Zach Bell is learning the ropes of European racing as part of SpiderTech p/b C10. This week the team is competing at the Tour de l’Ain in France. Zach tells the tale:
The end of Thursday marked the halfway point of our first tour back in Europe and I think the opening two days saw us do some promising things as a team. We were at the very least competitive in the prologue. I would say most, if not all of us were a little handicapped by a lack of intimate knowledge of the course there. We tried to get a good pre-ride in but the nature of the circumstances on the course just did not allow us to really hit the corners hard.
Day 2 we played for the sprint and waited for the “narrow dangerous” roads into the final town to make our move to the front. Again a knowledge of the course would have been helpful … as the roads were pretty much the furthest thing from narrow and dangerous that we raced the whole day.
Day 3 the hills started to roll and although I think many of us are on good form it is still a pack full of strong climbers and despite our best efforts only Svein was able to hang in with the front runners. So far this tour has been a battle for knowledge for us. This is what your first year in Europe is all about … learning the courses, knowing the finishes. The are hard lessons because I think all of us feel we have the legs to be more competitive than we are showing but as Svein said to all of us after the blundered sprint lead out, “its not just about your numbers over here.”
— Zach Bell
