View from the house.

Since when is 17 hours of travel seemingly typical to get to a race?

I guess these past few months have desensitized me to long travel days before races. For instance, two weeks ago, I traveled 11 hours to get to a 2hr road race and a 20 minute time trial. I just completed my 17 hours of trains from Limoux, France to Lucca, Italy and I am extremely glad to be here.

My standard philosophy is that I like to keep my time/miles in the car less than the miles I spend on a bike on any given day/week. I do not know how time/miles in a train fits into this scheme I have created for myself. Is my footprint considered less, since I am using mass transit? I don’t know.

So how do reduce the impact of travel? Well there are a lot of tricks, and I probably look like an idiot doing them, but it works for me. Here are some of my tips:

-Every transfer and every time I stand up, I stretch.

-Music. Not my bumping beats - those get me riled up. My current travel selection primarily comprises “Explosions in the Sky.”

-Podcasts, i.e., Coffee Break French, NPR Science Friday, NPR on Health......NPR has some great podcasts.

- A book. Sometimes one that I can depend on putting me to sleep.

- Sleep which requires:

-Therma-rest compressible pillow.

-Ear plugs.

-Bandana to cover my eyes.

-Traveling to bike races includes traveling with a bike. Bring a lock because you can’t keep your eye on the bike the whole time (yea, sometimes a bandana is covering your eyes).

-Sunglasses, in case I want to fool the people around when I am sleeping, “No I am not sleeping, I am watching you and keep your hands off my things.”

-Alarm clock, so I don’t sleep through my stop; it’s not like a plane were everyone gets off at the same time.

-Copious amounts of water. To ensure that I drink my water: I bring all of the water that I should drink for the day. This is quite heavy, but I don’t want to carry it, so its gotta go down the tubes.

-Food for the entire day. Tuper-ware is an amazing thing. Boiled eggs usually come in handy here for protein.

-Camera.

-(I am going here, sorry, but its important) Bring your own toilet paper – the trains run out of it ALL the time.

-Which leaves us at: hand sanitizer.

Off topic, but I have the time (musings on the train, again)

The rodent of the sky, a.k.a. the pigeon. Ewwww. Do other people feel as repulsed at these species as I do? Did you know they are considered a delicacy? This blows my mind.

Second, and more important question: Why can’t they walk without bobbing their head? If I didn’t dislike the species to begin with, this behavior solidifies my disgust for them.

I definitely knew when I arrived in Italy – it was the first place that people actually offered to assist me and my luggage. Shoot. One bike bag, one luggage bag, and a backpack.....up and down stairs in crowded train stations. I must have looked a bit pathetic as I was shuffling along the stairs.

I LOVE Italy. Fact. I have said it a million times before, and I will say it again. It’s “Guarnieri” not Guarnier. The French love to point out I have a French last name, and I love to point out, “I am actually Italian,” and then I go onto tell the 30second family story.

The minute the train crossed the border, the architecture, landscape, and people changed, and it is much more up my alley. I foresee establishing myself here. What a beautiful country.

(This is the view from one side of the train......

.....and this is the view from the other side.)

Even the food at the train station looks irresistible, but I am holding back on the panini/pizza as I am not training today and I don’t have euros to be throwing out the window on temporary indulgences.

(At the train station)

I am writing this blog on my third of four train transfers.Now that I am in Italy, I was able to successfully purchase the final leg of my journey. I had a tiny bit of anxiety about the fact that I had tickets only ¾’s of the way to my final destination; I am not touring, I am bike racing, and I have places to be, and kilometers to pedal. So “YAY” for: easy ticket purchases, smooth (albeit long) travel days, all things Italian, bike racing and the Giro.

Yea, this is going to be good.

My Big News

I am racing the GIRO DONNE (Giro Ciclistico Internazionale Femminile or the Giro of Italy) with the US National Team!!!!

I am so grateful and very excited about this opportunity. The US squad is unbelievably strong and will be run by Michael Tamayo and Andrew Hawkes.

With the best teams in the world competing, the racing is going to be incredible. I have been working very hard here in France and am elated to be going to Italy.

I travel to Italy tomorrow to meet up with the US girls. I look forward to being around Americans!

It is going to be quite the travel day: 6:30AM departure, 4 transfers on the train, and hopefully, I will get all the way to my intended destination in Italy by 11pm (or after). The Euro-rail system is interesting; I cannot buy train tickets for Italy in the train stations of France, and you cannot buy tickets online either because they do not issue e-tickets. It seems somewhat backwards, eh? So hopefully there will be a seat available even though online it says "please reserve"...this is what we call flying by the seat of your pants. I am used to this though, and I am learning the ropes of the rails with all the race travel I have been doing.

