Since I’d been sitting around (in between trying to ride, going to PT and attending sponsor events) instead of racing in Europe all spring it seemed like a bonus fall trip was in order. I like Europe. The racing is hard and the scenery pleasant. These are good things, in my opinion, which works out well considering the role racing on The Continent plays for me. With my shiny new Rabobank/Giant Offroad team membership I have the option to go to Europe and race bikes pretty much whenever I feel like it. Thus the Bonus Trip was born. The plan was to race the UCI C1 Hondsrug Classic in The Netherlands, the HC Roc d’ Azur in France and the opening cyclocross World Cup in Switzerland with good solid training in between and meeting the various Rabobank Road teams (ProTour, Continental, Development) at the Cauberg Clinic in Holland on October 22 to end the trip.
On the way east from Interbike I stopped off in Maine, my cousin Jennifer was getting married on Peaks Island. After the quite storybook wedding and after-party, I took advantage of being in southern Maine on a weekend and went to Sunday River ski area to ride Downhill with Sparky. It was cold and wet, just like we like it, and the day was shredded away on some rad new trails and some rocky old-school gnar I rememebered from racing DH there as a Junior. Radness. I also finally rode the new trails at Bradbury Mountain State Park. I never knew Maine could have such flow. Niiice.
More importantly, though, my Dad was planning to bid on our old house in Exeter. Yup, my childhood home had been foreclosed upon and was up for Auction. We got there in time to hang out on the deck and reminisce before the hordes showed up. Remembering how awesome childhood was there on banks of French Stream kind of made me misty eyed. Fortunately, we won the auction and Harvey is moving back into the house he built in 1987 while I watched and tried not to fall off anything… I’m excited to go back and relax there on the deck sometime soon. But first, a plane to catch. Some very European (fast) driving got me to the Portland airport in the nick of time to catch my flight to Amsterdam.
I’ve got to admit, each arrival in Europe is different, usually it involves landing somewhere in Germany and picking up a rental car, which is then overstuffed and poorly navigated to some Alpine destination where the lay of the land is absorbed and existence begun in a new environment. Instead, after giving my future address to United Baggage services (for delivery of my delayed fleet of bikes) I walked out into the bright sunshine at Schiphol Airport and stepped into the Rabobank team van, driven by Team Manager Leo Van Zeeland. He totally knew where to go, since the destination was his home just across the German border. We arrived a stress-free hour and a half later and had lunch before I promptly passed out for two hours in one of his spare rooms. Upon awakening we got his spare bike (complete with old school Dugast Tubular MTB tires) set up for me and headed out to the Kronenberg for a ride in the forest. Leo may have grey hair but he still knows his way around the hills and we had a super nice shred (I actually had to teach him the literal definition of “shredding”) as the sun lowered in the sky. A shower in his “Elvis Bathroom” (which is quite ‘70’s and quite awesome) had us ready for dinner with Emil Lindgren and Fabien Giger, who had arrived from Sweden and Switzerland in the afternoon. Fortunately, when in Germany it’s never far to “All you can Eat Schnitzel” on a Friday night… Mmmmm, fried pork. I like this Europe place.
-Hondsrug Classic
Not to get too settled into sleeping and eating pork though, on Saturday morning we loaded up the van and headed north to Gieten, picking up teammate Tim Lemmers along the way. We were en route to the Hondsrug Classic, a famously flat race in the North of Holland. An afternoon pre-ride confirmed what I’d been told, 100%, absolutely, completely, flat. Other than dropping into a couple sandy low-water ponds… Interesting. I’d certainly never done a race so devoid of terrain, not even the trail surface was rough, mostly forest roads with some ATV trails and horse paths thrown in for good measure. Well, I guess feeling a bit waterlooged from the travel wasn’t going to slow me down on the climbs… Too bad about the rule banning cyclocross bikes though, I actually had mine with me and it would’ve been FAST!
