Truly felt the cycling vibe today. Rolling along in the group ride. Who is a few rows ahead of me? None other than the man himself – Sven Nys. Doesn’t get much cooler than that. As Tim said “All the greats were out today.”

Hopped into the group ride close to the house and then dropped off with Marc and Ed in Zichem. Marc took us on a fun route that involved one of the largest and steepest hills I’ve seen in Belgium. I kind of thought Marc was joking when he said the hill was steep. So of course, I attacked… Mistake – big one. That hill was steep. Looking forward to riding it again next week.

Did a nice solo ride after that. No music. Just me, the bike and awesome little Belgium farm roads. Hooked up onto some of my favorite routes. Nice steady pace. A few openers for tomorrow. Not often that I ride without music. Had my iPod but just really wanted to get all the sense firing today.

Pretty chilled day today. Made a quick trip to the bike shop. Picked up some gear and Marc bought some swank gloves – some super warm Sealskin gloves and some slick BBB racing gloves. I might get some BBB gloves for myself – at 9 euros – can’t really go wrong.

Just us Canadians here at the house right now. Tim and Jos are over at Blauberg getting the British Cycling Federation riders settled in. We’re all flaked out getting caught up on the action of the day. Have a good one. Send me some fast vibes tomorrow. I’m racing at 1:30 (7:30 a.m. EST). Marc and Ed race at noon (6 a.m. EST).

Oh, it was kind of wet on the ride today. Not raining. Just greasy. See for yourself.

Muddy and happy