Jumping in feet first... the Omloop het Nieuwsblad!
The Omloop het Nieuwsblad in Belgium, a UCI 1.1 (one-day cateogory one) race. As the notorious opening race of the spring classics this race is a target for many professional female cyclists. Not only does it mark the start of the Belgium cycling season it is also one of the toughest races on the European calender. Omloop het Nieuwsblad will be my first race in Europe in general... talk about jumping in feet first!
The Maaslandster Nicheliving CCN girls that were to line-up for the Omloop het Nieuwsblad jumped in our team van a couple of days ago for a reconnaissance of the course and can I say thank goodness we did! Rolling out after gettting kitted up in the chilly outdoors on a side road somewhere in Ghent (Belgium) I was looking at the road in front of me thinking - this road looks nice, quite wide and smooth. So we began and there we were rolling along the Belgium roads which I had only dreamt of getting the chance to experience after seeing all the spring classics being showcased on television. We get about 20kms into the ride and we hit... COBBLES, AH! Without much warning we jumped onto these cobbles. I was pretty excited seeing them in front of me and also in a bit of a shock because I really hadn't prepared myself to ride on them yet. There was a lot of rattling from the bike and as after a minute or so I realised the rattling was not going to stop and came to the conclusin that riding faster and getting over them as fast as possible was a much better way to handle it. Rather than cautiously taking one cobble at a time. I think I'm doing pretty well getting over these cobbles, I felt fast until I looked up the road and my two new European teammates were nearly out of view up the road absolutely power over these cobbles like they were non-existent. So I decided I wasn't going fast enough and just jammed it in a big gear, slowed the cadence down and just got on with it. I got back onto still roads and although it was still a nerve racking experience, the adrenalin was pumping and I thought that was pretty damn awesome.
Conquere cobbled roads - check! Now for a cobbled climb...
We had been tapping quite a few more kilometres on our recconaisance of Omloop het Nieuwsblad, consisting of many punchy climbs; where the best option was to sprint up the steep 600 metres or so. After a few speedy descents in there as well, we are warned about the Paderstraat. The Paderstraat is a very steep, yet short cobbled climb. It's a key part of the race as the course takes a right turn off a descent straight into it. As we are rolling the course on our reconnaissance we come to the descent before the Paderstraat. I was getting a bit nervous after being told to be prepared for it by getting into a very easy gear and making sure to pick a good line to navigate over the bad cobbles. Shifting down the gears, I see my four teammates in front make the right hander, at this point I couldn't see the climb, so I turn on the brakes a bit and as I reach the turn and get a look at what all the talk was about, I immediatly thought... CRAP I should not have slowed down that much because I was going to need as much momentum possible to get my bum up this thing. I managed to navigate the first 3/4 of the climb feeling OK about it. In the easiest gear I have I reach the last 80m or so and feel the legs slowing and not being sure whether I could actually make it to the top without having to un-clip or without possibly falling backwards down this climb because of how steep it was. I did eventually reach the top with an extremely high heart rate, and as I reached the top I thought to myself;
'so that was quite a challenge to get through on my
own and with my other teammates riding just in front of
me... and in a couple of days time I will be doing that same hill,
however, I will be doing it with just under 200 women, a large
majority of which will be professional teams and we will be going
a lot harder and faster AND if the race has not strung out by this point we
will be handle bar to handle bar packed in, spread as wide as the road will
allowall trying to navigate our way up the cobbled wall whilst only
beingabout 20cm from the wheel in front... geeeeeeeez!!!'
Despite these somewhat scary thoughts, I finished the reccy of the course (after many more cobbled sections, the majority of which were on flat roads, with one or two more cobbles punchy climbs) and felt really excited to have conquered cobbles for the first time ever. I did forget to mention that this race has a bit of everything, so it is not just cobbles and nasty climbs as I have explained. There are a lot of long sections of flat roads particularly the first 30 kilometres where it is just about flat the whole way which is nice but it just means there is more time for everyone to prepare for the cobbles and climbs when we race. This recconissance ride however, really made me realise that a race such as the Omloop het Nieuwsblad is ultimately a race that every female pro cyclist would dream of winning and I would be lining up for it in only a few days time, which is now tomorrow!!!! To be racing in such an important race and to be lining up against a world class field of women including the likes of World Champion Lizzie Armistead who I would have to say is my biggest inspiration in cycling, was and still is a lot to fathom. I finally have an idea of what I have signed up for and what I will be experiencing these eight months. It is however comforting to know that I am starting with just about THE hardest race of the European season, so from here on the racing won't be quite as challenging.
Now it is time to rest and fuel up before I get right into it tomorrow!
