He who finishes, finishes with a good result...

..Is what someone once told me, and what I'm starting to learn as well.

I apologize in advance for the lack of updates this past week. I experienced my first shell shock of Belgium cycling last week. 

Stage 1

Tour de Namur, the last thing I wrote about, was rough. My legs, inexorably, felt like shit the second day after my twilight trauma and bonking episode I was fortunate enough to experience on the opening stage. I got dropped on the 3rd of 4 climbs and then to make matters worse, I ran into a police motor bike while in the grupetto. That hurt. After going down, I managed to finish the stage-50K to the end-but was outside the time limit. All in all, it was my initiation to a Belgium stage race. I was pretty bummed; I think one of the worst feelings in all of cycling is not being able to continue to race while your teammates do. Well some of them. The next day, it was raining and 2 more riders from the team abandoned during the 130km trek. The team finished with 3 riders out of six. 

Ingrid the medic coming to the rescue

Anyways, we stayed in the Ardennes, in the south of Belgium, at Luc and Ingrid's second house, which was probably one of the highlights of the weekend for me. The scenery was straight out of "Band of Brothers" from the Battle of The Buldge in Bastogne, although I was told Bastonge was about 60 kilometers south of the house. Still, I could imagine what the real thing was like-horrific.

I took two days off after that and was able to visit Brussels with Luc's sister and her family. It was pretty cool seeing the Grand Place, enjoying a Belgium Waffle, and having one of the best beers I have ever had. Surrounded by tourists, backpackers, and fellow Belgians, it brought me back to the days of backpacking last fall. It was a nice break from the usual routine of training every day. Oh yeah, the waffles and chocolate here are awesome!

One of the best Waffles. Ever. 

I tried to capture the sunset in Brussels but this is the best I got. Sun. Belgium. It's worth the picture. 

Please Just turn...

Today, I did a kermesse about 15km from our house, close enough for Matias and I to ride over. The day, however,  started with a little hiccup. After about 5-6 minutes of riding, I heard a big CLACK noise as I went over a speed bump. At first I thought I got a flat tire but after giving both tires a visual and "bunny hop" check, they were fine. Or so I thought. A little while after, I saw the back tire wobbling all over the place. It turns out I broke a spoke on my wheel and had to ride the last 10KM with rubbing brakes. No wonder my legs felt bad riding over there. 

Luckily, I was able to borrow a wheel from a teammate and the legs felt much better after that! Our team had a lot of riders in the field~14 I was told, although it I don't think we took up that much room. The race started fast but I was feeling good. In the first five laps,  two other teammates and I were either at the front or off the front in the breaks. It was hard but manageable. However, nothing would stick. After about 7 laps of doing this, I started to get tired and from this point on, it was all about staying in our now depleted group. 

A lot of yelling occurred in the race. As usual, I had no idea what the riders were saying, which was fine with me. It's actually kind of funny , " J'eh da les flagrant c'est e$#@#$$". I'm exaggerating of course, but not really. Some of the time, I just had to laugh to myself. I think after I would yell "What?", they realized I didn't speak French and would shut up. Of course, I'm pretty sure they had no idea what I was saying as well when, for the 47th time, a rider would open up a gap or BRAAAKKKKE going into a turn and I would yell some encouraging profanity. Speaking of braking into turns...HOT DAMN! Think of a Slinky Dog. The front of the group stops at full speed going into the turn, while all the riders behind the front are still gliding into the turn. This is intentional, as I am beginning to observe. Or so it seems. Then, BAM BAM BAM, the front 2-3 riders will accelerate extremely hard out of the turn WHILE the back riders are slowing down going into the turn. The result- a lot of pain. And this happens on every single turn, regardless of whether it is actually necessary to brake or not. 

Back home, this may seem, or appear, quite common in races. Hence, the exhortation, "stay at the front". 

This is an entirely new level. 

Imagine doing that for 3 hours. After a while, it starts to wear on you. Add on that if you are off the front, in the wind, chasing down riders, your a bit more fatigued half way through the race. This race taught me that lesson. Pick a good line, stay at the front, and try to minimize braking as much as possible. 

So....with about 2.5 laps to go, I was tired and lost contact with the front group. I think my early efforts eventually took their toll. But, I still finished ahead of a many riders and got some good prize money as well. Oh yeah, it was cool hearing the cheers and my name out there. Super cool!

