Yellow for a while then way too much gutter action.

Firstly, let me apologise for not keeping you updated more regularly. I have for the last few days been rather indisposed, for reasons you will soon discover.

The 2nd and 3rd of May saw the Moving Ladies team head to Medemblik, a town in the north of the Netherlands, for a two day mini tour consisting of a 70km Omloop and 100km Road Race. (Omloop, as I have come to learn is a circuit race which is longer than a criterium.) The tour was not quite at the same level as the UCI races I competed in the weekend before but with 150 girls all looking to try and add a win or two to their palmares I knew it was going to be another fast, aggressive and exhausting weekend of racing…I was right, but maybe not in the exact same sense I had prepared myself for.

The 70km Omloop began at 6:30 on Saturday evening, and was 10laps of a 7km course with a 1km stretch of Kwelderwej thrown in, which (almost) literally translates to “torture road”. With strong winds and a very chilly temperature I was eager to get the race underway, as were the other 149 competitors. As my five teammates and I rolled up to the start line we found the road already blocked by the majority of the field. Getting to the front and staying there is key to races in Europe, and on narrow, technical roads this can quite often be the greatest challenge you’ll face throughout the race. It’s not uncommon to see teams claiming their position on the starting line up to forty minutes before the race is due to start. As the race rolled away, (after numerous delays such as the lead motor bike having a flat tire and a rider dropping a chain which then took three people to put back on ), myself and the rest of the Moving Ladies team found ourselves at the very back of the bunch. As Emma had said “I might have to do some cyclo-cross”, we found ourselves darting through the smallest gap and occasionally acquainting ourselves with the grass in our quest to get to the front.

Once again the race didn’t let my expectations of Dutch racing down. The strong winds meant there was plenty of gutter action as people attempted to split the bunch apart. There was constant attacking and the 1km “torture road” stretch saw gaps open up and girls scramble to close them. This uneven brick section of road also made sure any loose water bottles would be punished, and I found myself not only having to pick the smoothest path of road but also dodging wild bottles in the process. Emma, who has had an incredible streak of bad luck in the last couple of weeks was unlucky enough to hit one of the stray bottles, crashing out of the race. Luckily she did no major damage to herself.

I got into a number of small breaks, I tried to drive the break to establish a decent gap, but I think with the combination of the riders in the race, team race plans and me not being a known rider yet no-one was willing to work to keep the break away. Coming into the final lap the bunch was together and it was clear it was going to be a mass sprint. The finish was very interesting, with a sharp left hand turn 600m from the line the road then curved to the left and kicked up hill for the last 150ms. Ideally, you would want to come from the left hand side as sprinting on the right would be like actually going around a European round-about when you can clearly just drive straight over the top of it. However, as everyone knows, things never, or almost never at least, go to plan in bike races. I came around the corner in 4th position and then somehow got myself boxed in. With 250ms to go I backed off, swung to the right and exploded up the right hand side of the road narrowly crossing the line in first position ahead of Claudia.

Being approached by the race commentator afterwards with a microphone was a little daunting, luckily he seemed to have caught on that my Dutch was limited to non-existent and interviewed me in English. I received my three kisses from the Mayor, my bunch of flowers and my first European yellow jersey which I would wear proudly in the next 100km road race stage.

I will not remember the second stage of the mini tour as fondly as I remember the first. The rain which began as we sat on the start line could have been seen as the first bad omen of the day. However, I think if you took that approach in the Netherlands you’d end up with an extremely grim looking future.

My race and overall Tour aspirations came to a crashing end 15kms into Sunday’s stage when I failed to see/hear the warning (if there was one?) that the gutter jutted out. As I seem to always do, I hit my head when I crashed, concussing myself and have very little memory of the crash and the next hour or so after. However, I’m told that when the team car got to me they found me putting my bike together and jumping straight back on to continue with the race. I’m quite impressed with my level of dedication, even when concussed.

Despite my initial attempt to continue with the race I was soon in an ambulance completely confused, disoriented and going in and out of consciousness. As it turns out, waking up in a foreign country thousands of miles away from home while a nurse speaks to you in Dutch and the roof is spinning can be quite overwhelming and exhausting.

My first trip to a Dutch hospital, a CT scan and a few hours later it turned out I was fine. The Moving Ladies team once again loaded everything into the cars and headed home after a very eventful weekend. Harrie, the man both Emma and I are staying with seemed to have found himself in charge of a mini hospital as both Emma and I hobbled into the house a little worse for wear than when we left.

This coming Saturday is my next UCI race. Here’s hoping I’m healed from my latest adventure and can improve on my last result when racing the big girls!