First Race Done

My first European race is in the books. With a 12:30 start time we were able to get a good night's sleep and leave the team house at a reasonable time. At 9:30 this morning, 6 Juniors, 5 Mechanics, 2 Soigneurs and 1 Director headed out in team vehicles. Geoff (Director) educated us regarding the process of registering for a Belgium cross race. A fair amount of pushing to get things done…..similar to say a roller derby match.

After registration, we headed to our bikes and the Mechanics have squared them away and we are ready to roll. SWEET. I went out for 3 preview/recon laps and then headed over to the trainer to get the body tuned up.

The call-ups for staging are based on a bunch of factors, UCI points, national/regional/local standings, etc. - all of which I lacked, as I was the last one to line up. I was the 42nd guy to toe the line. My warm up was spot on as I ended up around 20th after the hole shot, that felt good. The first 4 laps on the snow cover course were solid and I was making forward progress until I had to pit for a mechanical with my bars. The bumpy course spun my bars a bit and there were a few downhill section that would have been a bit over the edge with tweaked bars. The pit bike was much slower (wrong tire choice) and I lost a bit of ground. Fortunately, the mechanics had me back on my primary bike right away and I held my ground for the rest of the race. I finished 29th for the day and will make a few tweaks for the World Cup on Saturday.

If you are interested, you can check the results for the majority of the races we will do using the instructions below.
Go to http://www.wielerbondvlaanderen.be/
- Left scroll down to Uitslagen (results), hold down and scroll right to Weg-Pist-Veld (Road, Track, Field).
- Click on the date bubble of the day you want to check.
- To advance to the next/previous week, click on the right or left little bubble.
- Click on the race name and category.
+ Category B is elite/u23;
+ Category C is junior 13-14 (aspiranten); junior 15, 16 (nieuwelingen); junior 17, 18.
+ Category D is Masters.

After the race we immediately returned to the house to get cleaned up and grab some food. Then I went out to deal with my bikes and didn't need to. The mechanics had them all cleaned up, lubed up and ready to race hanging in the barn. THEY ROCK.

Off to the team meeting, then dinner and a skype with the family.

- A good day.