Phoenix Cycling Club
You are here:
David McCann's Tour of Langkawi Diary 2004
The club's very own David McCann rode for the Hibernian Ireland team in this UCI 2.2 category stage race, 6-15 February 2004. Here he charts his day-to-day progress.
CLEARING OUT THE COBWEBS: Stage one
Riders, Start your engines! Is it really that time again, already? As
I was once again pinning numbers onto an Ireland Jersey and hearing ‘5
minutes to the start’, it seems it is. The season started with
a bang today. Well, more of an embarrassed murmur than a bang, as it
turned out, with a baby traffic jam that had wandered onto the course
ending the race abruptly. It wasn’t a riders protest or anything,
more just a case of safety and common sense prevailing as no-one was
that keen to risk ending their season in February. Actually, that’s
not strictly true. Up until then the danger was building nicely, with
more than a few hair-raising moment. But only the regular flavour of
danger of being killed by other riders, which is perfectly fine.
It was great to see the suicide breakaway of Asian riders rewarded,
with the yellow jersey going to a member of the Philippines’ new
pro team. Yes, that’s right, the Philippines. Pro team. It seems
inevitable that an Irish team will appear soon enough. Right?
Why can’t all races start like this, eh? Nicely overcast-just so it doesn’t get too hot! Perfectly smooth, flat-as-a-pancake roads. And everyone, other than a few gutsy Asian riders, spending a couple of hours chatting nicely and catching up with old friends and adversaries. That’s probably due more to jet lag than anything else. Waking at 2am and staring at the ceiling unable to sleep somewhat puts the mood to race out of a bunch of Europeans! And Americans. And Aussies. And Kiwis. The race probably has the most Anglophones I’ve ever seen at a big event, and the steady progression of the ‘non-traditional’ cycling countries is apparent.
Anyway, after the fourth midnight hour of Davy O’Loughlin muttering in the dark ‘For flip sake, this is shoot’, we decided a second dvd film was in order to put in the long hours until breakfast.
So, one very civilized stage down and tomorrow’s daunting one ahead. A look at www.tdl.com.my/race/profile-stage02.htm will show you what I mean. What looks like one of the longest drags in the world awaits. 60 full kilometres of a gradual rise to 1500m presents the first real test of the year. I’m looking forward to finding out just were I stand (or if I can still stand) and tomorrow we should know just how everyone in the team is going. The suspense is just killing me.
____________________
·
McCann finished in the bunch on stage one. The final few kilometres were
neutralised after traffic was let onto the circuit.
CRASHES, FIREWORKS AND BIG MOUNTAINS: Stage 2.
Thank god all hilly stages aren’t like this, eh? 95miles finishing with the 37mile Cameron highlands climb to 1500m, and a 26mph average. Timmy (Barry) decided to sit behind the guy whose stem was about to snap, and was lucky not to need the ambulance to get to the finish, unlike his fellow bicycle acrobats. He was pretty banged up and although he soldiered on, he was unable to get back up to the bunch. I really don’t know why really, as we were only doing about 35mph. On the drags.
Bad luck, and bad timing, can be all it takes to end your race. Although one of the foreign commissaries considered that his crash and effort in continuing merited leniency regarding the time limit, he was nonetheless eliminated.
Crashes seemed to be order of the day. Carlos Sainz must have been driving the Relax team car, which somehow ended up on its roof half way up the final climb. That said, it is quite possible that I hallucinated that due to my brain being so starved of oxygen on the climb. Griffo’s (Paul Griffin) wee-ring allergy saw him try to change from 53x23 into 53 x Spokes and mangle his gears while David O’Loughlin was doing somersaults in the push to the bottom of the final climb. Although he got back on, he didn’t get the best vantage point for the fireworks.
I won’t bore you with the stuff about how eternally long the hill was and how fast the Columbians took off on the final, steeper, ten kilometres, save to say that Vladimir Belli was doing double-takes every time he turned round and saw a couple of Irish jerseys still there. I was tempted to take a sling off his jersey, just for old times sake, but he must have saw it coming and took off with Bruylandts and co. Anyway I rode tempo with Charlie Weg (Wegelius, from the De Nardi team) and finished respectably enough, I suppose.
________________________
· McCann finished 22nd on the stage, 2 minutes and 27 seconds behind the stage winner Marlon Perez.
SLIP SLIDIN’ AWAY: Stage 3
What a day! The proper heat arrived today. Factor 20 lotion from top to toe and I STILL get sunburnt. Three beautiful red dots on my forehead, where I got burnt through the helmet. Luckily we did the first 25 miles in 50 minutes so there was a nice breeze to cool things down a little. I was still going through 3 bottles an hour, all the same.