Funny moment of the race: After the race was over, a jolly Belgium man with a blue striped shirt, beer in hand and cigarette in mouth, started to talk to me in very fast French. I, with my slowly improving Francaise, managed to squeeze into our conversation, "I'm sorry, I'm from California and I speak English and Spanish, but my French is bad", all in French of course. He had a big smile on his face and started to talk again very fast. And then he gave me the thumbs up and returned to the beer line. I think that's a good sign. 

Pictures(I know they are out there) to follow. 

Hardest I've gone...

Not referring to what the girls in college used to tell me. Sorry Paul M-stole that one from you.
Today was stage one of the Tour de Namur. 150K with some climbs but nothing too long-2-3K maximum.
I felt good this entire week and had good expectations going into this race. Before the race, I stopped by the U.S. National team bus and was stoked to see Connor O'Leary at the start line. I met Connor a while back at one of the USA cycling camps in Arizona a couple of years ago. Besides being a beast on the bike, he is also one of the nicest people you will meet. Last year he was diagnosed with testicular cancer so it's awesome to see him recovered and tearing it up in Europe.

Laurent and Jonathan before the race. I think Laurent got in the top 20-30 today. Not sure about Jonathan. 

Before the race. Obviously. 

The car is ready to go!

The race was fast and basically, in my tired and post-race state, I'm going to make it brief. I went through my food in my jersey pocket too quickly and with about 45K to go, ran out of food. BONK. I hit the wall, big time. I made it over all of the climbs, but just got destroyed afterward. . It wasn't even hard when I hit the wall. I floated back to the cars until I came upon my car. Patrice gave me some food but still I think it was too late. I forced as much food down as I could but at that point, it was just about staying with the cars. After about 10 minutes, I got popped out of the cars;  I was by myself for a while until a chase group caught me and still, it was super hard. I don't think I've ever pushed myself as deep into the pain cave as during some of the accelerations up some of the rollers; cramping in my ankles? What? I remember one distinct moment when it actually started to get dark around me and I couldn't feel the lower half of my body. WOO bike racing!

I made it with the my group to the end, and luckily I had a few Americans and Matias for company in my group to exchange some dialogue in English. We finished around 4 minutes back. I paid, however, for my efforts to try to consume as much food as possible in the last 30K. Yeah, some of it came back up when I got back home.

Anyways, tomorrow-more food! More food, more food and more food. Tomorrow is another day.

A day in the life...

Since I have a couple of days off(a week) between races, I thought I would share some details about life outside of bike racing in Belgique-how it is pronounced in French.

First off, the weather in Belgium is ambivalent. It's almost like when you(or I) can't decide whether to wear long pants to San Francisco in the summer. One day it's 30 degrees and hot and the next day 20 degrees and raining. Not that I'm complaining as today was a cool 18 degrees, but warm and slightly raining.

The last few days are a perfect example of this very endemic and unique climate. As I found out, it never gets above 35 degrees and it is almost rare to observe a completely blue sky without any clouds. However, the past two days were the exception. After almost 3 weeks of completely stormy weather, it was finally "summer" here in Wallonie. So nice that we actually had to turn on the AC in the car.

So this is what they do in Spain when the sun is out? Matias getting his tan on.

Summer in Belgium means BBQs outside and our neighbors(Luc's brother-in law) are more than happy to invite everyone over for some great food. Speaking of food, I don't think I've eaten this much meat in my entire life. Apart from the very unique cuisine of cheese and bread, a lot of our meals have consisted of chicken, sausage, more chicken, pasta, vegetables and more cheese. Fromage, as it is called in French, is held in very high regards here in Europe. There is even a book in our house written entirely about the different types of cheeses and what they go best with. One of the gems I recently was introduced to is melted Camembert from the Normandy region of France. It can be eaten any time but I first had it after it had been taken off the grill; with bread and some vino, bon appetit!

When in Belgium

Lunch with Matias:

Did I mention my house mate Matias is crazy for pasta? He thinks I eat a lot of food but that's only because I don't have two dinners a day. Every single day for lunch-Pasta, ham, cheese.
"Sometimes rice, but pasta tastes better" according to the Spaniard.
I indulge every once in a while(when he offers to make it for me), but usually I like to stick with my sandwich, which seems just as foreign to not only Matias, but to my host family Ingrid and Luc, who have a more traditional lunch of bread and yogurt. I told Matias(from Spain) that most riders back in the U.S. have a burrito after a race or ride. He thought I was joking.

