Additions

I thought I would do another blog post as it would have made my previous one a bit long and unwieldy so here it is. Unfortunately it is really just a number of disjointed pieces really, but it's reflective of what Life's like so don't complain, I'm just not skilled (or motivated maybe) enough to be these it to one concise, flowing piece of prose.

To continue on from my previous post after Sunday's race me. Sam and Hamish thought it would be fun to go to a little festival gathering happening in the town next door, but it was closing as we got there due to it being 10pm. The only thing left open was the beer tent so we decided to have a couple of beers and just chatted amongst ourselves. We did attract some attention as we were not the average age of the people there, like 38, we were not stoned or hammered or both and we were dressed a bit differently too. In no time we had been asked for Charlie as well as fags and a light, once we said no and they knew we were English cue surreal conversations that were rather unintelligible to everyone. So after about 90mins we boys left.

When describing to Marie what happened that night I found out that 'to go westward' is the French term for 'being stoned' as well as being taught afterwards how to use her lawnmower so I could mow for her which was also entertaining as earlier in the day I couldn't get it started. This is because there was no oil in it. Lemon.

Well done to everyone who achieved well in their degrees and in other good news Tim Butt seems to be doing ok now that he is out of hospital and hopefully his recovery continues.

Harry from my British team, Aprire Bicycles, is currently leading the Race Across America in his 4 man team and they are about halfway now, so keep it up Harry. Aprire Bicycles have now finally done up there website and releasing their 2013 next generation bikes so don't forget to check it out http://www.aprirebicycles.com/.

The Nationals should be interesting this weekend and wish people all the best in them, as a result of the French Nationals taking place nearby though there will be no races in Brittany this weekend fortunately a team member's family will be putting me and George up this weekend so that we can race in Normandy and the Loire region. It should be really exciting and a real test of my French skills too.

Still can't believe the state of the British Road racing calender, with so many decent races clashing with each other this year and the fact no National B's on a Saturday anywhere I don't think and the race clashes result in empty weekends. Just because one may not be good enough to get on to the British Cycling programme at 16 does not mean they will never be good enough and if a big pool of great riders is wanted then the domestic scene really needs to strengthened by having better races, more often with less clashes. We can't expect other nations to constantly take other riders of the U.K.'s that are a bit late in developing as we are now one of the best countries at cycling. It has and will continue to grow on countries like France and Belgium's nerves and not only that it puts our athletes under a lot more pressure they maybe what is necessary if just the calender was improved.

I finish on this notice that I have started a new book, one that I have referenced many times, but never have actually properly read, Eric Hobsbawm's The Age of Revolution: 1789-1848 and if the first few pages are anything to go by I am really going to enjoy it.

Hard lessons have to be learnt

So this week was the big build-up to a race that was happening outside my front door, the 1/2/3 Grand Prix Leclerc (the French equivalent of Sainsbury's) at Hennebont. 24 laps of a really fast, technical 4km loop with 300m of off-road at the top of the hill just after the finish. A real strongman circuit and one that many people, including myself, were confident that I would perform well on. Alas this was not to be because I did something really stupid. My doctor in England advised me to take ibuprofen instead of paracetamol before a race as a pain killer for my knee as it would be many times more effective, however I should be careful though as the ibuprofen could trigger my asthma. I took slightly more ibuprofen for my knee than I otherwise would as I really didn't want any pain in my knee towards the latter part of this race and I thought I would compensate this by taking a few more puffs of my blue inhaler.

This did not work!

My first lap was great, but after that I just went backwards through the peloton and ended having to call a halt to my race after 4 laps wheezing my way back home with my tail firmly between legs. What a bloody tool!

Unfortunately this was my only race this week and with me going well recently, a small, but good quality field and a course that I know well from living next to it; it's just a shame I wasn't able to give any account of myself. You live and learn. Sadly I might have to wait over a week till my next race as next weekend is the National Championships in most countries, I would be competing in the Brits, but Glasgow is too far for me to get, would cost me a lot and the course looks rubbish. At least I will get a chance to continue resting my knee even more now though and catch back up with my French as I've let that slide a little bit recently.

This is because I've been caught up in my Balkan book which I've finally and what a great piece too, it's just a shame that it was written in 1999 and not a few years later so that the Kosovo Question and by extension the Macedonian Question could be dealt with more fully, it just feels a little open-ended. On the other-hand the peace process in the Balkans is continually evolving as we speak and the aforementioned Questions as well as the others in the Balkans, like Bosnia, will be open-ended for a good while longer anyway.

