Words and photos by Epic Rider Malaya van Ruitenbeek
When I stepped out of the house at 8.45h for my first Epic Ride, it was still freezing. Wearing a thick winter coat over my cycling kit, I cautiously rode to the central station of The Hague (avoiding the tram rail tracks and icy parts of the roads) where my mate Jurgen picked me up. He invited me to join a training ride of his cycling club, which gave me the perfect opportunity to finally get a long ride in the legs.
As I am only participating in criteriums this year, I actually do not need very long endurance rides in winter time. A short car ride later we gathered up with his cycling mates in Pijnacker. The director sportif told us were we going to the Kopje of Bloemendaal, where I had not been with my bike before. Having lived in this area for 8 years now, it was very nice to explore some uncovered ground!
This first video was taken along the Ringvaart, which is the outer ring of water of the Haarlemmermeer, the oldest polder (reclaimed land) in the world. The Netherlands is full of these polders and they are part of our famous flat landscape. By the time we got there we had been going north and straight into a headwind for over 75 minutes and were still facing some 25k of headwind to come. The roads started to defrost and everybody in the group was getting dirty because of the spray coming of our rear tires. At these moments I always wonder why I am the only one with a proper set of fenders...
Two hours into the ride we were getting close to the Kopje and it was time to take out my camera once more. The Kopje used to be a coastal dune and is now part of the residential area of Bloemendaal. It is only about 50 meters of elevation but it grew out to somewhat of a local attraction, frequented by many cyclists. I had been there before one time, when I entered a soapbox race with a group of students. This time, I would be going up instead of down though!
After two hours of continuous pushing on the pedals due to the headwind it was nice to get an uphill sprint in. A little boost of wattage takes out the itchy feeling that builds up under constant pressure. My Diablo felt very responsive, even on the cobbled part of the climb. We headed west to the beach and knowing that it would be tailwind from there on kept the morale high in the group. It is actually quite rare that we had tailwind going home this way, as the prevailing wind direction is south west rather than the north eastern wind during this ride. This part of the ride offers a variation of stretches through the coastal dunes, through coastal towns and along boulevards close to the sea. If the weather is good, the bike lanes here get very crowded, so we tend to ride here in winter more than summer.
Unavoidably after three hours fatigue started to set in and less and less riders wanted to ride in front of the group. I wasn't feeling that strong either and was happy that we made a two minute stop to reload our bottles with fluids. I took the opportunity and asked one of the guys to take the very first shot of me and my bike in action. Or should I say, almost in action?
The stop worked miracles for me and I felt fine during the final hour going back to the club house. The pace went up one more time before the group split up as some guys wanted to get some extra mileage in their legs. The final half hour we rode home at a leisurely pace and I got back feeling excited about the ride. I had got some decent time on my Diablo and I can't wait to take this bike to Japan in February for my first race of the season.
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