I haven't written anything in a long time, because I have been busy. Every week for the past six weeks I have been racing. Bit by bit I chronicle these races over the next week.

After Klassica Primavera I did another two classics in France. These were in Brittany and we were to go by car. This trip is about 2000km and the car journey is tiresome enough, yet along the 200km long races. As luck would have it, the planes were grounded due to Eyjafjallajökull. That volcano miles away that seemed to affect most of Europe. It made me give credence to the "Butterfly Effect". We were going by car anyway.

The races were Tour du Finistere and Tro Bro Leon. Both races are category 1.1, which means they are of a high standard.

Finistere actually went very well give everything. My team and I aren't used to this sort of racing by any means and the fact we all finished this race well is a big credit. I unfortunately stuttered a bit when the race split after a nasty little climb and didn't go in the final break. Which was a shame because I felt very capable. The door of opportunity in these situations is open only very briefly. The race in itself was hard, but not overly so. The nordic are a bit more aggressive at fighting for position in the peleton and like to attack incessantly, which is good. Far worse is being bored to death by a race controlled ticking a long at an average pace

Tro Bro Leon is an amazing race and it was a huge pleasure to take part.

This race is a little (200km) copy of Paris-Roubaix and takes in several dirt tracks sections totaling 30 odd kilometers. It start and end in the village of Lannilis in Brittany and takes in very beautiful scenery, these dirt tracks intersecting the most rural countryside and even taking in quite a bit of the coast. It was interesting to note all the Gaelic prefixes in the words, and sign posts to hill forts and the like. The place feels most definitely Celtic; cold, windswept and green.

My team coming from the Algarve was woefully unprepared. The equipment needed for this race is a bit different to the standard and we went on standard tires and only had one support vehicle, when we needed two, to have spare wheels at each dirt track section. I punctured about halfway through. I had to wait a long while for a wheel change. As well as this I should have finished the section punctured, but didn't. Anyway. I had to chase for 50 min alone till I reached the peleton. This was a massive effort and pretty much shot the engine. I don't know what speed I was going, but given I had lost minutes and caught a very fast moving race; that was quite some individual TT I did. Needless to say, when I got caught behind a crash 20 more k down the road I called it quits and went on direct to the stage finish at Lanilis by myself. I later found Rob Hayles and a team mate of his for company.

Klasica Primavera

This weekend we raced Klasica Primavera. This was a fantastic race, the Basque people love bike racing and each passage by the finish line or "helmuga" as the Basques call it was filled with a few thousand of people. The moutain tops or "muniketagane" were also full of supportive fans.

The weather also held of and except for the absolutely freezing start was ok. Thankfully it didn't rain. I am not fond of cold an rain.

The race started at 06:00 the day before with a massive car journey or a thousand kilometers or so. We arrived sometime about 17:00 and went out training. I felt good training, although, I was evidently tired after such a huge car journey. Still, I felt that by the next day things would be okay.

The next day, race day, started at 05:00 according to my body clock and 06:00 according to the Spanish clock. I had slept okay and was looking forward to the race. Breakfast was a bit of a chore as the hotel provided us with horrible sticky buns and some re-heated spaghetti complete with dry bits and some omelets.

The race started of badly, as the break went right away and I wasn't in it, although I jumped at each successive opportunity there after, all of which failed. Retrospectively (I didn't appreciate this at the time) I saw some fantastic team work by team Saxo Bank defending their man in the break, Andy Shleck, by closing down each and every attempt made there after. Looking back it was top shelf racing I was witnessing, with all of them mucking in to get the work done.

Anyway, for the first 2 hours I felt like I was a top notch bike racer ticking over nicely at 120 bpm in the peleton rubbing shoulder with many illustrious riders form the Grand Tours. However this view quickly changed when many kilometers later, when I found myself gasping for oxygen on the first mountain of the day and finding that in fact I was a good bit of form. I would normally get criticized for this, but I know I was 6-7% bellow par.

I muddled on anyway, climb after climb, especially enjoying the descents and disliking the run ins which were always done at a sprint. I finally dropped of the pace about half way up the penultimate climb of the day, found myself a couple of russians to ride hope with and then got caught by an "express" grupetto powered by the remnants of the Euskatel-Euskadi team... I quite enjoyed the express ride home, it made a change from the normal given up type grupetto ride.

All in all, although mediocre in many ways I am happy with with how this race went. The next will get better all the way to September.

Since the Tour of Algarve

The weather has improved here in the Algarve. The sun is out after what has been the wettest winter ever. It's still not baking hot, but just pleasant.

I got over the disappointment of the Tour of Algarve eventually. And had one race since then. This race was 1º Prova da Taça de Portugal G.P. José Zeferino in Povoa do Varzim. I was highly skeptical about my form having been relatively weak in training, however in the heat of the moment my body responded beautifully and I, together with a team mate controlled the entire race for 136km. Eventually we left the final climb and 10k to our fresh legged team mates to bring Cândido Barbosa nicely to the line and victory. I felt very good at all stages of the race and was just shy of passing the final climb, which means that even after all that work, controlling all those break aways I was ok.

That race was the remedy I needed to fix my head. Now I have an interesting calendar, which will take me to the Basque country and France in the next few weeks. I will be doing classic races which are very tough.