I also finally got round to watching 'God on Trial' this week too and I urge you all to watch such a fine drama.

On a complete different note I must mention my girlfriend Verity who won the 800m at an athletics meet in Italy on Tuesday, she is now beating me on the international scorecards this year 1-0 so far and can now legitimately claim to being the more successful partner, at least on the international stage, in this relationship. I do not begrudge such an assumption nor accolade, if bestowed as such, one iota. I am admiring her ability to balance not only the racing, but also the training, the exams she has at the moment as well as keeping up appearances with the social side of things in Siena too. I had only one job all week to do, to do well on Sunday, and I still managed to fluff my lines.

Special mention has to go to Sam Allen for his third win of the year on Friday. Chapeau bruv.

Until next time...

Boom, Boom, Boom

I was looking forward to continuing my fine run of form this week with the 3 races coming up a 90km crit around Auray town centre of Thursday evening, a 90km crit right on the coast on the Friday evening near Sarzeau and a 90km semi-nocturne on Sunday at Plouay.

Unfortunately at Auray I DNFed after about 40% had been completed, it was a small field of around 60, as were the other two races this week, but it was a quality field here at Auray being a 1/2/3 event. The course had lots of slow corners with massive, out-of-the-saddle accelerations out of them and my knee really began to hurt and struggle and knowing that I had another 2 races still left to race and where I would also be much more competitive I decided to cut my losses and quit. Annoyingly if I had of continued rolling round the course I would have probably got another top 20 as only 22 finished and a few these were dropped well before I decided to pack it in.

So on to Friday's race at Sarzeau, no slow corners with big accelerations, but 45 laps including a 400m long hill, sadly for me I missed the move that eventually decided the win even though they were never more than 45 seconds from me. All the other moves before and after the winning break I got in, but I was very closely marked all race which was incredibly frustrating and so I only got 8th when really I was capable of a top 5. What didn't help was that both George and Hamish had stopped early during the race and were not there to have a positive impact upon proceedings, but by the time I had finished the race they were well lubricated after spending the remainder of the race in the pub.

After the race me and Loic (a team-mate who had also driven us there) joined them and it did not take me long to get fairly merry. Loic then decided it would be a brilliant idea to show us prized monkeys off at the local he frequents before and after F.C. Lorient football matches, a bar famous locally for having 600 different kinds of drink available including a shot called 'the Alice in Wonderland'. A lot of banter, drinks, nachos and French dried sausage (not a euphemism) later we eventually went home though George did have the pleasure of sharing a bed with Loic as it was too much effort to take George home for any of us.

Saturday was definitely a rest then on Sunday was a race on some of the 2000 World Championship Circuit and it was certainly challenging with a mile long steady hill followed by a short descent and a very steep hill lasting 400 metres just after. Then it was a fast, rolling decent to the finish straight that crested up slightly and then went a bit downhill, the straight was about 1km long. So 15 laps were in order of the course and just like all my previous races, lots of moves went and came back to the bunch in pretty short time when after a few laps George managed to get away with a few others and they preceded to eke out a pretty good gap. Hamish and Sam Allen attacked soon after and managed to jump across to them where this lead group then managed to pull out a 30 second lead pretty rapidly. I then snuck to get into the second break who then bridged across to this lead group where we had about a minute over the peloton. This was with 9 laps to go still and from then on a couple of people would get dropped every time we went up and over the two ascents. Then with a little under 2 laps to go, two guys attacked and got away from our group that numbered 15 at this point. Soon after George and two other guys attacked and managed to get across to the 2 out in front with just under a lap to go. I sat in the remainder of what had been the lead group doing sod all and then over the top of 2 ascents, for the last time, we in the chasing group were gaining on the front 5 who were beginning to look around at each other. We almost caught the front 5 on the line as I won the sprint from second group grabbing 6th finishing right on 5th position's wheel, George meanwhile scored an excellent 2nd.

Sadly in none of these races was I able to add to winnings I got from the previous Sunday's race, but although my right knee hurt considerably on Thursday and towards the latter stages on Friday's and Sunday's races I was still extremely pleased with how it felt and managed the workload. Apart from the minor blip at Auray, my good run has continued and hopefully with this new found consistency I will soon be delivering even better results.

As we are approximately halfway through the cycling season I think it is appropriate to give everyone some basic facts about my race season so far and it is quite interesting to see what I have achieved in just raw, basic statistics. The numbers include the amount that also qualifies for the above category, so, for example, 5 top 10s and 7 top 15s, the latter also is inclusive of the 5 top 10s achieved. Here we go:

Out of the 30 races started by me this year I have failed to finish 6 of them.

