Arriving and the Grand Prix of Chambery

I arrived without event in Toulouse, France and was greeted by my new teammate/roommate and new friend Einat. I soon learned that travel in France is a bit different than in the US. The French are very efficient. There are no super wide roads, big cars and there is very little excess in all they do. This became very evident on the way from Toulouse to Limoux. There is no such thing as a shoulder on the road, but then again when you're car is smaller than most CEO's desk, who needs one?! Once we arrived in Limoux, I realized the roads were actually smaller than on the "main roads". I quickly settled into my temporary housing for the first few days and eagerly started putting my bike together for the afternoon ride. My new host, Chris Georgas was going to be my tour guide on day one. And after traveling for nearly 20 hours I was anxious to get some fresh air and spin the pedals in my new home town. Let's just say riding in France is not like the states. The roads are super narrow, which was a fear at first, but I was quickly told that French drivers actually "respect" cyclists and do not beep at them or try to run them off the road. Instead they slow down behind them and patiently wait for a safe place in the road to pass. What a novel idea! After our ride Chris shared with me what would become a ritual after each ride. We stopped at a cafe' in the square of Limoux and had a post ride "recovery drink" of hot coco. I'm now looking forward to riding for a whole new reason!! The "recovery drink" is my new motivator!!

Although life is very laid back and seems to move at a bit slower of a pace, I found my first few days to be non-stop. I was trying to absorb as much of Limoux as possible, get a sense of my surroundings, and at the same time connect with my new friends, while trying to keep my family up to date and informed. I was fully embraced by both Fabiano (Chris' wife) and Einat, who helped me feel part of the group right away. I was invited to attend the weekly trip to the flea market on Friday mornings to get the weekly supply of vegetables and fruits. This was an exciting experience and I now look forward to this each week. Also included in this trip is a stop at the butcher shop! We stopped and ordered our meat, which was....bugs bunny! The rabbit was dead, but head still intact. The butcher whacked off his head and then it was good to go! OK...I've never seen that before. Quality Market in Barre, never did it quite like that!! I've also been told that in addition to eating rabbit, that we will be eating black beauty...er, um, horse meat!! I may have to grab some pizza on that night! We shall see...
So by the time we left on Saturday morning for Chambery, it was actually relaxing to sit in the car for a while. Of course that relaxing feeling wore off rather quickly after about 2 hours in the car. I was informed that pretty much all of our races are "5 hours away" and every race "is a great course". Encouraging nuggets of information, but no where near the truth. We arrived in Chambery later than expected which did not allow us time to pre-ride the course. Instead we drove the course and found the roads to be incredibly narrow on the first half of the course but then opened up into an industrial park/strip mall with much wider roads. The last part of the loop was a nice 1k climb that included 2 switch backs....and would have made for a great finish. However, on the morning of race day Chris went out to do some recon work on the course and discovered they had moved the race to an entirely different location! (Lesson #1 racing in France: Be flexible) The course was moved further up the mountain and was now a circuit that would travel through even narrower roads (think bike path) and would have a few more climbs before a 2k finishing climb. Sweet! Also it was never clearly explained what this race actually entailed, but I soon discovered that a "Grand Prix" in its name is a big time race. On top of that Jeanie Longo was present, and in fact we were racing in her hometown. So what I thought was going to be a nice local race, turned out to be the Grand Prix of Chambery and featured pro teams from France, Switzerland, and Italy. Yikes! Great way to kick off my 2010 campaign. A bit different than my usual first race in the states...Charge Pond! This was the real deal and these ladies were cranked up to race hard from the opening gun. And that they did! A group of 10 riders got away about 20k into the race and proved to be the right selection to stay away all day. I was part of the main chase group, and was happy to sit with that group and just get my legs under me. A solid result for the first race of the year, which ironically was probably one of the most difficult and technical races I've ever done.

We departed Chambery, and headed home for Limoux and little did I know we'd be driving through some of the most amazing sections of the French Alps. We actually drove past Mont Blanc, which was breath-taking to see even from the car. Definitely an added bonus to a great trip. My weekend adventure with Chris and Einat was a nice start to a few months of living and racing in France. Now if I can just learn my way around Limoux and perhaps learn to read a French road sign or two, I may actually be able to survive here for a while. Until then I'll enjoy my rides with Chris and will most definitely be looking forward to my "recovery drinks".