Today started with (again) clear skies and amazing temperatures and decisions of "legs or no legs?", meaning "should I wear my longs, or not?"
We arrived a village surrounded by cyclists and cyclists: some wearing just shorts and others, like me, wintered up!
Steve informed me after that there were some French pros out and a number of French teams. It was, after all, a beautiful day and as their season is starting soon, this was a good start for them.
The beauty of French sportives is that they are organised like road races. You have your lead car, your motorbikes and all the backup. The traffic is stopped (not that we saw much traffic at all.)
The mass start was a bit slow but once out of the village the boys hit the pace. The course was very up and down, sweeping across the countryside, with some good small climbs, and great views.
I started to pick people off and started working with a few chaps, then ended up dropping them. I always end up wondering if this was a good idea.
Moving on, I started working with another group, which is just great practice, and also keeping up the intensity.
I was on the front of this bunch when this chap came gliding past with ease!! I looked round at the boys and then decided I would sprint to catch this chap up, and I sat on his wheel for a fair while, thinking, this pace is really rather high, there is no way I can sustain this effort, BUT, for me it was all part of the fun in training. I did end up dropping off, taking a small breather and some much needed gel to only be rejoined by the group I'd left.
I was really starting to feel the effort of yesterday's ride in my legs, and the sign of slight twinges and I thought maybe I'd been pushing it too much.
Our group had become two, as others had dropped off, I was chatting or trying to chat with this chap, and rather elated, I saw the 70km sign for straight on, and 100km going left..... So I bid fairwell to my companion as I excitedly decided to opt for the shorter route, which I was perfectly happy to do, as my legs really were spent.
One more small climb and I ended up joining on the back of the leading bunch of boys coming in from the 100km. Legs were silently saying "no more, pleases" and as we turned the corner into the village, we all came to a halt as we queued up to get through the finish.
A great ride was had, in about 2 hours 10 minutes.
When we came to drop our numbers off, there was food, and not only that, I had one a bag full of goodies: brilliant bike stuff I thought, but no, I'm a girl of course!! I had one bag full of kitchen utensils, a bowl, a knife, a kitchen timer, a flan cutter, pizza cutter, fridge magnets and a t-shirt of the local area: a nice surprise.
I couldn't have wished for better weather, it was sunny throughout, and very very warm.
Iona at Peterborough Crit