I have achieved 2 wins and 5 podiums, but these were all in Britain before I came out.

1 top 5 here in France.

5 top 10s here in France and 6 top 10s in Britain, the latter is now a fixed number for the subsequent statistics as out of the 6 races competed in by me in Britain, I achieved 6 top 10s.

6 top 15s in France.

9 top 20s in France

11 top 30s in France.

I hope everyone is well and the racing is going strongly too, until next time...

A more positive note

I did also have a great time when I was at home seeing lots of friends and family so it was not all bad as one could easily assume given my previous post, it was lovely to have Verity stay for a few days also so my week at homes was very mixed to say the least. Fortunately Tim has continued to improve and hopefully he will be out towards the end of next week.

I am pleased to say that my knee has continued to improve and that in my first race back in France I grabbed fourth, pretty pleased with considering how aggressive I was all race, but I mucked up the sprint and couldn't get myself on the podium. The race was the 2/3/J Saint-Jean de Villenard with about 80 riders there, 18 laps of a 6km circuit, with a real draggy climb on the circuit. I was at the front all day going for the primes and bagging points in the points classification too, this tactic resulted in me getting 110 euros as well as being at the front of proceedings close to danger. The race keeping on splitting and coming back together all day until with about 8 laps to go a big group of 15 riders went up the road with me also in it, then I went for another prime at the end of the 13th lap against another rider, but with no-one else near us two he decided to push on and so I joined him as the break of 15 hadn't been working too well and the second group of riders were never more than 20 seconds away. After a lap out in front together we were joined by four others who had jumped across from the original break of 15 riders and then we just worked well together to maintain our advantage.

With 2 and half laps to go on the main climb, two riders were dropped from our group of six including the bloke who had initially attacked with me to get away as a pair. Unfortunately I for some reason got a bit dizzy and believed this was the last lap we were on, so on the finish ramp I sprinted, but hearing shouts from my fellow breakaway companions, seeing no photographers and then managing to see the board I saw it said we still had one lap to go. This used up quite a bit of energy, but I got 40 euros for winning the prime so not all bad. Anyway after I attacked our group's entente cordiale went awry and everyone began attacking each other, particularly me as they all felt I was the strongest sprinter. The winner eventual got away just before the main climb and held a minor advantage over the rest of us, but the other 2 riders really didn't want to work with me to catch him. Coming into the final bend though I was in the perfect position, at the back of the other two, but I sprinted down the wrong side and got myself blocked, if I had of gone to the right then I might have got on to the podium, what also did not help was the fact that I really was surprised at the other two gentlemen's sprinting abilities who had really been bluffing quite considerably for most of the race.

Nevermind, I've continued to get some decent results some hopeful I can grab a podium soon, to be honest I felt a bit fat and unfit during the race due to not training on knee and having to eat and drink all the produce I bought believing I was going to do the SERRL Stage Race. My knee held up well though and I was in only minor discomfort because of it during and after the race.

Highs, Lows and the Grim Reaper

As many of you know I finally made my eagerly anticipated and long awaited return to Blighty with much fanfare reminiscent of the England Rugby Union team's return from Australia following their victory in 2003; the similarities were uncanny. Anyway, after a couple of days of recovering following the epic journey undertaken with Tony Mills Junior at the helm I went to the doctors to ask about the persistent problem in my right knee, it turns out that I have very mild tendinitis in it caused by overuse. The ramifications are not as bad as maybe first feared, I was offered 2 options; either I stop cycling and rest up for a month or I persist with racing and let heal over the course of about 3 months, but during this time I shouldn't train if I'm doing 2 or 3 races that week, if I'm doing just one then I can do one or two training sessions that week instead. I will having to wear a knee support most of the time, even at races too. The good news is is that it is minor and if I decided to continue racing on it I will not be doing it any further damage and that I will get over eventually.

I have decided on the latter due to the fact that by racing on it I'm not damaging the knee irreparably if at all and you have to weigh up the loss of form and fitness that a month lay-off in the middle of the season would do for you for the rest of the season.

