Worlds report

Well the big show is donzos! For now, what a ride.

So this may be a little brief then I'm sure some thoughts and comments will be added later or maybe not since we're on holidays as of about 4 plates of chineese food ago.

So, I had the luxury of watching Natasha's race on TV. I prayed aloud to God asking to give her one more final wicked ride. The race starts, all is well then bam! Saskia Elmans crashes in a corner and whiped out 5 girls behind her...urggg. Well I was actually scared at first cause I saw Tasha endo right over her bars! Shit.
Anyways I didn't see the rest of her race, but by the sounds of everyone there, well at least the 40000 people I talked to, haha, she was ripping it up especially when she got her groove back.
You have to know that that crash set her back to the tail end of the pack for the first bit and she started rocking it, but she just missed a top 20 and finished 21st. Wendy had a great start and faded back a little as her mid season illness no doubt affected the later half of her season. Fellow Canuk Pepper Herlton finished up 30th I believe so I think she was pretty happy about that.

At first we were hoping that Tasha was going to be top 15, top 10 on a great day, but the level of the Women's racing is definitely up a notch I think as the times are blistering fast, so it's good for Women's racing in general as hopefully they get the respect they deserve as they bust it out pretty darn fast as well.

Mens race, as I have always been involved in some sort of crash I was hoping not to today...well I could hope all I want, but sure enough, a Spaniard hit the deck in the first km and I was pulling my barsout of someones wheel. No panic, get going I was battling with an Italian, Swedes and we were closing the group of 8 ahead. I jumped on my bike after the stairs and my chain snapped! Man, it was a new chain too, so....man, I just ran like Forest Gump and I just kept running and running and then I jumped on my bike before a down hill to coast and thought I was going to kill myself, but it worked and I got back off and ran and ran and switched bikes...gassed!

Did I mention that it was 0 degs, so the ground was pretty much like ice and concrete. So just basically rode my brains out until the end. Didn't get lapped but was puled as I was only a minute ahead of the leaders on their last lap, kind shity, as I really did myself in on the last laps to make it, but what can I say, I did all I could.

There is a sweet write up on Canadian Cyclist.com and Rob Jones paints a great picture of my experience today. I look a little fat in the pictures, but I think its just cause my lungs have been pushed into my bowels lately.

Once again, I just pushed through, the bad luck, a little misfortune and grinded it out. I left some blood on the ground, but I wouldn't be the first Canadian that has left blood on the ground in these parts.

We got a little beat today, but wearing the Maple Leaf today was something that I've been waiting for a long time and you know what, it's all worth it. Don't let anyone ever tell you you can't do something or your too old, or too young or your dreams will never come true.
Seriously. I hate to get all philosophical and all, but when you have an opportunity, the desire, the skill and the sheer hunger to really achieve something, you can make it happen. But you need to really want it. So ask yourself the question, if this is my dream, am I really prepared to give up the comfort of home, my job, my family, am I really ready to suffer, to bleed, to risk it, am I really committed to this? Cause I'm not going to lie, it's hard, but we made it happen.
We got to live out one of our dreams today, sure it wasn't exactly like we wanted, but it just leaves us wanting more, to come back and fight again.

So I have to say you have no idea how happy I am I don't have to fix bikes for at least a few weeks. I ran out of juice about a week ago. It's been a long journey. But we did this because, well we love it, but to prepare for the next endeavours and get it right. There will be a lot of things that will change for next years preparation. If you knew how stressful it was to make sure that 4 bikes are all running 100% after continuous pressure washings on a very limited budget,trying to stretch the life of the equipment, it's just really hard work. But we've learned so much, that next year we will be able to use similar resources but use them slightly different to allow us to focus a little more on racing to our potential.

It's hard to really understand that we've just done the Worlds and the season is over, I don't think it's really sunk in. It's hard to soak it up while you're here, I tried, but it's a little surreal.

So maybe we'll do a few more posts, or maybe we won't. We were on for so long that we are "off" for now. Just a little break. We have three more days left in Europe, I'd like to tell you that we will do something exciting, but our budget is limited to perhaps having a coffe and getting some waffles in Antwerp. It was so tight that we had to switch brake pads between the spare bikes between races as we couldn't shell out the 40 Euros for a new pair. Nit that it really bothered me, cause I'm kind of cheap. But that was a bran new chain I broke...I'll blame Shimano and not the installation of the chain as I know the mechanic very well...haha.

Toot Ziens.