Farvel to Denmark

It's time to say goodbye (farvel). This is our last night here before flying out for good old Australia tomorrow morning.

With bikes packed and a spare day up our sleeves we headed up the coast north of Copenhagen to have a look at Kronborg Castle, or Hamlet's Castle as it is also known after Shakespeare used it as the setting for Hamlet.  The castle is located at Helsingor and within sight of Sweden.  Anyone interested in castles can find more information at http://www.copenhagenet.dk/CPH-Kronborg.htm.

Helsingor is worth a visit itself, situated right on the coast and very popular with boat owners as the following photo shows.

A very small selection of Helsingor's boat population

Kronborg Castle is very impressive. While it dates back to the 1600s, it's obviously been very well maintained, making it possible to really get a sense of how it must have been when it was a fully operational castle housing king and court.


Kronborg Castle from afar. It gives some sense of how imposing it is



Canons are situated all around the outer walls of the castle, apparently still at the ready if the
canonballs are anything to go by!

One corner of the enormous inner courtyard.

While in the castle, we discovered how Google Maps covers the areas where cars and other motorised vehicles can't go. It really was a case of the old meets the new.


Google Maps tricycle complete with all the paraphernalia necessary to photograph the world. Literally!

 The afternoon was spent on a final foray into Copenhagen for one last lap of Stroget, the capital's famous shopping street.  Copenhagen is not that much richer for having us there, but we enjoyed the spectacle of ancient buildings standing shoulder to shoulder with all the modern fashion houses and a huge variety of shops from an outlet devoted entirely to Lego, to a t-shirt outlet selling a variety of t-shirts and sweatshirts of a brand name not repeatable in polite company, and more jewellery shops than you could imagine!  All good fun and a good way to soak up those last few hours before returning to reality.

Copenhagen Town Hall

So this will be the last post from Denmark.  Thanks for tuning in and I hope you've enjoyed this journey with me.

Farvel and tak.

A little bit of luck goes a long way

The Roskilde World Championships circuit hosted the men's and women's tandem races this afternoon.  As predicted, the narrow and technical circuit proved challenging for the longer two wheeled machines, with several bikes coming to grief.

On one such occasion the victims of the misfortune were one of the American pairs in the women's race.  They suffered a front wheel puncture on one of the sharper corners of the circuit on lap 4 of 5 and had no hope of staying upright.  Brandie and Kerry were right behind them on the road and narrowly avoided kissing the bitumen with the Americans.  Rumour has it that Kerry has a future in any sport requiring the ability to change direction rapidly - she managed to muscle the Australian tandem out of harm's way and keep her and Brandie in the race. 

Unfortunately the interference with forward motion just as they were about to climb a small rise saw them lose contact with the main bunch, which at the same time, launched a series of attacks which effectively put paid to our girls' chances of regaining contact and being in a position to contest the final sprint. Still, better to be upright and finish the race off the pace than to be spending the night and ensuing days nursing road rash!

Kerry and Brandie getting involved in the action on lap 1 of the tandem road race

Of the other Australians in action this afternoon, Carol Cooke again added a silver medal to the team's tally in her trike road race, beaten by the same Canadian who won the time trial.

By my reckoning, Australia finished the 2011 World Road Para Cycling Championships with three gold medals and four silver medals.  Chinese Taipei produced its best ever result at Para Championships, with a 6th and a 4th.  Yes, OK, this is the first time, but congratulations to Jing for acquitting herself with great dedication and persistence.

Tomorrow everyone will enjoy some free time before flying out for Australia on Tuesday morning, another Worlds done and dusted.

Look out world, here comes Jing!

In her first World Road Championship appearance, Jing has improved from 6th in the time trial to finish a strong 4th in today's road race. The race was run over three laps of the 15.2km race circuit at Roskilde (the time trial was one lap of the same course).

The field stayed together for most of the first lap but the American defending champion, a Spanish C2 and a German C3 rider rode away on one of the climbs towards the end of lap one. The Spanish rider found the going a bit tough and dropped off, leaving the American and the German to ride together for the rest of the race, crossing the finish line with a joint victory salute for the cameras.

Meanwhile, Jing was having her own personal battle with another C3 rider, who narrowly edged her out in the sprint finish, but since they're in different divisions, it was academic anyway.

Here's Jing, very relieved to be crossing the finish line

This afternoon the tandem divisions have their road races, so more results later...

Deja Vu All Over Again

Sue Powell, World Champion. Again. Just in a different event this time.  Today Sue dominated the C4 Women's Road Race with a clever combination of attacks and conserving energy when it mattered.  As would have been expected after the time trial, when the three C4 women were separated by less than 12 seconds over 15km, the race came down to a sprint finish.  After 60km of racing, Sue took the gold by about 20cm ahead of Marie-Claude Molnar (Canada), with the Megan Fisher (USA) rounding out the placings.

