August

Racing racing racing this month, the month that I always said was my main focus turned in to a very reasonable month for me, one I am happy with, but also the one that left me a little disappointed in the middle. 

Starting in Het Hageland on the beginning Saturday of the month was very special for me, but to start somewhere close to where you live, when you've told people I can bring in what some might say is a half decent result is actually exciting, if not a little stressful, these races are the ones I know I can push forward with in my career, with the race close to where I live I was able to recon it a few days before, so come Saturday I knew simply, this is where I have to be in the front. Before these races every team manager will say the same things to there riders, simply stay in the front, or at least the way they say it is simple, I can do this, and in the final it left me a bit fresher than other riders, but with confidence for this race I got a little excited when I should have waited a few kilometres more, so when riders were able to bridge to the front, I was left dangling a little, but able to survive I came in 17th, I expected more, and knowing the mistakes I had made I decided to ride home, after all I also had a race the following day. 

So Sunday came Havenpijl, the only 1.2 standard race I competed in this month, the plan was for a sprint in the end with another team mate, that's normally the way the race goes, but you can't just sit back and expect that, it was fairly easy until the finishing laps where after trying to drag a small break away to take the pressure away from the team I found myself in a group of twenty or more riders, with most teams represented and some carrying more than two riders I knew I just had to roll with it, see how it goes, we took a nice gap over the peloton but after a couple of laps it started to come down, with some narrow sections on the loop I pushed through the corners and took a group of five away, we worked well together and held the gap until the line, the only disappointment was finishing 5/5, I simply had nothing in the sprint, but to do 2 nice results in 1 weekend was very positive. 

The next big goal was in Leuven, another local race, but a hard one with 4 reasonably difficult climbs In a 15km lap, this was to be the middle race of 3 in 6 days, before was Veenendaal on the Friday, I had a plan there to float reasonably under the radar and see what happened in the end, caught out of position I rolled in just behind the peloton of sprinters. So Leuven on Sunday, the legs were good, a break up the road under control, I was spinning around in the peloton feeling good, the speed was up a bit and I knew this would be the last opportunity for a natural break, from here I could ride straight to the front again coming off the momentum of the cars on one of the smaller climbs, or at least that's what I thought, on the way back through the convoy of team cars a commissaires driver decided that it was safer to let a motor bike through a small gap and slammed on his breaks coming to a near stop with me behind him, after heading for a seat in the boot of the commissaries car somehow I was able to avoid the incident, but after going very far sideways my rear wheel took a hit with the amount of pressure on it, not realising the severity of it I knew I had to come back to the peloton and quickly, let's say my plans to ride straight to the front did not happen, my legs were suddenly working so much harder and when we came to a flatter section I was suddenly getting dropped, knowing it could only be the wheel I opted to change it, but with a rampaging peloton and new wheel I was never able to come back, but for the kilometres I tired it was a lot easier with my new wheel, but that was race over for me. 

My next big goal was Schaal Sels, I started the month off roading in Hageland, so I decided to finish it off road around Antwerp. With a couple of races in between which didn't bring amazing results I knew with luck hear I can come to the finish strong, the beauty of these races? There a whole lot of fun and it's not just about riding as hard as you can, but generally the stronger riders come to the end, but you also have to be technical and tactical, with gravel roads and cobbles it's a difficult race to even finish, and with the sectors so close to each other it becomes relentless, I knew I was strong so I decided to attack early, one guy came with me and I knew that if we set a nice tempo that we could get over the next sectors and come in the front when it split later, thankfully I was correct, and with the peloton in pieces after 70km I was sat happily in the front with a very reduced peloton, sector to sector the peloton was slowly reducing, and with different riders attacking but always coming back I knew I had to make sure I was in the front, but not on the front, there was no pressure on me other than to be in a good position. The winning move was eventually made around 40km from the finish, but there were points where it looked like the peloton could come back, in now an even more reduced peloton I knew I had a chance at a good result, and finally I remembered that I didn't have the sprint that I had in the earlier point of the year, so with 1km to go over some less brutal cobbles than we had previously tackled I attacked, this saw me come to the finish in 12th, a minute behind the winner, In a field almost full of world tour/ pro continental riders I was happy with the result, and happy I could take the confidence to attack in the finish, rather than waiting for others I took it up, and even if it was for the lower places it was a small reward for me, knowing that I can compete in these races. 

Next comes Britain and I hope that the form can continue and hold to try and make a nice result there.