It isn't often that Zdenek Stybar is in London (not since he was 11, he said). You would not expect me to miss this auspicious event, would you? Well I didn't. Styby was in town partly to take a peek at the Olympic road race course and partly for the launch of Balint Hamvas' and tgsgirl's new cyclocross book (buy it, it's fab!). He did a question and answer session and then proceeded to be his utterly charming self for the rest of the evening, chatting and signing autographs with a massive smile. Now you may remember the pink hand decorated boots I wore to the Koksijde worlds. I gave them another airing tonight and Styby loved them! He thanked me, little ME, for my fandom and my efforts! I didn't know what to say! He was utterly utterly lovely. We talked for ages and ages about all kinds of things...his road programme, riding with OPQS, CX in the UK, my feeble efforts at being a crosser (he asked when I was going to race in Belgium, bahaha), my bikes, what he thought of London (he doesn't like full English breakfasts), how he trains, nutrition, mutual aquaintances, the races I'd been to. He was SO friendly and so genuinely interested in a little nobody like me. Just a thoroughly nice guy. I was a fan before but now I'm a SUPERfan.

Continue reading this post »

The groundswell of support in the Basque Country and around the world in an effort to save the Tour of the Basque Country and San Sebastian Classic from the scrapheap has resulted in an initiative asking people to donate one Euro, or whatever they feel they can afford, to help close the 150,000 Euro budget deficit. Early details have been released in the form of this website. There is also a Facebook page here with details of how to donate. At present, the only way to give money seems to be by transferring it to the bank account details listed on that page but I am raising with them the problems this presents for people in foreign countries (I know last time I tried to transfer money to a foreign account at the bank I needed all manner of codes and I incurred a massive fee). We'll see what they say. They are holding a press conference tonight at 7:30pm in San Sebastian where the campaign will be officially launched. We might get more details then. I urge you to donate something, however small, if you can. Every cent is useful.

In addition, use the hashtag #savetheBasqueraces on Twitter, and join this Facebook group.

Jose of @tourdejose has an article on her blog which sets out the monetary issues in English. Yours truly was also quoted by EiTB yesterday!

We may be very small fish trying to make ourselves heard in a surging ocean, but I for one am blowed if I'm going to see these races die without an almighty fight.

This weekend, I went to Koksijde. They had a big bike race. There were lots of people, lots of alcoholic beverages, and not enough portaloos. I cheered my heart out along with tgsgirl (who didn't bring ANY of the Leffes she owes me), Sarah, Bingo Little and UrlaubinPolen and while it was rather hard to get close enough to anything in the midst of 60,000 people, I did take a few snaps. Enjoy!

Continue reading this post »

When? 3pm (CET), Saturday 28th January

As I sat down to write this piece, I realised I had no idea what ‘beloften’, the word the Dutch speakers of this world use to denote the U23s, actually meant. Therefore, I did what every self-respecting writer on ‘foreign’ sports does in these circumstances, and plugged the word into Google Translate. Beloften…promises, the plural of belofte; promise, vow or pledge. For many casual watchers, the cyclocross worlds is all about the Sunday, when the elite men and women line up to astound with their power and mind-boggling skill, but these elites were once beloften, young riders whose potential promised their eventual rise to the top of their tree. On Saturday, Koksijde will get a glimpse of the future when the cream of the youthful crop battles it out over the dunes.

Lars van der Haar (Netherlands, Rabo-Giant Offroad) Age=20, defending champion.

Continue reading this post »

Next weekend, a deputation from the Cafe (myself, Sarah Connolly, tgsgirl and Urlaub...and maybe a couple of others) will be at the CX Worlds in Koksijde. We have wellies, we have buckets and spades, but we have nothing to wave. This makes us sadface. It is hard to decide what to put on a banner as we have too many favourites (although 'Styby, will you marry me?' needs to feature), so we thought it may be a good idea to take something a little more neutral. Also, we would like you to see us on the teevee. This set us wondering where the PdC banner is at the moment. Does anyone know who has it? And would it be possible to ship it to the UK in time for 27th January?

Once again, I forfeited sun, sea and sand this Christmas week for mud, sand, and….mud. My friends think I’m weird. Maybe I am. Anyway, I spent a week at The Chainstay in Oudenaarde for the second winter running and attended four cross races (GVA Loenhout, Sylvestercross Bredene, Fidea Classics Leuven and GVA Baal) with the gang. The Chainstay houses foreign racers over in the Holy Land to try and make their way on the toughest stage of all, and also caters for hangers on like yours truly. I made friends with them all last year and had such a great time that I couldn’t stay away! My housemates were Gabby Day (GB…you know her of course), Jeremy Durrin (USA), Craig Richey (Canada) and British U23s Andy Hargroves and Luke Grey, and I travelled to the races with them, waving a soigneur’s pass of power. I won’t bore you too much with words, as pictures speak louder, right? In this instalment I will cover Loenhout and Bredene. I have way to many photos to fit in one post, so please indulge me!

