Before I start this blog I just want to reflect very quickly on the tragic death of Swiss 18 year old Muriel Furrer during the world championship week. It is a sobering reminder that the sport we love can be very dangerous. Following on from the death of Gino Mäder last year it makes me pause and think is there anything I can do to make my and my fellow cyclists’ rides safer.
One small thing I have done is set up the incident detection feature on my Garmin. This automatically sends out your name and location to an emergency contact of your choice in case of any crash. You can find more details here.
Please, ride safe, and look after each other on the road.
“I can’t see a thing” complains my daughter.
“I can just about see their knees going up and down” I reply.
“That guy doesn’t need to have his umbrella so high up, he’s covered by his two friends’ umbrellas – and it isn’t even raining anymore anyway” adds my son.
“Right, I’m off to tell him to lower his umbrella so we can all see the screen”
To embarrassed groans from my two children I walk a few paces forward and politely tell the Belgian gentleman and his friends that their umbrellas are a) blocking everyone’s view of the screen, and b) not even needed as the rain stopped about 5 minutes before.
We’re standing in a crowd of people, most of them drinking cans of free 0% alcohol Feldschlösschen beer, on the corner of Stadthausquai and Quaibrücke in Zurich on the last Saturday in September.
Elisa Longo Borghini early on in the race
Our feet are wet, we’re all a bit cold, but now we can at least see the big screen and what’s unfolding in the final few laps of the women’s world championship road race.
We got the train up from Geneva on Friday night and awoke to cloudy skies and wet roads. The rain kept falling all morning which even dampened my kids’ enthusiasm for clothes shopping in the city.
We headed out to the course early afternoon after watching the start of the women’s race on TV in our hotel and found a good spot to watch right by the barriers.
People were coming and going throughout the afternoon, some more interested in the racing than others, but almost everyone paused to glance up at the screen to see the situation.
Each lap that passed you could see the grimaces become even more painful on the women’s faces, as they had to press harder on the pedals to hold the wheel out of the corner where we were placed.
At some moments we felt so lucky that the rain we could see at the other parts of the course wasn’t hammering down on us as it was on the riders. But then five minutes later that rain arrived, and the umbrellas all went back up, and the screen once more disappeared.
More and more Belgians arrived and by the last lap of the race it felt like a small corner of Flanders in Switzerland. This was when I realised that everyone was as engrossed in this struggle for the rainbow jersey as we were.
Dutch chasing Dutch
The groans from the Dutch as Vollering attacked and dropped her teammates. The cheers from the Italians as Longo-Borghini attacked once more. The gasps as Chloe Dygart managed to bridge across in the final kilometres.
But none were as loud as the Belgian cheers as Lotte Kopecky began her sprint along the lakefront in the final 200m. And the cheering continued long after we’d all got an alcohol-free beer shower when she crossed the line a bike length clear.
Then the rain really started to fall.
Saturday was a radically different day, both in terms of the weather and spectating.
My son turned to me as we walked into our section, a smile playing on his face.
“Wait, dad! Is that the finish line? Right there?”
Yes, for Sunday we’d managed to snag some finish line tickets through a friend, and I don’t think any bike race watching experience will ever come close.
We arrived at the course nice and early after meeting my friend Jim off the train. The race had already started, and the riders still had over 260 km to go.
And there was at least 90km until they passed the finish line for the first time.
So, we did what anyone would in our situation and piled into the food and drink, making sure not to stare too obviously at the former pros, directeur sportifs, and esteemed UCI administrators wandering around.
Another friend of ours showed up, who had also managed to blag a ticket, and we set up camp ready to see the race unfold.
The crowds were incredible everywhere on the course, and a small part of me wished we were also there on Zürichbergstrasse, the super steep ramp out of the city where the big attacks happened. From the TV it looked people were almost 10 deep on certain sections
But we were truly privileged to have our front row view of the breakaway, chased by the peloton, and to feel the rush of air generated by the hundred or so riders passing at over 50km/h.
A few other highlights for me: Jim spotting Marcel Kittel queueing for the portaloo on the other side of the course; walking past a smiling Movistar team boss Eusebio Unzué; seeing the legend Vincenzo Nibali grabbing a cake for his daughter; and the joy on Ben O’Connor’s face when he crossed the line in 2nd place.
And a very quick word on the winner.
It’s clearly Pogi’s world, and we are all just living in it.
Big thanks to Christophe at PepsiCo and the guys at Feldschlösschen for the tickets. And to Jim for his excellent photos.
What I’ve been listening to while writing
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Wild God.
Fabulous new album from the Bad Seeds. At the same time uplifting and reflective.