One of said ponds just before the finish. This is where Emil said I should make my move. Nice day, eh?
It became apparent about three minutes into the race, after I’d solidly positioned myself in the top 10, that racing on the flats is kind of like racing uphill perpetually. Never a rest, sprinting out of every 90-degree turn to stay on the wheel in front of you but not going quite fast enough on quite hard enough ground to have much of a draft. In short, really friggin’ HARD! Regardless of feeling quite like a small child, I kept at it for about 45min, almost the entire first of two 27k laps, and then could no longer keep a weak hold on the group. Yup, got dropped. Fortunately, the recently crowned Junior World Champion and Tim were in the same boat, so we rode with some other guys in about 20th place for the next hour. Lame. I guess all the awesome riding in Maine (which wasn’t THAT much) made my legs tired enough to suck at racing on the flats. Now I know, FLAT=HARD! I didn’t need the UCI points from a top 15 that bad anyway… Ok, I, and the USA Men’s ranking, need ‘em pretty bad… Shoot.
To France!
Another perk of this Rabobank team situation is they’ve got a fleet of cars for team business. I was able to convince them that driving around Western Europe with a loose agenda of racing was a worthwhile usage of team vehicles. For some reason I detected a bit of sarcasm when I was told I’d be driving the VW Caddy (mini delivery van) instead of one of the BMW X5’s but I didn’t care at all. Much like when you’re 16, your own car is freedom! I directed my new freedom toward the south of France and my friend John Van Vranken’s house in the port city of Toulon. John grew up about 3 miles from Mount Waldo on the coast of Maine and we battled each other in the Junior MTB ranks for years. He eventually met and married a girl from the Czech Republic, Linda. He’s smart. They just moved to Toulon to experience The South of France after a few years in Czech. Also smart. It was totally worth the 13 hour drive as we pedaled up the fabled Mont Faron as the sun set over the Mediterranean Sea. A delicious dinner prepared by Linda of things from the daily market in the old town square confirmed my trip south. In keeping with my intent to train well during the week, we did a 140km road ride the next day up into the mountains and then back along the Med. Niiiice.
Toulon with Mont Faron backdrop. John and Linda’s place is on the right just past the water. Above the mall, which made shopping for gadgets I’d forgotten easy…
I welcomed the Trance X Enduro bike to Europe on this trail from the top of Mont Faron. I pretty much shredded it like these guys… Kind of. Ok, I stopped at that dropoff. And didn’t cut the switchbacks on the rolly-polly rocks. God, I suck.
Lunch with my hosts in the centre of Toulon after shredding and before driving to Frejus to be lost and low on fuel and food with no cash to buy it for the rest of the day…
Roc d’ Azur Enduro DH
Before I knew it, it was time to drive an hour up the coast to the town of Frejus, home of Europe’s biggest Mountain Bike Festival. The Roc d’ Azur has been going on for two decades and has events for dirt riders of any type. Most take full advantage, riding all weekend. This also fit with my idea of lots of sweet Euro riding. The first event I took part in was the one I was most excited about. Finally I had an opportunity to check out a proper euro-style Enduro race. Basically you take your awesome All Mountain bike, pack a day’s worth of provisions and head out on a sweet ride. The racing part only comes on the good part, the downhills! Genuis! This Enduro, like all of them, prohibits pre-riding the tracks. The start location, on the Col du Valdingarde, was announced the evening before the race and the riders were responsible for finding it and getting themselves there. Neat.
