Having spent several days in non threatening Holland and slightly less non threatening Germany, George and I returned to Liege where the Tour begins this year. Our last day in holland was navigated by Garmin on back roads that brought us back into Liege along the road that the campground was located. Pretty much on cue as soon we approached the Belgian border the hills started again and one reasonably long climb out of Valkenborg drained the last of my juices and did me in. The following day I was feeling totally flat with no power left as we did the last 30km into Liege. It’s a good thing we have a couple of quite days here before the frenzy of the tour starts so that I can eat like a pig and try to recover some energy.
George of course looks completely fine and rested. No doubt he could ride 100 mile days endlessly without slowing down.
Last night was the tdf rider presentation in the town square. Each of the teams came up on stage and were saluted with a snippet from either Stevie Wonder’s Sir Duke or the tag before the b section of I Feel Good. That got old after the first few teams.
The riders then did a lap of the square slowly, sometimes stopping to give autographs to kids. George called out to Christian van de Velde as he went past, who then stopped and turned around to greet his friend from Chicago. I was too slow to get a photo.
Today we rode the prologue course in the rain, and with piss stops, rain stops and Liege traffic it took almost an hour to cover the six km course.
The Tour starts tomorrow!
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