Training#3 Ronde van Vlaanderen

I agreed to cycle the Ronde van Vlaanderen as part of my training. A chance to spend some time with some other cycling mad dads. This sounds great I told myself. Cycling 80 miles around Belgium. Frites,  great beer, cycling - what's not to like?

I'll tell you whats not to like - its the cobbles.



The Flemish decided at some point in the past that if they got good at riding on cobbled roads this would give them a competitive advantage over everyone else on a cobbled course. They are right, principally because you have to be mad to think that riding on cobbles is in any way fun at all. It's actually incredibly painful and about as far as fun as cycling can be. If cycling 80 miles sounds bad, imagine that you have to suddenly cycle 2km where the surface makes your arms and bum vibrate as if you were operating a pneumatic drill. Then imagine that when going uphill, or downhill fast. Imagine that the cobbles are wet. Imagine that the cobbles are wet, and big and muddy.


I'm not doing that again in a hurry, but a credit to Belgium for a very warm welcome and as always some wonderful food and drink,