Reflections of GiroDonne 2011

We were fortunate enought to have Fuji Marketing Coordinator Milay Galvez with us for the final 4 days of the Giro.. she made an excellent blog about our journey and took time to get to know each of our stories and took some great snaps along the way. Here is her short interview with me… I am sure I rabble on longer but she is very pro and knows blogs need to be kept short and sweet!

GiroDonne – 3 down 7 to go!

Hello from the sunny Adriatic coastal town of Forli where we have a little later start today before stage 4 of the GiroDonne. We have had long (i.e. 280k!) post race transfers after the stages which has not left much else apart from massage, shower, dinner and bed upon reaching our hotel.

It’s been full gas from day one with three tough stages to start the tour… My job in the team is a domestique for our team leader for this tour Mara Abbott (A domestique is a road bicycle racer who works for the benefit of his team and leader. The French domestique translates as “servant”.) This means I protect her from taking wind in the bunch, help to move her up into position etc

Day one was filled with heat, humidity, nerves, crashes and a technical pave finish.. it was short but fast, 800m ascent in total requiring super attention in a nervous bunch.

Day two was straight into the climbing starting at a ski town at 1500m elev we made a total of 1700m vertical in 91km.. all down then all up with an incredibly fast rainy descent, through fog and tunnels and again crashes. I was in the breakaway for most of the first climb before dropping back to remain with Mara.

Yesterday was a cracker stage with 12 short climbs to total 1800m vertical over 104km (2k the longest) one little 24% surprise thrown in at the 80k (yellow below) mark was incredible… we all rode a strong race (Claudia making a strong attack below)

My team and I area all happy with the way things are going and looking forward to the 7 stages ahead! Thats all for now.. time to go and eat some more pasta!!

Giro Donne 2011 – The Simple Facts!

The most prestigious tour on the Women’s UCI calendar GiroDonne begins this Friday with one of the strongest fields ever to begin the race.. 10 days, from Rome to Torino – 17 teams, 934.8km and 8751m of climbing. See a brief course preview here

However the most important news so far is confirmation of the TV coverage. RaiSport2 have 45 minutes planned every evening from 19:00 hosted by Piergiorgio Severini and Silvio Martinello… Italy only folks, terribly sorry!

Mara celebrating her 2010 victory

I will be racing with 7 of my Diadora Pasta Zara teammates – Mara Abbott (USA), Shelley Olds(USA), Olga Zabelinskaya (RUS), Amber Pierce (USA), Inga Cilvinaite (LT), Claudia Häusler (GER), and Elanora Patuzzo (ITA).

Stages Giro Donne, July 1-10:

Stage 1: Rome-Velletri, 86km
Stage 2: Pescoconstanzo- Pescoconstanzo, 91km
Stage 3: Potenza Picena-Fermo, 104.3km
Stage 4: Forlimpopoli-Forlì, 101km
Stage 5: Altedo-Verona, 129km
Stage 6: Fontanellato-Piacenza, 128km
Stage 7: Rovato-Grosotto, 122km
Stage 8: Teglio-Valdidentro, 70km
Stage 9: Agliè-Ceresole Reale, 114.8km
Stage 10: San Francesco al Campo TT, 16km

Here is a clip of my teammate Mara Abbott winning the 2010 GiroDonne on Italy’s famous ‘Passo Stelvio’

It is a great opportunity to showcase Aussie Women’s cycling on the world stage – here is the full list of Aussie women that will be racing;

Rochelle Gilmore
Ruth Corset
Shara Gillow
Alexis Rhodes
Chloe Hosking
Bridie O’Donnell
Carla Ryan
Tiffany Cromwell
Vicki Whitelaw
Angela McClure
Davina Summers

The final two – @ NVGP

It’s always a mad rush to leave a race, packing equipment making sure it goes with the right people to the right places.. then there is the trip home.. often in and out of wireless access… followed by a return to home with bare cupboards and a suitcase full of laundry hence not much time to blog.

So… belatedly… the final two days at NVGP was set out to try, risk and race knowing there was a great GC battle going on its was an opportunity to capitalise. Being only a team of three riders we did not have any responsibility to control or make the racing. We played, raced and risked for stage podiums. In the end nothing eventuated, but again learned invaluably. Compliments to the HTC ladies who put on a fine performance in the final 2 days to steal the yellow and retain it for the final overall victory with Amber Neben.

Not the way it should be – Day 3 @NVGP

Tonight while racing stage 3 here at the NVGP in uptown Minneapolis my teammate Shelley Olds crashed in the final turn on the second last lap of our race, behind her at least ten other riders also went down in a massive pile up. She is currently in hospital completing investigations, in a lot of pain but is expected to be released this evening.

This is not how I want to write a blog.. mentioning the words crash, ambulance, hospital should not have to happen when reporting on our sporting pursuits but it does and for some reason it seems at an increasing rate.

I was rocked a few weeks ago by the 3 tragic deaths we had in the cycling community. It is a struggle at these times when tragic circumstances come completely unjustified, to see through it and say ‘its just sport’ or ‘its part of the deal’ is not right, its larger than that and  if things can be done to reduce the extent of race crashes then moves should be made towards achieving this. Michael Barry (pro rider for Team Sky) spoke out just this week about cycling race safety he postulated some excellent points and explanations for the vast increase in cycling trauma and where the responsibility lies in creating a safer peloton for the future. When sport starts playing with poeple’s lives you have to take a step back and ask the vital questions… who will put their hand up for change?