After a bit of racing it became clear that there were just too many people still keen to chase, so things settled down and two masochists were let go for a day of fun in the sun. No harm done on GC as they were both 20 minutes down, and we got to ride along chatting again while they built up their 10 minute lead. Unfortunately this meant you had time to notice the searing heat once more. Jokingly, I pointed at the horizon and said “Bummer. Looks like rain.” Big Mouth! A couple of hours later, as we started to race up the main climb, Malaysia got tropical on us. It dropped from the heavens and as we raced up to 800 metres of altitude, it actually got cold.
There were a few crashes on the climb and an even better scrap for position went on, practically the whole way up the hill. Philip (Deignan) took on Bruylandts with a forearm smash from behind, but was knocked right back to the back of the group with a stunning Belgian power grunt. I played the weight advantage and pretty much rode were I wanted. That said, when Freddy Gonzales started drinking while I was suffocating, I considered taking a different wheel. No shelter behind him anyway!
I also tried using the old hypnotic wobbly-your-foot about trick to distract everyone, which seemed pretty effective.
The first roar of thunder rang out exactly as we crossed the top of the hill, and it set the tone for the next half hour. What a RUSH! Mayhem is probably a good word to use to describe the 25km descent. Basically, it was all about guys crashing or bailing out and locking their brakes all the way down the descent. I managed to get past the few bollards that had gotten over the top ahead, avoided the yellow jersey sliding across the metal bridge in front of me, and got to the front of the group. The next 20 minutes were then of a ‘life in your hands’ level of concentration, with mostly myself and Gord Fraser taking turns at showing each other how grippy are tyres were in the wet, and occasionally, how grippy they weren’t. We both had a few ‘moments’, as we’ll call them, but we managed to stay upright.
Unfortunately, quite a few of the others who wanted to play the slidey bike game with us were not so lucky. So, as well as having a ball, myself and Phillip - who today discovered the joys of Vittoria CX tubulars - managed to move up to 12th and 13th overall. Phillip took an excellent sixth on the stage. As for me, I got another scary moment as one of the Italians wanted to keep the 'lets-fall-off' game going right up until the last corner, and tried to get under my front wheel.
I think I’m ready for a nice relaxing stage tomorrow. I’m sure I’ll be disappointed.
________________
·
McCann was 12th on the stage, coming home in a small chase group just
35 seconds behind winner Brett Lancaster. The ride moved him up to 13th
overall.
HALFWHEELED BY A CAMPIONE: Stage 4.
Ah, Just what the doctor ordered! Not exactly 'easy' per se, but I seem to be going well enough that apart from Roland Green and Bruylandts having a bit of a lash up the cat 2 climb (I have no idea why, must have been bored) and the last 10km wind up for the sprint, today was pretty handy.
Since Eric Wohlberg of Canada was missing Tommy Evans this year, we let Eugene (Moriarty) do his best Tommy impression and go from the gun. That set the tone for the first hour with non-stop attacking. There just seems to be too many teams with good legs and even 30 man groups with almost every team represented are getting brought back by someone or other. So, again after about an hour, three heroes of the day were let go for their three hour team TT. The Selle Italia boys rode well and kept the gap hovering at around 1 or 2 minutes, and the Lampre guy in the break decided to sit up with an hour to go. Of course, then, his 2 pals stretched the gap out to 5 minutes and managed to stay away to the finish, as did a group of naughty Health Net boys, who led Gord Fraser out for the last hotspot and got such a gap they just kept going. I bet the Lampre director will be giving it plenty of "Why, I oughta......" at the team meeting tonight.
In the meantime we had another fairly handy day of rolling along in a fast bunch. In fact it was such a nice day of rolling along that I can't think of much to say. Lets just proceed directly to the dangerous run in then, shall we? Funniest moment was hearing the yell of "C'e sesto posto!" as one of the Italians wanted to remind everyone that it was only 6th place they were willing to cash in their life insurance for. Wasn't really THAT hectic, but I knew what he meant. Managed to pick up Eugene (Moriarty) at the 1km mark and did a nice charge up the outside of the group. Then came my dilemma at 500m to go: Do I keep blasting up the outside and maybe blow leaving Eugene in a pickle, or, do I get him onto the wheel of the guy that won 3 stages of the race in one year? It was now 450m to go, and I didn't think I would have time to phone a friend, so I opted for option 2, swung him over to Pagliarini, and sat up to watch! Only they disappeared so fast I couldn’t make out what happened at the finish! Pleasant reading on the results sheet then to see Eugene get an excellent 10th (5th in the sprint). He was just behind Gord Fraser (God! He is fast) and Graeme Brown, and ahead of Quaranta and Pagliarini. And apart from my little contribution, he more or less did it on his own.