GVA Loenhout (Azencross)

Not long after arriving, I had a wander around the campervans of The Bigs. I always grin when I see, in real life, the cross guys I normally only view on a little box on my computer screen. Hello Niels!!

Continue reading this post »

Albertina <----- off work, sick. I didn't pick a bad day, did I?! The Koppenberg is the first race of eight in the Gazet van Antwerpen Trofee series, which was won last year by His Svenness, from Stybar and Pauwels. In other news, this race is awesome. I won't say any more, as Chris has already written a fab preview.

Here is what The Belgian One, our very own GS had to say in her Cross Calendar:

Oh my, I wonder where this race is. On the freaking Koppenberg maybe? The race goes up the Koppenberg and then flies down the hill in a muddy, technical, awesome descent. One of the most prestigious races on the calendar, this one. Do. Not. Miss it.

Start time: women 13h45, men 15h
Last three winners elite men: Sven Nys (2010), Sven Nys (2009) and Sven Nys (2008)  [Note from Albertina: bah] [Another note from Albertina: in the women's race, our very own crayon artist superstar Helen Wyman will be out to defend her crown...good luck Helen!]


Website: www.koppenbergcross.be 

Profile, Map 

Live feed here

RESULTS!

1. Kevin Pauwels
2. Sven Nys
3. Zdenek Stybar
4. Bart Aernouts
5. Tom Meeusen

Watch the last lap here.

There have already been some fabulous reports of the Tour of Britain, so I hope I am not reinventing the aero-wheel here and that you lovely people will actually look at my humble photographic offerings. Please say you will. Every comment gets a Leffe, 'kay? You can bill tgsgirl. Anyway, I had excellent company for the London stages, in the form of majope and Mr majope, who had come all the way from the US of A JUST for our little bike race (and some other stuff). With them was Barbie Barbie. Want to see what he got up to? Scroll right on down!

Continue reading this post »

No idea how I'm going to make this post long enough to merit being a fanpost, as I just want to ask one simple question: who's going to be in London on Sunday watching the Tour of Britain finale? Shall we have a Podium Cafe race watching/beer drinking party? These things are always waaaay more fun when done together-like! Let me/everyone know if you're going to be around and what your plans are! My plans haven't happened yet, but I'm hoping to change this soon...

NB, I kindly request that you read Part 1 first!

Our plan for Stage 20, which ran from Bilbao to Vitoria-Gasteiz, was to do the double whammy of start and Urkiola. This involved walking from our hotel right across town to the team buses’ parking, running all the way to the old city to Atxuri Station, jumping on the Eusktren to Durango and walking 11km from the town to near the summit of the legendary Urkiola, the cathedral of Basque cycling. We must have walked 25km in one day, at least. We set out on a bit of a wing and a prayer, hoping everything would work, and it did, despite a minor panic when we got to where we thought the station was and found a shopping centre instead. The Urkiola was baking hot, steep, and utterly glorious, and the fans passionate, good natured, and encouraging to all. I will let the pictures do this talking, as quite frankly, it is hard to put awesomeness into words. 

Continue reading this post »

I am writing to you from a dull and dingy office in south west Essex, and am mournful of visage, for there are no mountains here, no white farmhouses with red roofs, no pintxos, no txakoli and no men in orange. I am no longer in Euskal Herria, and am thus in need of a hug. This week I lived the dream, and I hope to live it over again in my memories as I write this. UrlaubInPolen, known by many as Urbs (which is easier), went to stages 17, 19 and 20 of the Vuelta. We cheered with the masses on Peña Cabarga, were swept up in the euphoria of a Basque victory in Bilbao, and joined the orange wave on the Urkiola. I never, ever, wanted to leave.

Continue reading this post »

Something was afoot in London and surrounds yesterday. What was this? The citizens of leafy Surrey were unable to get out of their drives to buy a pint of milk, as they had done every Sunday morning for fifteen years! But hey ho, one man’s nightmare-inducing civic outrage was another girl’s bliss, for there were cyclists in town! Lots of them! A couple of hundred thousand enlightened beings were as excited as me…well, almost, and lined the route with heart warming fervour for the London-Surrey Cycle Classic, unofficially known as the Olympic test race. It pitted the best of Britain’s trade teams against a plethora of national teams, packed with stars, on a 130km route, identical to the 2012 Olympic course, minus an extra seven laps of Box Hill, and it was won by CAVISVERYFAST. Well blow me down.

