Britt and Jane waiting for the start.

The Koga Ronde van Zuid Oost Friesland is a national classic that has start and finish in the village of Appelscha, right on the top of a small hill called the Bosberg. Total length of the race is 129 km made up of two loops, one of just over 80 km and another one of 40 plus km. Last year Eileen finished third in this race, a fact the speaker reminded the spectators of a couple of times.

This year our team was represented by two riders: Britt and Jane.  They were part of a field of about 100 riders. 

Because of the absence of wind, which is quite rare for this part of the country, and the lack of serious differences in height, which is a sure fact for (this part of) the country, the only serious obstacle was a stretch of cobbles after about 40 km. However the lenght of this road was too short to cause serious splits in the peloton.

Although several riders and groups of riders attacked and got leads on the peleton up to 50 seconds the  race ended in a bunch sprint. A bunch sprint with a nasty chicane about 400 m before the finish.

Natalie in an AA drink train

In the bunch sprint Britt ended 37th and Jane 48th. The race was won by Monique vd Rhee from the Skil Argos team.

Meanwhile in the village of Rijssen, Natalie and Esther raced the local criterium over 60 km. Due to there also being a National Classic in combination with the traditional sponsorship relation between the organisers of the race and the AA drinks team, not too many riders turned up, but nearly the whole AA drinks team did.

Esther out and about with two AA drinks riders

Due to their class and numbers, they really dominated the race and made the race into  a weird one. The AA drinks riders took the positions 1,2 and 3. The race was won by Sharon Laws, followed by Jessy Daams and Chantal Blaak,  Natalie was the first non-AA drinks rider finishing fourth having lapped the peloton twice. Emma Pooley completed the top 5. Esther finished on a good 10th spot.

Oh and of course guys: don’t try this as home !!

Team presentation in Gooik (left to right: Aafke, Natalie, Esther, Hannah, Jane)

Gooik is a town in the center of the Belgian Pajottenland. It has one of the largest supportersclubs of Dutch multichamp Marianne Vos. Her photo was on every wall in the pub where the teams had to register. She won this race last year, but this year could not fit it into her schedule.  Five riders of our team could: Aafke, Esther, Hannah, Jane and Natalie. Hannah, back after her injury was told to get some race km in, but not do the cobblestone-stretches as we want her to heal fully first. The five Ibis riders were part of a field of in total 145 riders.

Natalie on the Muur

The race started of with a ride out to Geraardsbergen. The infamous Muur was situated at 35 km in the race and that’s where the race exploded. The combination of the cobbled steep climbes of the Muur and the Bosberg (within 5 km) split the field in several groups: a lead group of 8, a group of about 40 riders following at about 40 seconds with Natalie and Esther, followed by group of 30 with Aafke and Jane, followed by different small groups. 

Esther climbing the Bosberg

This was the race situation as the race got back to Gooik after 65 km to start the 7 local laps. Due to the length of thes laps the groups up until that of Aafke and Jane were taken out of the race in the course of these seven laps. So only two groups in the race the lead group and the group of Esther and Natalie. The distance between the groups varied between 40 and 20 seconds until 2 laps before the end the distance increased to 3 minutes.

Liesbeth de Vocht finished the race first. Natalie and Esther finished this long and hard race in the peloton, making them two of the 54 riders that managed to finish the race: well done ladies !

The Muur on the highday of the Flemish spring: the Tour of Flanders

The ‘Muur van Geraardsbergen’ is a monument in the Flemish cycling history. The steep and cobbled slope has a length of 1075 meters. The highest percentage is 20%. The Muur has often been the decisive moment in the finale of the Tour of Flanders. The difficulty of the climb on the bike is constituted by the fact that the cobblestones are arranged horizontally and thus forms a kind of small steps.

This thursday, the team will participate in the race Gooik – Geraardsbergen – Gooik, a UCI 1.2 rated race. After 35 km it will be waiting there for the riders: De Muur……

Jeroen cleaning bikes near the hotel

Preperations for this 123 km National race for some members of the team started well into the evening before: It was past 10 PM and way past riders bed time, before mechanic Jeroen had cleaned all bikes from the race earlier that day.  This did mean he could have a bit of a lay in as we were quite close to Veldhoven were sunday’s race would be and the race would not start before mid-day.

Anyway, the next day: Aafke, Jane, Julie,  Laura, and Natalie together with Kayleigh and a special guest appearance by last years teammate Emma, were ready for this race that goes through the area called ‘De Kempen’. A large loop of 100 km followed by 2 local laps of about 10 km.   

