Was a really long time since I wrote here, sorry for that! Since last time I have been at home by my parents for a month. After Germany I was supposed to do a stage race in Sweden but after all that travelling I got a slight cold, think my body just said enough travelling! So I stayed at home and got well after a few days of no training. Then I had 2 weekends without races and I fitted in a hard training period instead. It was nice to be at home and relax mentally from racing and just train and see family and friends. 2 weeks ago I got a stomach bug and was in bed again, just in time for the last races in Sweden, bummer cause I felt that I needed some races in my legs before heading to South Africa for the next Alpha Pharm seeding series race. So with no racing for a month I was a bit unsure about my form when I left for SA.
Last week Wednesday I started what was going to be a long trip to my second home Stellenbosch. I flew overnight and landed Thursday morning in Johannesburg, stayed there for one night and then travelled onwards to Upington to do the race on Saturday and then finally yesterday, Sunday I flew to Stellenbosch. A long journey but absolutely worth it.
Upington is an interesting place, it is in the middle of nowhere and it is a semi-desert which means that it gets really hot during the days with very cold nights. Yesterday when I cycled in the morning we went out on a flat straight road. We passed a road sign and I almost laughed, it was a sign for the next 2 towns, the first one was 160km away and the next 240km and I think that was in Namibia!! Just after was a sign for the next petrol station, also 160km away!!! The airport was the smallest I have ever seen. Coming in to the area where you wait for your bags, I just realised that we were also in the check in area, it was just one little room for everything. And when the two guys came with trolleys with the luggage and put it on the floor in front of us I could in my mind hear the voice of the lady from the check-in in Johannesburg saying “ your bike will come beside the belt in Upington” which belt….?
Airport in Upington, this is the whole airport including check in, baggage claim and cafe!
I have been in the lead in the Alpha Pharm seeding series from the start and during the first 5 races. Unfortunately I could not be here for the 6th race 2 weeks ago. Anriette who was laying 15 points behind me got 4th and got 30 points, meaning that she took the jersey away from me and I was then behind by 15 points instead.
It was not many people that came to the race in Upington, only 150 in total and we were only 5 girls in the elite category. Anriette was there so I still had hard competition. We all started together so we got to race with the elite guys, I have never done that before and was a bit unsure about how hard they were going. They attacked a lot but since we did not have anything to do with their race we could just sit in the bunch, even though sometimes just doing that was hard enough. We went out 52km on a road with rolling hills and turned around and went the same way back. It was a tight turnaround point and the guys attacked just there. I found myself too far back in the bunch at that stage and missed the first bunch going. So me and Anriette and 7 guys created a small group and it was just a cruise back to the finish.
I was a bit unsure about the tactics for the sprint, we had to go through 3 sharp corners between 500-350m before the finish, and it is always hard to know if guys will sprint or not even though they don’t sprint for positions. So I figured that the best thing to do would be to go first through the last corner and then just give it all even though 350 meters normally is a bit far for a full on sprint. It was one veteran guy that pushed a bit hard before the first corner, with Anriette on his wheel and me on hers, she was not good at taking the corner so I passed her before the next one, there the guy in front almost crashed so there I passed him to be first out of the last one. From there I just gave it all and was first over the line with probably 10 meters to the next person. This gave me 50p and Anriette got 40p so I am now only 5p behind her with 5 more races to go in the series.
Thank you to the organisers of the Upington race, amazingly organised for so few people! The dedication really shows! Also a big thank you to Alpha Pharm for taking me to all the races so I get to see different places like Upington that I probably would never go to otherwise.
I will now stay in Stellenbosch for the summer and have a lot more races to do then what I normally do at this time of the year. This is normally when I have my resting period and usually I come to SA mid November, but now I have races every weekend until the end of November, since I love racing I think that this is great.