Cyprus Sunshine Cup #3 Race, Amathous

Start of the race (Picture by Marius Maasewerd)

It's amazing how different one's perception of a race can be from another racer! When I read Annika Langvad's blog post about how the race went for her (she won it), I first thought she was talking about a different race....

Anyhow, for me the race started with a blistering pace and I was being squeezed in by riders from either side, so I dropped back to avoid a crash. The start loop was up a short climb and very fast along on fire road and road circumnavigating the complete race arena. I found the pace very fast from the start and did my bestest to hang on to the bunch - it was like a road race: a person in front of me dropped a wheel and I had to chase! Finally, on the road section I was able to make up a few places and catch onto the group in front before we hit the singletrack and that was more or less where I would end up position wise. Because while the course is great fun to ride, with about 95% singletrack (time-wise), it's not that lovely in a race when you can't get by some girl that would rather push you down the hill than let you pass her (I only witnessed the quite physical elbows-out battle between the two girls in front and thought better than to get involved myself, apart from shouting at the girl that was holding both of us up). So we had to trail behind her for a whole lap before we had the chance to pass her.

However, the course was such a savage course, full of short steep power-sapping climbs and it was quite warm and humid too and I felt I was tiring towards the end of the race, starting to loose concentration and making more and more mistakes. In the last lap (which actually came one earlier than I had expected) I had to really focus to keep the pressure on as a few riders were closing in on me, but fortunately I could hold them off.

I finished in 14th place, which is OK, but I was a bit disappointed with my race, I didn't feel I had enough power and was beaten by a few people that I would have beaten last year.

Report and full results on cyclingnews here.

Thanks to Bas for doing my bottles - isn't it nice in mtbing that conflict of interest is being largely being ignored and people help you out everywhere?

Taking deep breaths at Afxentia Stage Race, Cyprus

Well, the 3-day stage of the Cyprus Sunshine Cup is just over. And what a mixed bag it was. First up, on Friday, was the time trial: one loop of the XC course. The course was different this year, with more singletrack, more steep climbs and more speed changes. They did keep the super steep descents from last year though. The other difference was that the weather this year was a lot more true to the races' title, it was actually reasonable warm and the sun was out! In fact, due to the rain overnight the course conditions were perfect, the ground was really nice and very grippy.

Stage 1: Time Trial

After last week's shock to the system and my realization that I may not have enough racing fitness as I had hoped to have, I knew that this short, sharp effort would be a tough one. It's always hard to judge how well one did in comparison to others before you see the times, but I was happy enough with my ride - my heart rate was pegged throughout and I found I rode the first half really well on the technical parts, but lost concentration on the second half of the ride and started making small mistakes on the singletrack. Unfortunately about half the girls were sent the wrong (time-wise shorter) way, so that the times are not all correct. In the end I was down as 20th, a good while off Annika Langvad, who again showed off all the girls with an amazing performance.


Stage 2: Point to Point

Then it was just resting up for the XC point-to-point loop on Saturday, one of my favourite courses. The only annoying thing is that you have to endure lots of fast and hard fireroad riding before you can finally indulge in the nicest and longest singletrack climb and descent here in Cyprus. This year we also started further down the mountain in the village Kapedes and the climb up on the tarmac to the start of the fireroad was hairy, to say the least. Some girls really don't know how to ride their bike in a bunch. People were barging through everywhere in a fight for positions and almost pushing you into the ditch, erratically changing positions from one side of the road to the other and not staying in their line. So to stay out of trouble I went to the front. The pace was actually not very fast, and Ryan thinks with all my road training I should have attacked off the front to try and get a bit of space before entering the fireroad - now that would have been an interesting move! We hit the fireroad still together, but the pace soon picked up and the bunch started splitting up. I overshot on one corner and had to break really hard and lost a few positions. But my aim was to not go too hard at the start anyway, so that I don't blow up on the long singletrack climb, like last year. And it mostly paid off. On the climb I was able to overtake a few girls and was working my way up the rankings. Unfortunately I got stuck behind a slow Ukranian girl who really didn't want to let me pass (of course this was at a stretch where the track was too tight and the sides too steep to pass without pushing her into the ditch), so I did my best to control my anger and finally passed her at the first opportunity. I passed more girls on the way to the top and when I came out on on the top on the bit of road that connects the two singletrack sections I could see Anne Terpstra and Laura Turpjin in front of me - I knew then that I was going well! I felt great too, feeling that I had paced myself well up to the top, possibly even left too much in the tank. I absolutely loved the singletrack descent, but lost a bit of concentration when I came off the bike in one loose corner. I knew the girls I had overtaken on the climb couldn't be too much behind me, so I kept the pressure on and kept up the speed on the last 5km towards the finish. I was very happy when I saw the 500m sign and went underneath the bridge. I prepared myself for the last short steep climb - but wait, why is Mike at the top gesturing me to go into the middle loop of the XC course? It was an extra 1.5km that we had to do that I had not expected! Finally I finished in 12th position, which I was really happy with.

