It's been a long time since this race, well atleast it feels like a long time.
It was a 4 day tour, held 3 weeks ago. Now it's not for a lack of trying to update my blog but more the fact I havn't really had time. I finished this tour and was straight into some other races but the report for them will go up soon.
It was a pretty hard tour, well on paper. The feild was as good as at the tour of bretagne. My fitness has been getting better over the last month and I have been enjoying riding a lot more, have a new massuse who is in the know with a lot of teams and who has a lot of belief in me.
So the tour itself. 4 days, first stage was on the Thursday, 120km starting at 4pm. I went into the tour with an open mind. Better fitness than Bretagne and now I could take it day by day and just grow in confidence.
15km into the stage, 15 guys got up the road, unfortunately we had no one in the move but luckily neither did 2 other strong teams, beveren 2000 and roubaix - metropole. Roubaix chased for 50 odd km before they lost fire power, beveren took over, I joined in with 1 team mate. We had the gap at 40seconds for a long time, I was getting frustrated as my team mates wern't riding the front and general classification was going out the door. I said to my director after I wasn't happy that the team wasn't riding. We are a continental team and should have been showing that we are strong, well apparently we wern't as strong as I thought and my team mates were pretty tapped. I finished in the bunch, 1 minute down on the break.
Stage 2, 180km. Again I was feeling good. Again a break of 15 odd got away and again we missed it along with beveren 2000. Another day on the front and another day I was happy to finish, we lost 20seconds to the break at the end I think. I finish in the bunch. Normally this tour should be hard, as there are 6-8 hills each stage with no decent after except open paddocks and feilds so if the wind was blowing and the race was harder things would have been different, unfortunately the wind didn't blow for the first 3 days, hence the big bunch finishes.
Stage 3, 180km. Fast stage, lots of climbing, but again quite easy. Another big bunch finish, no break stayed today. Didn't have to ride the front, got to chill, stay out of trouble and look forward to the last stage.
Stage 4, 170km. Finally the wind started to blow and the race got hard. So hard infact I went in the break in the first 10km, we were caught by 30km and I was dropped by 40km, spent the next 15km in the cars chasing with 10 others. Got back on and started to find some legs and they just got better and better and better. A group of 7 got away on the last climb and held us off by 10sec over last 5km. I was in the chase group of 25ish. I don't think many more than 50 of 120 finished the day.
Overall 33rd, same time as 20th and only a handfull of seconds off 15th, from 15th upward it was mostly guys who had took time on the first and second stage, had the wind been blowing and the race been hard on the first 3 days I think the gc wouldn't have been so close but I am happy with where I am and happy to get through a hard day, it was maxing at 32 degrees!
Next up is Fleche Ardennais on Sunday and Romsee - Stevelot - Romsee on Tuesday. 2 of the biggest classics Belgium has each year. Held in the ardenne hills, they should be 2 races suited to me.
Until then,
Ryan
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