Stage 8 - So It Begins...

Well, stage 8 was the big one we were looking forward to before our first couple of days of rest coming up.  We had 7 categorized climbs to tackle with a few cat 1’s and 2’s to finish off the day.  Everyone was a little nervous going in but we had our trusty SRAM WiFli gearing finally set up so we knew we could do it!

Actually, the stage was amazing on so many levels.  The climbing was great, with some stunning views and awesome descents.  We also traveled across the French boarder into Switzerland!  Can I just say that Switzerland is my new favorite place on Earth!  It’s gorgeous and so friendly.  You just have to smile while you’re there. I think it’s a law or something.  All of the cows and goats have bells around their necks and every little house and village is so cute.  Ya, Nick, scratch the French seaside idea from a few days ago… Switzerland is the real place we’re moving!

But as far as the climbs went, we all did great and got up every one of them without much trouble.  In fact, I thought the Col de la Coix was going to be waaaay harder.  But it wasn’t all that bad.  I actually thought the Cote de Saulcy was the toughest of the day.  But as someone mentioned, sometimes the difficulty depends more on your blood sugar levels than anything else. 

Overall, the team is working great together.  We worked through some of our issues and I think everyone is really enjoying their time out on the bike.  We split up at times so we can all ride the climbs at our own pace.  That way nobody is blowing out knees with super low cadence and nobody is pushing too hard and blows themselves for the next few stages.  It’s definitely something you have to be a part of to understand and we’re hoping people will just start having a little faith in us that we’ve got things under control from that perspective.