However, when I stopped after the race to chat to a few people before I went on my cool down, my chest started tightening up and I couldn't get any air. I started panicking which made it worse, so people called a lady from the ambulance. She tried to get me to go to the ambulance, but I didn't want to move because I had to concentrate hard to get my breathing back. After a while the heaving and wheezing died down and my breathing went back to mostly normal. This was now the third time I had this happening, so I will get it checked out when I come back to Ireland. Another thing I was unhappy with was that again some girls were sent went the wrong way, with some girls having done the very short loop that I had expected, the middle loop of the XC course or even the outer loop of the XC course.



Stage 3: Cross Country

Then on Sunday was the last of the stages, a regular XC race on the same course as the time trial. The pace was blistering from the start. It was so fast and hard in fact that my breathing problems that had plagued me after the race yesterday returned and got so bad that I had to stop for a rest after the start loop. I could barely get any air and had to let all the riders pass one by one. I told the marshal that I wanted to pull out of the race, but he didn't want to take that and told me to take a rest and catch my breath. I was weighing up my options in my head. I would have stopped if it had not been part of a stage race and counted for the overall cup. So I waited until I my breathing returned back to normal and decided to try and finish this lap and re-evaluate then. Unfortunately the course with all it's steep ups and downs and speed and acceleration changes was not suitable for riding easy. But I got around and decided to keep going and finish the race. I focused on getting into a rhythm and stay at that speed for the rest of it. It felt like I was going only at 80%, so I was surprised then that I could pick up a few more riders. In the end I finished the race in 16th position and 11th in the overall - thanks to my good time from the point-to-point race I didn't loose too many positions. But needless to say that this race is ranking high on the list of most frustrating races. But it could have been worse, I could have been the strongest rider and leader of the race and missed the start, therefore missing out on 160 UCI points in the only HC stage race, a heap of prize money (Some blank looks were exchanged when the race leader, Annika Langvad, was called to the start line but didn't turn up! Anyhow, the race was started without it's leader and it turned out that Annika Langvad simply arrived too late to the race due to not being aware of the change in start times that was communicated on the manager's meeting but not updated on the website (luckily I heard about it!) - see here for her emotional blog entry).

Until I got the breathing problems during the race in stage 3 I had been in denial about having any problem at all - sure, who cares about breathing problems AFTER the race is over and sure a bit of heavy breathing and gasping for air, isn't that normal after a hard race effort...? But today, when I went out on my training ride today with Frederik and my house guest Henrique, I couldn't keep up with them and go my own pace because of my breathing again - I felt like I was dying to keep up with them and they were not going very hard....

Obviously I am now a bit more concerned about this, especially since it has started to affect my performance. The obvious guess is that it's exercise-induced asthma, something that seems to afflict half of the professional cycling community, so I'm planning to get tested for that.

All the results can be found on cyclingnews.

Big thanks is due to the Orange Monkey Team for helping me out in the feed zones!

