Wet, muddy and lots of fun!

My training basically consists of Wednesday and Saturday with Team SV Reudern on the MTB and Tuesdays and Thursdays on the road bike with a road group. Then the other days going out and riding in the Schwäbishe Alps or resting and recovering.

Tomorrow we have a MTB race at a nearby town and today's training was out at the track, I didn't realise until I was at the normal meeting point and it was pouring down with rain. It was too complicated to to find my way to the track, so when the rain eased up I decided to go and explore.
I thought it might be fun to find the way to a track called Ho Chi Minh -actually the same route as my first ride back on the mountain bike (First Week of School). I wasn't very sure of the way which went through the local forest through some towns then up into the climb. I managed to get myself lost quite a few times but I eventually found myself in a more recognisable place.

I brought my camera along with me thankfully so here are some of the pictures I took:

A bit of scenic German forest, very green after the rain.

Want any more gliders to go with your gliders?  - The local Airfield

Some really nice trails heading up the mountain...

One fairly big rain cloud coming in

Very slippery with lots of tree roots but so much fun!

Typical German

By the end of the ride I was almost glad that I had missed the training, it was such an awesome ride...

Just going out and going a ride like this really brings the motivation back up, it reminds me that it is not just the race results and training that make mountain biking important to me.

Food

One of the hardest things to get used to other than everyone speaking German, was the meal times and the food.

On weekdays for breakfast we eat bread with butter and sweet spreads (i.e. jams and honey), cheese and meat (salami, ham...). Lunch is the main meal of the day, and either we come home, go to the local bakery or eat from the school canteen. Then dinner is much the same as breakfast.
Lunch is usually a hot meal, more often something with pasta or rice and then a salad on the side. It was hard at first having a small dinner and a big lunch, though I think it works better because I don't eat as much in between meals. I also think that the German diet suits me quite well, and if I eat properly, then I don't get hungry on rides.

Linda, Jakob's sister also like to bake cakes. They are often very good and I probably eat a little too much for being a cyclist, but then again I have to embrace the German culture (as I have been told more than once before).

Linda's confirmation was last weekend, and I said I would bake a Pavlova. It turned out the best one that I have ever made, with no cracks, a very nice crunchy outer shell and soft inside, probably mostly because of the awesome KitchenAid that they have (beats the egg whites to perfection) :) Yummm....

THE Pavlova (ok ok, it does have a few cracks)

All that cake!! Mmmm....

My First Race in Germany

Yesterday I rode my first race in about 12 weeks, the last one being the Australian National Round in Echuca, VIC.
Germans seem to like the Le Mans start, where you line your bikes up and have to run to them. I don't think it works very well though because if you are right at the wrong end like I was, then it is very hard to get good position into the first part of the track, I was last in a field of about 40 U/17's.

I am second from the end furthest away.

It was so muddy that there were not many overtaking options and it was on the second lap of three that I finally passed the slow group I was stuck behind, but by then there was a fair gap to the next riders.
I would start to catch the boys in front of me on the uphill but then I would start to lose them again on the incredibly slippery downhills and the fire trails which felt so slow.
On some of the downhill sections the mud was at lest 20cm deep, others it wasn't so deep but even harder to keep a line in. Many times I ended up in the ditch beside the track which was almost easier to ride in! On the uphill of my third a final lap, my back wheel stopped moving altogether and I had to get off and clean the mud off the chainstays.
I passed a of the boys in front of me eventually, but I did't have the strength or stamina to keep the pace going.
The biggest problem was that the laps were short, around 15 minutes, and I didn't have the chance to get into a rhythm over the 45 minute race.
Overall I had a pretty good time considering I have only been back on the bike for a week and a half, and I am looking forward to next the race where I can gauge my improvement...

First day on the MTB

It was organise even before I came to Germany that I could go and train with the  local Nürtingen SV Reudern MTB Team. Yesterday was my first day allowed back on the mountain bike and also their Wednesday Training day.


It rained in the morning so I expected it to be muddy in the afternoon, but not quite as slippery as it was. There is a race coming up this Sunday so we practiced the course three times, once slow then two times race pace. The lap first climbed up the hill then came down a little a short piece on off camber really muddy single track, then a short fire trail, a fast descent that was really wild with the mud and then some more short bits of single track and firetrail.
The first time I got caught out on one of the off camber corners with too much speed and slipped out. I scored another layer of mud on my leg. The next crazy bit was the straight fast descent that only had slight corners, but in the wet with a couple of rollers chucked into the mix made it hard to keep a straight line. All three times I found myself right on the edge of losing the front wheel. The rest of it as I hit the brakes.

After being off the bike for 9 weeks I was pretty happy to be able to keep up with the U17's on the climb, but when it came to the firetrail I was left behind. Something to keep the training going with.


All of the people there have very good bike skills and are hopping around and doing wheelies all the time. I think it is time to sharpen up on the bike handling skills...


The afternoon was awesome and I can't wait till the race on Sunday. Fingers crossed the track will have dried out a bit by then.

My bike before I washed off all the mud last night.

The Road Bike

This Italian bike,a Cratoni "Colorado", was a top of the line road bike in its time (mid 80's). It still ride very nicely, and even has internal cable routing. I can see why they deveoped shifters for the handelbars though, because it can become a bit crazy trying to shift ears while riding down hills. Though they managed in races such as the Tour de France for many years.

