Cycling in Asia

It was 3:30am when we were awakened by a massive thunder storm in Borso del Grappa.   We were slated to get up at 5am for the Pinarello Gran Fondo Race that day in Treviso for the 205km race which included one of the toughest climbs up Monte Grappa.   I did this race last year but it did not have any tough climbs like Monte Grappa and it definitely did not have massive thunderstorms that were happening that morning.  This year there was a big group of people from Singapore doing the race so it was going to be a fun day.  With the wind blowing trees over, the rain coming down heavy, and the temperature being only 14 degrees Celsius, a few riders decided to call it a day and stay and rest at the ICC.  Kim, Andrew, Lee, Lee’s replacement rider Ed (Lee II), all decided to stay back while Damian, Mike (aka Philip), Gareth, Colleen and Ernest and I all decided to go to Treviso and see what the situation was about the race.  Italians are normally quite fair weather riders so who knows…maybe it would be cancelled.  Matteo our driver showed up at the ICC and was probably thinking we were nuts because it was thundering, lightning, cold and dark and here we are getting ready to go to this bike race at 5:30 in the morning.

When we arrived in Treviso the conditions were no better. It was cold, rainy and we were staring at people with jackets with envy.  We found out that some trees had blown over on Monte Grappa and that the long course was cancelled and only the 130km route was open for the day.  We had to wait for the race organizers to clear some trees so we headed over to a coffee shop beside the Pinarello store to warm up and grab a coffee before they started the race. During the coffee we agreed we would all work together as a team given the poor conditions. 

After our coffees were done (we did two rounds as it took a long time to start), we headed over through the starting line around 9am.  Our team plan was short-lived as Damian broke away within the first 3km…the rest of the team stuck together as per the plan….until the first climb.  The climbs were all small but there were so many people on the hill that we actually had to stop to prevent from falling over.  During one of the slowest spots, we had to walk up the climb as there were simply too many people. At this time I noticed my bottle cage was loose so I borrowed an wrench from team mate Gareth to fix my bike during this slow climbing section.  As I scanned the group to see we were all together as a unit, I noticed Mike snaking his way up the climb only to shoot a Lance Armstrong look back at the team and hammer off into the future.  It seems he adopted the Damian Barrett team approach to this race right at the time when I had a mechanical.  None the less, the rest of the ‘team’ pressed on and hammered out a good pace for the rest of the race.

I spent most of the race with Gareth.   He was quite keen to pass as many people as possible and insisted on catching all the groups in front of us…even if it was a group of one rider….near the end I was keen but only after 100km did I start to feel good and want to catch people.  We finished together like a team to meet up with MIke and Damian later for drinks.

In the end, we all safely finished. Damian finished first on the team and rewarded himself with some red wine afterwards in Treviso.  We went back to ICC after for a great dinner and to relive the stories from this year’s Pinarello Granfondo race.