IMDE Race Week - Wednesday (Day Two of Seven)

It's been another scorching hot day here in Frankfurt with temperatures well in to the thirties. Yesterday we arrived in Dunkirk at 11am and managed to reach our hotel (the Miramar) by 6pm via a nice leisurely lunch in a town called Leuven in Belgium. We much prefer driving to European races as we can pack as much stuff as we want and don't have to depend on useless airlines not to lose our bikes... in fact with our mate Ady flying out tomorrow from terminal five with BA we even brought his bike just to be safe.

As soon as we'd unloaded the car we nipped out for a very easy 30 minute run to check out the finish area and part of the run course. From what we saw the run looks pretty flat although will no doubt be hot and looks to have quite a few tricky twists and turns. At 10k per loop it's a little long to run but we'll probably try to ride it on Friday morning.

Today we had a nice lie-in followed by an ok breakfast here in the hotel. It was then down to the finish area for 11am to take part in the official tour of the bike course. On Sunday there's a 12k section out of T1 before two 84k loops bring you into T2 and the start of the run. As expected the German organisation was amazing and with about 30 other riders we had a full police escort right through the middle of Frankfurt and out into the countryside, through red lights, taking up both lanes of dual-carriageways and generally getting the full Tour de France treatment. They even scheduled in a short rest stop just over half-way and gave each rider a two litre bottle of mineral water to top up their supplies. So how was it? Pretty much as I expected although with names like 'the Beast' and 'Heartbreak Hill' I'd imagined the climbs to be climbs but even the worst were no more than drags... nothing to compare to the Austrian or Swiss mdot courses neither of which are particularly hilly. We took it super easy and my heart rate only averaged 95 for the whole session but with the benefit of being in a large group still managed to average over 15mph. I was pretty tired by the end but with plenty of good food today and three super easy rest days to go I'm sure I'll be fresh come Saturday and a sub five hour bike split is certainly on the cards.

Tomorrow we've got another nice lie-in scheduled before heading down to the expo (only about 400 yards from our hotel) to register. We'll then look to head over to the lake for a quick swim before lunch and spend the afternoon kicking back.

It's still meant to cool down for the weekend and the current forecast for race day is 25 degrees and dry with a reasonable breeze.

See you tomorrow,

T.