Late with the update

Kids, thanks for being patient. I hope you've been patient anyway. At least where I am now computers seem to be alive and well. Much has happened since I last posted up here, so I will distribute the info in little bits over the next little while.

First to tell you where I am now-
Bunnik, 10km east of Utrecht, Netherlands. Living over a butcher shop run by a dude named Wim who also owns a Div 3 road team called Wilton Meat. Protein is not a problem here. I arrived the evening of January 3rd, after the last race of a block 8 races in 10 days. MOre on that later. Wim and Tonni are really cool and feed us really well. They are always excited to help out cyclists, which is really nice. I should mention that I am now travelling with Peter Morse, who will also be attending cyclocross World's in St Wendal. Benoit and Bruno are returning to Canada tomorrow.

Recap of the last 2 weeks-
Got really sick after that first weekend of racing (thanks Bruno!) and had to take some time off. Definitely bummed about that. Got in a couple of days of riding before going off to race again (still a little sick) on Christmas day in this little place called Beernem. This was a B race, meanin hard but not the hardest, and I managed to make 15th, which I was pretty happy about. Stayed on the lead lap by a good margin and scored 15 Euro to boot. Maybe racing isn't so bad after all? So that was December 25.

December 26, Diegem. Yes Super Prestige means just what you might think. Best of the best, tougher than Worlds, Canadians need not apply. Somehow we got an entry here and got paid to show up. Unfortunately, or not, I never found out how hard it was because I tore my derailleur off 200m into the race. The start was fast though. My spare bike hadn't made it to the pit by the time I got there, so I had to withdraw.

December 27, at the shop in Oudenaarde. Dropped my first bike off at Asfra in the morning with Luc, our manager, soigneur, mechanic, whatever. The Ultega derailleur was dead, as was the dropout which was a drag cause it is non-replaceable. I'm like 'Luc it's boned!' and Luc's like 'no problem I fix it up quick' then I left when he had my frame up in the vice with a mini sledge hammer.

December 27, Veldegem. Another A race, another flat course, another rainy day. Ever wonder what it's like to try to ride a bike through a ploughed field after 2 months of rain? I can tell you all about it. Raced on my Kona Jake today, which was cool, except since my Redline was getting fixed I had to use a really small circus bike as a backup. Really needed a backup cause it was hideously muddy. I felt like I rode pretty well, but still got smacked around by Mario de Clerckq. So did everyone else though and he won by like two minutes. Could have something to do with the dope. Did I say that? He is also claiming retirement right now before they can suspend him for his incriminating desk planner entries. But apparently he only made them cause he's writing a book. Or something. Maybe he's writing a doping manual for the cycling school he's running.

That's probably good enough for now. Bite size pieces and all that.

If you want to find out where these places are, go to www.multimap.com and punch in the place name. So far they're all in Belgium.

Cheers,
GR