Fresh Bread, Stale Legs in Loenhout

I thought this was a great photo of what the mechanics are doing while we race, I don't know how they keep track of things in there, but my bike is always clean and ready when I come through. Mario of Cycling-pics has been documenting the camp with photos and always has some interesting shots of the sights and scenes of the cross races.

I found a few from Hofstade that were pretty cool, man that sand was hard. You had to run the entire way through the pits, then run out and another 20 yards before you could remount in the cement so the pit technique above was required, and pretty dope.

Yesterday I suffered pretty good at Loenhout and came away hurting pretty bad. I made it within half a lap of not being lapped before the train of Boom, Stybar, and Albert came through. It's always a little unnerving to hear the roar of the crowd grow behind as they come up and then trying to stay out of the way. I think they said about 70 starters and I finished 43rd, one lap down. I'd like to finish one race here on the lead lap, seems like it's going to take a race with a long lap to accomplish that.

While sitting in a traffic jam for 40 minutes as files of drunk Belgians walked through town to their cars in the fields and highways around town, I discovered you can buy bread here not only from every corner bakkerij, but also from vending machines. Yes, those are bags of fresh bread in a vending machine, and it's not Wonderbread either, it's fresh made.

Ryan pulled off a good result yesterday with a cold, today I'm the one that woke up with one. I'm pretty plugged up right now, but felt ok on the ride today, so tomorrow I might give the Superprestige in Diegem a shot. It's at night under the lights so it would be pretty fun, but another huge race where the chance of giving Planet Bike some prime time TV coverage will be good at about 55 minutes, if you catch my drift.