More Drenthe!

Saturday and Sunday brought more Drenthe races with lots of cobbles, narrow roads winding through farmlands and quaint towns, and even a climb up a garbage mound (they don't have natural hills in this region, but there is a steep steep garbage pile).

The start of these races is a fight for position because once the race hits cobbles and crosswinds, it gets blown apart into small groups and you don't want to be stuck in the back. The start of yesterday's race highlighted this fight for position. We started outside of town and proceeded in a neutralized pack to the town square where all riders must sign in for the race and then line up. Sign in is on a stage with one set of stairs leading up to the stage. Now you might envision the pack rolling in and riders proceeding up the stage in an organized fashion and then calmly making their way to the start line. That's the scenario I was imagining as we came into town. But instead, people started getting off their bikes as soon as the stage was in sight, throwing them down in every which direction, and running toward the stage. There was a crazy mob flooding the stairs, crawling up the sides of the stage, and pulling themselves up onto the stage floor sans stairs. A pile of people surrounded the sign-in table pushing towards the pens. Then a run back to the bike and on toward the starting line. You'd think that we were late for the start or something, but we still had 20 minutes to just wait on the starting line.... everyone just wanted to be in a good position for the start.

So the goal of the race was position, position, position. Saturday's world cup was going along well -- the whole team was hanging out towards the front, ready for the cobbles. We were winding through Wezup -- the last town before the cobbles and I was pleased to be sitting towards the front and excited for the cobbles to come when all of a sudden a girl to my left decided to slide across the road, take out the girl in front of me and form a pile of bike and body right in my path! I was on the side of the road (a pretty tree lined road) and there was no where to go but into the mangled pile -- the bike hit and i took a dive straight towards a tree. KaBooM! I hit pretty hard and hurt all over.... but as I slowly assessed the situation, nothing seemed to be broken or bloody (no worries mom :). Just a lot of bruises. By the time I was back up, the pack was gone into the cobbles, i was in a haze, and my race was over. But I got to hop into the team car and watch the rest of the race live. I must admit that there are some boring moments driving along at 40km/hr when you can't see much. But also some very exciting moments -- like watching my teammate bridge to the winning break! And some amusing moments -- like when the caravan is forced to stop and I look out my window to see all the DSs and mechanics lined along the side of the road for a quick pee - ha! At the end of the day, the team had one crash and one flat, but also a 6th place finish in a world cup!!

The next race came quickly and brought more cobbles, more climbs up the garbage hill, and lots of wind. The wind proved to be the brutal factor for the day... lining the race out and splitting off groups forwards and backwards. In the end, there was a lead group of 18 riders, a chase group of 11, and a big pelaton... and many riders off the back. There were several times that I thought I was gone off the back of the race. In my attempt to stay very far away from the trees (all the roads are lined with them!!!!) I did not hold a great position. But I kept chasing and chasing and somehow managed to keep getting back to the peloton.... only to be pulled along with the rest of the peloton at 100km. So, in the end, only 29 riders finished. Two of my teammates finished in the chase group (they got soooo close to the lead group!). It's pretty crazy to start a race with 166 riders and finish with 29. I think Paris-Roubaix had a better finishing ratio yesterday!!!

Next up --- Gelderland. Until then, the team is enjoying a week of riding around Schoonard, playing bananagrams in our camp house, and eating frites mayo.