The hard yards

Congrats to cousin Sophie, Nik and Nina for enlarging their family by the Power of Harry!

Les and I have discovered that we can ride our bikes around the dining table in the living room and through the kitchen (which has two doors) without putting foot to the ground. It's a bit tight, especially on my bike, but it can be done and it relieves the boredom. Not that we've been really bored for the last three weeks. He's going back to Oz on Wednesday, so I'll have to do it on my own.

I've decided to get back into some more serious training, as my wrist has improved quite a lot in the last week. I think I did the same number of kilometres on the weekend as I did during the entire week before last, with the expected result (hit the wall on Sunday). Saturday was with the bunch (see previous bilge post), then for some reason on Sunday, I decided to do the Berchem ride. Never mind that it was one of the busiest weekends of the year with over 40 UCI races on, and I'd gone to sleep at 1:00am the previous night. But I woke up bright and early at 6:00am Sunday, which may or may not have had something to do with Les plus one returning home at around that time.

Anyway, I haven't done 170km for a while, and I knew it would hurt after a hard ride on Saturday. And 'Snelle Eddy' is fit at the moment. We had about eight of us left after Tournai, then Piet Stevens took a shortcut before Lahamaide and proceeded to set a hard tempo up that climb. At the top, he dropped off and there were only four of us: moi, Snelle Eddy, Versmessen, and Guy Callens. The usual suspects, except for Guido, who didn't make it over Lahamaide.

After that, it was mostly Eddy and I swapping off, and I hoped that he wouldn't drill us too hard on the finishing climbs, which were at least into a headwind. No such luck, and that was probably a good thing as far as my training is concerned. Firstly past the Chapel, he dug in and we had to bite the handlebars to hang on. Then the same on the next one just after, up to Quatre Vents. I pretty much had nothing left after that.

The other two were wise to sit on, except Guy Callens couldn't figure out how to get his chain back on at the top of the false flat before the Hotonde (we said just shift into the small ring). We waited, but he ended up stopping, so we continued. Then I ended up having chain/gear issues on the Hotonde, as I was trying to find a gear to follow Eddy in. After several attempts to get it into the 53x21 (it only wanted the 23 or 19), my legs suddenly and completely gave up, and Versmessen and Geert d'Hondt (who'd taken a shortcut) blithely sprinted around me and back onto Eddy's wheel. Don't ask me who won the sprint.

Well, I nearly made it, and the slow ride home only required one coke at Oudenaarde, so that was OK. We did the 80 km in 2:13, which is quick enough for that course, and I finished up with 170km and 4000 calories burned. Given there's between 100 and 200 calories in a beer, that's a good day's work.

Here's a thought for a Challenge: Try and replace all your calories burned by drinking beer, and see how far you get before passing out.

Are we there yet?

I want an ice cream. Much has happened in the last week and a bit, but I won't bore anyone with the details. Well, maybe a few.

0) Work has been busy. Happy when the Giro is over. Did you know there are over 40 UCI races on this weekend?

I) It has been raining every day.

II) The cast is well and truly off, but I need to go back to ye olde hospital in Gent for a checkup next week. My wrist is still pretty sore, and definitely not up to full capacity. I can ride (carefully), but I'll get some physio on it before thinking about racing again.

III) Les and I have kept a small semblance of sanity and been eating remarkably well. But he goes next week so I'll be on my own again.

IV) Outings have been kept to a minimum, but we did go back to Charlatan last Saturday after finishing work around midnight. Didn't get until 4am, then I did 80km on Sunday morning. Somewhat tired later on.

V) Today I went out with the bunch for the first time for six weeks in the hills, while it was dry. We didn't go too hard at the start, but then wound it up a bit on the Trap Op: 5'20 with a headwind, not so bad. I took it fairly steadily on the descent of the Edelareberg...