Jane, very focussed....

After various attempts, among others from Natalie who got a maximum lead of 15 seconds, the decisive break of six got away. Unfortunately our team was not represented in this group. The lead group had a maximum lead of just over a minute, but in the last of the local laps the lead decreased rapidly. But the peloton could not quite close the gap. 

The race was won by Suzan de Goede from the Skl Argos team. Natalie did very well in the bunch sprint finishing 10th overall.  Aafke (41), Emma (48), Julie (62), Laura (76) and Jane (95) finished in the bunch. Kayleigh was unlucky crashing just before one of the cobblestretches. Luckily without any damage to person or bike.

Julie in the first group (photo Bart Hazen)

The seaside resort of Knokke-Heist was host to the 5th leg of the Lotto Cycling Cup (a series of 8 UCI 1.2 races in Belgium). Knokke-Heist is a nice town, but today the weather covered that up well. It was cold, it was damp, there was a cold wind, it was not pleasant at all. Nevertheless over 160 riders took on the challenge of starting the 112 km race.  For Team Ibis Cycles today:  Jane, Julie, Laura, with Kayleigh Brogan from Scotland and guest rider Joyce Accoe from Belgium.

The race consisted of one big lap of 56 km (including a nasty stretch of cobblestones)  leading from Knokke-Heist to Bredene and 8 local laps over just over 7 km in Bredene itself.  When the riders entered the local circuit the peloton was split in 4 groups: a first group of about 20 riders with Julie, a second group of about 20 riders including Laura, a third group of 40 riders and a fourth group of about 50 riders with Kayleigh, Jane and Joyce.  Despite their hard work this fourth group was taken out of the race three laps before the end.

Two riders escaped from the first group and it looked as if they were going to decide who was going to win  the race. But when group two caught group one, in a crazy last lap the two leading riders were caught by two other riders, one of them, Liesbeth de Vocht winning the race. Julie came 27th, Laura 37th. For everyone it had been a hard day in the saddle.

Natalie in the lead group

With the majority of the team in the Czech republic, only 2 riders at the start of this race: Natalie and Aafke.  This meant no car in the race. Therefor a big thank you to the staff of Team Nutswerk who took excellent care of our riders in the race.

Then the race itself. In the first lap a crash caused the race to be neutralised for a short period. After the restart a lead group of sixteen riders was formed. Among the riders in this group Natalie. This group was chased by a group of nine, followed by the peloton with Aafke. The distances between the groups remained fairly constant at about one minute, but when the three local laps started the leadgroup increased its lead to over 2 minutes and it became clear that the winner of the race was in this group.

Natalie was outnumbered in the lead group by several teams: Dolmans Boels had 3 riders in the group, Noordwesthoek 4, Restore 2, Specialized-DPD-SRAM 3. So the only thing she could do was pay attention, ride economically and gamble. So she did and nearly succeeded, only to be outsprinted in the final meters. Natalie came 4th. Aafke finished in the peloton and came 53rd.

Jane seems to get better every day

Stage 4 was a tough stage with climbs up to 1000 meter, average temp of the day=27 degrees…. The time differences at the finish were huge, with the rider who finished 10th in the stage already at over 6 minutes down on winner Trixi Worrack.

In the first few km of the race the peleton was in one long line due to the Australiians pulling hard and windy conditions plus the fear of the first climb of 11km coming at 15mins of race time.

Positstion was crucial.. however (as always in bike racing) this also proved the down-fall of out top GC rider. A significant crash at the front of the peleton saw the end of Lauras race and required a full check by hosptial experts…. thankfully initial thoughts of broken bones was not proved correct however she did receive a significant impact especially to the face.

The result of the crash and with the team orders set prior to the stage all riders were to protect Laura and her GC.. this crash impacted greatly on both Jane and Esther. Both riders waited for their teamleader and the wait proved significant in their position on the climb which resulted in missing crucial moves of the day.

In today’s stage Esther finished at 31st after a brave and impressive jump from group to group, showing that todays climbs were what Esther thrives in, sadly the stage was just one climb too little and the road ran out, Julie was 70th and Jane 83rd. In the GC Eshter moved up into 36th place. Julie is 69th and Jane is 84th. In the team classification the team dropped from 11th to 18th.

Tomorrow the last stage, let’s hope the team can finish on a high.