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Lene Byberg's Journal
Offenburg World Cup 2007
posted by at 04:00 PM on November 26, 2007
From one beautiful place to another! I know I expressed lots of admiration for Houffalize, but the same definitely applies to Offenburg. Benno and Sandy Gilchrist, a mechanic who works with us from Scotland, arrived on Tuesday to setup early, while the remainder of the team arrived on Wednesday. Christoph drove here from his home in Switzerland, while Claire, Leo (our mechanic from the UK although with Italian origins) and I arrived into Strasbourg airport and drove the short 33km journey across the French Germany border and into the scenic area that is Offenburg. The area is very like Stellenbosch, South Africa with its many vineyards and cherry trees. Susi, Lene and I sampled some cherries on an easy bike ride earlier in the week. The team moral is high going into today’s race. Unfortunately, Liam Killeen is still having some problems and will not be on the start line here today. Specialized are pleased though to support the three Chinese Girls in World Cup Number 1 winner and overall world cup leader Ren Chengyuan, who is accompanied by team mates Jingjing Wang, who placed 5th in the first world cup and Liu Ying who placed 7th. These girls will still represent China, but Specialized are supplying them with bicycles and mechanical support and they will base themselves from our team truck.
Just as the race was about to begin, after days of blue skies and good temperatures, the drops started and within one lap of racing, the rain was heavy. Most of the girls started on what could be best described as an intermediate tire, but by the time the race finished today wet tires would have been a necessity. Although, starting back on the grid in 37th following the first world cup, despite suffering from a crash on the first lap, Lene produced a good performance to creep into the top 25.
categories: General
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