Offida

Worlds for juniors this year are being held in Offida Italy. And as far as I know it is a very small town but I quote “the treasure of Italy”. I was kind of surprise to find out that there was only one hotel in this town, which kind of looks like an upscale farm house. I think there are only 4-5 bedrooms for rent. There are no hotels other hotels around this place but there are farm houses that can be rented. I know when I say farm house you probably think, old, shabby, hay and life stock. But I am talking about a modern dream house in the heart of wine land.

Though I don’t know where we are staying I know that where ever it is, it will be very nice because it’s Italy. But here comes the problem of where to eat. Since there are no hotels close by that means no in hotel restaurants. I’m really not a big fan of having to cook for myself after some long tough races. I have no idea what we will do for food. The food itself should be wonderful – Italy is the land of pasta and pizza and let’s not forget, the wine. Last year worlds were in Moscow and the food was so bad, there really are not words for it – this year there is no way but up for the food.

I am so excited to go to Italy, it’s a place that I have always wanted to go and see. Offida may not be a big city or have lots of things to do but it does have some amazing history and culture. The buildings from what I have seen, on the web of course, are mind-blowing! I will be in Italy in lest then I month from now, but I will already be in Europe. I am leaving for Belgium in four days…. More updates soon to come.

Europe please




JG

 
 

one more thing

Totally forgot to put this in my first post today (or tonight).
I made the World Junior Canada team - off to Italy baby!!!!!
And Canadian cycling wants me to go to europe early to race and train before worlds. So I am now going to be going to Belgium and France!!!! A whole month in Europe? yes please :) My jaw was probably somewhere on the ground when I heard this. I was grinning like an fool, and the most the came out of my mouth was maybe a "yes" and "oh really" "thats awesome" more smiling and nodding of the head. I must have looked like a idiot....

JG

Nationals are done

Nationals are now done and all is left is the crit tomorrow which is not a national event. Which is my significant opinion is too bad because some of my best races this year have been in crits. But that’s the way it goes and I will just have to face (over time of course) to that’s the fact. Truthfully I really don’t care that it’s not a national event I try to look at each race as an important race. A race is a race whether it be a local provincial race or a world cup – they only differences would be the goals that would be se for that race.

Well I am the Canadian National Time Trail Junior Champ again, but this time it was by default with isn’t quite as nice as winning it a 100%. Personally I would have like to come in second knowing that I did my best and that the better girl won that day, doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t have like to beat the girl. But here’s the thing rules are rules – a person that is not a Canadian citizenship cannot win a Canadian championship.

I gave the TT my best shot, I had not had a good TT all year and it really turned out well in the end. I was really hurting up the hill in the course. I hate to admit that up the second hill I was hurting more then I should have been – seriously I was in my granny gear, I had no more gears on a junior geared bike. Oh and it wasn’t a steep hill maybe 6% maybe a bit more.

The road race… ya… we will leave it at that…. Grrrr.




Cheers
JG




Oh and the bubbly its not real... apple juice, too bad

Nationals UH-OH

Right now I am sitting in my hotel by myself in Edmonton because I am the lone junior rider from Saskatchewan that is racing Nationals. I never really had a hotel room all to myself; I have always shared with someone. It’s kinda weird and more than a little bit boring. It wouldn’t be so bad if this hotel that I’m staying at had wifi that I could watch some videos. But the internet is so slow here that Facebook is so slow. Still there is a TV so I won’t die and So You Think You Can Dance is on, what girl doesn’t like that show?

I’m a bit nervous for my races that are coming up. First race is on Friday, the most importance race, the ITT. I am going to be meeting up with the BC junior Team tomorrow morning to go for a ride in Devon. I think we are going to be riding the road course. Though, I will still need to ride the ITT course tomorrow, so I might not ride that long with the BC group tomorrow. I will still need to talk to my coach and find out what the plan is for tomorrow but it’s not that late right now so I have time to figure this all out.

PEACE
JG

.....Ah can't think of a title for this post

It’s been a long time since I have wrote here is the break down in what has happened since then.
- Raced
- Hurt my back and couldn’t race
- Rode the track
- Raced Westside (back gotten better)
- Packed up my car and drove a long 9 hours to Calgary (4 hours faster than my ETA on my GPS
- Drove home to Saskatoon the next day
- Did the Tuesday nighter the day I got home… can you say keener
- Raced Regina with the boys
- Home for a couple days
- Left for Banff
- Got sick and wasn’t able to race Banff
- Tried to get better
- Tuesday : hardest work out ever
- Wednesday: correction today hardest work out of the year
- Beautiful lighting and thunder storm
- 15km time trial
Well this is up to date with all the more important things that when on in the life in the last 4 weeks or so. This, people is my life so exciting. I haven’t traveled anywhere that has been crazy interesting. I am thinking about going to Australia in the fall for a while. I might not even do school this year.
The next big race that I’m doing is Nationals and I will be leaving in the next couple of days. I will try to write a bit about it afterwards but I might not have time cause I will be driving straight to BC the day Nationals is all done.

