Day 3

Today was my last day with the team. Not really a very nice day, but thankfully I was able to borrow a rain jacket and rubber gloves for the ride. It was a relatively easy 2 hour ride. What is relatively easy ride for a pro team in the cold and rain? 25kph. Not slow, but a pace that I can ride for hours on end. If only I had worn the bibs they gave me, any onlooker would think I was part of the team. Pretty cool.

So after cleaning up after the ride, it back to work for a little bit before heading to the airport. All in all it was a good trip. The only thing that could have made it better was being able to speak Spanish. Maybe by the next trip I'll know a little more. Until then, thanks for reading and I'll put a few pics up on Facebook when I get home.
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Day 2

Today was nice. It was sunny and probably in the mid-50s before the start of the ride. There was some media, similar to our VeloNews. The ride was good, but hilly. Nothing like 5k climbs to kick you into shape. For me the ride lasted about 90 minutes before I was slowed by a mechanical, then paced back to the group behind the follow car (by the way, that was pretty cool by itself). After more shifting problems, the mechanics stopped and fixed the problem, although I decided at the same time just to call it a day. I wasn't sure how many more of those climbs I could have taken.

So eventually I got back to the hotel, cleaned up, ate, and did some other work with our Spanish distributor, ate again, and off to bed.
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Land of the Euskaltels

The last two days have been crazy. Here's a quick recap. Arrive at Madison's wonderful airport at 9 am Monday. Thanks to Chicago's wonderful weather my flight is delayed until 1, which means I'll miss my connection. So I get on the phone with the very helpful people at United's frequent flyer program and after trying to figure out how to get to Alicante, they rerouted my entire trip. It turned out okay. My layovers were a little longer (which means a little less stress, especially when connecting through Madrid) and arriving 8 hours later. And after 36 hours, I made it to the hotel just in time for dinner. That may not seem bad, but pro teams eat around 9 PM. So after some good appetizers, and okay pork dinner (I wasn't about to have fish after my last experience), and a couple glasses of good, Spanish red wine, I was off to bed by midnight.

Fast forward 8 hours (yes, I slept 8 hours). I've traveled to Europe so many times over the past year I don't really get much jet lag, but it was nice to sleep laying down, for the first time since Sunday. Breakfast was good. Bacon, eggs, croissants, and of course coffee. The coffee here is amazing.

By now you're probably wondering, is he ever going to go to work? Ah, right. After checking in with the mechanics and making sure everything is AOK, it's time to change into my riding gear and go for a spin... With the team. Right, we'll see how long that lasts.

I guess I forgot to mention that I'm at the Euskaltel-Eskadi training camp in Alicante, Spain. I'll write more later.
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