One more day, that was all we needed. There were a lot of tired faces at breakfast, and people were happy enough to be sitting in the sun at the start – that’s a good warm up when you’re tired. However my team mate Ant White (Cannondale/Mt Zoom) and I had our work cut out for us. We moved up to 5th on General Classification after Stage 4. The past two days have been fast and hard racing for us – not to mention the days prior to them. In 5th, we had about 4 teams within 12 minutes of us. So we did all we could to warm up for th 78km, 2700m stage from Gluszyca to Kudowa Zdroj.
We had a police escort out of town, end it was chop central behind the lead out. Neutral is never really neutral. Plenty of teams wanted to make it fast, as did some of the Solo riders. Team Swat, about 12 minutes behind us, were up the front forcing the pace with some of the Milka guys and Polish Solo riders. Not good.
Ant was a bit slow to get started, and I realised I couldn’t hear his helmet bell. Although it does make me think of him like a little mountain biking elf, it is useful to know when he’s nearby. Splits went super early. I had thought Ant was still on my wheel, and we had gapped the Merida Russian team, and only the strong Czech team who we had been racing closely with were in front, in terms of teams that we needed to watch. In time, Ant got on, but the Czech guys were well out of sight.
The profile for this stage was relentless in the first half. Continual climbs and descents, described as ‘steepy’ in the road bike. Quite apt. We had forced a new split in the group that came back, holding us, the Swat kids, and two solo riders. This was 11km in. Todays race had really been a direct trip to the hurt box.
And then Ant tore a tyre. A big tear, right up the sidewall.
Sometimes a flat is a fast fix, other times it isn’t. The gash needed patching, but patching a sealant covered tyre isn’t easy. Ant uses PVC tape pretty heavily. It’s good stuff. But every spare was doubley taped on, slowing things down. We used a ziplock bag and SiS Go Gel wrapper to patch the tyre – but needed to C02 cartridges, as the head kept blowing the seal. It was an 8 minute repair.
Back in traffic, we had to push- hard. Loose singletrack descents were next up, and it was a case of sliding down using your bike as a brake. The terrain did not make chasing easy – but we had to try. Countless kilometres of border trail followed, involving steep hike-a-bike sections, root-fest bomb runs, and some amazing grassy singletrack through pine forest.
At some point the cold rain came in. Everything became super slippery. Chains sucked, instead of whirring. It was cold and dark with the heavy cloud. Gratefully it passed, and we warmed up on the next climb and valley section.
The final climbs took their toll. Although we had caught mixed teams, and plenty of solo riders, we just weren’t bringing in any Mens teams into sight. Turning yourself inside out for no apparent result is tough. The final climbs were over small old cobbled forest roads through the mountains and back onto fun border trails. We came across more rooted climbs to test our balance and patience, and some super rocky tech test pieces that I recalled from 2009.
In time, we were approaching the last cobbled climb – Ant was spent. We made it up, and did what we could to get down the other side safely. Finishing was great, but we felt foolish to have let 5th place on GC slip away. The Merida boys were quick to congratulate us. It turns out they had us beat by 4 minutes. The Czech team had us beat by 3 minutes. Good racing happens anywhere on the ranking, not just on the podium.
Full results can be seen here.
A full event review will be up shortly.