Sunshine Cup #1 XCO C1, Voroklini CYP, 21.02.2010

By: Roel Paulissen

I finished 3rd with two flats in the C1 Cyprus Sunshine Cup in Voroklini in a 2h14m looong race.

I felt really good in the race, powerful and comfortable, cheery to be back playing in the peloton. I was sitting in the front group when I flatted, crashed and my tire came off. Lucky me, it were just about 500m to the next tech zone.

Soukop and me, we once managed to get away from the group and got a nice 20 sec gap on them, which we unfortunately lost when we came upon the women’s race taking place at the same time , right in a downhill section. You should have heart the screaming of the boys and the swearing of the girls! We couldn’t pass, got stuck and so our followers catched us up again. Maybe the organizers should reconsider running the men’s race and the women’s race at the same time?

I flatted for the second time on the last kilometer, two Czech guys got off and crossed the finish-line just in front of me, when I slowed down came in third.

This season’s first race is in the books. As I said before, I was feeling good throughout the whole race, tried not to overdo it and to “save” my legs for the upcoming weeks of intense training.

Racing over 2 hours in your first race of the season, when just coming out of the continental winter into Cyprus’ spring with temperatures above 20 degrees, is anything else than easy, many have suffered cramps. I started feeling my muscles getting sore by the end of the race by myself. But we handled also this one, once again.

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