Its been said that central Europe is the cycling capital of the world. Recently Charles and Zach from the shop had the opportunity to see for themselves. The trip was a bit last minute and, excluding the few days around the actual 95th Tour of Flanders spring classic itself, was unscripted, unplanned, carefree and very awesome.
This whole trip was the result of an invitation from Lazer, a Belgium helmet manufacturer, to experience the Rhonde Van Vlaandren, or the Tour of Flanders as its known here in good ole America. We would be both riding the race course (100 miles of it anyway) and then be VIP guest spectators of the Pro race the next day.
As mentioned, the only thing we planned was our flights there and back, the rest was in the air. We took an overnight flight into Amsterdam landing at 5:30AM local time, the city was dark, misty and eerily quite. We managed to find a small cafe open at that hour and had our first of many cups of amazing coffee. We found a park bench, sat there and watched the city come alive for a routine mid-week workday. I was well aware that Amsterdam was a city of bikes, but I was still pleasantly shocked at what I witnessed over the course of the next few hours. As the sun started to rise and the light rain continued to fall, the bikes came out. At first it was just a couple as it was still early, but by 10am the city streets were packed. The coolest thing was almost no cars! Sure there was an occasional auto, service vehicle etc, but I would guess the bikes outnumbered the autos at least 100/1! Keep in mind it was about 50 degrees and rainy, but that did not stop the local business woman in her skirt and heels pedaling her way to work, often times with coffee and perhaps and umbrella in hand. We saw moms with 3 kids hanging off the bike, delivery bikes with big cargo's and the occasional motor scooter. The streets were also designed and engineered for bikes and public transportation, autos are at a distinct disadvantage, yet they were always courteous and respectful towards cyclist and pedestrians. That really impressed me.
Here in America, we are pretty quick to jump in the car and run to the supermarket just one mile down the road. Even "hard core" recreational cyclist will most likely still drive to work instead of riding a few miles. Perhaps we can all learn a little from the European culture and their attitudes. The city was chaotic, no doubt, but there was definitely a certain sense of tolerance, respect and courtesy that must exist in order for so many people to live peacefully in such a small area. I would also mention that we rarely saw any police.
After a day and the first night in a hostel in Amsterdam, we jumped on a train south to Antwerp, Belgium, headquarters of Lazer Helmets and our base for the next few days. Antwerp central train station was amazing and the city was a nice blend of new and old architecture, full of courteous people, great food and beer, and sweet bike lanes.
Saturday we hopped on the provided Ridley Damocles bikes, team Katusha bikes from last year and headed out for the 100 miles of the Tour of Flanders sportif ride. I had grand visions of battling it out with Belgian strong men in the rain and mud and wind in a "race" type ride. The reality was this was an 18,000 person cookie ride! Imagine a constant uninterrupted peloton stretching 100 miles long, that's what it was like. Constant passing, cobbles, hills, mud, cow manure, grass, ditch, sidewalk, bike path, more cobbles, mountain bikes, comfort bikes, road bikes, beginner riders, advanced riders, you name it we saw it. Nevertheless, we were determined to do some serious head down riding.
The winds were steady and gusting at times, weather was amazing, 70 degrees and sunny, dry and dusty. We hooked up with another American from Utah and hit it hard for the first 50 miles. The European riders are quirky and would jump on our wheels as we would pass and hang on as long as possible. At one point on a windy flat stretch I looked back and behind the three of us there was a train of probably 60 riders behind us! The Flanders course is mostly rolling with a few dozen steep climbs. The two famous climbs being the cobbled Koppenburg and Muur. The climbs weren't that difficult themselves, what was crazy was finding a line through the crowds of people, many of them walking or laying on the road. We are happy to report however that we were able to cleanly ride all of the famous Flanders climbs. We enjoyed the day, stopping on occasion to take some photos and have a drink but in between it was good hard riding. Both Charles and I are big riders and we tend to turn a big gear which made this our kind of ride. It was pretty sweet riding along over rough cobbles at 30mph in sections. We were sure the bikes were going to fall apart under us but they did great! The Ridley Damocles was the perfect bike for that ride, high all around marks for sure. Our heads were safe and cool in the sweet Lazer Flandrian edition helmets as well!
The rest of the trip consisted of riding the train around Belgium and Germany stopping off at random cities we thought would be sweet. Renting or borrowing bikes or just walking we would wander around the cities and towns and check out the architecture, old castles, and cathedrals stopping to eat when we were hungry, drink when we were thirsty and sleep when we were tired. We visited Brugge, Brussels, Cologne, Langenselbold, Budigen, Frankfurt and a few more. It was an amazing trip and Europe will most defintely be the location of the next Mock Orange Bikes if we ever open one.
