European Junior Cycling Tour Assen

Stage 1 – Prologue

                                                                                                                                                            

The first stage was a 1km prologue with a tricky 180 degree bend which, annoyingly, we weren’t allowed to recce before our timed attempt. My preparation leading up to my prologue wasn’t the best, as up until an hour before, I was lying in bed because I was ill. I still gave the prologue my best shot but my time wasn’t reflective of what I should have got if I was feeling well. So a bit of disappointing and annoying start to the week of racing by being ill.

Stage 2 - Criterium Goudkust Vredeveldseweg

Today’s crit race was fast and furious from the start. We had 22 laps of a 1.8 km course to do, which had a few tight corners and a section of road which was tiled. In this tour, they grid riders by a lucky dip of the second digit of the bib numbers, to each row at the start line. Today I was gridded around the middle and so in the first few laps I was able to move myself up into a good position in the top third of the peloton, trying to conserve my energy. Next though, there was a crash right in front of me which completely slowed me up and I had to chase back onto the peloton. By the time I got back into the peloton I definitely had begun to tire and I found myself at the back of the peloton for the next few laps, before eventually dropping off. I was quite surprised at the time that I had dropped off as I believed that I was in good form, so I assumed that having to chase on after the crash had completely drained me. After I was off the main group I found that I was still struggling to keep up with a group of other riders who had dropped off, this made me realize that there must be another problem. I stopped at the pits and yes I had a slow puncture on my back wheel. This explained why I had dropped off the main group as when I checked my inner tube the hole was sooo tiny that I must have had the slow puncture for the majority of the race as it was rather flat when I stopped. So today was annoying as I lost time on the GC but it taught me that I need to be much more aware of problems to do with my bike as if I had realized earlier, when I was in the main bunch, I would have most likely lasted the whole race in the main bunch! I hope, my teammate, Paige, you recover quickly from breaking collar bone on the final corner on the final lap!

Stage 3 – Klassieker

                                                                                                                                                             The Klassieker was a 40 mile road race, with a technical 4.4 km cobbled section to contend with! The cobbled section was 10 miles into the race and leading up to that the race pace was set high as everyone was moving around the bunch to get to the front of the peloton; the safest place to be leading into the cobbled section as you were less likely to be stuck behind splits within the peloton. Last year I really struggled with the cobbled section as it was very damp and I was scared. This time I had gone to recce the cobbles and so I was much more comfortable riding them at race pace. However it didn’t go to plan as I was caught behind a split in the peloton before the cobbles!. I went through the cobbled section pretty smoothly (!) with two other riders. On emerging from the cobbles, there was a group of riders between us and the main peloton, which we caught within a few kilometres. At this point there was still over 25 miles left of racing and as a group we worked very well together and were eventually able to catch the peloton. I managed then to move my way back into a good position in the middle to front of the peloton. Then, with 10 km to go, there was a crash in the middle of the peloton just ahead of me. I had to come to an abrupt stop causing the person behind me to bang into the back of me and my back wheel. I was in the middle of the crash scene, still upright, but with no easy way out and not much room to quickly untangle someone’s rear gear cable from my Garmin cadence sensor. So it took quite a while for me to get going again, but I had someone else with me and together we managed to chase back onto the peloton, though exerting lots of energy in that attempt. There wasn’t very long to recover as by that time there was only 5km to the finish, but I managed to move into a decent position with the main bunch and I finished 14^th in the sprint finish! Definitely very pleased with that result, in such a tough race and especially as I had to use so much energy chasing onto the peloton with 10km to go.

Stage 4- Omloop Kostvlies

Today’s stage was early in the morning and I was also still very tired after yesterday’s tough stage. It was another fast race which was going well for me. I stayed in the main bunch, which was gradually getting smaller and smaller. Then, on the corner, with 1 lap to go, I was cut up going round outside of the corner and consequently pushed into a small ditch by the side of the road. By the time I got myself back onto the road the peloton was long gone and I had no energy left to chase on. This was very annoying as because it was just outside 3km to go I lost more time on the GC. I finished 28th as quite a lot of riders had already dropped off the main group. So another frustrating stage as I could have finished a lot higher if I had been there at the sprint finish. This has taught me to be a stronger rider, to stop the foreign riders from feeling as though they can push me off the road!

Stage 5- Criterium door het Asserbos 

I was really looking forward to this last crit stage as I quite liked the course. It was another very fast race and I found myself towards the back of the group most of the time which wasn’t the best place to be as it meant that I felt the elastic band effect going round the corners. However, as it was a slightly shorter race and I was on good form I still had energy left at the end of the race. With 2 laps to go I moved up into the top 20 in the bunch and by the final corner on the last lap I was in at least the top 15, so in a good position to be competitive in the sprint. However, I didnt anticipate that the line I was taking round the corner was going to be my downfall .... as there was a crash at the front of the peloton, going round the final corner, with the riders sliding round the outside of the bend, directly in the line I was taking. I had to slow down to get through the small gap between the riders and the barrier. Unfortunately, this meant that all the riders who had taken the inside line went right past me! Well done to my teammate Lucy for taking the inside line and coming 4th J

Stage 6- Individual TT

After a long busy week of racing, today was the final stage, and unusually it ended on TT. Annoyingly for me the TT was very short (like the prologue) and was a total of 1.9 km. A longer TT would have suited me much better. Anyway, I managed to pace myself better than usual as normally I completely fade in the second half. I did better than I did in the prologue but short TT’s like this are something I really need to work on!

In the end I finished 35^th in the General Classification with my best result being 14^th in the Klassieker. All in all, I had a really great time racing in Assen. The races were much shorter than I was used to, but much faster as well. It has certainly given me a lot of experience and I hope to go back again next year and use what I’ve learnt to do even better. Well done to all my teammates!