Euro Livin'- Race Weekend

Wow, I hope my whole time here in Europe doesn’t fly by as fast as the past few days. It has been a whirlwind. In the past two days the team and I have battled it out in two as-euro-as-it-gets type races. The climbs were steep and the descents gave little in the way of recovery as we were forced to bend and contort ourselves to even carve out a line over the barkless roots and mud slime. I am tired, satisfied, but dysfunctional in my exhaustion. Because of this I hope, as a reader of this blog, you’ll forgive any embarrassing grammatical errors. Il’l Probibly make afew.

When I left off on Thursday we had just arrived and gone out for our first ride along the German countryside.

 

Like I said, it was a beautiful ride, but when we went Friday to pre-ride the race course in Landgraaf, Netherlands, it was refreshing to be back on dirt. Even though we were racing in Belgium the next day, we decided the 45 minute drive to Landgraaf was a bit more appealing than the two hour drive to Belgium. It felt amazing to get be able to acquaint myself with the mountain bike again, and it didn’t hurt that do to a recent dry spell, the track was in amazing condition for ripping. The track inspection went well, everyone got their lines down perfect, and it would have been day without a hitch if I would have just gone the direction I knew.

 

Looking for a nice place to get a cool down spin in, I took a trail I’d noticed before but never ridden. It was a cool trail and I followed it till I found another good looking trail, which lead me to an ok looking trail, which lead me to faint deer trail leading into someone’s horse ranch. I did get on a bike path as soon as possible, hoping it would just lead me back to Landgraaf, but he further I went the less familiar things got.

 

It provided some beautiful riding, I just didn’t know where I was. I used my best high school German to ask a woman passing by how I could get back to Landgraaf, but I think I must have insulted her instead. She was riding a bike next to me and once I asked for directions she looked at me like I was crazy and started dropping me like a rock. Thankfully I came across someone else shortly after, but this time I decided to be the stupid American who was lost instead of the stupid American who was obliviously spouting off accented insults. This kind Dutchman sent me in the right direction and I was back to the vans with enough time to still get a little cool down in.

After a tossing, turning, Ambien enhanced night, the alarm was singing to me loud and clear, waking me for battle. The drive to Belgium is about two hour, though it seemed to fly by as I had the nonstop entertainment of our mechanic, Michelle’s, epic stories of the life. Fixing Tom Mussen’s rear shifter before the world championships, giving Jenny Rissveds chocolates at the last world cup, the man has seen it all… or at least he talks like he has. Either way, it sure made the time fly by.

Before I knew it, I was lining up for my first European race of the season, and European it was.

There was mud, rowdy spectators, and roots with the bark worn clean off flowing down the hill side like thick greasy cobwebs. There were even sausages being cooked by about the most cliché European mom I’ve ever seen.

  

The gun goes off like a crack of lightning and before your brain even realizes you thrust yourself into the fray. Cocked elbows fly like clubs and force fields, providing both your defense and offence as you try to weasel your way to where you belong. The front group of riders disappears in an instant. They’re floating over virgin ground, an unobstructed view of victory. We, on the other hand, are forced back by the masses in our wake. Cut in on a line there, get off and run around a guy here, hold on white-knuckled for dear life everywhere.

It would be great to be on the podium or fighting for first, I mean, at the end of the day that’s the goal, that’s why we’re here, but there’s something to be said for fighting every inch you can muster when you have idea where you’re at. When you could be fifth or twentieth but it doesn’t matter- what matters is that guy in front of you is beating you, but not for long. When you drive the pedal down with more force than you thought you had, and then do it again and again for every pedal stroke of the race- that’s what matters. When you climb onto and around the wheel of two Belgians and hear their coach frantically shout, “Don’t let the American beat you!” and even though you’ve got nothing left you drop one more attack- that’s what matters.

That’s racing in Europe. They’re dirty and grueling and ugly and smell of leaf decay and cow poop… and are absolutely addictively beautiful in their raw emotion. I don’t know if I hate the way I love them, love the way I hate them, or love them for just the way they are.

That pretty much sums up the two days of racing for me over the weekend. In both Belgium and The Netherlands I did actually have pretty good races all things considered, but that’s not what mattered. What mattered is that now, on Sunday night, lying in bed writing this, I’m so tired I’m shaking; I’m so tired my computer just had to autocorrect from tyerd back to tired. When that happens you know it’s been a good weekend.

P.S.- I would just like to take this moment to point out that I took a selfie with Sven Nys on Saturday. That is all.