Belgium - Week Two

After a hard week of training and the weekend spent racing it was finally a recovery day on Monday. Tuesday was straight back into training with one of Yvo's special ergos, leading me to now dub the garage "the pain cave."  With the session done around lunch and I had a few hours to kill before the evening session at Revels, which is a nice 110km loop with a group of local riders.

Wednesday was race day with a kermesse in the evening. The morning was spent warming up and resting, ready for a big afternoon.  The loop for the kermesse was so cool, running through the main street of the village then a big loop around the outside of town, passing through some of the local farms and using roads that are about the width of a lane way in Melbourne and felt like them too.

The kermesse went well, I was there to ride position all day and keep out of trouble in the bunch. With 147 starters, the bunch was strung out single file for most of it. I stayed up in the top 30 wheels just keeping out of trouble.  Three laps to go around one of the last corners before you hit the main street I punctured my rear wheel. This was race over. I rolled back to the start really disappointed that I did not get to finish.

Thursday was much the same as Tuesday but instead of having a hard ergo I had recovery then the bunch ride in Revels that evening. Friday was a rest day and warming up for another big weekend of racing.

Saturday was another kermesse in which Yvo had given me strict instructions to be aggressive all day and work to try and form a break away. With the loop being a little bit lumpy and with 16 laps, this was a race I liked. But the bunch was not willing to let anything go all day. Finally a group of riders got a gap with 2 laps to go and managed to hold the chasing peloton off right to the line. I finished in the bunch and was really happy with how I rode the race.

Sunday I had another opportunity to race Flanders Cups and I was so keen to get out in my mountain bike after a hard week on the roady. With Petra and her husband Wilfred taking me to the race I was up early and we arrived at the course around 8am.

The Elite and U/23 race was not till 3 in the afternoon but being so keen to get out on course I got a few practice laps in with Petra in the morning session. I loved it! The course had a few good little pinch climbs up in the forest and a gap jump at the end of the lap just before the start/finish.  Unlike the week before it was not raining so the course was damp but had plenty of traction.

Petra smashed the Elite Women's field and so it was up to me to do the same. Starting on the second last row, I knew I had to have a good start and a fast first lap to have any chance of working my way through the field.

After the first lap I came through in 22^nd and I never looked back as I started passing a few riders each lap until I was sitting in 5th overall and 2nd in the U/23 field.  I finished the 8 laps of the course with a big smile on my face, it was so good to be back on the dirt and riding my beloved Epic again.

It was a great way to finish another really hard week of training with a result and my first podium in Europe.

A huge thanks to all my sponsors for helping me make this happen.