#1.- The Muur. The Muur.

I left home with my bike (badly) packed in a cardboard box. First time flying with my bike and I was heading to no place else but Belgium, a country I never thought I’d visit in my lifetime for some reason.

I got there on the morning of July 28th and, luckily enough, one of my best friends from high school, who now lives in Canada, was road tripping around Europe with his wife and decided to go to Brussels to meet with me until the start of the race. They picked me up at the airport so I avoided having to assemble the bike right there and then, which was something that scared me a bit, considering that if I had any problems, I could have been stranded at the airport.

After leaving aaaalllll my luggage where my friends were crashing we went for a walking tour of Brussels, which was kind of unavoidable considering it was my first time there. Not only helped me to switch my legs into a different form of exercise for a few hours, it also helped me get my mind of the race, for about seven or eight full seconds each minute.

Discovering a bit of Brussels.

Of course, I also started my food tour which I was very much looking forward to with an amazing Belgian waffle. Ok Belgians, well-deserved reputation! You just need to add dulce de leche to your toppings and then you can go for world domination.

Belgian waffle, in Belgium, in good Argen/Canadian company.

As the sun started its slow descent in the sky, my friends gave me and The Thing a ride from Brussels to my destination for the night, accommodation in the 5-star De Sterck residence.

A few months before the start of the race Stephan De Sterck offered a spot in his backyard to bivvy in for riders of the TCR who didn’t have where to sleep the day before the race, and me, being on cheap mode as I was for the race, jumped right in and accepted the offering. Boy, was I in for a treat!

As soon as I arrived at their place Stephan and his wife, Maddy, were on their way to Geraardsbergen (their house is about 8km outside town) since Stephan had to fill in his duties as a volunteer for the race. I switched cars and went with them to have a look at the town, meet Mike Hall (race director and cycling unicorn) for a brief second (he was really busy preparing everything for the registration) and then climb the Muur on foot to see what was waiting for the race night. By the time I climbed down, everything was being set in the marketplace for a public viewing of Inspired To Ride, a movie/documentary about the TransAm bike race featuring Mike Hall himself along with many other amazing riders.

A light rain accompanied most of the movie which I watched standing alongside Maddy who, tired as she was from her own day, stayed with me to be able to drive me back to their house. In the end, we didn’t stay for the whole movie, she was tired, I was tired of a day of flying, walking and commuting and I had the race to rest for so we called it a night and we drove off.

My bike was already stored in their garage where I was supposed to spend the night as well (since the rain wasn’t a compelling company for a night in the garden), but I was first treated to a warm, amazing bowl of pasta from Maddy’s own kitchen. After that, it was about time to get the bike ready before going to bed at which point Stephan joined (he had stayed until the end of the movie) to help me get the finishing details.

Things were good enough, but then I found out I was actually invited to stay in the house, in a real bed. I couldn’t ask for more and gladly accepted since I knew many uncomfortable nights were to come.

When morning came I was expecting to get up, take a quick, last shower for who knows how long and be on my way to Geraardsbergen to complete my registration and spend my final hours before the race around town, eating and provisioning. But once again, my hosts surprised me with their never ending kindness and offered a full blown breakfast to get my belly full before setting off. A shower and then, after eternally thanking Maddy for their kindness, I hit the road to get as early as possible to the registration.

Unfortunately, I was far from early and the registration was a slow process involving much waiting but after a couple of hours I was out, tracker ready and some names that finally had become real people, like Marion Esfandiari, Matthijs Ligt, Anna (Mike Hall’s wife) and Paul Buckley.

Lunch was in order and I couldn’t think of anything better than pasta, so I got me a tasty bucket and went for a short ride to better get to know the town. I thought about climbing the Muur in preparation for the night, but I was scared of spoiling the surprise for myself, so I avoided it.

A bucket of pasta, TCR style.

A bit after two in the afternoon, Stephan offered me to take a recharging nap backstage where the registration process was still taking place and I was offered an amazing couch to rest my bones in. Again, I couldn’t refuse, such luxuries would be soon a faint memory.

I snoozed for a bit over an hour and then it was almost time for the riders briefing. The briefing didn’t really add anything new, but it was a good time to see all the riders, volunteers and the organization in one place, at the same time, for the last time.

The Argen/Canadian couple were back in Geraardsbergen to keep me company in the last few hours before the start and to have the chance of possibly burning me with one of the torches during the ascent to the Muur.

As the hours passed the anxiety grew and the marketplace was suddenly filled with riders in bright yellow vests, blinking red lights and road bicycles overloaded to make them worthy of a 4000km ride. Slowly but surely the needles in the clock kept moving and soon it was 10 p.m., race time!

Ok, it wasn’t race time yet, first a neutralized loop around town, in theory, it was going to be limited at 25km/h but it ended up being more like 15/10km/h which was actually kind of nice because it allowed me to really turn off my mind for the 20 minutes that it lasted and only focused on not crashing against whoever was in front of me. Soon enough we were back at the marketplace, all spectators were already gone, waiting for riders at the top of the Muur, so now, for real, the race had begun.