1st race this season: Cyprus Sunshine Cup #1 Voroklini

Well, I got the season opener out of the way. Unfortunately I wasn't going as well as I had hoped to and I was quite disappointed with my result. I knew that I probably wouldn't be able to repeat my performance from last year (a 4th place) - with the scramble for Olympic points and double as many women signed up (with 10 out of the 30 ranking in the world's top 50) the competition was going to be tougher from the outset. Annika Langvad lead from the start and pulled away quickly, finishing with a huge gap of 5min to the next person down, Blaza Klemencic. Third was Kristine Norgaard, a further 4min down. Then, from 4th place onwards the girls came in closer time gaps, and unfortunately I was towards the backend of those.

I didn't have a great start, with two girls closing in on me on either side so that I dropped back to stay out of trouble, but the main thing was that I just didn't have it in me today. I pushed as hard as I could, but just couldn't give any more. In the first or second lap I was still towards the front end of a chase group, but one by one I was overtaken by the girls behind me, loosing more and more ground - I felt I was going backwards! In the end I came in with a gap of over 16 minutes down on Annika - last year it was only 6 minutes.....


Of course I ask myself what has gone wrong - surely I am hoping to improve year by year, and my power figures show that I have gotten stronger - so why am I not doing any better in the results? Has my training been wrong? Have I started intensity too late? Should I have done more mtb specific training? Is my sickness from last week still holding me back? Was it wrong to fly out so close to the race (last year I came a day earlier)? Is it because I don't have Ryan here to support me? Or did I just have a bad race? I don't know. But I know it's early in the season and I've got plenty more chances to have a better race - the next one will be the 2nd round of the Cyprus Sunshine Cup, a HC stage race in the Macheras Mountains next weekend! :)

Thanks to Ninko from the Milka team for his mechanical help and Frederik for feed zone support.

Full results and report can be found on cyclingnews here. Photos from Marios Spyrou.

Short results:

1	Annika Langvad (Den) Easton Rockets	1:45:39
2	Blaza Klemencic (Slo) Felt Otztal X-Bionic	0:05:07
3	Kristine Nørgaard (Den) HMTBK	0:09:08
4	Janka Stevkova (Svk) CK Epk Dohnany	0:11:08
5	Anne Terpstra (Ned) MPL Specialized MTB Team	0:12:17
6	Rie Katayama (Jpn) Specialezed JPN	0:12:18
7	Laura Turpijn (Ned) Dutch National Team	0:12:55
8	Tatjana Dold (Ger) Easton Rockets	0:14:14
9	Iana Belomoyna (Ukr)	0:15:36
10	Asa Erlandsson (Swe) Swedish National Team	0:16:06
11	Melanie Spath (Ger) Cycleways	0:16:49

Oh god, I'm racing tomorrow!

It kinda is like Christmas, you've been waiting for it for so long, prepared for it for so long, seen all the lights and heard all the jinglebells, it's been creeping up on you, and then all of a sudden it's there: the start of the racing season (and you haven't even bought all the Xmas presents yet (read: done all your intervals)).

I just can't believe that I am in Cyprus again and meant to race my first race this season tomorrow. It always seems to happen so quickly. And it still somehow amazes me how one can plop oneself into a completely different surrounding in such a short time. Feels surreal sometimes. And if I was flying home on Monday it would feel like "blink, and you missed it". But I am not flying home Monday, I am doing the complete Cyprus Sunshine Cup this year again. And without Ryan too, so I hope I won't be too lonely in my huge apartment that I had rented for the two of us. But I don't think it will be too bad - lots of people again are staying in Kalavasos and the neighbouring village Tochni, including the Rabobank Giant team. Anyhow, I better get going on my pre-ride in Voroklini - I am here to race after all!

Gran Canaria Training Camp

This was the 3rd year that Ryan and I went to our Gran Canaria training camp in January to get our long base miles in.

