Stage 1
Valromey Tour was my first UCI tour and from the get go the hype of this was quite evident. The race begun well before the start with boys lining up more than 30 minutes before the race to get in a prime spot for the race start. We had a 6km neutral which was mad. 170 teenaged boys all pushing for the front of the skinny little French roads. The stage was a relatively flat 130km so my plan was to take it as easy as possible and save my legs for the more important stages later that weekend.
As soon as the flag dropped the peloton arranged itself quite quickly. The early break went with 13 guys making it up the road. The gap got out to just under three minutes and hovered there for the majority of the day. Towards the end of the race there seemed to be no motivation coming from the peloton to pull the break back so with 30km remaining of the 130km stage I looked to get up the road to try and bridge some of the gap. I managed to get away from the peloton with three others and we did a really good job to reduce the gap to the break away. I finished up in 12th, 26 seconds down on the winner but had a 58 second advantage on my key GC rivals in the peloton behind.
Stage 2
On paper stage 2 would also be a relatively flat insignificant stage but for me was quite the opposite. 50km in a spoke snapped in my wheel, I got a new wheel and got back into the bunch without using to many berries but then shortly after on a technical descent I overcooked a corner and shot off the road down into the bushes below. I spent a good 30 seconds fighting to get out of the bush before trying to pull my bike out too. I decided to ditch the bike and climbed back up onto the road. I got a spare bike and begun my chase back onto the peloton. It took what seemed like forever to get back to the peloton and I burnt a lot more energy than I would have liked. I finished safely in the peloton without loosing any time and with no serious damage which was a huge relief with all the chaos of the day and also moved up a few spots to 8th on GC.
Stage 3
Stage 3 was time trial day which I was really looking forward to. It was a short 9.9km ITT. The first half was dead flat before finishing with some punchy climbs and a lot of cornering. The ride went smoothly and when I crossed the line I heard I was sitting in third with eight seven riders left to come through. I spun out the legs on the erg whilst constantly refreshing my phone to see the times of all the riders as they crossed the finish. No one bettered my time and so I finished third nailing my first UCI podium!
Stage 4
With 2600 meters of elevation gain and four category 1 climbs I expected the real GC shake up to come on the final day. I waited patiently over the first three climbs saving my legs to really try and do some damage over the last climb. The peloton slowly thinned down as boys fell off the pace throughout the stage but when we got to the base of the last climb the peloton was still a lot bigger than I had hoped. Along with my NZ team-mate we tried to put the pressure on and cause a major split but the final climb just wasn’t hard enough to do so. We summited the climb still in a relatively big group of guys. With three kilometres to go I made my move to get away. The timing was perfect and the peloton all looked around behind me as the gap went out. I just held on from a fast finishing bunch to take second on the stage with one rider from the early breakaway still ahead. The stage didn’t cause the shake up I needed and I only moved up to 6th on GC.
The tour was great however. Riding in a bunch with such a depth of talent was a massive step up for me and I learnt so much to take into my upcoming races. I also gained a lot of confidence and now know where I stack up with the best juniors in the world and will no be afraid to back myself more and take more chances to get a first UCI win.