I'm taking it to Mont Ventoux, so I'll have to train up a lot before we go so I can get that gear ratio up the hill! (I don't know what the ratio is exactly but it is not easy to say the least).

I just went to a ride this afternoon on the Cratoni and I am starting to work out what roads and hills I can use for training around Nürtingen. I have to say I am very lucky that the Zaisers live close to the Schwäbischer Alps, otherwise I would be becoming a sprinter, with no hills to train on.

Freiburg

On the Monday after Easter, Jakob, Linda (Jakob's sister) and I, headed off to Freiburg on the train to start practicing for the school musical 'My Fair Lady' (mentioned in My First Week of School).

We left on the Monday morning earlier than we needed, to so that we could catch up with Jasper, Jorin (Jasper's exchange) Lotta, Raffi and Claire.
Jasper has written a very good blog describing his three months in Germany (http://jasperlindell.blogspot.de/), and so has Lotta although she is staying for six months instead of three (http://germanydiaries.blogspot.de/). Raffi and I became good friends in Australia when he came over for six months, and it was good to see them all again.
We eventaully found Starbucks and a nice Italian Pizza Restaurant that sold such good but unbelievably cheap pizza. I think I will definately good back there before my three months are up.

Afterwards, Jakob, Linda and I caught the tram to one of the Freiburg Waldorf Schools. The next day practice for My Fair Lady started. It wasn't great for me from the start, Herr Götte (the music teacher) didn't have much music organised for me so I was reading off Piano scores for the most part of the two days we were there.
Those two days basically consisted of being kept awake untill about 1 or 2 in the morning, practicing music that I had trouuble deciphering, and eating...Doesn't sound too bad untill you keep on playing the sames songs over and over again.
I was glad to leave by Wednesday afternoon and head back to Stuttgart on the bus. Herr Götte even promised he would have my music organised by the time we got back to school! He nearly did...

My First Week of School.

The School in Nürtingen is fairly large. It has two main building, the first housing years 1 - 8 and the other has years 9 - 13. With many other classrooms within I still have no idea where everything is. There is also some other smaller buildings spread about, the Kindergartens and an art room housed within one of them.

All the year 10's are nice. I had met some of them previously practicing for their School musical 'My Fair Lady' (Ahh soo much funn...!? I'll write about it later. Although I can say that I never plan on EVER playing music again for a musical). And most of the teachers seem to be nice.

One thing about German school is that it starts at 7:45am. It is a bit early but on Mondays and Fridays we only go until 12! :) Wednesdays go till 1:30pm and Tuesdays and Wednesdays go until 3:30pm. I hav. And as a side note, every morning for the next three weeks we've got German Poetry. It's almost better than Austrlian poetry because I can't understand a thing! (No offence to those people who like poetry. I do happen to like some poetry, just generally not the poetry we do in school).

For most of the lessons except for Maths and English I sat there note really comprehending what the teacher was saying. I understand a little bit, and a few words every now and then but other that that all you get is blank stares from me. I pass the time when I am really bored by drawing in my book.

Wednesday's bored creation

I have to say one of the best classrooms is the Woodwork of Design Tech (DT) room. It is much smaller than what our school has in Australia and SO much messier. There is heaps of saw dust and wood chips and everything all over the floor but it makes it look like it is being used like it is meant to. The teacher is pretty relaxed but I don't get to find out what he is like until later in the Term because we have art at the moment...

In English we are doing an analysis of Slumdog Millionaire. The teacher made me read so much because she 'liked hearing my accent'. Next time she does that I think I should giver her a real Aussie accent.
Hearing lots of people speaking English in a German accent can also be quite funny. The English teacher in question speaks good English just the accent makes it a little bit hard to take her seriously.

It was actually an awesome week because Mayday was on Thursday so we only had Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday School. Also on Thursday was my first day allowed back on the road bike, and we went for a 60km ride through the Schwäbische Alps. There was a pretty long hill climbing up to the top of the mountain range which was very satisfying for my much deprived legs.
Before every little state or town (which there are many) there is a small yellow sign telling you the name and other details about it. On every ride we go on it is a sprint to the sign, I think I am slowly getting used to road racing tactics.
I am riding an old steel road bike - it is pretty awesome and I 'll put a picture up later but bbeing steel it is a flexy. Trying to chase Jo (Jakob's father) down a mountain with a couple of sharp corners made the bike feel like it had a bit of a flat tyre; one of the biggest downsides of steel. I had no chance in keeping up and decided to play it safe.

Yesterday, being Friday 2nd May, I got back on my lovely stiff carbon fibre mountain bike and went for a ride up to a castle in the Schwäbische Alps. I am still not technically allowed on the dirt until next Wednesday but the Road bike wheel was being fixed, so we decided to ride on the dirt up (very little chance of crashing) and ride the road back down. It was a little bit cold up the top, and unfortunately a big cloud which made it hard to see beyond 20 metres. We'll have to go up there on a day without any clouds and take a picture.

Here are some pretty bad quality pictures from up there anyway (taken on Jakobs phone):

Some sweet German singletrack... pretty muddy though, I'm not quite sure if it ever dries out

I don't think I need to say anything.

And I had to put in a photo of Jakob looking swagy.

Back to school tomorrow, which I'm not really looking forward to. Only till 12 though so I suppose that is an upside :)