So on to the SERRL Stage Race, a race that I was really looking to, but 25mins into the first stage the race was cancelled and the rest of the weekend was subsequently cancelled too due to a motorbike marshal colliding with a car resulting in his, the motorbike marshal's, death. I'm not going to describe the incident as I feel it would be inappropriate, but I will comment on it. This tragic event, as well as Junior Heffernan's death, highlights the desperate need for the road racing scene to have closed roads, or, if not, at the very least make sure an ambulance is following each race and/or increase the powers of the marshals to stop traffic, these would have massively helped in preventing these incidents occurring as they will improve the circumstances in which we, the racers, and the organisers are operating under. Sadly it appears that this accident on Saturday will also go unheeded by British Cycling who have failed to deliver any findings on the cause of Junior Heffernan's death; the brief, sentence-long statement about the death of the N.E.G. rider who died on Saturday with it also being seemingly purposely hushed-up as shown by the fact that news of it was only briefly shown upon the Road homepage on the British Cycling website and has subsequently been buried underneath multiple links to reach the statement. Neither, but more importantly the former point (as there has been more time to react), were good enough for British Cycling to act upon and make a revision to their 'Get Britain Cycling' petition with which they are lobbying government. There has been no real public backing of Paul Morton's campaign by British Cycling or other authorities in the wake of Junior's death to increase the powers of the marshals and the N.E.G. also who regularly put themselves in harms way for free, completely voluntarily.

When is British Cycling going to act upon what a large portion of its members actually desire? It's all very well having this 'Get Britain Cycling' petition, but your average cyclist does not possess a British Cycling membership, every racer has to. British Cycling surely need to get their priorities in order for when you encourage people to cycle naturally some are going to want to race, how can they in such an unsafe, unworkable environment? It seems at the moment we have reached a fork in the road, how many more incidents need to occur before we jump across to the other road, one we should have gone down long ago?

Following on from this I had a relaxing weekend with family, friends and Verity instead, but this was tempered somewhat by not only what I witnessed on Saturday, but what was to come. On Monday, we had a little family get together to celebrate my little brother's first birthday, unfortunately he decided to choke on a crisp so now I'm fully aware of how to do the Heimlich manoeuvre on a baby, obviously pretty scary at the time.

Afterwards I met up with some uni mates in Camden for a few drinks, had a good bubble and it included one  Mister Timothy Butt who had just got back from Portugal and who was racing (or meant to be) in the SERRL Stage Race. He's a good athlete and friend, but unfortunately he suffered a cardiac arrest the next day on Tuesday, fortunately the doctors have worked wonders and Tim is quite the fighter and he has finally awoken from intensive care today properly. This highlights the important work that the John Ibbotson Fund and C.R.Y. do in trying to increase the amount of testing done on young people to prevent such cases like Tim's and John's from happening.

Now I'm back sitting here in my house in France, alone, I wonder about the great moral lessons I maybe should have learnt, for me, it might be a little to close to home at the moment to really consider the questions and issues that inevitable raise themselves upon mere preponderance of the recent occurrences in my life. All I can think about though is thus, the Grim Reaper on closer inspection does not seem to possess the same sense of geniality as DEATH in Discworld.

Marked out like a Lion on the Highveld by some Boers who has been killing some of their prized cattle

Unusual title, for an unusual man, but nonetheless I believe this idiom goes some way to describing the predicament that I found myself in on Sunday  not to say I was suffering alone in such a situation and is highly representative of what cycling can degenerate too and has, is and will continued to be experienced by many cyclists.

Sunday, the weather was awful on a lovely 6.25km loop with 2 climbs on it, 16 laps in total and a 2/3/Junior race with about 80 competitors only 43 finished. Right from the beginning it was obvious that I was a marked man maybe because of my recent run of semi-decent results and the fact the course really suited a rider such as myself, especially because of the conditions also. I attempted to get away and establish breaks, but nothing was working, initially when I attacked on a few occasions  some people who came across with me refused to work or do very little. On top of this, their team-mates back in the peloton would actively happy other teams who may have missed this move to chase me and my little group down, subsequently they would then launch counter-attacks over the top which were hard to cover, sadly at the end of the 5th lap this is what happened, a counter move was too hard to cover and follow by myself and so I missed the winning break of 18 riders.

What was happening was also happening to Sam Allen, but we both worked to bring the gap down to the break as both of our teams had missed the move as well as the fact we were both closely being watched, as a result one of Sam's team-mates used us as launchpad to get across with a couple of others to the winning move. Unfortunately none of my team-mates were able to thus making all that effort I put in a complete waste. The break quickly gained 45 seconds, me and Sam then tried to attack together to try and get away, but no-one was having any of it, so I said to myself that the only I was going to get away was to let a break go of a few good riders and just jump across, which with 4 laps to go happened. We then worked well, but with me doing most of the work of course, never really eating into the time of the break ahead, then with 1km to go of a draggy climb to the finish I attacked my group hard crossing the line in 19th.

