I Like Robin Meade

This made my day.

Twenty-Five Years Ago Today

I still regret making a grammatical error
in the cutline I wrote for this story.

A Dreadful Tuesday

At least dessert was good tonight.
This will be quick. It's 1:20 a.m. and I have a race to staff on-site today. Plus, it was a long and very stressful day.

I supervised no fewer than seven interviews. It would have been seven, but I couldn't be two places at once. That alone was taxing. But we also had a few media-related issues to work through. Oh, and did I mention I covered a race in Spain? Yep, I started working at 7 a.m. and didn't meet with anyone (visiting) and here I am, still working.

Today's highlights:

- They fixed the light that was out in my bathroom. And the one over my desk. Then they pulled the door shut and locked me out.

- Chris De Vos and Freddy Viaene, team soigneurs, shared some type of dessert/cake loaf with me. I guess it's super high in calories. I had a bite and it was awesome. I skipped lunch today but can say I've eaten pasta at nearly every lunch or dinner. In four days, the team went through 20 kilos. (You'll have to do your own conversion.)

- Wednesday is a big race. I'll be riding in the team car. Hope to get some good video or photos. Thursday, we'll be doing reconnaissance on the cobblestones for Sunday's race. Friday we move to France. Saturday is the team presentation. And Monday I fly home.

- I still need to get my picture/blog post up from Sunday's race.

- It rained here. Nearly all day. The high temperature couldn't have been more than 50. This was what I imagined Belgium was like.

- The Quiznos Pro Challenge in Colorado (in August) is no more. Actually, it's still happening. But it's now the "USA Pro Cycling Challenge." Quiznos is apparently still involved. It's all confusing. What I do know is that it looks like the race is on shaky footing. And the people doing the marketing and public relations have a long way to go before they understand the sport. They're obviously outsiders to the sport or just plain bad when it comes to doing their job. Or both.

- Taylor Phinney is not doing Paris-Roubaix (Sunday's race). I didn't announce that, which led to some of the stress today. But it's all good now. Everyone knows now that he won't be there and they'll mob George Hincapie and Alessandro Ballan instead.

I wish I had some fun stuff to share today, but it was all business.

Marcus Burghardt did an interview via Skype.

This might have been my mistake – coffee for breakfast.

BMC Racing Team Chief Mechanic Ian Sherbune (left)was interviews by Nick Legan of VeloNews.

Check out the tags on my lululemon pants. (Click to enlarge.)

A Long Day On A Monday

Yes, that's a parking ticket.
While I was walking around outside by the team bus this afternoon, I noticed a woman with a small phone-like device. She held it up and took a picture of one of our vehicles. But then she used a pen-like device to tap on the screen. I watched her make her way to the front of the vehicle and it quickly became apparent she was a parking meter reader. Problem is, our vehicles are parked in the hotel parking lot. Or so I thought.

It turns out, we're in a public lot. And we're just eating the tickets every day. If you look at the one photo of the cars, they didn't get tickets. That's because they're parked in the driving lane of the lot. Crazy. I saw the meter reader ticket at least two more cars before she disappeared around a corner. What I don't know is how much the tickets cost because the entire text is in Flemish. And somewhere in the lot is a place to pay, but I'm not readily seeing it.

When I'm in Europe, I frequently think "globally" when it comes to what is happening. It's most evident just by watching my Facebook wall or Twitter feed.

People in California are getting ready for bed about the time I am waking up. It's not until about noon or 1 p.m., that people back in Omaha begin stirring – and showing up in my Facebook and Twitter feeds.

Things really get going about 7 or 8 p.m. and continue right through to the middle of the night. So if I want to be active on "U.S. time" it means staying up to 2 or 3 in the morning. I did this at training camp in Spain and it was a real headache. Unfortunately, I'm doing it again on this trip. It's not fun. But work has to be done.

I hope to get out and check out the city we're in - since I'll be here through Friday morning. When Freddy Viaene (BMC Racing Team soigneur) invited me to go pick up pizzas with him after the race Sunday night, I jumped at the chance. It was the first time in three days that I'd left the hotel and who knew there was a Pizza Hut right across the street from an Italian "Pizza Parlor"?

So today was crazy busy. Crazy. But I also wasted some valuable time, looking back. It wasn't all a waste, actually, but I always feel if I'm not working I'm wasting time. It's not the case, of course, because conversations and meetings can be memorable – much more memorable than the volume of work that comes with my job. Sometimes, the only thing that makes work memorable are the photos I take (like the one at right of George Hincapie and directeur sportif John Lelangue).

Today, I took time to meet with friends. Ed Beamon was the former long-time director of the Navigators Insurance team. He gave me my first job in professional cycling. You may be scratching your head at that because obviously I got my start with Toyota-United. But Ed actually offered me a job to do PR for his team in January of 2007. And I accepted. It was only part-time work and before I could even get a task list to him, Toyota-United called me up and offered me a full-time job. I jumped at the chance, but anguished over the call I had to make to Ed to tell him I'd taken another job – after I accepted his offer. UGH. I've had to do that twice in my career and those calls are not pleasant. Ed hung up on me. He knew – more than I did at the time – what he was missing.