I thought I would spin my legs out a bit, so I rode part of the transfer to the hotel in a nice little group of guys, mostly riding Moser bikes, which was understandable since one of them was Francesco Moser. I rode along and chatted in my pigeon Italiano, but then El Campione started throwing the wheel on me on the hills, so I ended up sitting on the old boys. I hang my head in shame.
_________________________
McCann finished in the main bunch on the stage, 1 minute and 29 seconds behind winner Sean Sullivan. He remains in 13th place overall going into the 18 km stage 5 time trial.
Stage 5
Flat 18km TT, so nothing too interesting or amusing to write about that. Except that with a gale blowing, and riding road bikes and road helmets, with only clip on bars allowed, the lumberjack (former lumberjack to be accurate) managed to average over 31mph with the equivalent of a short 19 minute ‘10’. They must have got the distance wrong. Mustn’t they?
I
should be pleased with my 30mph ride for 14th, but surprise, surprise, I’m not. TT’s are great for if-onlys, and 10 secs quicker would have been top 6. But I decided to try and win and so, rode possibly my worst paced time trial ever. I had my wee toy on (srm power cranks) and knew I would need to do at least 420 watts to be in with a shout. So I blasted to the turn holding that, and planned to try and lift it. But mice and men and plans best laid etc…etc…et cetera.
I got to the turn fine, and caught my minute man, Santiago Blanco. The
cheeky bugger even tried to sit on me. Poor old guy never managed to
get on my wheel (check my bad self!). It all went a bit Pete Tong after
that though and any time I glanced at the power meter it was reading “Haha,
You are joking, Pal”.
So I kind of grovelled my way on thinking (even though it was a straight
out and back course) I had surely gone off course, as it seemed to be
at least twice as long coming back.
Slid on up to 11th on GC, more from the others slipping down than anything
else.
Phillip lost a bit of time, after a pre-race incident that I absolutely can’t mention. Definitely nothing whatsoever to do with tri-bars, studying his front hub and somersaults. Nothing he won’t make back while floating up the monster called Genting highlands though.
“Order of team service vehicles for stage 6
…
7 Ireland
8 Lampre
“
Frankie, john and co. got a kick out of that at least.
Stage 6
After Eugene’s good sprint we decided we should give him a bit of a hand if it came down to it, and as luck would have it, it did. Only problem was the stage was just a little bit fast.
First attack of the day: can you guess? IRELAND! As David O’Loughlin took off at the drop of the flag, they were having none of it though, and attack after attack all got brought back until, that is, there was the nasty crash. Chocolate Jack were at the front and called a time out to let the victims get back on. Then they chased down a rogue attack and rather than give the guy a rollocking, they decided to go for it. A lot of very naughty boys on this race. So next thing you know there are 12 guys up the road riding flat out with an 8 second gap and the Selle Italia team going bananas after it. 10 seconds, 12 seconds. I go to change up into the 11 but see I’m already in the 10 sprocket I has specially put on for just such an eventuality. My legs are sore. Team Relax, go to it, and the pace goes up a notch, 14 seconds, 15 seconds, and I’m thinking ‘This is just like the Rás, great.’ So, we belt on into wind, that can’t decide what way to blow, and a few more guys bounce into the ditch and kiss the tarmac. And yet the group somehow draw the gap out to 2 minutes. Then the Ken Barlow fan club team decide they’d better chip in a bit. The break realise you just cant go that fast and get away with it, and the gap comes down to where its looking distinctly like its going to come together for a bit of a gallop.
I only play “Pick a winner” because I’m really good at it. O’Loughlin shows his yank background and picks Gord Fraser, while I do likewise and pick Quaranta, but with a pound each way on Moriarty.
Griffo and myself do our best to skulk around just behind the sprinters teams in the last 15km and leaving it as late as we can, we charge Eugene up in the last 2km. Although we didn’t get him anywhere near as close to the front as we should have, he manages to weave his way through the charge to get 5th. I’m impressed.
No after stage transfer today is a blessing and we finish right outside
the luxurious hotel. At the front door, we are offered towels to clean
off the dust of the day, and a drink of water. In with are room key I
find are free drink vouchers.
Hmmm. Waste not want not, Rodney. Waste not want not, my son.
