of the season, Cholet-Pays de Loire. I had a particularly good result in this race last year, so was keen to repeat that again. However, with all the travelling over the past week, my legs just did not feel 100% and I rolled in with the 2^nd group, 50 seconds down on the front bunch of 20. However, our team sprinter, Fanny Riberot, had an awesome result, sprinting in for 4^th place, a nice present for her birthday, which was that day.

This past weekend, I had my 2^nd lot of racing, with the first 2 rounds of the Spanish cup series being held 40 minutes away from our team base. Due to this being our local area, we had a very strong team represented at these races, and were keen to dominate the field. We definitely managed to do this, sweeping the podium both days, and racing aggressively throughout the weekend. My legs felt back to normal, and I felt strong both days, finishing 4^th on the Saturday and then taking my first European podium of the season by finishing 2^nd on the Sunday.

Team mate Sheyla Guitterez winning sunday's race

On the podium with team mates Sheyla and Eider

A breakaway during saturday's race

Our next race is not until Monday, so I am having a good week of training, as well as desperately trying to improve my Spanish, so I can communicate with my house mates (I live with 2 russians who speak NO English, and we currently communicate with hand signals!! Pretty sure they think I am about as strange as I think they are!!) . I had a nice surprise when I was out training today, coming across 3 guys from the American Optum team, who are staying in the area, while competing in several big races here. While talking to them, I discovered they knew 2 of my good friends- Courteney Lowe and Emma Grant, and that Courteney and Emma are currently living at their house in America- small world! Anyway, it was nice to be able to speak English for a bit, and not have to worry about being understood!!

Well this has turned into a bit of a novel, so well done if you managed to get to the end of it! Will try and keep this updated more often!

Emma

Summer racing and plans for 2013

Well since it’s the new year, I thought I’d start getting this blog going again. I have been back in NZ since the end of September, enjoying the good old kiwi summer, with lots of sun, swimming at the beach and of course, a bit of cycling as well.

Whangaparaoa, my home for the summer

I had a bit of a rough end to the 2012 season, with a mechanical forcing me out of the World Championships road race early, and then a few weeks after my return to New Zealand, finding out that the team I had signed for was folding, leaving with the daunting task of searching for a new team in November. Luckily, I eventually did find one, and am happy to announce that I will be racing for LOINTEK, a Spanish based UCI team, in 2013. I have already had quite a bit of contact with the team via email, and they seem really nice and welcoming, so I am looking forward to being part of a much better team environment than I experienced last year.

My team for 2013 at their team presentation

After a good break in October, I was back on my bike in November to race a few of the classic New Zealand races, including the Lake Taupo Challenge, the Festival of Cycling and the Takapuna Criterium. In previous years, I have made the mistake of getting back into training too quickly after the European season, and being too fit for the NZ races, meaning I am exhausted by the time I get halfway through the European season. So this year, I took a more gradual approach to gaining fitness, and was not as concerned about getting good race results at the beginning of the season. However, I still managed a few trips to the podium, winning the Mt Maunga Challenge and coming 3rd in the Festival of Cycling road race.

Festival of cycling criterium

Unlike cyclists in the northern hemisphere, us kiwi cyclists do not get a rest over the Christmas/new year period, with the elite national road champs taking place at the beginning of January. To prepare for this, I headed down to Nelson on boxing day, for one of my favourite stage races, the Tour de Vineyards. This year, a group of us doing the race decided to rent a house in the Richmond area, and I was put in charge of finding somewhere, somehow managing to book us a place in the middle of a retirement village…oh well at least it was quiet!!! The tour ended up being a very successful one for me- I won 2 stages, including the queen stage finishing up the 18km long Takaka hill (a race I have been trying to win since I was 18!), and the Queen of the Mountains Jersey, as well as placing 2nd overall, only 7 seconds behind the winner, and a cyclist I really look up to, Linda Villumsen.

