My head hurts!

Got up this morning at 5:30am to catch the train to Roubaix, which involved one switch in a place called Kortrijk. Today was the big adventure of my Belgium trip to ride Paris-Roubaix from the Arenberg Forest into the finishing velodrome, about 92 km with 17 of the 27 pavé sections totaling 30 km of cobbles.

Sunrise on my way to the Arenberg Forest just outside Roubaix












It was exactly 50 km to get from Roubaix to Arenberg. This place is not easy to find and I'm very thankful that Gregg loaned his GPS to me for the day. There is no way I would have been able to get to the start and do the course without it. The course is not marked in many sections and believe me that those cobbled sections are not easy to find in the middle of farmer's fields.

After 2 hours including a few missteps I made it to my designated P-R start where there was a memorial to a cyclist Jean Stablinski, who won quite a few races in his time but I'm not sure why there's one here since he didn't win P-R and I didn't take time to read the long inscription.

The cobbles of the Arenberg (these were the worst of all the secteurs I did). Not a nice way to start. My head and brain received a real shaking today (that's why my head hurts!). These cobbles were also filled with grass and moss growing over since the gaps were so large. I should add that I wisely chose to do this with cross tires.





Cobbles and more cobbles.

As you can see, I had a beautiful day riding through the farmer's' fields. Here in France and Belgium I keep seeing these huge piles. At first I thought they were rocks but up close they looked like huge turnips. I saw a sign nearby selling "endives de la terre" and maybe they are the root part of the endives. Maybe someone knows out there?

Each of the sections are marked off by little red and white markers with the name and length but sometimes there are other signs.

This one had a little flower growing beside it.














Crashed out on these cobbles.

Not really, this was staged!

In between the cobbles it is very flat and most of the roads are in good shape so I could see that during the actual race the pace must be very fast. I only recall one significant downhill in the 92 or so clicks where I got up over 55 with the cross tires and I really can't recall climbing anything more than a few meters.
A few nice pics along the way.

Finally, making it to the velodrome after 142 km and many hours in the saddle. Yes, you can actually ride right in and do a "victory lap"!

The "Hell of the North" (L'enfer du Nord) was actually more heavenly today than hell-like (on the building it says that it leads to paradise and today was definitely paradise for a cyclist.

I rode the few km to the train station and after a 40 min wait hopped on to Kortrijk. By that time, I was getting the chills and didn't warm up enough on the short ride plus I felt great so I decided that I didn't want to wait 30 min for the connection then set out to ride the additional 40 km back home to bring it up to a cool 195 km for the day. What a day!

Racing in the Carrot Patch!

This morning I headed out to a place called Maria Aalter about 38 km from where I'm staying for my 2nd CX race in Belgium. It was warm (about 10 degrees C) but windy (steady at 35 km/h). I had a hard time finding this place from the Google Maps directions because I found myself in the middle of a farmer's field - but that's where the race was to take place! I already feel pretty comfortable driving here and finding my way around and figuring out how to sign up, etc. It's pretty easy when you get the hang of it. I didn't arrive so early this time but I still had a full hour to ride a few laps. About two-thirds of the race was in the farmer's field and he must have been growing carrots since there were bits and pieces of carrots everywhere on the course. The ground was hard packed in this field and was extremely rutted. I don't think I've ever had a shaking so bad in a race or training session (for the Kingston guys it makes the Fort Henry trails seem very smooth). There were two mud sections in the field along with a few ditches. After we finally got out of this field, we went into a school area with a playground section where all the technical and fun stuff was situated including a 3-stair dismount and then up and down a 4 meter hill 3x with 2 sandpits and 2 ditches interspersed between, then around a couple of soccer fields. There were lots of switchbacks throughout the whole course.
There were 20 guys in the Master C race and about the same number in Master B. Same format as last week with the B guys starting about 30 sec in front of us. I got a much better start this time and was in 5th place as we made the first swing onto the farmers field from the road (starts are almost always on a road here with at least a 100 m straight away). However, a few minutes later on the ditch dismount before the mud section I remounted too soon and got bogged down in the mud and was passed by about 7 or 8 guys - bad mistake! Anyway, I had a few mishaps that cost time on the 5 laps but got into a good group with two others. On the last lap, I got stuck in the sand pit when one of the two in our group misjudged his line so I ended up going down then lost contact with these two and finished 10th. Not sure if I would have taken 8th but it was definitely in reach. I was much more competitive this time and closer to the leaders so I'm hoping I'll be in the top 5 by the time I leave here. I recognized the faces of just about everyone so it seems like the same crew shows up at each of the races and I beat at least three of them from last week that beat me. I won 5 Euro again and on top of getting the 5 Euro for returning my number I again finished ahead by 2 Euro. I could get used to this racing for free or picking up a few $$ each race!
I was planning to take some pictures after my race when the juniors were riding next but the weather turned very nasty with rain and even more winds. So, I snapped one shot on the soccer fields and that's all I have to show.

Next weekend I'm going to try doubling up in Lottenhulle on Saturday and Tiegem on Sunday. We'll see how that goes. I'm also planning on a mid-week ride of the last half of Paris-Roubaix with all the cobbled sections from the Arenberg forest into the velodrome at Roubaix. This will depend on a few things working out including weather, being able to take my bike on the train and some good maps! Roubaix is about 40 km from where I'm living. It could mean a very long day 130+ km with not a lot of day light so I hope I can work out the logistics. If not this coming week I may still be able to try the following week but daylight is working against me.

