The Day Before The Big Race

This will be on the front page of Italy's largest newspaper.
Kortrijk, Belgium – Where did I leave off?

Instead of blogging at the end of the day, I resolved to do it earlier in the day on this trip. Well, it's 12:20 a.m., so I guess I'm ahead of myself (and only one day behind).

Another resolution I've taken up on these European trips is to get as much rest as possible. That means going to bed by 10:30 or 11 p.m. Of course, that's not the case tonight, but it is my goal. So last night, I went to bed at 11, but took a sleeping pill – just to make sure I didn't wake up in the middle of the night. That's a frequent occurrence when you first arrive because your body is still seven hours behind.

Well, the 5:30 a.m. alarm came too early. So I reset it for 6 a.m. After that, I don't have a clue what happened. I woke up to bright sunlight shining into my room. I grabbed my phone and saw a horrifying sight – it was 9:15 a.m.! Good thing it wasn't race day.

I only missed breakfast, which wasn't a big deal. But getting your day underway about three hours later than you'd planned means condensing everything. I hustled to do a video shoot (for a video that's uploading right now) and shot tons of pictures before the 10:30 a.m. training ride. Then I battled for the next 90 minutes with the wifi on the BMC Racing Team motorcoach. What I didn't realize was that everyone else was having problems with it.

I also tackled a project from John Lelangue – install his company e-mail on his Outlook mail (which was in French) on a laptop that has a European keyboard. Somehow, I got that task accomplished (faster than getting the bus wifi to work, in fact).

And, not to be forgotten, I spent about two hours working outside. No, not lawn work or washing cars. Because the motorcoach has wifi, I'm able to sit outside and work. That was nice.

Other things I did today:

- Got a new pair of lululemon pants and a collared shirt (I thought we weren't doing collars this year). Great stuff. And yes, it's all black.

- John Lelangue and crew had a little fun at my expense, shoving a bunch of empty dessert containers in front of my plate after dinner - and then tweeting it. If you want to see more pictures of the BMC Racing Team from my official capacity, check out this gallery.

- Searched for a church. As you can see from the masstimes.org map (at right), there's nothing close. So I'll be watching that 48-minute mass on YouTube tomorrow, like I usually have to do on the road in Europe.

- Attended the staff meeting where Jürgen Landrie laid out the behind-the-scenes plan for this race. It's amazing the logistical planning that goes into covering the riders on all the cobbled sectors. There are four support cars the team will be using, with two people in each car.

- How big is this race? Well, 20,000 people rode their bikes over the course today. And they had some terrific weather too. It was in the low 70s and sunny. Tomorrow is supposed to be much colder with rain.

- I'm referring to this race as the "Super Bowl of Belgian Cycling." It's that big. There's a 36-page race program, separate parking passes for the team vehicles for the start and the finish lots and the major newspaper inserted a huge map of the course into its Saturday editions.

All day, people congregated outside the team hotel.

Special sticker on all BMCs to remember the people of Japan.

My credential, map and numerical race roster.

This is not a posed photo. These guys are serious.

Check out tonight's dessert. I only ate one, not six.