Sprinting for the stage win

Climbing Takaka hill in the QOM jersey

With my good results at Vineyards, it seemed I was coming into form just in time for the elite nationals 2 weeks later. Unfortunately, I managed to come down with a bad cold a few days before the big race, which was not ideal! However, I managed to hang in there with the front group each time over dyers pass, and got to the end in the breakaway of 8 riders, when I unfortunately completely stuffed up the sprint, and came in 7th place. Big thanks to Dave Ostin for helping our Auckland team out and filling in as manager at the last minute, and to Linda for the encouragement and tips she gave me during the race, and congrats to Courteney, Georgia and Jo for their podium places.

Auckland team before the Nationals race

Climbing Dyers Pass with nice view of Christchurch behind

Sprint finish

I am now enjoying my last few months of being at home, before heading to Spain in March, where I will begin my European season with the French classic, Cholet-Pays de Loire.

Thanks for reading…
Emma

World Cup Plouay

Well my early exit from the trophee d'or last week ended up being a blessing in disguise, with the extra recovery time before the world cup in the weekend helping me to have a really good race!

As we arrived at our accomodation the night before the race, it started to rain. Now for most people, this would be a bad thing, but not me...for some reason I always seem to race well in the rain- maybe a result of all those rainy saturdays I spent racing out at Counties Manukau club during the winter when I first started riding! Anyway it was a great relief after the horrible heatwave at Trophee d'Or!!

The world cup was held on a hard, hilly circuit in Plouay, Bretagne, and due to it being the final of the world cup series, all the best riders in the world were there. Lining up on the start line among all the big riders from AA drink, rabobank, specialized-lululemon etc was a bit scary! Out of all the teams at the race, our team was ranked last, so we knew that it was going to be a tough race!

The race started off at a quite easy, and I was having no trouble staying up the front. Then on the 2nd lap of 5, there were a few attacks on one of the difficult hills of the course. Due to good positioning, I initially made the front selection of around 35 riders. However, after being caught behind another rider who crashed on the next hill, just as the bunch was all lined out, I dropped back to the 2nd bunch. Over the next 2.5 laps, our bunch kept going at a good pace, and I felt really strong and was able to contribute a lot to the pace making, especially on the hills. I had a bit of an average sprint, to finish 46th in the race, a result I am very happy with as only the first 2 bunches ended up being allowed to finish the race! The race was won by the unbeatable Marianne Vos, who arrived at the finish alone after breaking away from her 2 breakaway companions on the last lap.

After the race, we had a long drive home, getting back to Dijon at around 2.30am. I am now spending the week recovering, before starting the Tour of Ardeche on monday.

Trophee d'Or: Only one word to describe it...HOT

I have just spent the week racing the trophee d’or, a 6 stage race base around Saint-Amand-Montrond, which is somewhere in the centre of France. I went down to this race, expecting it to be a good tour to ease the legs back into racing, as it is not that hilly. What I didn’t count on was the extreme heat wave which is happening in France at the moment. Lining up on the startline of the first stage of the tour, my garmin was reading 48.9 degrees, and this was at 4.30pm!! I don’t think I have ever been anywhere so hot before, let alone raced a bike in it!! After only a few minutes of riding, my drink bottles were boiling, and I pretty much spent the whole stage pouring water over my head, or trying to strategically position myself behind other girls who were spraying themselves with water! The stage ended in a sprint, with me coming in just out of the top 20, in 21st place. However, even after the stage finished, there was no escape from the heat! It was so hot at the end of the day that we had to get up several times during the night to have cold showers, and it became normal to walk around in just a sports bra and shorts the whole day! It also became normal to have a constant headache from the heat, which was not nice at all!

Stage 2 was a team time trial around the city, and as per the norm in France, the course was all ups and downs and corners. This was a bit of a worry, as our team had never ridden a team time trial before! However, we managed to make it through without crashing, and even bet 2 teams, so that was better than expected!

