Time to blend in a little

With a Kermisse finish rate of just one in three I was praying for significantly better fortunes for my second week on the bike here in Belgium.  The week started in a decidedly ‘dodgy’ manner with a meeting with my new team ‘Lotto Olympia Tienen’.  Up until Tuesday night I had only ever exchanged emails with the manager and a rushed phone call between myself and the club president in a mixture of phrasebook Flemish and broken English did little to put me at ease.  I arranged a meeting down In Tienen at an abandoned military airfield after dark and in what sounds like a scene from crime watch.  I was due to meet the boss in the car park.  After a rather apprehensive afternoon filled with my housemates dividing up my possessions after my inevitable murder, I made my way down to Tienen.  I was pleasantly surprised when I arrived to find a good sized group riding in formation around the airfield and plenty of parents on hand clutching flasks as their children made their way back to the car park.  I asked around with my solitary phrase for the team manager.  I waited in a café just off the airfield nursing my cup of coffee and pretending to read my Flemish phrase book, not to actually learn anything, more to deter people from approaching me and quizzing me for a minute or two as I shrugged and smiled like the village mute.  Finally after an hour the Manager arrived and arranged to take me to his house to sort out the clothing.  A quick drive later and we entered his kitchen, there; perched on the table he had his air rifle…so much for putting me at ease! But never the less he was most helpful, kitting me out in Lotto’s vibrant red, retro black and high visibility yellow.  We parted with a handshake and another appalling moment of my poor Flemish as I wished him good morning…oh dear.

I have been here two weeks now and I am ashamed to say my Flemish is coming on like a hard kermisse…a tough start full of a lack of understanding followed by abandoning shortly afterwards.  Action was needed, or more importantly, Dutch lessons.  My first rest day came around and I decided to do something about my poor Flemish whilst combining it with one of my favourite past times…Television!  My new Dutch teacher is a 30 odd year old man, dressed mainly as a lion or a plant as he teaches me and thousands of other Dutch children aged between two and Five our alphabet and numbers 1-20 every morning.  Kids T.V is a decent way to learn actually, sure I feel abit silly but no more so than asking around half way through a race what the commentator called out.  I get to practice these few phrases occasionally on the local baker or shop assistant. 

Onto the racing then and I had a point to prove after 2 straight DNF’s.  Nieuwrode was Sundays venue for 116 kilometres of Kermisse action on a pancake flat course with a couple of tricky sections.  248 riders decided to make the most of the good weather and as the flag was dropped the bunch was in good spirits, largely due to the 16 degrees and sunny conditions.  My race started badly… Only 3 or 4 kilometres in I hit a pothole more like an uncovered manhole than a small crack in the road.  My handlebars turned down on themselves leaving me with 110km or so still to go and a position on the bike that resembled The Hunchback of Notre Dame.  I pootled around at the back sulking for several laps before I realised that abandoning simply was not an option when the course was this easy and the weather this nice.  I hung around the middle of the bunch, only once poking my head of the front of the peloton before we came round for the last lap.  I kept up the front and managed to avoid a couple of you’ve been framed crashes in the final kilometre and eventually I rolled over 36^th from 165 finishers…tantalisingly close to the prizes but a noted step in the right direction.