On the Schelde, it broke up properly as there was a light crosswind. I was down in last wheel when the first couple of groups went, but eventually got across with a couple of others. We whittled it down to een mooie kopgroep van acht: Ikke, Guido, Iljo Keisse, Krijn, Patrick Middernacht, Luc de Loor, Eric Van De Wiele, and one other (a teammate of Luc's). 44.3 km/h back along the Schelde with a cross/tailwind and I was hurting a bit, but it was good training. I think Krijn got the sprint from Iljo but from my vantage point about 10m behind, I couldn't really tell. They should install a photo finish camera at the cafe there.

Een concurrent minder

Finally, I was quite shocked and saddened to learn of the death of Italian journo Valerio Riparbelli last week. Apparently he was riding with a group and was hit by a car - don't have any more details than that. I didn't know him that well, but he was a nice guy, and he was also second and third in the journo world's in 2004 and 2005: He beat me for second in '04, and I beat him in '05. He was looking forward to racing me in Austria this year, and when I said I wasn't sure if I could go because of work, he said, "Sometimes, cycling is more important."

Heel spijtig.

Vlaamse Stoverij

Les and I have been having cooking wars, but he wins most of the time because I'm happy to have someone else cook for me. However, I got my own back with my patented Vlaamse Stoverij^TM. It's based on a time honoured recipe handed down by the monks, and I cooked it for the first time on Saturday. It goes something like this:

Reagents

Meat from a hoofed animal, preferably one that's dead
Rodenbach beer
Onions
Sugar
Vinegar
Herbs (pretty much any herbs will do)
Bread
Dijon mustard
Stock cube and pepper
Oil (not Valvoline, but almost an anagram of this)

Method

Fry the onions in the Valvoline, then realise you should have fried the meat first. Add the meat while no-one is looking and fry it as well. Forget about removing the onions. It's far too late for that. You're basically doomed from this point onwards, but you may as well continue because you will starve otherwise.

Add a couple of bottles of Rodenbach, keeping one spare for private consumption. This is one of the Key Ingredients^TM. Add the salt, pepper, stock cube, herbs (I think I found some tarragon in the cupboard), vinegar and brown sugar. Do not add too much sugar otherwise you end up with quite a sweet stew which you still have to eat or you'll starve.

Don't even bother waiting until the onions have caramelised. Instead, add the bread which has been smeared with Dijon mustard, because this is basically the last thing you have to do, then you can go and do something far more useful, like work.

Turn down the heat, put the lid on, and let it do its own thing for two hours. You can stir it, but it probably won't improve the flavour. At the end, realise you haven't stirred it enough because the three slices of bread are still sitting on top of the stew. Stir like crazy until they disintegrate, then it's ready.

Results, discussion and conclusion

Consume with bread (OK, frites if you're really hard core) and more beer, which you will need to stomach the stew. Nevertheless, it was surprisingly good.

Appendix

Proficiat Tomas Vaitkus for winning stage nine of the Giro! I knew all that flat training would pay off.

Microgolf

Is what you play in a Flann O'Brien novel. It's also Dutch for the device you use to heat up all manner of foodstuffs, or blow up cockroaches if you are that way inclined, and I'm not.

The cast is giving me the pip. Away with it, I say. One more week, and hopefully that's it. Typing with it is damned annoying. Pumping up tyres is not advised.

Lucy Power sent me this link to Jan Ullrich's MySpace page. Tres hilarious. Turn up the sound!

Absolution: the West Vleteren experience

It has come to pass. Months in the planning, and all down to the last detail: my quest to taste West Vleteren beer is over. But I am sure it will not be the last time I imbibe of this holy drink, which is rated by many as the best beer in the world.

As mentioned in the previous update, I have been in heavy training for this occasion. Some moderate drinking in the early part of the week, then four or five Leffe Tripels (8.5%) on Thursday, followed by an easier day of pils consumption on Friday. That was just to ease the load on the body while keeping the levels of alcohol dehydrogenase up high. But as I found, West Vleteren 12° (10.2% alcohol) is more than just a strong drink.