Stage 4

Lesson Learned: 15 seconds of being in your head too much on a Cat 1 climb gets you nowhere.

Stage 3

Lesson Learned: There is only so much one person can do.

I suppose you want to know about today

Stage 2: Brasseiur to Noirt

Stayed upright. Attacked twice. Too fast, but too easy.

They shouldn't post a "4km Arrive" sign when its only 2km. Didn't get to sprint. 14th in the Stage. I should trust my computers and cheat sheets over signs.

13th GC.

Stage 1: Bressieur Time Trial

18km, we quickly modified one of my teammate’s time trial bike 25 minutes before my start time, and off I went. Well kind of......I need to work on my starts, today wasn’t the first time that I almost rode off the ramp. It’s kind of scary and an awesome way to make yourself look like a complete idiot.

So about the course: it was very bumpy; it reminded me of the day Einat and I were riding, and she commented, “I don’t get this! There were holes here, and now there are bumps – what’s the difference?!” So that is basically the feel of the entire course, really patched up pavement and sometimes I had the joy of rolling over the ripples (don’t you love it when pavement does that?)

The turns were quite tight, and for my first ride on a time trial bike in 3 months (I rode a TT bike once in April, so maybe I should say for the first ride on a time trial bike since last August), I would say my technical skills were somewhat adept.

Another little obstacle to ‘letting her rip’ was the tiny factor of gravel ALL over the descents and sharp corners – if I fall, the TT is over, if I am slow and stay upright, well, then I finish. I was aggressive, and might have taken some chances, but I am not super pleased with my decelerations into the corners and my hesitation on the descents.

I dropped my chain twice, and had some difficulties with the rear derailleur finding gears. The second time I dropped my chain, Marianne Vos was passing me. What was I doing letting Vos pass me 1km from the finish? Hahaha.

It’s a bummer, because the last chain drop cost me big time, as I was drilling it (within 1km to the finish) and I mid-hill, preparing for the remainder of the hill, and bam! Off with the chain –eerrrrrrrrrr, so frustrating. BUT the key today was that I had a time trial bike, sooooo key.

Oh I guess you want to know my placing too, I was 16^th, I think had I not been busy easing the chain off the front chain rings I could have found myself in the top 10, or had I just pushed it a little more up and over one hill, or had I not slowed down going into some of the corners, or had I not gotten out of my aero bars into some of the corners......well you get the point. But I guess the magic number was “20” (seconds) because the directeur sportif who was following me said I lost 20 seconds on the second chain drop (I was messing around for a long time), and looking at the results right now, I am seeing that to beat the 10^th place woman, I would have had to be 20 seconds faster.

Anyway, it was fun. I like time-trialing and the next few days should be interesting.

Quick Update

I am on a French Keyboard, and actually do not feel like talking/typing much.

A few things to update:
Saturday: was an 11hr travel day.
Sunday:
Road Race in AM: I was 2nd. I tried to be aggressive the first 3 laps but quickly realized I was not going to be allowed to get away from the pack solo or in a small group, so I ended up just sitting in - not so fun for me. I am not overly happy as I was beat in the final sprint.
Time Trial in the PM: I think it was a decent effort. I did not have any aero equipment, and the 'posted results' were incorrect, and then we could not find other results. Anyway, it was a solid training day.

Monday/Tuesday: Stayed at my teammate Isabelle's house (I just met her, and she is the BEST! She is a world class triathlete and an awesome person.) She lived 20km outside of Dijon in the countryside - it was beautiful there.

Wednesday: Travel to Grande Boucle Internationale. I am rooming with Isa, and its great.

Thrusday: We have an 18km TT this afternoon.

I am learning this whole process is about building character and staying focused in the face of adversity. Send me your positive thoughts and your strong legs this week.

98 years old and still riding

An inspirational little story. Keep those legs moving!!

An Elephant with Wings

As I was saying, our apartment should be listed as a tourist attraction, under the heading "Zoos". This morning we had another exotic 'find'. This insect was about 3 inches in length, I would not get close enough to give you an adequate scale to appreciate its enormity, but trust me, this thing was HUGE! Looks like a bee, on 'roids.

This is a couple days after Einat walks by me with "Fluffy", her little pet spider. She used the web as a leash to walk around the apartment with him.

Lets see, its been a few weeks since my last update. Lots and lots of training and thus exploring of the area - I am getting a hang for the geography: up and down, and then back up again.

A trip to Carcassonne, but not the Castle.

And apparently "John's Club" in Carcassone (just realized the name of the cafe we sat at, for ages - very French, eh?).

"Show me pensive"(....or "bored"... or "irritated"? I guess this might have been during our 1/2hr wait for the bill.)