Holidayrace or Raceholiday?

About our Polish trip I can be as short as a blink of an eye. Honestly, it didn’t take much longer to decide it wasn’t going to be our best week.

All started with a free ticket for the anniversary edition for 2019 on the podium last year. As we had some good memories of this stagerace, it appeared without hesitation on our racecalendar for 2019.

We prepared it like we do for every other race. And we wanted to do good after our good result in Transalp a few weeks ago. A podiumspot was the ambition.

Racing in MIXED TEAM

I am always curious about the weather, so I can prepare myself mentally in case of ‘bad’ predictions. I don’t like biking in the rain, whether it’s cold or warm.

The forecast did not make me very happy at the least.

We drove to Poland in very bad weather conditions, so we knew what was going to be the menu for this week: soaked trails, slippery rootsections, mud, cold, dangerous,….

PRE race stop in Germany

Checking some trails in Germany

First bummer: On arrival, we noticed that the accommodation was not at the same spot as last year. For an anniversary edition, we’d expected better than what was proposed. (Amateuristic accreditation, No decent parkingspace, no decent showers/toilets, …)

Bikes are ready, but are we?

Rain, rain, rain,..

Second bummer: It rained so much during the night, everything was flooded, and organization decided to postpone the start with 1 hour, and cancel a part of the track due to bad conditions.

Third bummer: When the race finally started, everybody was so eager to win this one, the start was so hectic, that numerous crashes occurred in the first neutralized start.

As we know, the race is not going to be won in the first kilometer, so we did easy, not to get tangled up and separated during the first part.

A severe crash just before turning into the first offroad section where a guy was screaming and lying down in the middle of the street, made us decide to stop and see if we could offer some help and perhaps give first aid if necessary. 

In those cases, all that matters to us, is to help out where we can.

It turned out to be someone we knew, and he had a dislocated shoulder, a broken collarbone and broken shoulderblade. We could not help much, but we called the ambulance and waited there 15’ before we could carry on with our ‘race’.

At first we were motivated to catch up with the bunch, but 15’ was way too long before we catched up the first riders. It was a calvary trip to overtake the slowest riders as well in the uphill sections where most of them were walking, and the downhills weren’t much better.

So after hours of overtaking and stressing about our time loss, we finally got to ride a nice flowy track to the finish where another horror scenario occurred. Sara had a flat rear tyre (torn at the sidewall). So the time we made up, we lost it again at the last part of the stage.

Motivation was very low as we had lost in total about 25’ to a podiumspot.

As it is still 4 days of racing, we could go for a stagepodium later on, but for the GC it was going to  be much harder.

Second day promised to be a hard one, so motivated to carry on, we prepared for the stage.

This time (luckily) the horror occurred before the start. One minute before the starting signal it started raining cats and dogs.

Sara and I looked at each other, and it was clear as crystal to both. This is not going to be very funny today.

In a split second we decided our stagerace was over, and after the start was given, we sprinted to the camper in a new world record.

Without any regret, we turned the switch and instead of racing all week, it would be a small holiday somewhere dry and cosy.

On the way home, we argued a little about the destination, but finally WINTERBERG it would be for the coming days.

@BIKEPARK WINTERBERG

Sausages, French fries, beer, trails, bikepark, my baby, camper,… nothing more I could wish for.

Practicing turns

Taking the easy way up

It turned out to be the best improvised trip we’ve ever made together.

Easy ride in the sunshine

Now we’re back  home and batteries are recharged for our next goal: Rothaus Bike Giro in and around the Black Forest from August 15^th-18^th .

Real holiday spirit!

When she drinks 0% beer

And for us this was another lesson in life. Never mix business with pleasure.

“Race is race. Holiday is holiday.”

Peter