Wish me luck
JG

Race reports

Race reports here they come….
Maple Ridge was a local race held by Local Ride, which had three races in two days. First was the road race, and in my humble opinion one on the tougher Canada races in the West. There was a good size field of women ready to tear it up. The road course was a lap course of 10km. We have to do seven laps in total. Oh how I hate lap courses, ‘cause you get to do the same hard stuff over and over and over again. It doesn’t just hurt once on a killer climb it hurts seven times. By the time that the five laps rolled around, I was in some major pain and was pretty close to cracking on the hills. The race wasn’t that exciting and finished in a group up hill sprint. Now that’s really never a good thing for me because my sprint is average and my hilling climbing is below average and put those two things together you don’t get above average that’s for sure.

The time trail was about 3 hours after the road race which doesn’t give a person much time to recover. But everyone is in the same boat so suck it up princess. The TT went, bad, terrible, it was one of the worst TT that I have done. I was anything but unhappy about it; it was like I was doing intervals and decide that I wasn’t going to work hard. I was pretty mad at my self but while riding there wasn’t much that I could do about it besides finish the race.

The Crit the next was tough; I wasn’t able to get in a break off the front so I tried to settle into the three spot in the main group. My legs weren’t feeling it so I really couldn’t get any good attacks in off the front. I tried on but I went wide on a corner and jumped the sidewalk… people went scrambling.

Wenatchee!!!
Wenatchee was so hot and warm for the whole time we were there, got a good sun tan. The TT was the first event and it was one of the best time trials that I have done this year. I this the reason why this one was a lot better then the others was that a) it was warm and b) I got a very good warm up in. The last few TT have been in cold wet weather and I think my legs just really cramp up in that weather. This TT was about 14km long and it was a fast course. I really enjoyed it. I didn’t get great places nor was I in the points but I was pleased with the feel of how I rode it.

Wenatchee is a neat little town which has a big river running through it. After the TT we were still really hot so we found a place on the river that had a dock and jumped in. The water was so cold that your hands went numb very fast but it was so nice. I really want to go to the beach now.

The crit was later the night and it was still muggy and hot. I knew that I had to do something in the crit because I wasn’t in the points and it was going to move up in placing I only had 30 minutes to do it. I made an attack early into the race and I was able to get away and was out front on my own for a couple minutes till one girl bridged up to be. We worked together for about 10 minutes or so till the group caught us. I was pretty cracked when the pack ate us back up and almost fell off the back of the group. I was able to hang in till the final sprint and I got 8th place which I was happy about but I would have like to have stayed away in the break.

Ah the road race… it was tough. Being a non hill climber when I see that there is an 8km climb in a course I shutter. With these types of climbs I have try to stay with the pack for as long as possible. I got dropped from the lead group on the first time on the climb about 6km into it. I was able to work very hard on the down hill and flat part and I caught the group of 10 rider. The only problem was that I caught them at the base of the climb… and the climb started and about 2km into it popped off the back again when a girl attacked. I never lost sight of the group on the climb, they were only about 50m in front of me but there was nothing that I could to catch them at this point. After the climb I time trialed after them for about 10km and I caught them with only about 7 km from the finish line. By this time there group have split into parts and there was a group on 5 girls up the road a ways. I was able to sprint a bit in the end got 9th place.

It was a good weekend I really enjoyed racing in nice weather.

Life as I know it

I’m not very good about keeping my blog updated; I seem to find other things to do instead of writing like watching TV and ya that’s about it. I’m usually too tired to think at the end of the day and therefore if I do try to write it doesn’t make any sense at all. An example of think would be “Rode bike today, legs were tired – thought about food, I need to pick up food, why is food so expensive here? Fruit apples and bananas, monkeys eat bananas – I wonder if they have monkeys in BC?...........” And there you have it, my mind jumps from one thing to another to coma blankness.

Living on my own is pretty different then from living at home. I never would have thought that I would have moved out at eighteen and technically I haven’t “moved out” but have just been living somewhere else for the past two month. I will be going home in the beginning of June which I’m pretty excited for. I will be so nice to see everyone again and not have to ride in the rain.

One thing that I hate, I know hate is a strong word but I really, really don’t like (you) rain. (I don’t know if you got that quote from the band Plain White T’s, but that song sums up the way I feel about the rain). Being a prairie girl we almost never have to ride in the rain – and if it does rain in Sask I stay indoors if I can help it. Since I’ve been out in BC I have started to melt in the rain and not in a good way. Give me wind, hills, cold, snow, ice, even heat (I really melt in heat too but I get a nice tan from that so that’s ok) but rain just kills me every time.

I’ve been getting a lot better at hills since I’ve been out here (well duh), there are not too many big long hills around where I am living in Abbotsford but I make do. My sprinting has come along way too. I feel that it’s only my time trialing at has legged a bit behind this year. Overall though I have been improving greatly from where I was last year. I have done more races in the States this year then I have in Canada. I got a late start on racing this year, I wasn’t sure it I was ready to move up to the cat ½ and start racing with the “big dogs”. I have only raced 4 stage races this year with my first race been in April. Last year I started racing in February which is very early I know but it would have been nice to maybe start racing is March so that when the time came the bigger races started I wouldn’t have feel so nervous.

I don’t have time to write any more right now, so I’ll save my race report for another day. If I forget here is a note to self – Race the Ridge and Wenatchee Stage Race. Reports MUST be written. There shouldn’t forget now.

Cheers
JG