Monday, February 16, 2009

Another good reason...

to come to Monsignor Tucker's Saturday morning trainer sessions:  you never know who might be there.  This last Saturday there were seven of us, some of the usual suspects as well as a couple of guys I had not met.  After finishing the first hour working out to a Spinerval DVD, a film on last year's Tour de Flanders was put in the DVD player.

About 10 minutes into the race, a guy at the other end of the row started talking about his experiences racing the same roads as the guys on the film.  Evidently he races in Europe in the summers on a development team - racing against other young talented riders as well as former pro tour racers.  Although I never did meet him because I had to leave a little early while people were still spinning, looking online later I figure he must have been Aaron Pool (only guy I could find from around here who is racing in Europe).  

He had some entertaining insights on the experience of racing on some of the roads there - for instance, there was one section of the road that has about a two inch unsealed expansion crack running right down the middle of the road, which confines the whole peloton to one lane.  In another spot which had cobblestones, he said that it was similar to riding over half-buried, loosely packed softballs.  

Good stuff.

4 comments:

gravy said...

For starters... racers jump two foot gulleys. No measely 2 inch gap is going to confine the peloton.

And second... they don't play softball in europe...

I slept in Saturday morning so I'm probably dreaming that I know what I'm talking about.

Bob K said...

1) They can jump them only if they can see them coming.

2) Really?

3) I slept in Friday so I know what you mean.

Adrian Olivera said...

What time is the spinnerval interval massacre?

Bob K said...

They start about 7:30 a.m. - but I don't usually get there until about 8. It has been wrapping up around 9:30 or 10.

I can't make it this weekend - I'll be flying back from Buffalo. Hope they de-ice the plane.