Every. Single. Day?!

And today, it rained of course. However, it wasn't too bad. Matias thought it was freezing but actually I enjoyed it. Matias introduced me to some new roads, which were awesome-nice and smooth with relatively no traffic, and we rode part of the road race for one of the stages next week. It has a hill! I think I finally found my terrain-only 60km away from the house!

Enjoying the summer weather

One last note about food; the portion sizes here are extremely small! Well, small compared to those in the U.S. And I'm not talking about McDonalds food either. The bread or juice here is distributed in containers and bags about half the size of those in the U.S. That means one thing-purchases of large quantities. I went to the store today with Ingrid and by the end of our 2 hour excursion in the largest grocery store in Wallonie, our shopping cart looked like an emergency storage container, filled to the brim. I wish I had my camera with me to snap a photo because it was impressive. What's also even more impressive, and a bit disconcerting but expected, is that amount of food will probably only last a week. AHH, I wish I had a photo of it all!

Here are some photos from the last race I did on Saturday. A bit late but still good. 

With two days to go before Tour de Namur, it's pretty much taking it easy. It's pretty hilarious watching French TV, or should I say Belgium. In the end, it's all the same because of the language. We get House, The Jersey Shore, Lie to Me and Desperate House Wives-all in French. Too bad there's no Office on BBC anymore(or the U.S. Office here). Michael!!!! 

Thanks for reading. I'll try and update during the race. Enjoy your sun!

One week before Tour de Namur

It's sunday and it's time to relax. One week ago I was cracked(which in cycling vernacular means dead tired) after doing a race and then riding back home. I got a bit of a head cold the next day and spent this entire week taking it easy, going on 2-4 hour rides but nothing too intense. Matias was racing a stage race so I basically had the entire house to myself all week. On Friday, I went and watched the TT and again, the set up was impressive. The team buses, cars, trailers occupied an entire town. It kind of reminded me of an NRC race back in the states except this was a bit more polished and nice. Also, every rider has a follow car and lead motorcycle for the TT. Every single rider!

Anyways, after the TT, I went with Matias and Freddy to the team's masseuse and got a massage. Ahhh, so nice.

I raced Saturday at a kermesse really close to the house. My teammate Laurent and his girlfriend picked me up and we all drove over to the race, about 15 minutes away. We were running late and got registered 20 minutes before the race started. Riders number 148 and 149. Great warmup. I was  bit worried due to the lack of a warmup but the group decided to take it easy on the first lap, which was nice. The course had one hill in it yet we still went up it fast-20mph. Hills...climbs....where are they in this country!? I managed to go off the front once with a small group but the everything stuck together. On the last lap, two crashes happened within inches of my front tire. The riders around me went down but somehow I managed to keep the bike upright. The second crash happened in the last 5K, which really hurt the legs putting in the extra effort to unite with the front group. I lost some significant positioning due to that crash but still managed to pull a teammate near the front. I finished in the front group, and after last weeks very subpar performance, I'm happy.

One thing that I will definitely have to work on, however, is the pronounciation of the OOOO and UUUEEE. I rode up to my teammate Laurent during the race and said, "Laurent, OOOO(water-l'eau in French".

"What?" , he yelled.
 "OOOO", I said again
"What?"
"Water, do you have water"
"Ahh, water. No I don't have any water"

I ended up finishing the race with no bottles; one was empty and one was lost during my near collision with the crash. Sometimes, English works best.

 I wasn't too sure about my conditioning going into the race given my easy week of riding and no racing, but this race confirms that I still have good fitness and the legs are good.

Some of our friends at the Tour de Wallonie last week

I'm not sure how many races, if any, I'm doing this week, as next Saturday is the Tour de Namur. I'm pretty excited for it. It will probably be very challenging, but I'm looking forward to racing against other Americans. What?! My manager told me the U.S. under-23 national team will be there. How ironic-I'm going to be racing as one of the only Americans in this race but for a Belgium team nonetheless. And I'm pretty stoked.

Rain rain rain 7/20

I drove with Freddy to my third Kermesse in Kersken. It was sunny and warm when we arrived and I decided to put on some sunscreen. By the start of the race, it was dark, cold and drizzly. In the first 50 meters, the drizzle turned into a downpour. This was going to be a race.