Yours truly toddled down to central London at an earlier hour than is commonly regarded as sensible, armed with camera and a charming smile (no Stern Librarian Glare at the weekend), with the intention to woo the pros into posing for photographs. Bizarrely, there was next to nobody in the team area apart from me, and I had them all at the mercy of my lens. Here is what I saw.

Continue reading this post »

tgsgirl informed me recently that she has NEVER been party to a Hottitude Thread. Can you believe that?! I coulnd't either. But it would appear we haven't had one in far too long. Perhaps since Curacao even! I told her to create one, but she hasn't. So it falls to me to further gutterise my squeaky clean vicar's daughter reputation. Every Tour we come across new gems of hottitude, about which we were sadly unaware, and we revisit the stalwarts of this most crucial classification. Both are welcome here. And DNFs can be included (I guess you know why I wanted to stress that). Have fun kids!

Continue reading this post »

I love cyclists. Every Movistar rider except Rojas crashed during stage one, and they went on a nice team outing to the hospital. The two worst off were Basque debutant Beñat Intxausti (horribly banged up elbow) and Andrey Amador, the first Costa Rican to ride the Tour, and who began the year left for dead in a ditch having been mugged on a training ride (ankle like a balloon). In addition, Arroyo had bumps down his right side, and Costa and Ventoso some nasty wounds on their legs. Kiryienka, Erviti and Gutierrez also smacked planet, with varying degrees of pain. X-rays found no fractures in the bones of Intxausti or Amador, and they started today, and went to hell and back.

Continue reading this post »

Over the past few weeks, the UK has been showered with elite crit racing, in the form of the Tour Series, an eight round team series contested by eight top teams, including Rapha Condor Sharp, Endura Racing, Motorpoint and Raleigh. I was at the last two rounds, in Woking and Canary Wharf (London). As you may have read, I had the good fortune to spend the London race in the company of FrenchKheldar, Papyrus and EdredonBrowny. We had a suitably beer fuelled little Cafe party, capped off by a capital dinner. Most of these pictures are from Woking as I was alone there (although I did bump into about a million people I knew!), but a couple are from the Wharf. I attempted to capture some of the faces, as well as the scenes.

For the record, Rapha Condor Sharp won the overall series. In the Woking round, the individual winner was Scott Thwaites, who is having a great season, having won the Lincoln Grand Prix earlier in the year. His Motorpoint team took the team honours. In London, Jonny McEvoy won by attacking impressively from a break of five, and his Endura team won the night.

Nestling in a verdant valley on the road between Besain and Zumarraga is the small town of Ormaiztegi. Water is very much a theme in this typically Basque habitation, full of white painted baserriak, standing as it does where the rivers Estanda and San Lucia connect, swelled by abundant streams which tumble from the heights of Ukarreo and Monte Española on either side. Wikipedia’s Spanish-language entry on the town speaks of another variety of water, in the context of its climate, which is "temperate and humid, with no major seasonal contrasts", for "prevailing winds are north and northwest, making a plethora of rain".

It is perhaps appropriate therefore, that one of Ormaiztegi’s most famous modern residents, Euskaltel Euskadi rider Gorka Izagirre, whose surname means in Euskera ‘a person living in a place exposed to the wind’, should be rather fond of the rain. In an interview published in Deia, team chief Igor Gonzalez de Galdeano described his young charge as being ‘motivated by bad weather’. At a winter team camp, he tells us, Izagirre was the last man standing on a wet, cold day, still desperate to test himself for three hours even though most people’s sense may have dictated a rest day indoors. His first professional win, as if by design, came on a hideous day at last year’s Tour of Luxembourg. So who is this resiliant, hardy young Basque, and how did he come to occupy his rightful place at the zenith of Euskadi’s Generation U25?

Continue reading this post »

Many of you will have picked up on the fact that I was in Italy last week. Did you miss me on the live threads, yelling at Tommeke and my Beloved Beñat through the medium of the keyboard? I feel sure that you did. Please tell me that you did, otherwise I will get sadface. Anyway, the reason for my absence was the Horizon Fitness RT training camp in Riccione, a week long boot camp (for me at least) held at the Mpire Cycling Centre, the brain child of former pro Jamie Burrow (immortalised in Gav’s interview here), and the Hotel Villa Platani. Here is a modest little diary of the week.

Continue reading this post »