That afternoon, there was another road stage, and like the day before, the temperature had risen into the 40s by the time 4pm rolled around. Again, I spent the day pouring water over myself and made it to the end with the peloton, having another good sprint to come in 28th place. My team mates were not so lucky, with one fainting during the stage and ending up in an ambulance, and my kiwi teammate Gen, spending several hours in hospital after the stage due to extreme stomach cramps from the heat!

Day 3 arrived, and I woke up with an even worse headache than the day before, and was dreading the stage that afternoon. Although the temperature was slightly cooler than the day before, it was very humid, so it felt a bit like riding in a sauna! Unfortunately, this proved to be the limit of the amount of heat I could handle, and after 30km of racing, I fainted and spent the rest of the race in the ambulance, with a French nurse trying to feed me cubes of sugar!

While I was disappointed that my tour had ended early, in reality it may have been a good thing, as it has allowed me to recover better for the world cup that I am doing this weekend. We have been told that this is going to be the hardest, hilliest race we have ever done, and we are not expected to finish! So the aim for Saturday is to prove that wrong!!

Round up of July racing

So as I said in my last blog, during July I had the hard task of completing 3 4 day stage races within the space of 3 weeks. First up I had the Tour of Krasna Lipa in the Czech Republic, a tour which I have done twice before. I competed in this tour with my team from last year, Team Ibis Cycles. This is a very difficult tour, not only because of the constant hills, but also because of the extremely hot temperatures. For some reason, I seem to have a real problem with the heat. Last year, I had one occasion when I collapsed during a race due to heat stroke, and since then I haven’t really coped well with really hot weather. Unfortunately, during the first stage of this tour, the heat stroke struck again, and feeling as though I was going to faint, I had to let go of the front group, and ended up finishing in the 2nd peloton. After the first day, the heat didn’t die down, but I started feeling a lot better. Strangely, although it was so hot in the mornings while we were racing, every afternoon, there would be a huge thunderstorm! On the 3rd day, we had a double day, so this meant racing in the thunder storm for the afternoon stage, and this just happened to be the most technical stage of the tour, with descents filled with potholes and sharp corners. While most of the peloton were dreading this stage in the rain, I was loving it- a break from the heat!! I had a really good stage, managing to stay right near the front for the whole race and finishing in the front group. I again finished in the front peloton on the last day, and ended the tour in 40th place- unfortunately I had not been able to move any further up after such a bad first day.

Next, I was off to France for the tour of Bretagne, which started 3 days later. Although this was the tour I had not really wanted to do, it ended up being my favourite of the 3 races. The terrain in Bretange is constantly rolling, but with no really big hills to split up the peloton. Therefore all the road stages ended in big bunch sprints. One thing that I have noticed this year is that I have got a lot better at riding and sprinting in a bunch, and that really showed during this tour. Whereas last year I would just roll in at the back of a big bunch for the finish, during this tour I finished in the top 25 out of around 150 girls in each stage of this tour. So that was a really positive thing for me, and showed me that all the flat races in Holland and Belgium over the last few years.

By the time the final tour, the tour of Limousin, started, I was absolutely exhausted! This had originally been the tour that I had wanted to get a good result in. However, after having to do 2 tours before this, it was obvious that this was not going to happen! On top of the tiredness, this was an extremely hard tour, with big hills everyday, and the Olympic champion, Marianne Vos, using it as her final Olympic preparation. The highlight of the tour had to be following Vos in the car while she was warming up for her time trial- over an extremely technical and hilly course, she was going at an average speed of about 40km/hr..and this was her warm up! She was definitely in a class of her own during the tour, winning by around 40minutes over the next rider! For me, the tour was just a matter of getting through it. However I did have a really good last stage, finishing in the front group of 40.

After the tour was over, I travelled back to Holland, where I have been staying for the last couple of weeks, having a much needed break. I am staying with a group of Scottish and British cyclists, and am enjoying being able to speak some english for a while!! I am now getting back into training, to get back into form for the trophee d’Or at the end of the month.

I have also recently received the good news that I am on the long list for the road world championships at the end of september. My main goal for the year is to race at these championships, so I am very happy to be a step closer to achieving this goal.