52, 4, 2, 0, 35-12. No, this is not some ground breaking numerical formula. I have not miraculously turned into a mathematical genius over night, much to my father’s disappointment. Rather these numbers refer to certain experiences I had had while travelling to my first ever professional training camp.
The annual hTC-Columbia training camp was held in Mallorca, Spain from the 12th-23rd of January. Sounds lovely right? Well it was, if you erase the travel to get there. And here I present to you the story of my truly epic journey to the Balearic Islands.
52: Hours of travel. Flying straight out from Melbourne after the National Championships I had no idea that I would soon be travelling for more than two days. It was made worse when I misread my flight details and rocked up at the Melbourne airport seven hours before departure time.
4: Different planes to actually get to beautiful Mallorca. Melbourne-Kula Lumpa. Kula Lumpa-Frankfurt. Frankfurt-Barcelona. Barcelona-Mallorca.
2: Cancelled flights. I know little of the weather circumstances in Europe when I began my journey. I was enlightened only slightly at the check in desk in Melbourne when I approached the counter cheerfully announcing, “I’m travelling to Frankfurt” only to be greeted by laughter.
“What?”
“Good-luck”. I then learnt that Frankfurt airport had been snowed in and in excess of 200 flights had been cancelled or delayed causing chaos across Europe. Luckily, it was not this flight that was cancelled. I made it to Frankfurt just fine, getting out of it was the problem.
What was meant to be the shortest leg of my journey quickly turned into the longest, and I can only thank my six espresso shots for getting me through it. My flight from Frankfurt was delayed, then cancelled, then my make-up flight was delayed, and then cancelled again. I made the executive decision to change my flight destination from Madrid to Barcelona and six hours later I was out of there and only moment away from Mallorca! ...Or so I thought.
On the same flight from Frankfurt to Barcelona as Ina Teutenberg, I began to relax, I was almost there and it felt good!
Ina had a flight to Mallorca only moments after we arrived in Barcelona so I waved her goodbye at the gate and foolishly said “I’ll see you in an hour” as my flight was scheduled to depart only an hour or so after.
Another delayed and cancelled flight later I arrived in Mallorca, five hours after having said good bye to Ina in Barcelona. She greeted me at the team sponsorship meeting that night with a massive smile; we couldn’t believe that I had managed to arrive almost a quarter of day later and so all there was to do was laugh.
0: The number of bags waiting for me upon my arrival in Mallorca. Not a surprise really, after all my flight hopping.
35-12: The drop in temperature from Australia to Spain. I was there shivering while the Euros, so the majority of my team, were embracing the ‘warm’ weather.
So apart from my nightmare journey to Mallorca how was the training camp? It was pretty fantastic, while at the same time incredibly daunting.
The camp was held on the Spanish Island of Mallorca which, as it turns out, is where the entire European cycling community migrates in the winter months. Well not quite, but I don’t think I’m too far off with that statement; in my time there I saw the entire Silence-Lotto, Skil-Shimano, and countless other smaller continental cycling teams. Known for its good weather/less than freezing temperatures and its fantastic riding it’s easy to understand why the island is so popular with cyclists.The two week camp seemed to be some bizarre drawn out version of Christmas. I constantly found my arms full of things I didn’t really know I needed but was sure I could find a use for. I managed to accumulate more team clothing than I will ever find time to wear and that I am sure could easily clothe a small army. Aside from this, the camp was a mixture of getting to know team mates, my new coach, and sponsors, fitting bikes, shoes and helmets, eating, and of course, training.
While attending my first ever professional training camp was exciting and frightening enough it was only magnified by the fact that after six years of being coached by Sian Mulholland (Hi Sian!) I would be changing coaches to the hTC team coach, Rene Wenzel.
While changing coaches was to some degree an exciting prospect, I am a creature of habit and would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little worried.
Sian was unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time in 2002 when my father ambushed her and asked if she would be interested in coaching a naïve and somewhat terrible 12 year old female cyclist. Six and a bit years later, Sian has become more a mentor/auntie figure to me than a coach and is probably one of the major reasons I am still in the sport, so it has been a pretty huge change.
Rene is a wealth of knowledge when it comes to cycling so I know I am in good hands and I’m eager to learn as much as I can from him. Although I can’t help feeling a little sorry for him, as I’m not sure if he’s fully aware of what he’s getting himself into. For those of you that know me you’ll understand that I’m be no means a complacent person and when it comes to my cycling I like to know what I’m doing, when I’m doing it, and why I’m doing it. I have warned him about my high maintenance demeanour, I'm sure he can handle it...
Hours on the bike (I spent more time on the bike than I ever have, with some training blocks seeing me spend up to 17 hours out on the road in three days) allowed me to get to know all the girls and it’s definitely a great mix. Hailing from seven different countries we’re a diverse and different group of people that seem to work really well together.
You’ve got the Germans (Ina, Judith, Luise, along with our Sports Director, Ronny) to set the schedule, the Dutchies (Ellen and Adrie) to break the schedule, and the neutral countries (Sweden, Emilia; New Zealand, Linda; Australia, Me) to do whatever we’re told. Then there are the Americans (Evelyn and Kim) to joke about the Germans setting the schedule, the Dutch breaking the schedule, and the neutrals following the schedule. Finally there’s the Italian (Noemi) who just wants to ride Randa (a climb in Mallorca).
So after returning home, and with my first professional training camp out of the way, I’m now looking forward to the season ahead. I’ve got a lot to learn, but I’m racing with some of the best athletes in the world and for the best team in world and I cannot wait.
No comments:
Post a Comment