Jonesin' for Pro Racing

   My consistency in writing blog entries has dropped off since our world has gone into shutdown, as there isn’t a whole lot going on. I’ve been getting out on rides, but just fairly local routes, since the governor’s “Stay at Home” order was imposed.

   This is usually my favorite time of cycling season, as, not only is it getting warmer, but also it is time for the Spring Classics races. Sadly, with everything postponed or canceled, I have been left to watch old races or other cycling features on the internet.

   This past Sunday most fans would have been taking in the Amstel Gold Race held in the Netherlands. The event used to be rather predictable when it finished with a final ascent of the Cauberg - Philippe Gilbert has won the event four times in the past decade. Teams would control any breakaways until the town of Valkenberg and hope that their team leader, usually a punchy climber, could top the hill first.

   Organizers changed up the route and were rewarded with what was perhaps the most exciting finish to a race all season, when young sensation Mathieu van der Poel dragged a group of eight others along to close a seemingly insurmountable gap and catch a breakaway trio just a few hundred meters from the finish line. Somehow he had enough left to sprint by and hold off the rest of the pack for the win.

   Unfortunately, the Amstel Gold overshadows one of the most spectacular events of the year, the Tro-Bro Léon, translated from the Breton language as “Tour of Léon”. Léon is an historical viscounty in the northwest department of Finistère, Brittany in France. The race originated in 1984 as a fundraiser for Diwan schools, which teach the Breton language and are still privately funded. The race has grown to be a fairly prestigious UCI 1.1 event, but it honors its early days as an amateur-only event by continuing to award the highest placed Breton rider with a baby pig!

   The race has been nicknamed the Petit Paris-Roubaix and L’Enfer de L’Ouest (Hell of the West), but it really doesn’t need that association, as it is a brutal and beautiful route all on its own. Tro-Bro Léon traverses 25 sections of dirt/gravel paths or ribinoù, which are narrow farm paths that cross the fields and connect the paved roads in the region. These paths range in quality from a fast, packed dirt, double-track with a grassy center strip to a boneshakingly chunky, broken gravel path that has eroded badly during the winter months.

   Below are a couple of my favorite photos from past editions of the race, but I encourage you to read this article, written a few years ago by two support staff members of the Garmin-Sharp cycling team. It provides a great sense of the flavor of the race, as well as more wonderful images around the course.

   Greatly regretting not being able to view this year's race, I watched some video of the 2015 Tro-Bro Léon, which was blessed with fantastic weather, and there are several helicopter shots of the verdant farmlands and spectacular coastline of Brittany. The cycling action was great as well - the race heats up with constant attacks near the end and a couple riders make narrow escapes from disaster while pushing their luck on the rough terrain. I particularly enjoyed seeing that the breakaway quintet included Europcar and Fortuneo-Vital Concept riders with their respective Colnago C59 and Look 795 Aerolight bicycles.

   Many times I’ve expressed my preference for the single day races over the Grand Tours, and I’ve taken the time to watch clips of my favorite editions of these races while eating breakfast. I’ve re-watched a couple of Fabian Cancellara’s wins at Strade Bianche, and I thoroughly enjoyed watching again Vincenzo Nibali’s thrilling victory at Milan-San Remo in 2018. Paris-Roubaix is always a great spectacle, and I took in Cancellara’s famous 2010 breakaway, as well as more recent Peter Sagan and Philippe Gilbert sprint wins in the Velodrome.

   I also found a series of programs on the Ronde van Vlaanderen (Tour of Flanders), that takes a behind-the-scenes look at the race, including the television and radio production, as well as the in-race radio crew and pro team support vehicles. These films provide very interesting, and sometimes humorous insight about what it takes to hold one of these events and how the World Tour teams work to get their man on the podium. Here are the links: 2019 (Alberto Betiol), 2018 (Niki Terpstra), 2017 (Philippe Gilbert) and 2016 (Peter Sagan).

 

   On the shop end of things, there are a couple quick items worth mentioning. My friend Matt, who is short-ish in stature, will be purchasing my wife’s Klein Quantum road bike. Gary Klein started full production of his beautifully smooth-welded aluminum frames in 1985, and Trek bought the company in 1995. Trek continued to manufacture bicycles under the Klein name for a little over a decade, then let the brand fade away as the move into carbon fiber frames took off.

   This particular bicycle comes in “Purple Haze”, a multi-chromatic paint that changes from purple to green, and I’ve even seen it look gold or red when the sun hits it in certain angles! Matt is a big fan of the single front chainring arrangement we put on his cyclocross bike a few years ago, so we’ll be doing a 1x10 road version of this setup.

   Someone who was directed to my blog by one of my craigslist ads noticed one of my Projects-In-Progress. This person expressed interest in the build, and I realized that I had neglected to mention it in my blog.

   SOMEC (the SOcieta MECchanica) was founded in the Romagna town of Lugo by artisan Oliviero Gallegati in 1973. This beautifully-painted frameset by the Italian brand, presumably named after one of the company's builders, came with a wonderful engraved 3T stem.

   My plan is to assemble the bike with a Campagnolo Athena 8-speed groupset, including a set of wheels built with FiR EL-45rims, that I set aside a few months ago.

Stay tuned...