Amstel 2011
Muscat Cycling in The 2011 Amstel Gold Race
In November 2010 some 7 regular riders of the Muscat Cycling Club made the plan to cycle one of the great spring classics and quickly landed on Luik – Bastenaken – Luik (Liège-BastogneLiège) as this race is held since 1892 and as such the oldest, it is in Belgium which is the epicenter of the cycling world, it’s one of the five monuments, and of course because of the long but gentle hills that cross the Ardennes.
Halfway the preparations but luckily before booking any tickets we found out the race had been shifted towards the end of June. That would seriously compromise our training plans as the temperature in Oman would be too high in May and June. So we quickly had to select another race and despite of missing all the historical connotation we certainly liked the sound of the Amstel Gold Race. Online registration took place in the middle of the Omani night and only by a miracle we managed to get 7 entry tickets when servers were collapsing under the load of 70 000 riders sprinting to register. In the end 12 000 people were granted start tickets.
The Amstel Gold Race takes place in the most southern and only part of the Netherlands with a height difference exceeding 5 meters. Whoever designed the route must have been a genius to squeeze in 250km and 3000 meters of climbing in an area of just 20 by20 kilometer with the vertical scale extremes at 30 and 300 meters! This means the route is confusing with heaps of sharp bends and short climbs in a very densely populated area. On top of that, being situated in the most egalitarian society of the world with one of the highest tax rates,it is obvious that an army of civil servants has hired two armies of subsidy addicted consultants to do their utmost best to force any means of transport to go at an equal speed. Consequently the route is littered with “road narrowers” (basically a funnel with a pole in the middle of the road), speed bumps, roundabouts, wild rosters, and any other invention that proves that society can be fine-tuned to the last decimal. Oh boy I cannot wait before I am allowed to pay taxes. The 250km route felt a bit like a roller coaster spaghetti.
The beautiful undulating landscape of Limburg, the most southern province of the Netherlands, with castles and timbered houses.again in the Netherlands! Having said that, the route also went into Belgium for a short distance which was only noticeable by the quality of the roads: though tax pressure is equally high over there Belgians generally prefer just not to pay them.
Now we only needed to get at the right fitness level and we introduced the Thursday morning social ride on top of the regular Friday club ride which was expanded into the not so social überloop concept. A ride covering 165km from Qurm to Seeb, to Marbeela and from there to Halban, Fanja and back through Cement. Having done that a couple of times was the maximum achievable balancing rising Omani temperatures in March, late night social life and of course family obligations as all of us are not only cycling champions but also thoughtful husbands and caring fathers.
Apart from preparing in terms of fitness of we also needed to prepare in terms of “the right cycling gear”. As April temperatures in the Netherlands can be anything between zero and 30 degrees it was prudent to basically order the whole range of any product. Better be safe than sorry! And being logged in to this online shop you are just one click away of lots of other absolutely indispensible cycling gadgets. In this context I am proud to mention that Charles’s sweat gutter finally prevented any sweat from entering his eyes - admittedly helped by temperatures of around 5 degrees. Then we needed to land on a suitable team name. Now this cannot be taken too lightly as the only hobby that can compete with cycling is compiling top 10’s of most stupid pro-cycling team names: A name like ‘Muscat Cycling Club’ would just not be able to stand up to Farm-Frites, IJsboerke-Colnago, Marc Zeepcentrale-Superia or MagiCrème.
Luckily Peter suggested the name‘New Kids’ named after his best friends from the town where he grew up and who are pictured at the left.
These potential Noble prize winners recently had their break-through in a reality show in the Netherlands. We are still not sure if the guy with the moustache in the middle is Peter or not. He does dress in the same style though. Then the last preparatory hurdle: though we had spent weeks looking at each other behinds the integrated logistics plan had not received more than 5 minutes attention. So 3 different airlines brought 5 of us to Valkenburg a/d Geul, the start and finish of the Amstel Gold Race. Now Valkenburg is a place to behold. This is the crème de la crème of what the Netherlands have to offer in terms of upscale tourism and it is only visited by those who cannot afford a bus package deal to the Costa del Brava that typically starts at 50 euro for a whole week. Now this is the crowd Muscat cyclists want to mingle with.To stay in style we dismissed the Château with the one Michelin star restaurant in favour of a rundown place for the same amount of money. On the upside it was located at the top of the Cauberg some 100 meters from the finish and featured a lift shaft that came with a tacky light show. Upon arrival Willy and Raoul were offered the choice between sharing a grotty 3 bed family room or an executive suite. The latter came with fake champagne in a cooler next to awhite leather chaise longue. Tissues were handed out later. That setting came quite in hand as we discussed “rubbing ointment on cyclists’ sore body parts in a hotel room” extensively already and were in need of new quality conversation topics.
When in Valkenburg we of course sampled the local cuisine that wa unfortunately mostly targeting the above mentioned adolescent focus group. The other thing to do was to collect the starting kit, containing electronic chips for time registration and ensureour fluid levels were up to spec for the race to come. This was also the last opportunity to raid the local cycling shops -we finally discovered some common ground with our wives.
Then the race: we wanted to start at 6.30am but Charles and Peter had apparently some unfinished business in their hotel room and we did not start until after 7 which allowed the temperature to rise above zero degrees. Initially we took it easy and tried to pace ourselves not to cycle any quicker than 33 km/hr. We had some spontaneous rotating handle bars and chains that came off when we hit the Maasberg, a cobble stoned climb in Elsloo and a few moreforced stops before getting at the first The Keutenberg after 235km was the steepest hill of the race and saw many cramped riders coming of their bikes. Near Fromberg at 83kmrefreshments after 90km. Temperatures also started to rise to more civilized levels and jackets were stuffed away. More delays followed as James became a victim of sabotage as local youngsters thought it was very clever to scatter thumbnails en route and Willy took a wrong turn, downhill, on probably the steepest hill of the day. And as cycling is such a brain intensive activity it exceeded Charles’s peak capacity as he blindingly followed the wrong bottom for just 30 km missing a drinks stop and tearing the Muscat peloton in three pieces only to be seen again laying in the grass for half an hour working his tan. All in all the race went remarkably smooth, the cold did help to prevent the de-hydration we are used to, there was no wind to speak of, the event was very professionally organised and in sharp contrast to our Friday rides where the ultimate objective is to drop each other we managed to more or less stay together. Between 165 and 200 km was probably the most difficult bit as the hills seemed to become steeper and more frequent.
After that we hoped to step up the pace, not only because we wanted to drop Peter but also to at least feel our legs a little bit when we made it to the finish.
Unfortunately it was at this part that all routes came together and we found hundred fifty kilogram cyclists in front of us who dusted off their alu bikes and blocked the 50cm wide cycling lanes. We crossed the finish at the Cauberg together though James won the sprint. We just averaged 27.5 km/hr but there proved to be other ways of getting rid of any remaining energy as the Muscat cyclists deservedly climbed the podium and were congratulated by the round misses in Muscat Cycling Club colours and a roaring crowd. After toasting to the flatness of the Netherlands plans were made to ride a similar spring classic in 2012.