Stage 7
Still can't shake that damn jet-lag totally, so I wake before 7 again and, having lost my stage race essentials (ear plugs), I listen to the traffic below until breakfast time. I'd kill for a good long sleep, the sort where you wake up sleepy but not tired, as opposed to this kind, where I wake up not a bit sleepy, but still tired. The morning appetite has gone walkabout too, so breakfast is now a bit of a chore to get out of the way before a quick lie down to steady my nerves for the transfer to the stage start. Malaysian traffic is a bit of an experience and can put your nerves on end. Denis 'the Buddha' Lynch had it under control though, and chanted 'Aaammm' all the way until we arrived. Great atmoshpere at the start.
Had a quick chat with David Duffield and was a bit taken aback when we talked about nothing but the race. Not a Chateau or fine beaujolais was mentioned!
Plenty of attacks again and enough crosswind to ensure a few more people hit the deck. Euge got away in a dangerous enough 8-man break for 15k or so but it never really got off the ground. With no-one really getting anywhere, after an hour and a half we just had a bit of a time-out and rode piano for a while. It wasn't to last though, and me old mate Shinichi Fukushimi, launched himself up the road for the next few hours, going really well, but really just dangling there until the sprinters teams decided to reel him in. Griffo popped off in a little break after that, but it wasn't going to be allowed to prosper with the sprinters able to smell the finish line.
More thrills and spills were to ensue then, as the run in was the fastest yet. The problem was, it wasn’t really until the last 10 miles that the bunch got up a good head of steam and there were a few too many fresh legs and keen heads up for the sprint. I got bossy then, and the Paddys got organised. We had all 6 of us working to get Eugene into a good position with a minimum of effort for the gallop. So instead of the Saeco train, we had the Iarnród Eireann charging up the side of the bunch! An unfortunate police marshall, who must have been looking for Jalabert, was in the middle of the road and ended up taking a fair smack from a couple of riders. The bunch split like the parting of the red sea as the poor guy hit the deck, spinning, and I was fortunate not to soil my shorts. Well, maybe just a bit. So that was how Denis and I came to be in the middle of a 40mph bunch sprint going 'Aaaammm'. The chaos messed up the Iarnród Eireann boys for a while, but with a late charge we got Eugene up onto Quaranta's wheel just in time for the pair of them to be taken out with a mega switch that split the bunch in the last 500metres. Just after the finish Quaranta had an Italian fight with an Iranian (that’s where you mouth off and threaten a lot, and even throw pretend punches, but don’t actually do anything). He looked tough and angry, but my money was on the Iranian if it kicked off.
In spite of no result, it was good to have the whole team working so
well together in a bunch sprint of that insane speed. Eugene ended up
15th. Were not there yet, but we're getting there.
I've a bit of a sore throat coming on, and the Doc decided to give me
antibiotics, which I really don’t want to take. But, the legs felt
good on the massage table tonight. Benji and Jerry are doing a great
job. Genting would scare the Bejaysus out of anyone but I have my fingers
crossed I wont have to get off and walk more than just the once.
Only half a stage tomorrow, at 96km. And, glory of glories, a 3:30pm
start, so we can sleep in. Or in my case, stare at the ceiling for an
extra hour or two. 'Aaaammmm'
Stage 8
Damn it! I missed the Formula 1 circuit. We rode right past it too, but yet again I was too engrossed with the wheel in front of me to see it. A lazy morning was great....the stage didn't start until 3:30pm, although we still had a transfer of 120km to drive before we got going. Much hotter too, later in the day, and so starting with a bag of ice cubes down the back of your jersey seems to be all the rage this week. No vest of course, so one less thing to wash!
It was another fast start, and blowing a gale again. Plenty of
crosswind and most of the day spent on a motorway so it was line-out city for quite a while. The legs didn't feel the Geordie best today at all, nothing to write home about but just not as grrrrreat as they have been. It's been a strange race, in that the teams going for the GC aren't letting anything get away much at all. Even groups of guys who are all 20 minutes down are being chased. Pretty strange. Especially when there are sprinters'
teams here who could do the chasing. Actually, today they did finally do the decent thing and start to give Selle Italia a bit of a hand later in the stage. Alas, it was to be a bunch sprint again. Anyway, with the big climb and important GC to go for tomorrow, I made the wise decision to....(wait for it).....get stuck into the middle of the sprint and tried to help Eugene hold a good position. We had a good little green group near the front of the bunch for the run in, although in the end it was to be pot
luck as to who got switched just the 3 or 4 times, who got pushed out once too many, and who came down in a heap. And that was me, as it happened. Right at the kilometre flag a couple of the guys in front decided to set up an impromptu road block, and although I almost got stopped, I'm afraid it was to be over the bars for Davy boy. What fun. Just a bit of a hole in my knee and elbow and a nicely bruised hip and lower back for my trouble.
