L'Hexagonal - Stage #3 - Montmartre Urban Time Trial, Paris

Sacre Coeur church


Jakey (our masseur) going to town on me before the time trial


Dan Mac waiting in the rain for the start of his time trial


Me about to hit the course.


The last climb, believe me that is definatily a grimace, not a smile

Today was the 3rd stage of the tour, a 5km individual time trial around Montmartre in Paris. If you have ever been to Paris you probably know what it is like. A big hill, cobble stone streets, heaps of stairs, tourists everywhere, and the Sacre Coeur church in the middle.

The course was crazy. It went up and down heaps of stairs and twisted around cobbled streets. And it is not like dirt, a lot of these steep stairs, would really hurt if you fell. During practice (and even in the race) there were tourists everywhere. On some of the long stair sections it was impossible to wait for them to be clear so you just had to start and hope that all the people scattered in time. Appart from running up all the stairs, i felt relatively comfortable with the course. Being quite technical probably suits me, but i was worried by the looming clouds because cobbles get very slippery when they get wet, especially steep stairs!

The riders were realised at 1 minute intervals in reverse order of GC (fast guys last). Since most of us Aussie are quite close on GC, we were all off at about 40mins in. Right on que the rain started about 5min before i had to go...bugger. I was really scared. I had know idea whether the lines i rode during practice were even possible anymore. I decided to take it easy in the start and hopefully build confidence as i went. That was a good strategy becasue i was super careful in the first few corners and i still nearly slid out. The climbing sections were so hard, it is tough to run up stairs when you only ever ride. Running is something you do if you are late for a bus! Overall my run went well, i passed the three guys that started in front of me so that is a good sign. i made a few mistakes but considering the rain i think i rode well. Then after my rdie the rain stopped and the roads dried out for the probably the top 20 riders, very frustrating.

I just checked the results and it turns out i got 17th and was the first Aussie. That is an awesome result! i was 58sec down from the winner but all the quick guys had a dry track, so i'm realy happy.