On 18 April 2013 the next adventure begins! This one actually scares me because its such a great adventure. On the 18th April, Team GSS will be flying to Belgium. Yes, you read right. Belgium. After arrival in Brussels, we will be fetched by Sports tours international who will take us to the little town of Liege where we will prepare for the next day. On 20 April I will climb onto my faithful roadbike and race the Liege-Bastogne-Liege sportiv (I am going to be doing the 155km version as I am not quite brave enough to do the full 271km).
Liege-Bastogne-Liege is the oldest Classic cycling race in Europe and is known for being tough (notorioiusly for the second half) as well as for having bad weather. The first race was run in 1892 and had 33 riders (all amateurs), with only 17 finishing! The winner completed the race in 11hours which is quite a difference to this years winner who won it in 6hrs 43minutes. Its an interesting race filled with climbs and history racing through beautiful scenery and historic areas.
The sportiv we are doing is the amateur version of the race and is run the day before the professionals do the race. The sportiv offers 3 choices for distance: 80km, 155km, 271km. From what I have read, the 155km is not easy by any means! With 2500m climbing, its not a flat race and I have read it includes steep cobbled climbs. Eeek. The 271km is for real cyclists! It offers not only the insane distance, but also over 4500m of climbing. So ja, both distances are going to offer challenges to Team GSS!
The day after our race, we will get to watch the professionals race for glory and see how they tackled the climbs we did the day before. After 2days of obsessive cycling behaviour, we will enjoy a few days of exploring in Belgium and eating waffles and chocolate.
The next few months will be filled with training, eating, sorting out stuff for the tour but I will try and blog about updates and other adventures. (I will also try find interesting stuff about the places we will be going to.)
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