I’m sure those of you, who visit this site often are very bored of me going on about the Gavere cyclocross race, how great it is, how it is one of my favourite races of the season. Well, I have bad news for you, because that’s what I am going to talk about once again.
There are so many things I like about it, the beauty of the place, the ever-present mud, but above all, I think my favourite feature is the sketchy descent after the first visit of the pits. It’s a fast, muddy, slippery mayhem. It takes every ounce of the riders’ skills to get to the bottom unscathed. And survival is not enough – you really have to go for it to stay competitive. One my favourite moments was when in the first or the second lap, Katie Compton launched a daring attack near the bottom and managed to overtake Helen Wyman, following the outside line. Wow.
Oh, and the poppies before the men’s start? There was all this fuss about the helicopter, which would unload 20,000 poppies three minutes before the start, but it looked a bit anticlimactic, to be very honest. I guess the wind sent the poppies on the wrong trajectory, it sadly ended up as a bit of a ‘meh’ moment, which didn’t feel like a fitting way to commemorate Armistice Day.
I have to shoot now, the Eurotunnel train won’t wait, will be back with more next week, first from Tabor and then from Hamme.