Not more than a year later, I did get the chance to work with Ed – with Team Type 1. It was a real privilege to work with such a veteran director. He also helped nurse me through the rough patch that was 2008 and 2009. He wasn't with Team Type 1 in 2009, but I remained in contact and in 2010, he helped land me some project work with the Fly V Australia team he was directing. Today, Ed is between gigs and he's hoping to get back on the circuit. I hope so, too. I consider him and his wife to be good friends (plus, we went to mass together at the 2008 Tour de Georgia).

After meeting with him, I met up with Allen Bean, who goes back to my days with Rock Racing in 2008 and 2009. Again, we spent some time reminiscing and catching up. It was a nice break, actually, from the grind.

But then the grind began in earnest. A press release on an upcoming race, a race to cover in Spain, a press release about a U.S. race, a press release about a U.S. race series, photos to post, tweets to put out, etc. Before I knew it, it was well past midnight. So here I am, still typing away. And I haven't even written about Sunday! Nor have I posted any race pictures to Facebook.

We'll see what tomorrow holds. It's shaping up to be busier than today.

From the notebook:

- The hotel had me listed as checking out this morning. That was strange.

- I didn't eat dinner tonight. But I did raid the nutritional area of the motorcoach for a few energy bars. There's a few really, really nice tasting bars out there. Wow.

- The weather here today was pretty good. Sunny and in the low 70s. I heard it was super windy in Omaha with grass fires burning outside Lincoln.

- Tonight (or this morning) is the national basketball championship game. But it doesn't begin until 9:21 p.m. EDT. Ouch. That's 3:21 a.m. my time. Not that I would have watched it, but geez, it won't end until after midnight on the east coast.

The morning training ride left at 11 a.m.

Marcus Burghardt got new shoes the day after he crashed. Wow.

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.

Back In Europe

It doesn't get more Euro than this (lobby of my hotel).
So I'm back in Europe. Seems like I never left. And it's nice to be back.

My trip out of Omaha was a bit hectic. Lots of errand-running (thanks, mom!) and then a delayed flight as we sat on the tarmac for 22 minutes waiting for other planes overhead to clear. When I got to Chicago, I didn't have much time. About 25 minutes to make my connection, in fact. But I made it – and even managed to get an important e-mail sent out.

That important e-mail distribution was kind of funny, actually. I had to rush to send it and they were already boarding. They had done a "final boarding call" and I was still waiting for the distribution to wrap. But the friendly gate attendant asked to see my boarding pass and said I had "plenty of time." And get this – she even switched me to a row where no one was sitting next to me. Wow. Fantastic. I love United Airlines.

Though the pilot didn't turn on Channel 9 (so you can listen to cockpit communications), the flight was good - and short. Only a little more than seven hours. I ate dinner (even had time to watch "Spinal Tap"), then went to sleep. It wasn't entirely uninterrupted sleep, though. We had a lot of turbulence and I needed to go to the restroom somewhere over Ireland. But everything else went well. There were even some Americans going to the race, which always makes it fun because they knew all about the BMC Racing Team.

Speaking of knowing about the team, the border patrol agent asked me about the nature of my travel. I told him I was here for a "bike race" - thinking he wouldn't have a clue. "The Tour of Flanders?", he asked. Wow. Not only did this guy know, but he knew all about Greg Van Avermaet (the Belgian rider on the team) and the BMC Racing Team. Only in Belgium, right? It's a cycling crazy country. Think Nebraska football for Nebraskans.

Following an hour-long drive to the hotel, I had lunch, followed by some interviews to moderate (one with Alessandro Ballan show at right). Everything up to this point has gone smoothly. Let's hope it continues.

Tomorrow (Saturday) is supposed to be extremely warm (up to 25 Celsius, which is about 70 degrees Fahrenheit) and sunny. But get ready for Sunday: rain, cold, wind. That should be epic. And yes, I did pack my own rain jacket this time.

Notebook:
- Best moment of the flight? When the purser came on this morning and said, "Ladies and Gentlemen, good morning. We will soon be landing in London. Please begin stowing away your electronic devices. (pause) And happy April Fool's Day."

- My room is huge. Seriously. But there's a lot of wasted space, too. And only two outlets (one in the main room, one in the bathroom). But there is (good) wifi.

- Here's a look outside my room. The city where we're staying (Kortrijk) is actually where Greg LeMond lived for most of his cycling career. I haven't seen much more of the city than what you see here. And that's usually how it goes. I do know that our truck is parked out back and that we are one of two teams staying here (Lampre is the other one).

- It might have still been March, but the movies were already switched over to April on the plane. We didn't have a guide, though, so it was a matter of trying to figure out what was on each of the nine channels. One had the "Tron" sequel, but I've seen that movie three times already.

A look at my room.

The invitation on the right is for "Americans only," according to the hotel.

My "Belgian phone" which was issued upon my arrival.

Parking passes in the car, leftover from the race that ended yesterday.

Julia won't be getting a key card from this hotel.

The pool area has a dungeon-like feel to it.

