Rough Stuff

The weather has been great here. The boys and I are all rocking pretty good sun-burns/tans and I might spend some time in the sun today to chase away the Casper appearance.

Traning went great this week, the races however did not. We started out Tuesday as Zack and I had a great interval session during a three hour ride. The next day I was pretty stiff and didnt feel particularily perky but we did put in a good 4 hours regardless. Im ashamed to say I bonked a little bit toward th end, but thats how it goes. Either way I felt I recovered well, and was set for the the races this weekend.

The DN1 race on Saturday was pretty bad. For some reason on the first climb I felt I didnt have any power and just lost contact with the main group going into the windy section. It was wierd because my climbing legs this year arent great, but they werent that bad.

I honestly set it aside as a mental barrier. Saything that it probably wasnt my legs but just my head, and that I may have went into the race not full mentally focused as I should have been.

The next morning the questions were answered as I woke up sick. Having another race that day I didnt feel great about it. I suited up and rode the first 40 km, but pulled out after that feeling pretty shitty.

This season has been like that. When ever you think the match get lit, it quickly gets blown out. I still have plenty of matches left in reserve, but its just frustrating to have the good legs one day and bad ones the next.

In other news(or lack there of) We now have four English channels in Chez Benoit. They are CNN, France 24, Sky news and Russia news TV. CNN is the staple here and I find myself watching hte same programs at least 3 times before they get replaced. Its great to see actually. Simply having English tv in the background is kind of comforting.

From what Ive gathered there is nothing going on in the world other than the Volcano errupting in Iceland. Its on about 23 hours a day. As most of you know most of Europe is grounded and France is no exception. Here in Normandy the air was definatley bizzare for a couple days last week. Zack and I figured it was from the Volcano.

I bought a killer coffee grinder in a flea market here. Its made in Holland and is pretty sick if you ask me. I havent used it yet because surprisingly its very difficult to find decent whole beans in France. It makes you earn your coffee.