I felt ok during the race but it was kind of hard to tell what was going on because the number of the riders and the low visibility and the technicality of the course. It started out in a village, went along wide city streets and then cut into narrow, one lane farm roads; it was actually pretty cool. I got a pretty good sense of what was going on in the race every time we road by the announcer's booth when he would announce the gaps. For the most part, I understood what he was saying, probably due to the dutch dialect. 

Back home I'm thankful to be able to carpool to the race. Here, everyone has a pre race massage!

Anyways, by the last four laps, my group was down to about 20 riders, plus the riders up the road. I kept looking behind me and only saw the official vehicle and ambulance, which meant that we were the main group on the road. I ended up getting 19th out of about 60 riders, which was good enough for the money again. YAY!  Anyways, it was a pretty hard race and only about 25 riders finished the entire 120K. It was pretty cool-at the end I heard the announcer say my name and something like  "....martinez....a'mérica...."

Also, later on Matias, my housemate from Spain, arrived. He is a pretty nice guy and it's nice to have someone to talk to my age. He also speaks English, as well as French and Spanish. He is also the one who helped convince me to start a blog. He also likes to go out, which we both agree on, is a necessary break from the stress and intensity that goes along with bike racing.  Is there anything Matias can't do? Break his post-ride meal habit of pasta and chicken. Every. Single. Day. Yes, I speak only the truth. 

Ah, Belgium Beer. 

I'm sure we'll have some more of that when the season is done. :)

A couple more races 7/15-7/20

My second Kermesse took place a little bit south of Brussels. I went with Ludovic, another rider from the team; I don't speak french but we were able to talk a little bit about music, europeans, girls by using sounds, hand signals, and pointing at the radio.

 Like the interclub,  this race was fast and flat. 170 riders moving 48km/hr. More obstacles in the road, including huge cracks running right down the middle. I was a little more comfortable riding in the pack but it was still tough staying at the front, and then, getting off the front. On the last lap, I was moving up along the left side of the road when suddenly, WHAM, the entire group swung left. I almost got run into the gutter at 30 mph. I managed to keep the bike upright, along with the riders around me, but subsequently had to slam on the brakes and lose about 50 places. I finished in the main group and felt good; I just need a little more experience moving up and around in a field of 150 riders.

SUN!

First Kermesse 7/12

The day started out with me not really knowing what race I was going to do. Yes, multiple races on a Tuesday. In the middle of the week. Luc, one of the team managers, who's house I'm staying at, informed me that a thunderstorm was rolling into the region later in the day so the 6PM race I was tentatively planning on doing would be decided on around 12PM. It was determined a couple of hours later that it wouldn't be such a great idea to do that race in the pouring rain so we decided to do a race that started at 3PM instead. Ahhh, no 5AM wake up calls. At 12PM, Ingrid's(Luc's wife), dad arrived at the house to pick me up and drive me to the race. Keep in mind this is my fifth day in Belgium and my french is, well, c'est mauvaix, but getting better. The dad doesn't speak english, and I speak relatively no french, so it was going to be very a animated car ride, using lots of hand signals and movements, as well as interpretive noises to convey nouns such as rain, wind, hills etc.

He is a very nice guy and helped load the car; we set off at around 12:30. I had no idea where the race was, where I was going, or how long it would take to get there. After driving a little over an hour, we arrived in Roselare, in the Flanders(flemish) region of Belgium. Just to give you an idea of how small this country is, Roselare is just south of Bruges, which is just south of the coast. We drove from the middle to the coast in a little over an hour. WOO!

The first thing I noticed when we arrived were the bars. And lots of old people. The registration area was not a plastic folding table under a tent in the middle of a parking lot. It was inside a bar/pub. NICE! I walked into the bar and was instantly consumed in the aroma of smoke, beer, pretzels and the loud but amicable conversations occurring between the locals who turned out to watch the race. "Turning out" to watch a race in Flanders does not mean standing on the side or in the feed zone. This means placing bets on each rider, smoking cigarettes, drinking beer and having a good ol' time commenting on(or criticizing, of mocking, or praising)  each rider as he would ride by. I made my way past all of the patrons, mostly old guys with big smiles on their faces, and approached the registration table. I handed the official my license; he took it, scanned it into the computer(yes, it was that fast), and I was given my abnormally(for us in the U.S.) large jersey number and frame number for 8Euros. At the end of the race, according to the protocol, you give back your numbers and in return, you receive 5 Euros. In all, registration was 3 Euros. And that's for every race, regardless of the prize money.

