When I wrote my last blog post for MarathonMTB.com about racing in Europe, I was looking at it as an outsider, it was all a bit of a novelty, all a bit of fun.
When Mike and I started Transalp eight days ago it wasn’t much fun. I felt like I had in most marathons since I came back to mountain biking about a year ago – fast, then slow, then resigned, frustrated, and defeated. We had a lot of mechanical difficulties, and I went out too hard and blew myself up, but behind it all was the way I saw myself as a racer – as someone who’s there to make up the numbers, to observe it all, to try, but to fail. On the first stage we came twelfth, and I thought that was probably about as well as we’d do.
We were here to race as a media team, to blog about the race and do publicity for the website, our goal was top 10, a safe ride, an experience. When we rode ourselves onto the podium on the second day, we had to change the way we thought about the race. We started studying the course profiles, working out who the other teams around us were, we started getting nervous, and we gave every inch of that course, every 600km of it, everything we had. Both of us. All the time.
Recover, or meet obligations? At least the Craft compression socks helped for multitasking.
Racing in a team with Mike, who can be very strict and very firm, I’ve learnt a lot about marathons, nutrition, logistics. Racing with Mike, who just would not let me give up on myself, and who never gave up on me, I’ve learnt that I can do it. Mike has sat behind me, he has pushed me, towed me, he has encouraged me, he has screamed at people trying to chop me, he has yelled at me when (on about 4 out of 8 stages) I cried, been firm when I needed it and kind when firm didn’t work anymore. We assessed everything we did, and I don’t think we ever made the same mistake twice out there. Stage 6 was a highlight for me. I rode past racers I idolise, unassisted, and stayed strong. I learned that if my mind can stop turning, my legs bloody well will.
Imogen and Mike at the finish of Stage 6.
Doing media, we had a lot of running around to do, and it was hard to see all the other teams sitting around eating pizza or getting massages while we were running from the press office to our hotel and back again, around and around. We are also unsupported – we’ve had wonderful feeds from Sara Mertens’s and Laura Turpijn’s partners Manuel and Dave the last few days – but we’ve been doing our own feeds (this means stopping), our own shopping, dealing with our repairs (and there were a lot). We’ve done it on the cheap, a few nights there were six of us to a room stuffed full of bags, filthy kit and discarded boxer shorts. And all this makes you tired. The only day we ever got any downtime was yesterday, and we gave it to ourselves at the expense of our press responsibilities, because we knew we had such a tight race today, and I really think it helped us perform as well as we did. There were days when we were so busy that I’d look at the clock at 10pm, with a 5:30 wakeup, and decide whether I wanted to have a shower, have a stretch, or go straight to bed and get the extra sleep.
A few minutes downtime were rewarded.
We had a punishing day yesterday, utterly pumped by Euro teams who all seemed to have had game plans that WORKED, who put dozens of minutes into us as if they knew precisely what our weaknesses were – the road race format yesterday really blew us apart, and we were so tired that by the time it turned technical that we could do very little to make up time.
Somedays needed to end sooner.
Today we were only 2:55 ahead of the team in fourth, and a long way behind the team in second. The run to Riva Del Garda is a short one, a 20km up and a 20km down. A road climb, our weakness. A techy decent. Our strength. We HAD to stay in front. We knew we’d let hundreds of riders pass us on the dodgy, 20km ‘neutral’ start the day before, so we had a chat and decided that the best we could do would be to stay right up the front for the first three km on the road today, and then go hell for leather, and we did. Up the front of the bunch there was a lot of room and a lot of respect, a far cry from yesterday’s madness, and we held firm, stayed with the top men, and suddenly, we were climbing with them.
The first time we rode into second, on day 6, I had a dream ride, one of those days when you can’t feel your chain. Today, I felt every link, every pin, every bit of grease and grass on the bastard thing, and I can honestly say I don’t think I’ve ever hurt myself more, especially when Team Craft Rocky Mountain passed us and it turned steep, really steep, and I could barely turn the pedals, even while holding onto Mike’s pocket, and I lost it a bit. Sally Bigham was behind us, just tapping up, and gave me a few words of encouragement I will never forget. ‘Never panic,’ she said. Never panic.
We blasted through the feed zone. No need to stop. Pumped through some singletrack, and suddenly it was down, down, down. I was in front of a few men and everything went quiet, a strange silence of nobody trying to pass you, because you’re going fast enough. Then the road, an 8km time trial behind Mike and some men’s teams. A quick check. No-one behind us. The finish line. Hugs and NO TEARS!
We came second, took 6 minutes out of the team in second on the GC, and extended our gap over fourth place. We’ve finished third, and I’m a different racer and a different person.
Full results are on Datasport.com.