Santa, Cyclocross and Sand!

It was World Cup CX day in Koksijde, Belgium. The Belgians love their cyclocross so much that they even believe Santa delivers toys by cyclocross bike, of course! The Santa "monument" is actually a big ad for the coming of the World Championships in just over 2 months to the same spot, a tiny town by the coast line.

Being by the coast means sand and this course has almost nothing but sand, sand and more sand. If you think our tiny 5 meter sand "pits" in our Canadian races are much then you really haven't seen anything until you see this. Perhaps some of you watched the race today and you get an idea but seeing it live is another story. Basically, the race takes place on a series of sand dunes on a military base. The start/finish is by an air strip runway and the course weaves through some military baracks/trailers and homes. The fans were out in full force but it actually seemed less crowded this week because the setting was more spacious.

It's actually much easier to take better pictures of the U23 race since there are far fewer spectators around so the next shots are from that race.

I've been to two Pro races now and both times I've seen this fan who is a Kevin Pauwels fanatic. He goes around with this crazy umbrella with a women's head on it and all sorts of pictures of Pauwels on the umbrella.

Staying at the Chain Stay has it's perks. Normally it would cost 17 Euro to get in to an event like this. Gregg operates the small Renner team with Gabby Day from the UK and Craig Richey from Canada. We get to come in with the team van and set up with all the others nearby as opposed to a long walk and get free passes into the pits or starting area. As for the women's race, Gabby was not very confident warming up (shown below) but she had an excellent race finishing 10th in the strong field of 45 competitors.

Start of women's race by the air field about to make the first corner.

Now it's time that I get ready for my race tomorrow!

Help! My bike is lost!

Since my culture plates were incubating in the lab incubator during the day, I decided to take a sightseeing detour to Brugge, a quaint city I've been told by many is a must see . While switching trains in Ghent, I had some extra time so I went out the back side of the station and clicked a few pictures of the masses of bikes. I estimated that there were 3000 bikes based on a row count. There was even double-decker parking available and a huge full-service mechanic shop just for bikes immediately adjacent to the huge parking lot. Can you imagine downtown Kingston with 1500 bikes in one spot (Ghent is about twice the size of K-town)?

 Bikes, bikes and more bikes at Gent-St. Pieters train station (this is the Flemish way of spelling it)

Double-decker parking!

 One part of the bike (fiet=bicycles in Flemish) mechanic shop (the main mechanic shop is not shown)









Brugge was indeed a fantastic tourist spot with majestic cathedrals, small cobbled lanes, an amazing bell tower, tons of chocolate boutiques, etc. After my quick visit I had to finish off my stay with a Belgian waffle, of course, covered in chocolate sauce - pure decadence! I was going to take a picture but it was devoured too swiftly. As you can see, the weather is still fantastic - sunny everyday with fog in the morning burning off, then up to 10-15C, no wind. I took a picture of this tree - white roses growing on this! Behind it was a whole garden of red rose bushes. Is this really the end of November (sorry to my Kingston friends who had snow today)? I think I can get used to riding here all year round. Wherever I go there are groups of road riders in twos, threes or on Sundays 10-20s along the canal and of course cycling commuters everywhere.

White roses growing on a tree in late November!












Back in Oudenaarde, I headed over to the Donk for a CX skills training session. The trails were much more slick and muddy today and I came back covered in mud. I love the power washer!

Picking up the Spoils

Usually, I take the Chain Stay "clunker" bike to the train station, hop on the train from Oudenaarde to Ghent St. Peters, then take the bus to the university and finally walk from the bus stop to the lab. This has been taking about 60-70 min. Today I decided to ride my bike to work along the N60 highway, which is the most direct way, about 24 km and it took 45 min. This 90 km/h traffic route has a dedicated bike lane on the right side with a 2 meter "empty lane" left of that than 2 traffic lanes. Needless to say I feel very safe cycling here and it will be hard to go back to cycling on Hwy 15 or Hwy 2 when I return to Kingston. I didn't take a picture of this but here's just a common example of a bike lane on a major road with a barrier in between.





On my way home I decided to go back along the canal. It's a bit longer but more scenic. I decided to stop off at Asper-Gavere where the Super Prestige CX race was on Sunday to see if I could ride the course. The course was in the midst of being "disassembled". There was garbage everywhere and a crew of about 50 guys cleaning up the mess. Nonetheless, I rode around the course and got to feel what the pros were up to.

The Spoils from the race











Below is the picture of the 90 degree right turn up a nearly 2 foot ramp from a long straightaway on the bottom part of the course. I got up to 42 km/h and wasn't even forcing it. I'm sure Kevin Pauwels, Stybar and Nys were doing 50+ along here during the race.

On my way home in Oudenaarde I stopped at a few bike shops to check out the gear. Surprisingly, there are nearly no CX bikes on display; mainly commuter bikes, nice road bikes, kids bikes and some mountain bikes. One of the places builds custom made CX Lindor bikes (Lindor is the name of the shop). Back at the Chain Stay, Belle keeps us all company looking for handouts of food, foraging in our rooms or under the table for crumbs and scraps.