Are they using a helicopter to record the finish?

I got kitted up, numbers on and rode around a little bit. I made my way back toward the main bar and noticed all of the people on the side of the road, sitting under the awnings, with big white boards. These, as I found out, were the betting tables. It was almost like a casino, but outside and at a bike race. Everywhere I looked, locals were talking with the bookies, placing bets, observing riders pass by. One man came up to me and uttered something in Flemish. I shrugged my shoulders with a confused look on my face. He then said, "What is your number?". I told him, " 48". He said, "ahh ok", and scribbled something on his board and strutted off to his friends.

I had no idea of what to expect going into the race. From everyone I've talked to, Kermesses are hard. My goal was to stay at the front and finish. I didn't know any of the riders or any of the teams in the race so it was crap shoot.  The race started out and instantly, an attack. A lot of yelling ensued, in dialects I could not comprehend, and the race was off! The race was 120K with 13 laps. It was fast, but I was feeling comfortable and stayed toward the front. One thing I noticed right away was that a lot of riders would simply stop pedaling, sit up, and open a gap. For no reason! And then suddenly, a group of 6-8 guys are off the front. Sometimes riders will chase and counter attack; other times, the group will wait, a lot of yelling occurs, and then it gets fast and the group splinters down to half the size and eventually catches up to the breakaway. But sometimes not.

Did I already mention that people yell a lot during the race? Or it seemed like it. Whenever someone was on the front and not pulling, or gaps would open up, a barrage of flemish, french, dutch(same as Flemish I think), and I caught a few lads chatting it up from GBR, would ensue. I got yelled at a couple of times, or at least I think it was yelling. Not understanding a word they would say, I simply continued to ride. It actually didn't bother me at all; it was merely a bunch of noise.

Today, a group got off simply because riders refused to put in 2-3 hard pedal strokes to close a gap. People sit up, no one wants to close the gap, and bamb! Off the front.

I had one "teammate" in this race. I say "Teammate" because

1) Kermesses are considered individual races. Although many riders from one team may be in the same race, they don't necessarily work together

2) I hadn't met this rider before(I'm still getting to know everyone) and he spoke french, and I spoke english. We used hand signals when we first saw each other

His chain snapped in half about 30 minutes into the race so I was by myself for the rest of the time.

I was almost taken out of the race twice. First time- it had begun to rain and the rider  in front of me fell, forcing me to go off the road and get dropped from one of the lead groups. I eventually got back into it after the group behind me caught the lead group

Second-In the last couple of laps, I was pulling on the front when I came into a turn too fast and went plowing into the field. I managed to keep the bike upright but lost contact.

Anyways, it was sort of a race of attrition, and being smart. There wasn't one big peloton. Instead, there was a group of 10, then a group of 5, and then a group of maybe 5-6. I also noticed that when riders are tired, they simply sit up and stop pedaling. What!? Oh yeah, and a gap opens up in crosswind/rain/thunderstorm elements going 45km/hr.

So, I had no idea where I was in the race other than I knew there was a lead group of 10 up the road, and then a few more in front of me, and people behind me. After I got back on my bike after going into dirt, I looked back and only saw the official's vehicle, wheel car, etc. I saw one rider in front of me who stayed about 50 meters ahead of me for about 10km and wouldn't wait! I rolled through the start/finish line when I was waived at by the official. I guess that means "pull over?". I watched the last 2 laps and saw only about 10-12 guys so I didn't feel that bad.

I ended up placing 24th out of 60-70 riders so I'm pretty happy about my first kermesse in Flanders. According to the people in Wallonne, the racing in Flanders is some of the toughest in Belgium. Not only did I place, but I finished in the top 30, which meant $!

My driver Freddy

All in all, I'm pretty stoked on this performance, given that flat fast races are not really my specialty(yet :)) The team seems pretty pleased as well so it's all gravy. I have yet to find any sustained climbs but I am hoping to actually make it to my pre-determined destinations on my rides in the next couple of days. Yesterday, I tried to ride to Waterloo, which is about 10km away from my house, to check out a monument dedicated to Napoleon.  I rode for 1.5 Hours and still did not find it. So many roads, traffic circles and villages!