To do what exactly? Well to race my bike of course :) oh, and I guess I should visit my parents too...:P
For the next 3 or so months, I have the great pleasure of riding for a local Dutch club team – SwaboLadies Cycling Team. Rochelle Gilmore has been a great help in my quest for a team for the 2010 season and has very kindly reached into her bag of contacts and put me in touch with Hans Blom, DS of SwaboLadies. I am very privileged to have help from someone like Rochelle and really appreciate the time and effort she put in to help someone like me :)
So why a Dutch team? I know that the typical style of Dutch racing doesn’t seem as though it would be up my alley; however, I believe I have a lot to learn by competing in these sorts of hard and fast races (how to place myself in an aggressive bunch of 200 girls, on dodgy roads and in most often less than ideal conditions) and I will be able to improve on my weaknesses (such as my ‘renowned’ lack thereof ability on the flat) and develop into a stronger, more rounded cyclist. In addition, Holland has races on at least every weekend and what better way to improve myself in races, than to race. I will be able to gain the valuable race experiences that unfortunately you can’t get back in Australia.
For the length of my stay, I have had a very generous offer from one of the girls on the team, Sofie van Horik, to stay with her and her family on their farm in Oosterwijk which is apparently just outside of Lebermann... and if you don’t have google maps handy or a creepily insane knowledge of geography, 30min south of Amsterdam. Upon accepting the offer, I learnt that two NZ girls will also be staying there which means i’ll have plenty of training buddies!! Hopefully they like coffee stops....otherwise we may have problems :p.
I am heading back from Geelong today, sad to go but will be happy to see my gorgeous sister who is holding down the fort back home :) as well as my coach, who has had a much needed break from me :p
For more information about the SwaboLadies Team, you can check out their website at http://www.swaboladies.nl but good like deciphering it ;) i may have to add Dutch to my every growing list of languages to learn.... However, surfing the site I noticed that you can buy sort of ‘fan cards’ of the girls... maybe i’ll have my own trading card when i’m over there ha ha
Update from my time in Geelong to come!
Ciao for now
Take care
xx
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