Happy with how I felt and my tactics at the end of the race, but just annoyed that no-one on my team was in the physical condition to help thus causing me even more grief as less people would look at me to work if I had no team-mates present. My knee was quite sore and swollen in the race and after though.

After an epic road trip with Tony Mills I'm now back in the U.K. and having gone to the doctors I can now confirm that I've got mild tendinitis in my right knee so I am able to race still, but I've got to limit the amount of training I do as well as do some strengthening exercises for my knee and wear a support.

Now I'm looking forward to riding the S.E.R.R.L. Stage Race for Aprire Bicycles, my British team, where hopefully we can do some real damage and again I will marked out like a Lion on the Highveld by some Boers who has been killing some of their prized cattle.

I hope everyone else is good, chapeau to all for the Regional Champ results, some great performances and I hope everyone is enjoying the fantastic racing at the Giro.

Sprinting 101

Well this Sunday I raced in La Boucles Serentaise a 1/2/3 race over 130km that also included within the race the Morbihan Championships and with this race as well being the only race on Sunday being one that cat.1 riders could race, this all guaranteed that it was going to be a highly motivated and strong field. It was pretty odd weather conditions throughout the race really, occasionally threatening to rain and did so a little about 20mins before the start, but never really materialising and mostly the race was competed under some Sun. Within half an hour I regretted wearing my waterproof plastic overshoes, my feet were really rather sweaty at the end, not pleasant at all.

Anyway the pace was high from the off and after 10km a break of 22 went off up the road because in the roller-coaster section someone dropped a wheel, I found myself a little too far back as the pace was so high in the preceding kilometres and with so many wanting to do well I thought there was no need to be any nearer the front than about 50th wheel out of the 130 who started. Unfortunately I was proven wrong and tried a good few times over the subsequent 6km to try and get across the 20/25 second gap that had quickly been pulled out, alas, to no avail.

After about 10km from the initial break happening the gap to the leaders quickly drew out to 50seconds/1min and everyone sat in for the test of Cote de Plumelec, but when we got the climb we were told by the motorbike that the leaders were still only 50 seconds in front, due to this many people began to attack and fly up Plumelec, I conserved my energy as at this stage as my right knee was hurting quite a bit and I just wanted to nurse it and myself round to the finish, but once I got over the top I felt great and I attempted on a couple of occasions to bridge across to a group of about 10 that had got away from the peloton on the Plumelec climb, but within 3km we were all back together with the same gaps between the lead group at 50secs that included Sma Allen and Doug Dewey and then the peloton.

Heading back towards the finishing circuits the peloton absolutely flew and I was beginning to feel better in my right knee as well as my whole body and so I began thinking about maybe grabbing a top 20.

Upon reaching the finishing circuits the peloton exploded, 6 x 5.5km, with a short sharp ramp and a long drag with a steep section of about 12% at the top as well as 800m of plain flat for the finishing straight, the finish loop was really interesting and perfect for me. Allied to this, I felt stronger and stronger as we went round the loops and as a result, I launched a 2 attacks of my own as well as getting in countless moves eventually bridging up to Doug and Sam's group, who had been jettisoned by the lead group on the finishing circuits, here's Doug with a his view on what happened, 'It split with about 4 laps to go I think and I went out the back door along with about 10 others I think.' So after what remained off the peloton joined us I tried to sit in as much as possible and save myself for the sprint.


Here's me leading one of the moves I got in.

Sadly I positioned myself about 2 places too far back in the final sweeping right-hander resulting in me getting blocked and not being able to sprint, to add insult to injury I was on the far-side from the judges and so even though I finished in line with the guy who got 24th, I was placed 29th and then the remaining numbers were obviously between me and 24th. If I was 2 places higher up in the right-hander I would have got a top-20, damn it.

I am unbelievably frustrated by this, but I've learnt something from it and so my toil was not wasted, it's just a shame that I couldn't really show what I was fully capable off that's all, but such is the nature of the beast. I'm just happy that my knee was not too bad and I didn't have to climb off like I said I would do to Hamish after an hour as well as the fact that as everyone is saying now I beginning to knock on the door of a decent result soon so hopefully that might come this Sunday, my last race in France for a bit as I'm returning to Britain straight after.

Out of the 130 starters only about 70 finished and less than 60 finished with the peloton or the winning group, this demonstrates somewhat how tough it was as does my Strava so get on it people and be nosy.

I hope everyone had a great weekend and I look forward to talking to you all from the comfort of Bexley!