Julia, the restroom has its own room.

This is what my dashboard looks like when I cover races.

The Final Kilometers

Post-race shot from the chopper.
Media swarm the winner on the right.


Watch the final kilometers of the race.

Race Day

A look at the final 10 meters of the 298-kilometer race course.
It was an early start to the day for everyone because the race was scheduled to start at 9:45 a.m. Or 10 a.m., if you were going by the race guide. Or 9:30, if you asked the riders. Or 9:37 a.m., if you went by the time of the actual start.

I got everything packed up after enjoying my second day of scrambled eggs for breakfast. At the hotel front desk, I asked them to print out 10 race cards for me. They printed them in full color, which was pretty darned impressive. (It was a five-star hotel, though.)

Scott Nydam (shown at right) and I would ride to the start together in a rental van. Unlike some other teams I've worked with, the BMC Racing Team always has its bases covered and had official race stickers for it to permit it access to the course, team parking, etc. Very pro.

The funny moment of the morning occurred just as we were leaving the hotel. Jeremiah Ranegar, one of the soigneurs, had told me he was going to "run up and get his stuff." What I (and nobody else) didn't know was that he probably wasn't completely packed up. We started rolling out, with all the vehicles making their way down the hotel drive, when suddenly one of the lead vehicles stopped. Second later, Jeremiah came running out of the hotel with all his stuff and we were off again. We nearly left him. Oops.

I sold a bunch of BMC Racing Team autograph cards right when we rolled up to the start. I went back into the bus to get more and suddenly all the fans had moved on. The "time to buy/sell" window had apparently closed. Since we had the bus, the riders were pretty cozy and away from fans until it was time to go to sign in.

Once the start was underway, I followed the motorcoach out of town. The interesting thing was taking the streets of the race route. Lots of fans and lots of cobbled streets and train tracks.

Driving from Milan to San Remo was 300 kilometers (185 miles) and three hours comparable to being on a thrill ride. Narrow roads, dark tunnels, lots of tunnels (20+, by my count), toll booths and incredible scenery. Of course, I was watching the back of the BMC motorcoach nearly the entire time since I was following it.

We were expected to be stopped by police somewhere along the route from the start to the finish. Apparently, it's a shakedown that's not unexpected every year at this race. Police set up a road block and get a jersey from every team. But there was no roadblock and no free jerseys given away, thankfully.

San Remo must be the motor scooter capital of the world. There were TONS of them. And tons of traffic. But the parking area for team vehicles was organized (if a bit cramped).

The press room was more than two kilometers from the finish line. Who does that? With that in mind, I canvassed the area for media members, most of whom were watching a TV located about 150 meters after the finish area. I also ran into Marya Pongrace, the Garmin-Cervelo media relations director, and Joachim Schoonacker, who I worked with at Toyota-United during the 2007 season.

Once the TV coverage came on (about 90 kilometers from the finish), I watched the race from the bus (interior shot at right). When they were within seven kilometers, soigneur Stefano Rubino and I went to the finish line. There, I tried my best to watch the TV from the crowded area where soigneurs and media were gathered.

The swarm (scrum) of press around the winner was of epic proportions. Imagine the media running out onto the field and tackling Tom Brady after the Super Bowl. That's what it is like. (See aerial photo in this post.)

After the race, it was fairly chaotic (photo at right was shot looking outside the bus), with an hour-drive from San Remo to Nice, France (and no check at the border) in the motorcoach. We dropped off Greg Van Avermaet at the airport, then made our way to a little hotel nearby. Fortunately, it had free wifi, but only two outlets in the entire (tiny) room. So I unplugged the coffee maker and the TV and plugged in my computer and phone.

From the Notebook:
- I typed my story on my Blackberry (again) because there was no internet on the bus (still). This was getting old.

- When Greg Van Avermaet was off the front with fewer than 10 kilometers to go, I really thought he was going to win. Some of the soigneurs on other teams even started walking back to their buses. But it wasn't to be. He was caught with 2.5 kilometers to go.

- For the first time in a long time, I didn't eat my sack lunch. Perhaps I was a bit nervous or maybe it was the big pieces of salami. I didn't eat my candy bar, either.

- Francesca Villa, our motorcoach driver, and mechanic Ronald Ruymen went to a nearby cafe to get a coffee and a pastry. It was one of those rare moments when I had a chance to get away from the race and see a bit of the sights I always seem to miss. The race hadn't yet come on TV, so we just enjoyed some coffee and a brief (15-minute) moment of relaxation.

The yellow fencing indicates this is an area to escape the course.

Nice fountain as we drove into San Remo.

A look at one of the little tunnels we drove through.

My view for the three hours.

I thought this was a pretty funny sight in Milan.

Here's the damage after filling up the motorcoach - $654.00.

My view of the race (watching TV) near the finish line.

Garmin gurus Joachim Schoonacker (left) and Marya Pongrace.

Before the race came on, "Miracle" was showing in the bus.

The finish line is adjacent to the ocean.

Before the start, Greg Van Avermaet is interviewed.

Alessandro Ballan finished fourth.