So this year’s Tour ended like so many others have for me with an early withdrawal. It certainly wasn’t for the lack of trying, legs or even injury this time.
To give you the full run down of what has been going on lately, I struggled through the month of June like so many of you have seen. The reason for this has been that I had a very high acid level in my body, possibly brought on by the stomach bug I got in the Giro. So to explain, what that means is “my whole body was inflamed”. The more I raced, the more lactate I built up and my body just stored it. Luckily this was caught by the team’s medical group and I was put on a low acid diet to give my body a chance to regroup. Basically a complete detox!
That might not be the best build up to a three week tour, but the legs were good all the time. After some long discussions with the management (JV and Matt White) where I stressed to them that I didn’t want to just take a spot just to go to the Tour. In my eyes, that would not be fair to the rest of the guys gunning for a Tour start. But they still felt that I was good enough to go. So off I went.
The first two days I was going OK, but nothing special. Then my legs started to come around and by stage 3, I was feeling like myself on the bike again. The time trial wasn’t one of my best, but I wasn’t that far down and on a course that didn’t suit me at all. I was pretty happy with the result. Things kept on getting better and on stage 5, I was there to mix it up with a big attempt for a lead-out for Julian. I was by then seeing myself as being back!!!
What happened yesterday I still can’t explain. I was going great for the first 50 km and had no problems keeping the pace over the first couple of climbs. Then 50 km in to it my legs started building up lactic acid and I couldn’t get rid of it. Then when we hit the 4th category climb, I just popped. I couldn’t get out of the seat and by 500 m to the top, I could not even turn my legs over. Same feeling as I had when I was racing in the US earlier. I had to cruise for a bit to recover and then set about trying to get inside the time limit. I knew it was a tall task, but I wasn’t gonna pack it in out there on the road. I gave it absolutely everything I had for the last 100 km. I finished exhausted and unfortunately 4 minutes outside the time cut. I was gutted!!! Still am!!!
I can handle missing the time cut if I’m riding at 100% and I’m just not good enough to keep up with the race. But that part of the day when I got dropped, I was maybe at 50% and that is very hard to live with. The worst part for me is that my legs were better on the massage table after that effort than they were after the previous day. So it’s not the legs that can’t take it, something else is wrong!!
And now comes the chase that I have been accustomed to so many times in the last couple of years. Finding out what is going on!!! Straight after the race, I rang up my guys back home and they are on the case sorting out what ever tests need to be done to work this out. So I’m hoping to have an answer by mid to end of next week.
I want to say a big thanks to all of my fans out there who are always rooting for me in good and bad times. I hope I can bring you something good to cheer for soon!
Maggy
