Now for the week's review, oh where do I start....
With the excitement and anticipation of the Mallorca classic training camp finally arriving everyone was looking forward to the cycling adventure ahead, from the newbies to cycling to the hardened racers.
The various flight arrivals meant that i had to travel out early to make sure everything was in place and check out some of the routes that we were going to ride over the next week. Myself and Malc arrived at L'Arenal three days before our first arrival which was Richard (who was to become known as 'tan your dick').
As with the Newquay camp the weather was on our side, warm, sunny and temperatures ideal for cycling, albeit 15 degrees warmer than Newquay....happy days!
The initial few days it was myself, Malc and Richard riding together and with neither of them knowing the island by bike, i took them on 4-6 hour rides around the south of the island over the mountains and through the rolling hills of central Mallorca with Richard stopping every 10 km for a natural break on each of the rides... hence his nickname!
The rest of the gang eventually turned up after some being on time and some being delayed which meant the hotel driver doing some extra shuttles out and back to the airport. Once all rooms were allocated and everyone was settled in, it was a case of meeting in the morning at breakfast and deciding the days 'parcours' for the two groups consisting of mainly the lads in one and the lass' in t'other and collecting the hire bikes pre-booked from 'Sportbequi'. After a few small sizing problems with the bikes we finally made it on the road with Sue Seller taking out Von, Leah and Nicola on a gentle ride up via the coast rode.
I decided to take he lads on nice 'break-in' sort of ride, a little of everything, coastal rolling roads mixed with a few gentle climbs and some very fast flat stretches. The riding hours seems to pass so quickly with scenery to die for and weather that was just perfect, warm sun and little wind, no winter kit hear, just shorts and a jersey, happy days!
The evening was a case of fueling up for the next day from the vast buffet in the restaurant, which Ryan certainly made his own! Funny though, one thing I did notice during the week, people were coming down later for breakfast and eating became a little torturous trying to replace all the energy used on each of the rides! Saying that, the Aladins cafe stop, after a day's ride was just fantastic, out of this world cakes and real coffee, It was a place we took over in the late afternoon sunshine, to sit and chat and reminisce on the day's heroics!
.JPG) |
| This is the life |
I must mention how impressed I was with the ladies, no moaning, just grit and determination not to let each other down and just enjoy the experience and see some of the island. Leah, must be given the award for tenacity, as she had hardly turned a pedal before she arrived, (mainly due to the crap weather here in the UK) and with wearing basic running trainers she completed all the rides...hilly ones to-boot! To me the lass' bounced of each other, a little competitive which is nice, but, all supporting each other at the same time, pure magic!
The awesome foursome - Sue, Nicola, Leah & Von
Over the week, I had designed specific 'training segments' to give the riders that something different to their rides and help them prepare for their seasons targets. The rides broke down like this..hard day with segment, easy recovery day with the girls, hard day with segment, easy recovery ride and so on...
These were optional, but the pleasing thing everyone was up for it...BOOM (one of the camps new phrases)
Our first segment came on our 140km trip into the mountains, where after a few shall we say 'ups & downs' performed an 8km team time trial with everyone doing 200m on the front and then swinging off. It was great, good tempo on medium size gears and all of us in team kit, it must of looked like a pro outfit, just a shame we didn't video it!
As last year, I kept the popular 'cut & chase' where the riders team up in pairs (selected at the pub in a draw) and set off for a 5km 'two-up' and given 1 minute before the rest gave chase. If the pair make it to the roundabout (5km) they won a drink courtesy of Poco Loco....trouble is, all pairings made it, no one was caught! :-/
I must give mention to Ben...for drama and the most noise made in a two-up he's reigns supreme, man can he suffer...but valiant he is!
Don't get me wrong, even the recovery days were still fairly hard and on several occasions we were still covering 100kms and with the lass' even pushing on the front! It was great to see the improvement from the ladies as the week went by, more confidence and the capacity to do such long days in the saddle, chapeau!
.JPG) |
| Well earned coffee break with Spenno having the widest grin after seeing the Cannondale Slice in a nearby bike shop |
Ever wanted to know how to stop Dave W in his tracks...place a fake Euro note in the middle of a mountain road with a bleeding great lorry coming down the opposite way! Nearly wiped out for what turned out to be monopoly money :-(
The hardest day came with two days left, Richard had already departed and his happy go lucky, cheeky wit persona was already being missed by the group! Yeh, this day was a mixture of segments (basically to confuse the body and incur positve muscle reaction). It consisted of 5 x 8 second hard sprints, ride recovery, 2 x 1500m overload mountain climb and finally the cream on top of the bundle, 2 x 4.5km road race with 9km recovery between each effort. Once again, Ben was in his detemined chewing stem mode, while in complete contrast Spenno was never out of level 2. Rymo & DW were showing their strength, with myself...just disguising my age!
The road races were great fun...painful...but fun! The first one going to DW after an awesome attack with 2 km to go and the second one going to Rymo, showing all that eating must go towards his huge turbo!
.JPG) |
| The man who changed the rule book for tenacity...Ben |
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