I didn’t really know what to expect, the climb was through a different path of that which I had taken the day before so I had no idea of gradients or terrain. Had never ridden on cobbles for more than 3 meters and, well, my experience on climbing was very, very inadequate. Luckily for me, my mind was still in automatic mode so I don’t think I was actually aware of the way up. I remember a few sections, then seeing Maddy cheering, my Argen/Canadian friends cheering and all of the sudden I was at the top. I was amazed. Didn’t have to stop, I wasn’t the last one and I was actually not even sweating yet! And then came the fast descent on the other side, all the riders flying down, all together pointing in the same direction: Clermont-Ferrand, France. Checkpoint number one.

I was part of a group of maybe 10-20 riders going down at a nice speed when suddenly my mind woke up and I bothered to check my GPS. I was completely off my route. I was so taken away by the moment that I had followed riders instead of my route. Panic set in. I hit the brakes and checked the GPS again, I had to zoom out quite a lot to even be able to see where my marked route was. F*ck. So, what to do now? Think, think.

And the only thing I could think of was, think, think, you are off your route, you are wasting time, think, think… Instead of doing the obvious thing I would do now (check for the most direct way to the closest point on my route and ride there) I did the dumbest thing ever and asked my Garmin to take me to the beginning of the route. In my head that was an excellent thing to do, except the beginning of my route was marked on top of the Muur.

It was stupid to climb the Muur again, so I tried to find my route before climbing and, before I knew it, I was back at the marketplace. F*ck. The closest point on my route was on the other side of the hill, but I didn’t know any way around it and after going back and forth the same street five times I let the panic win again and decided to climb the Muur a second time. As I was starting the climb I crossed Maddy that was finishing her descent as a spectator who asked me if everything was ok and I think I got to shout something back like «routing problems!» without stopping. The adrenaline mix from the race start and the panic from being «lost» so soon made the climb even easier than the first time and soon I was at the top again (after having my first fall after stopping without unclipping to avoid getting hit by a car near the top) but, for the life of me, I couldn’t match the route on the GPS with the roads I had.

Some riders were gathered at the top, talking. One of them asked if I needed help. Another said «Wrong way», like I didn’t know… and after freaking out for about 2 or 3 minutes I was finally able to hit my marked route and start the descent properly, with my senses now in full alert.

The relief came almost instantly. I was now following my very well thought out route, which I had prepared in two days before flying (pro tip: don’t try that at home, it sucks!), and the night was mine. Either because of my delay or because of my weird selection, I was riding completely alone and in no time I was away from Geraardsbergen and into some small roads between farms and countryside.

Part of this route I had checked using Street View from Google Maps, so all of the sudden I was seeing the live versions of things I had seen on my computer screen thousands of kilometers away. It was quite a weird feeling, but also a reassuring one since it meant that I was on the right path.

Or so I thought.

After maybe 8 or 10km I noticed the road I was in was getting narrower. And narrower. And narrower until it finally disappeared into a patch of tall grass.

F*CK!!!

Not even an hour had passed since the start of the race and I had already learned that a) I wasn’t comfortable enough with my GPS unit (a.k.a. I hadn’t played enough on the road with it) and b) my so thoroughly planned route was a piece of sh*t.

Panic set in one more time, briefly. I checked the route against reality and I could see that after a few hundred meters the paved road seemed to resume so I picked up the bike and walked across until, luckily, I reached the paved road continuing on my route.

Phew! That was a close one! On the bike again and to try and make up for ALL the lost time in my eventful beginning. I continued riding, following my route religiously across more farms and open countryside. Some roads were completely dark. Some were gravel-ish, but I was moving forward. Fewer kilometers left on my route meant more kilometers closer to CP1.

And then that. I had seen it on another road that wasn’t part of my route. I had seen it before and my basic understanding of written french (from my Spanish) allowed me to understand (I think at least) what it meant.

I had seen it before and I was scared shitless that I would see it on my route and now there it was. A fence was completely blocking the way. My way. That’s it. I’m done. I’ll just go back to Geraardsbergen and tomorrow I’ll fly back home. Or I’ll go back and make a new route and then start tomorrow. Or maybe I just have to go home. I’m not made for this, clearly. F*CK!

I think I was like 20, or maybe 30km in. I couldn’t believe it. I wasn’t panicking this time, I was just utterly defeated. And then I had an idea. Oh, such a great idea! Why didn’t I think of this before?

I started playing with my Garmin and after locating a road that seemed big enough not to end like this one while still not being a highway that crossed the border to France I said: «Garmin, take me there, show me the way Master».

Oh, the joys of Garmin routing.

You see that part in the race manual where Mike discourages you from using GPS routing because it’s not «good enough yet»? Well, that’s a horrible understatement.

A horrible, horrible… Horrible understatement. I’ll tell you all about it in a minute but first I’ll let you rest your eyes from the screen, and I’ll go get a coffee.

This is just starting…