We had synchronised our watches so that Philippe and Guido would pick me up in Gent at 8:15 on Saturday evening. From there it was a 15 minute drive to our secret rendezvous just outside the city, a certain café in Philippe and Jo's neighbourhood run by the impressive Mia. Nothing was left to chance, although when we arrived, we were somewhat dismayed by the number of cars parked outside. Surely they weren't all coming to drink West Vleteren?? Fortunately, it turned out to be a school play or something, and we were not disturbed until later in the evening, when a mini-horde of children came into the bar and started reading books. [Note for the Belgians: this is not common in Australia].

The café was in a very pleasant rural setting and you could appreciate the history around it. From the old wooden bar and tables to the paintings and, err, trumpets, on the walls, the ancient beer bottles in crates on the floor, the local patrons and of course Mia herself... It was another slice of Belgian culture that I could taste.

Guido and Philippe outside Mia's café
© Jeff Jones


The wall decorations were a little surreal
© Jeff Jones

Mia was kept busy this evening. Cool bar too.
© Jeff Jones

Guido and Philippe get stuck into the serious part of the evening
© Jeff Jones

Enjoying West Vleteren 12°
© Probably not Jeff Jones

While we waited for Jo and Jan (of Ronde van Vlaanderen for wielertoeristen fame), Guido, Philippe and I decided to start with the serious business of the evening. West Vleteren wasn't even on the menu; you had to know that it was served here. The monks who brew it generally forbid it to be sold outside their abbey, and if you want to buy some there, you have to queue up for hours at certain times of the day. And even then, you are only limited to two or three crates! This stuff is hard to come by.

There are three types, all of which come in plain brown bottles with only the caps to distinguish them. The strongest is the full flavoured dark one - the Abbott - which is 12°/10.2%; then there is another dark one (Extra) with a sharper taste at 8°8%; and finally there is the blond (Special), which is 'only' 5.8% and has a different taste again. We had already decided to start with the heaviest first while our palates were still functional, then work our way down.

Mia poured us out three Abbott beers with a religious solemnity, holding the bottle above the glass and moving it anticlockwise, like a priest, until the glass was full and had a small layer of foam. We clinked glasses and I drank a mouthful, slowly. This sort of beer is like a good wine in that you should hold it in your mouth to taste it before swallowing. And although I'm by no means a connoisseur, I could tell that it was different.

The flavour seemed to come in two parts: first of all, sweet as it hits the front of your tongue, then slightly sour when you swallow it. Fruity? Yes, but also very heavy as it fills your head very quickly. It wasn't just the alcohol that did that, but also the full flavour. And it stays with you, no matter how slowly you drink it. It's pretty amazing stuff, and puts other beers in their place.

Jo and Jan contemplate the West Vleteren 12°
© Jeff Jones

We hadn't gotten too far into our glasses when Jo and Jan turned up, and proceeded to play a slow catch up. The café began to get more crowded as folks appeared, including the kiddies mentioned earlier. So we moved onto the next beer, which was the Extra, although by this stage the first beer was working rather well. The Extra had a much lighter, sharper flavour, but it was still a most delicious drop. I was thankful that it was only 8%, and that I had done the necessary training, because it was still hard going.

Our party doubled in size when The Wives appeared, and things became more merrie. We had moved onto the blonds (Extras) by this stage, and these took some getting used to after the donkere bieren. They were still very good, but I'd recommend drinking them separately to the dark beers.

As the evening wore on, we moved onto the blonds...
© Jeff Jones

Guido and Philippe in the non-serious part of the evening
© Jeff Jones

There's nothing Nietzsche couldn't teach ya about the raising of the wrist
© Jeff Jones

Serious drinkers: Jo, Guido, Philippe and Ik
© Jan de Roubaix

Three West Vleterens in one night was more than enough for me, and was happy to call a halt at midnight. Philippe only had one beer, so I got a lift home with him, with Guido and his wife heading back to Oudenaarde. Jo and Jan were still going by the time we left, and I hope they didn't end up like one of the patrons, who simply fell asleep on his stool.

Thank you Pater Guido and Brothers Philippe, Jo and Jan, for a full bodied, but not out of body, West Vleteren experience. Now for the Oudenaardse Einse Cnudde...

Close of play
© Jo Vandenheulen