Lucky really, as it could have been much worse, given the speed we were doing. Eugene got nicely switched too, but Philip got it right and somehow got Gord Fraser's wheel at just the right moment, for another excellent 6th place.
The down side to our lazy morning was then a late finish and a huge
traffic jam transfer into central Kuala Lumpur. We arrived so late that
Griffo (Paul Griffin) and Davy O' L (David O'Loughlin) thought it best
to go straight into dinner wearing only 'the wife beater' as Davy called
it. Wearing their sweaty sleeveless vests with cyclist tans and 5 o'clock
shadow, a few of the swanky hotel's guests gave them a wide berth. A
scary sight, I can tell you...
Food, Massage, sleep, pretty dull evening.
Stage 9
Stage race fatigue setting in, and wit and inventiveness seeping out, so at 11pm after the hardest day of the race, I'm sat on bed under Philips make-shift clothes drier (i.e. rotary ceiling fan spinning round with clothing hanging from it.) trying to remember my name. 1700metre climbs do strange thing to the mind alright, and Philip is marching round the room singing to himself 'They know what. Is. What. But they don't know what is what, they just strut'. I think he's talking about the Malay Monkeys that
he saw on National Geographic, but I'm not sure at all. I made the last minute decision to ditch the 25 sprocket and go with
the 27. Philip (Deignan), riding campag, couldn't get a 27. But, Frank (manager) found a 29, 26 up cassette which he went with. Good call on both counts, as we were both in 'first' plenty. Hard to describe Genting really. Think Gap of Mamore lasting 75 minutes.
Denis (Lynch) got up the road in another none to dangerous group, early on, but again they just weren't having it, and although there were a few more attacks, mostly everyone was just waiting for 'THE HILL'. We hit the foot slopes and for some reason I had 'O Fortuna' going round in my head (the scary music from The Omen) and Freddy Gonzalez was starting to look more like Freddy Krueger with every metre we climbed.
It got hot, with a capital Bloody, as we got about half way up the hill and the bunch whittled down from behind until there were only about 40 left. Then we hit the steep final 10km and, Bang; Bodies everywhere. No groups at first, just strung out riders, metres apart, then I ended up in a nice little group with Santiago Blanco, Sergio Barbero, my good buddy Eric and a few other godly Freds.
Of course it couldn't last, and once we'd been climbing for around an hour the group sort of drifted apart, leaving each of us to suffer in peace.
Blanco raced up to a group with Phillip in it and I sat 20seconds
behind (or about 60 metres, at the speed we were going) staring longingly at the group for the next, oh, eternity.
Thankfully we were heading into the clouds so it cooled down a fair bit and after what seemed only forever, the last 2km was upon us. Philip decided to come back and keep me company for a bit, which was nice, as I was a little bit worried about passing out with pins and needles up both arms and just a hint of tunnel vision coming on. Then it was over. And cold. And lets get to the hotel quick, and who cares where we finished. 19th and 22nd as it happened and me down to 14th on GC. Disappointed,
but if you'd have said that a week ago I 'd have laughed. Philip back up to 16th, and just the crit to go. Although its driving down the hill tomorrow morning that I'm worried about, I hope the brake pads are up to it.
Stage 10
Final stage crits are great, eh? A definite air of relief surrounded
the start area. And although you knew it would still be a hard, fast stage,
you also knew that having gotten this far, it wouldn't be anything you couldn't handle.
Definite sore legs after the climb yesterday though. Took a while to get going alright. I misunderstood that there was to be a neutralised lap, so started at the back. Bit of a surprise then as they took off from the gun straight into a 30mph first lap, which set the tone for the rest of the stage.
We had one bit of excitement, when Eric Wohlberg gave Philip the slip and popped off up the road before a time bonus sprint. Since he was only 3 seconds behind Philip on GC, Griffo (Paul Griffin) went to the front and tried to reel in his 4 man break. I ended up going across to his group and then past it, taking the bonus sprint. Then I ended up off the bloody front with Scott Moninger. With nothing better to do, we gave it stick then for a bit, and we held off the bunch for a while. It was always going
to be a bunch sprint, but it was good to hammer off up the road,
showing off the Ireland jersey at the front of the race some more. Wasn't so great to nearly go out the back of the bunch once we got caught, though!
I didn't fancy another spill so stayed safe in the final lap and left
the rough stuff to Eugene, who pushed his way through to get another top 10.
Reading over this, its pretty clear that day-after brain numb has set in.
Apologies for my lack of sparkle. Stage 11 probably has something to do with that. But I won't bother to tell you about that MOST entertaining stage.
Thanks for reading my rantings.
DMC
Navigation
