Tenerife

For the next 10 days or so i will be calling tenerife home as i start to prepare for the hilly tours. Our race calender now is going to be a very vast contrast to that of what we have been doing as the flat, and sharp rises on footpaths of belgium will be replaced by the regular 2 lane rds and 10-20km climbs in italy, america, japan, canada and china. I am really excited about the programme ahead as feel a little more comfortable in these type of races. So there is a need to adjust the training and prepare for the small tours and thats where tenerife fits the bill exceptionaly well.

The hotel i am staying at is located at 2100m above sea level and on the side of a volcano which i have read could erupt at any time. Fortunately the fatique of being at altitude has meant that i have not lost any sleep worrying about this, infact i have been that zonked since arriving 3 days ago that i would probably take a volcano erupting with me inside it to wake me!! The hotel seems built for cyclists, nice big rooms to spread out all our home comforts such as stretching mats, coffee machines, our buffet of training food and personal nutrition preferences and most importantly a good tv with good channels. Well perhaps most important is a good bed and fortunately the rooms have them aswell. Next is the tucker in the restaurante and not wanting to offend any other hotel i have been in over the years but the breakfast buffet and dinner's of salad and steak are simply devine and perhaps the best i have indulged in. Throw is a large safe area to keeps the bike stored, exceptionally friendly and helpfull staff, great training rds, and you have the perfect environment to train at your best.

Not surprizingly it is a popular place for cyclists to stay and train at at this time of the year with ivan basso, vincenzo nibali, roman kruziger, brad wiggens and my good mate from the land down down down under, ritchie porte. The training rds consist of one thing, up and down which i am sure you could guess from the fact that you stay atop a mountain. There is a bit of a plateu but its more that the rd rises less than the climbs that decend to all corners of the island so pretty much each day is climb climb climb. For example today i did 2hrs 30min nice and easy and 2500m of vertical climbing and that was an easier day, i am a little nervous to see how many m i will be assending when i actually start training!!

Anyway will get some photos and do a more indepth piece as the 10 days progress but for now its of to the sauna. To pass some time before a much anticipated dinner which i have been waiting anciously for since i finished last nights meal!

Cjw
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