Belgie

A busy week last week with work, training and a wedding thrown in for good measure, culminated in a visit to Belgium. The purpose being to go and see our house for next year and to visit our landlord Andy Hillman. Andy is a pro Soigneur, having worked for the Unibet Team a couple of seasons ago, as well as several other teams on an adhoc basis. As such he is very well connected, and knows pretty much everyone there is to know. Which is rather handy, I'm sure you can appreciate!

So as I say, busy week. Basically my Aunt got married on the Friday, at a hotel in the New Forest, which meant driving back from there on the Saturday morning. Followed by a quick turn around before Josh and Jay picked me up and we sped to Dover just in time for the boat. After which we headed straight to Waregem and onto an 'Eat Feast' in aid of Jens Vandenbogaerde, with Andy. Jens is the Junior TT Champion of Belgium, and was also 2nd in the road race, and this season was his first year as a Junior! Next year and beyond I'm sure he'll become a much, much bigger name. His results this year earned him a place on the Avia Cycling Team, which is the QuickStep junior feeder team. For those of you who don't know, QuickStep is one of the biggest pro teams and certainly the biggest squad in Belgium. Watch this space... here is Jens winning earlier in the year...

After a good sleep we were off on a tour of the local lanes with Andy, where we were joined by a few of his mates. A bitterly cold morning, but none the less, a good ride. Novelty seems to have an amazing warming effect! We also had a coffee in the Centrum de Ronde Van Vlaanderen, which is the museum of the great race that is De Ronde. After which another hour or so of Vlaamse style zig-zagging lead us to the sprint for the Waregem sign. Now Andy was desperately trying to fool us all by misleading us as to whether or not there even was a sign, to disguise his well timed attack... but to no ends. Josh was straight on him, and launched his sprint. I thought that was it, but for pretty much the first time ever, I began to come back at him... and with about a meter to spare I nipped underneath his left arm and clinched what was, I think, my first sprint victory over the sprinter himself! Of course, I didn't gloat. No really!

Once back at Andy's we all lined up for a massage/shower/food before packing up for the journey back home. None of us wanted to go, we could have all happily stayed and finished off the winter there! I even felt a little bit Belgian sitting eating my pasta watching Niels Albert storm to victory in the cross. Roll on March...

There were many pictures taken of the weekend, though all on Josh's camera. I will in due course get some posted up here. Ciao for now!