A Day in the Team Car at Omloop Het Volk

Good morning all!

Yesterday I had the wonderful opportunity to ride along in the passengers seat for the Thompson Junior Cycling Team during the Omloop Het Volk Junioren. I would spend the day with Director Sportif, Wim De Wolf. We would go to sign in, attend the directors meeting, and support the team for the 119.5km long race by providing mechanical support, along with the occasional bidon (water battle).



As much the cyclists ability to win is determined by his endurance, desire, and heart to succeed, cycling also comes down to equipment. There are two cars at the race. A van is used to house all of the larger mechanical equipment, spare parts, and tools. The team car is then packed for the day with the basic necessary items. To the left is the position of the mechanic. He rides along with a spare set of wheels, some tools, and also assists in keeping notes about the race.




The car is loaded up with spare front wheels, spare rear wheels, drinks, energy bars, energy gels, and other small items that a rider might need. On top of the car are spare bikes in case of a major mechanical.

I think it is truly hard for any American to realize what this is like. Imagine an American family that is involved with sports, say baseball. Part or the entire family might come to a game and watch. They all gather around their star player before the game and do what families do best, embarrass each other. It become an entire Saturday/Sunday tradition. The parents are running around trying to make sure they have all the right gear, everything is going smoothly, and they are all chatting game strategy. Take the same atmosphere and replace the game of baseball with the sport of cycling. Parents are helping out to double check the air pressure on their race bikes, they are putting together food, drinks, and all gathered around chatting about how the race will go. Now add the fact that these young adults (23 and under) are racing at speeds of 50 to 60km/u between cars, over cobblestones, and with nearly 200 hundred other young adults.


Right before the race there is a quick debriefing. The Director Sportif (DS for short) talks to the riders and discusses some key points in the race and where to pay attention. In the professional races the DS is allowed to utilize a radio to communicate to each one of their riders during a race. Each cyclist wears and ear piece that also allows them to communicate to the DS. At the Junior level however earplugs are not allowed. So any race communication is exchanged by the DS driving to the rider and telling them what is going on. In the team car there is a radio to listen to "race radio." Race radio provides a constant update on the race situation. They give the numbers of the riders in the breakaway so you can look them up on your rider list, inform DS of riders that have a mechanical and riders that are dropping back.

The total length of the race was 119.5km and before 10km had finished there was a crash, a puncture, and the bunch was driving along at nearly 60km/u! The video below is of one of the riders whose bike had broke and needed a new bike. The video starts just as we hear race radio announcing the number of the rider who was in difficulty and we begin to race to the rider as fast as possible. After the rider has his new bike we chase back up to him and assist him in rejoining the race by using the car to allow the rider to draft behind. This enables the rider to go faster with less energy and hopefully rejoin the race. If you are thinking to yourself, well isn't that cheating? Then you will never make a good DS.



Without individual radios to communicate with each rider for any information that the DS wants to share he has to drive up to the rider and have a "casual conversation." Not exactly. Here we are on a cobbled section of 2km and as we are racing to catch up to the bunch we pass one of our riders and have a chat.



All in all it was an incredible day. I will say though there were certainly periods when all I wanted to do was get on there bike and ride like heck for them. The level of competition I saw that day was like nothing I've ever seen in person before. I was also thinking about what/where I might be today if I was a kid brought up in Flanders. Instead of playing hockey or soccer. Riding around all day on my bike would have actually been a sport I could have played. Always something to think about. I also learned a lot about my own racing. The ability to sit back and watch a race unfold can really teach you a lot about decision making during a race. Hopefully I will be use some of this knowledge to do a bit better.





























The long line of team cars and the peleton up ahead. The motorbikes travel with the race and ride up ahead of the race to close the roads and protect the riders.