I hope all of you have enjoyed a great summer so far (maybe a bit too hot here and there) and have energized and relaxed with family and friends. Jeroen and I surely did. Although vacation is always too short, we must keep realizing that it only feels as a
It's been quiet here for a month. That was the plan - we told you back in April that posting would slow down, because Cape Epic 2027 is still a long way off and there's only so much you can write about maintenance training before it starts
I'm writing this almost one month after Cape Epic, mildly amazed after my last few rides. Amazed in a good way though. In the way where you go out for a training what you think should feel like work, and it doesn't. Where you look down
It's been a couple of weeks since the 22nd of March - the last day of the Cape Epic. And if you've been following this blog, you know that the last day wasn't exactly what we'd imagined when we started this whole adventure.
Today was the last day of the Cape Epic. Not my last day of racing - that was two days ago, at kilometer 111 of the Queen Stage. Today I was on the other side of the fence, and it turns out that's a much harder place to be
Below is the story of Jeroen's day out on the Stellenbosch trails. No longer a teammate on the bike, I just assumed the role of ghostwriter. I slept really well, thanks to the wonderful bed at Darrel and Christa's. After starting Cape Epic with a few
I am out of the race. The Queen Stage proved too much for me. After the crash in Stage 4 — landing hard on my thigh and hip — I was struggling with the pain going into yesterday. But the bigger problem was what it did to my sleep. Another night lying
I slept. Actually slept. After three nights of tossing and turning in Montagu - between the heat, probably suffering from sugar overload as we felt we had overdone our nutrition somewhat, and whatever else was conspiring against us - I finally cracked the code. Half of one of Jeroen's sleeping
If you read yesterday's post, you know how Stage 2 ended. A destroyed rim at kilometre 61, a 16-kilometre walk to the water point, an hour waiting for a replacement that didn't quite work, creative shifting on three functional gears, and a finish in 186th
We started Stage 2 in good spirits. Jeroen had slept properly and we both felt ok, realizing we would fine out if the legs would agree with that position later. We were in start batch H, and as we arrived quite early, we were the right at the front at
It started exactly as Stage 1 of Cape Epic probably shouldn't start: Jeroen hadn't slept a single minute. On the way to the start — which was already hectic and slightly chaotic, the timing having been pushed 30 minutes earlier due to expected heat — he told me
Well, that was not how I imagined the first day of Cape Epic would go. Let me rewind to last night. About an hour afterdinner, I'm blaming a dish that was loaded with raw garlic, my stomach decided it wanted no part of this adventure. What followed was