I got myself there and ended up parked near a French guy (surprise, you’re in France) who had the wisdom to have his Mom driving shuttle. I asked him about the course and he immediately replied “It’s shit, flat and with nothing technical.” To which I replied “Sweet, then I won’t die?” He looked confused and went back to getting dressed, which I noticed included an open-faced moto helmet, goggles and various armor. Loaded for bear for a flat course, eh? Turns out that French guy was Slaven’s Kona teammate Karim Amour, who won the race in convincing fashion…
Not a bad place to start a morning ride, eh? Nice, um, ride, too…
Basically, you have an assigned start time, every thirty seconds beginning at 10am, then, from your start, you have a set amount of time to ride the timed stage and the un-timed transit to the next start. For this race, there were four “Specials” with 1:00, 1:20 and 1:00 to make it to the next, respectively. I started at 10:08:30 and about 14 seconds later was pumped that I’d walked down the first 300 meters of track to the first steep rock drop. Knowing it existed saved me from going over the 15 or so that was prudent for the loose rock skid track leading to the drop, which doglegged aggressively left and was not easy to slow down above. That was exciting. The track crossed the Col du Valdingarde road from there and dropped into the unknown, which was also STEEP and loose and RAD. Good way to wake up! More of the same dropped us on a dirt track that undulated downhill and required serious pedaling for a few minutes. Riding as hard as you can toward an unknown finish line is an interesting task. Basically you haul ass 100% of the time, trying to make up for riding like a sissy on the blind steep stuff. OK, not dead, breathing hard and pretty sure I’m getting smoked by the guys who’ve done this before.
The scene at the start of a “Special” Just hanging out waiting to shred. I like.
I hooked up with a French photographer, Sam, for the first Transit and after 20 minutes or so of cruising we reached the top of the next ridge and the next Special. The start official immediately informed me that I could start whenever I pleased. Cool, no need to keep super accurate transit time like in those stressful Rally Car races… The other guys seemed to be in no rush so I walked down to the first turn again and again noted that too much speed on the steep, loose, rocky hardpack on my little Trance X with no Downhill tires (like the other “smart, fast” guys were running on their 160+mm travel bikes) would result in flying off into the weeds. Good to know, again. I let a few guys put down tracks to follow and gave ‘er. Wow, this is kind of fun, riding loose and taking chances on stuff that, upon first glance, looks terrifying, but then works out just fine thanks to the radness of the modern Mountain Bike. Ungh! This is how the next four hours went, mellow ride, or heinous hike-a bike up unrideable jeep trails, while chatting with whoever was around, then some relaxing and cookie eating atop the next Stage, then a blind, committed shred down to the next valley with some pedaling at the end to give me a tiny chance of not embarrassing myself. Pretty fun day of riding, I mean racing, if I do say so… The last stage took place on the Cross Country course so I pinned it hard, hoping to win a stage, and the one that finishes on the beach, no less. I don’t know if I won but I do know that Mr. Amour beat me by a minute and a half over the course of twenty minutes of racing. Ouch. And three other guys had a few seconds here or there for me. 5th overall, not a win to announce “I’ve ARRIVED” on the French Enduro scene, but not too shabby… Next time I’ll bring more pads and my trusty Reign X to take some CHANCES!
Beach finish. Nice. No speedos in the frame but I promise there were lots in the background…
Here’s a photo from VeloVert of some Enduro Shredding. Carefully…
It might not have been a sanctioned event at Roc, but on Friday I met up with Rudy from Michelin to do some tire testing on one of the Enduro Tracks. He brought a few young members of the Keops cross country team to partake in the shredding and double-blind taste test of some new rubber compounds Mr. Bib is developing. We did four runs on the track and the boys totally didn’t die on their hardtails. Impressed. One of the compounds was head and shoulders above the rest, in my opinion, so stay tuned to your local Michelin retailer for some forthcoming rubber that will make your ride that much more shred-tastic.
The Keops boys climb over the Gendarmarie Truck blocking the exit of the Enduro track, they were marshalling the Marathon race which we ended up on the course of. Four times. Oops.