View from the top of the island - Tenerife in the background

With lots of sunshine, temperatures of about 16-26 degrees Celsius and plenty of smooth roads up the central mountains it's the perfect choice for us, especially since we live in Ireland, where the weather can be quite miserable in January (although this year the January was quite mild, the sunniest and driest one in a decade or so according to the news....). It's a lot easier to do 4-5hours of training a day in good weather and it's great for your motivation and mood too. To be honest, I can only take Irish winters with it's generally grey skies and miserable cold weather when I can avoid it.... And we're not the only people taking advantage of GCs roads and sun: We met old friends Sally Bigham and Dave from the UK training, the world marathon champ Alban Lakata, a load of UK MTBers on their training camp, pro-roadies and triathletes and even the current TT world champ Fabian Cancellara was sighted by Ryan (and overtaken by Ryan on a climb as he likes to point out... ;)))! As Sally says, it's a mecca for cycling and you're sure to have a group spin to go on or to meet somebody you know out on the roads. It's fantastic!

Out on a group ride with the UK boys ;)

Anyhow, the plan was to get a lot of training done and so I did. The 3 weeks I was there I trained about 23.5hours the first week, 27.5hours the second week and 23hours the third week. The first week of training was really hard, after having had a whole week off over Christmas (apart from one day cross country skiing which completely wrecked my legs, and a long run). But by the 2nd week I was back into the swing of things and I felt good. My training load was bigger than ever this year and I was not nearly as tired after the spins as I had been the previous years - I think my body is adapting! :) The last week though was the best for me, I joined the UK contingent of mountain bikers - many of whom I knew from racing in the UK - on their group spins. I had so much fun riding my bike with them (don't get me wrong, it was still really really hard), I could so do with the pro life-style - now just have to get that PhD finished!

Beautiful valley in GC

All of my rides from Gran Canaria are up on Strava (my Strava profile here, ignore the distances, my Garmin is currently reading wrong distance, but climb and power are accurate) - Ryan and I both populate the Strava database with lots of new climbs - now we hope that we've got some people challenging those before we return the next time. Both Ryan and I managed to win the January Strava KOM challenge :)

Gran Canaria really is the perfect place for winter training and I'm already looking forward to next year (or maybe even this year again?)!

The Stick

Ryan usually gives out to me about not doing enough massaging and stretching etc. and I usually come up with some lame excuses (I've got to work on my PhD, I'm too tired, can we not ask Stew to give us a massage...?), but deep down I know he is right and I should be doing much more of this. Ryan has always been a fan of trying out new tools, but I usually lack behind in my enthusiasm for such things.

Until Ryan got The Stick.



The Stick is basically just a slightly flexible stick with 2 rubbery handles holding in a bunch of loose plastic mini-rollers in the middle.

As soon as Ryan got The Stick I started using it too. And I liked it so much I wanted one for myself. So Ryan gave me his Stick and got himself a new one. We now have a 20" Marathon Stick, which is the longest and most flexible one and a 17" Travel stick, which is slightly less flexible. And I like my Stick so much it came with me to my training camp in Gran Canaria and it's seeing much use here. The Stick is the first massaging tool that I do not find too cumbersome or time consuming or annoying to use and it actually feels good to massage your tired legs with The Stick. Both ease of use and perceived benefit are for me perfectly combined in The Stick. And it's handy enough to take with you on your travels.

So, get yourself The Stick, best massaging tool I have come across! (and I am not sponsored by them)

Cyprus Sunshine Cup Flat share 18th of Februay to 7th of March

As every year I'll be taking part in the Cyprus Sunshine Cup. I've booked a flat for 2-4 people (twin bedroom and sofa) in a beautiful old house in Kalavasos, a rural Cypriot village. Ryan and I have stayed in the same place for the last 2 years. However, it's not sure if Ryan is going to be able to come or not, so I'm looking for a possible flat share from the 18th of February to the 7th of March to keep the costs down.

This would suit another 1-2 riders who also take part in the Sunshine Cup (or anybody else who wants to come over during that time frame for a holiday). The location is perfect for off-road riding and the flat very big and you can roll the bikes straight in from the road. It also has wifi included.

Kalavasos also has a bike repair and rental shop for road and off-road bikes and a lot of riders from other teams stay in this and the neighbouring village, so there's plenty of opportunity to hook up for rides too.

Let me know if you're interested and I can give you more details. melanie dot spath at gmail dot com