Roc d’ Azur Classic XC
The event that everyone comes to Frejus for is “The Classic”. This UCI Hors Categorie (next only to a World Cup) event leaves the Nature Base on the coast and heads inland for a beautiful 56 kilometer loop up proper climbs and down rad trails before finishing along the Mediterranean Coast. I’d ridden the last 15k on the way home from the Enduro race and on Saturday, despite quite tired legs, did an easy ride of the middle section so I’d know where to make my move if the tired legs came around. They didn’t. I got swallowed at the start as a result of my inability to pedal hard enough and was mired somewhere in the high double digits as we walked up the first steep climb. Oops. Fabian and Mike Broderick were (unfortunately for them) there as well so I figured I’d have someone to ride up through the field with at least. Fabian immediately climbed like the skinny little guy he is and Broderick dropped off, leaving me to myself to consider the depth of fatigue my body was experiencing from the last few weeks of racing and traveling. I passed some guys and some guys passed me until the last feed zone, where I got a coke and Italian Champion Marco Fontana Arulieo caught up to me. I know Marco likes to shred and, after talking about dirt bikes on the climb, as we dropped into the next descent to the Coast it was apparent that he was down with the brown on this particular Sunday. We rode like jerks, passed some guys on hardtails irresponsibly fast and were stoked enough that the final climb didn’t seem so bad after all. On the final descent one of the guys on hardtails we passed was my Rabo teammate Marco Minnard so we set up the Marco-sss-esss train for the final windy battle to the finish along the very angry looking Med. 42nd place was awarded to the guy who happened to be on the front at the line, me. But my Mom thinks I got 21st, so maybe I just squeaked into the UCI Points (HC goes 25 deep) for Elites if there were 21 non-UCI pros or U23’s ahead of me, which, considering the level of struggle, is quite possible…
Leading the Marcossssessss train across the line. Thanks for the pic, John and Linda.
Giant Europe Product guy Andy Wollny at the finish while I try to say something clever but end up looking weird, again…
On our ride home from the Expo area, deep fatigue sensations still quite strong in my body and mind, I made the decision that, after two weekends of struggling to race well and recover enough to train properly during the week, I needed some time off the bike. I like Europe and everything, but if I’m going to be not riding I’d much rather be doing it at home, where there 1,000,000,000 other little things I’ve not done while riding and traveling all summer can be caught up on. A quick and pleasant Skype call to United Airlines found me a flight home Tuesday with a better routing and nominal change fee. I jumped on it! So here I sit (in a complimentary Business Class upgrade seat) on Flight 909 to Chicago and the prospect of two extra weeks at home! One to rest up and get my life on track and one to get in some training for the rest of the cyclocross season, there’s good form in my body somewhere, I’ve just got to acknowledge that this year is a strange one and the effort I’m used to putting forth week in and week out just isn’t sustainable, given my unique situation. The last thing I need to do is get burnt on Europe travel, I still, and always want to, love riding and being there, but it’s better when you’re prepared. Which I absolutely intend to be in 2011. I mean the London Games are just around the corner and us Gringos need to show our stuff to the world sometime…
Cheers,
Adam
PS- I hope the road team doesn’t miss me at the Cauberg Clinic. Pretty sure it’ll be OK. And I kind of am once again disappointed with Road Racing culture after that greedy dumbass prick Contador got busted for drugs after winning the Tour de France. You jackasses still think you can get away with that shit? Seriously? Stop making us all look bad by association, we’re just trying to work hard and make an honest living racing bikes. Idiots.
PPS- Speaking of Idiots, some guy stole my Rabobank edition Anthem X race bike from the Fox Shox booth at Interbike. It had super dope 2011 XTR components on it, plus an unrideable prototype Titanium Crown Fox fork and Fox Adjustable seatpost. So if you see some bum on a sweet bike with a bandage on his face, club him and call me. Or if one of your buddies gets a super good deal on an obviously unobtainium bike, kick him in the shins and call me.
Ok, after those outbursts I need a few minutes to relax. Oh look, there’s a lawn in front of the Chicago Airport Hilton, I’ll just close my eyes for a minute…