On the podium again. Only two medals are awarded when there are only three starters

And what of the rest of we mere mortals?

Last night Jenny, Jing and I had dinner at Noma, Copenhagen's famous restaurant voted best in the world for the last two years.

Outside Noma which is housed in an old warehouse on the waterfront in Copenhagen

At Noma there is no menu, you simply eat what is put in front of you. And what is put in front of you is a range of very small servings of a wide variety of locally produced exotic fare. We had about nine appetisers including Reindeer moss, deep fried and served with creme fraiche..

Reindeer moss imported from Finland, served deep fried

The appetisers were followed by seven main courses and bread served with pig fat crumble and unclarified butter.  If you are into exotic food I suggest you go to http://www.noma.dk/ and check out the full menu.  It's certainly an experience!

This morning those who raced yesterday had a light recovery day and took in some more stunningly green Danish scenery.  Of course, one must have the obligatory "I was here" photo -

Jing and Kerry on the outskirts of Ringsted

As I've mentioned, Jing is here representing Chinese Taipei and this morning, the Chinese Taipei Ambassador to Denmark, his wife and secretary paid a visit to the Chinese Taipei team at out hotel.  It was an honour for us to have this meeting and to be able to provide some background on Para Cycling. 


Jing explains the finer points of cycling to the Ambassador

And so ends another varied and busy day in the world of para cycling.  Tomorrow is the last day of racing and Jing and Brandie and Kerry have their road races to complete proceedings.


Time Trials Done and Dusted

The time trials for all categories are now finished.  Unfortunately the second day wasn't quite as successful as the first but Australia still finished on the podium twice, with silver medals to Michael Gallagher in the C5 Men and Carol Cooke in the WT2 (women's trike) category.

Brandie and Kerry couldn't quite find their rhythm in the Women's tandem category and finished in 16th place. We'll chalk that one up to experience and move on to the road race tomorrow to look for a better showing.

In the women's C2 division, Jing delivered Chinese Taipei's first top 10 World Para Championships result, finishing 6th in her category and overtaking the rider from Russia, who started three minutes in front of her, in the process.  Jing's average speed was close to a personal best and Taiwan can be very proud of her representation.  Jing is also looking forward to the road race to see what it's like racing elbow to elbow with others in her category.

Today Sue is in action in the combined women's C4/C5 road race.  Sara Storey (C5) from Great Britain is also in this race and is a formidable rider in able bodied elite company, so my prediction is that the pace will be on and only the brave will survive!  Tune in later for results/report from this race.

Sue Powell, World Para Cycling C4 Time Trial Champion

Yes, the first events of the Championships are completed and Australia leads the medal count with two Gold medals.  David Nicholas won the Men's C3 Time Trial and Sue Powell has reclaimed the Women's C4 crown.

Final times haven't been posted yet, but David blazed around the 15km course in around 20 minutes.

Sue powered her way around in a stunning display of power and technique to shut out the USA rider who beat her by a full minute last year.

And here's the proof!

Another Rainbow Jersey for the collection!

That's it for now.  Time for.... you guessed it, a well earnt cup of coffee.....

More Wild and Woolly Weather

Today was another day of rain and extreme wind, which kept the temperature down and anyone vaguely faint hearted indoors.  Not the intrepid Australian and Chinese Taipei teams though. In the interests of cross team harmony, Australian physio and classifier Anouska and Taipei's star athlete Jing came together for a trainer session early this morning, fully supported by various members of the Australian team waiting to leave for their training session on the course.

Jing and Anouska tough it out in the wind on the trainers while Kerry, Brandie, Sue, Peter and Jayme provide moral support or distraction, depending on your perspective!

Kerry and Brandie had an interesting time on the tandem, suffering a puncture only a few kilometres into their training ride, then as the wheel was changed, the sky opened up and it started to pour.  Some days are like that I guess.

But no matter what the weather...

A very rainy, windblown view from the hotel room

...there's always the reward of a hot cup of coffee waiting, if you just know where to look...

Latte at the local cafe

Today things started to get serious around race headquarters.  This morning we collected numbers, had racing kit inspected to ensure it complied with UCI regulations and were issued timing chips - after handing over a 100 euro deposit!

This afternoon at the Manager's Meeting we were briefed on all the various requirements for the next few days of racing, like where we have to park, how and when riders have to turn up for their time trials, when and where feeding is permitted during the road races and so on  all the administrative stuff that ensures the racing runs smoothly.  We were also given cool stickers to put on the front and rear of our cars to show that we are really allowed to follow our riders during the time trial.  What a shame they gave me stickers with "Turkey" on them instead of "Chinese Taipei"! Might have to do something about that tomorrow.

The day ended with yet another drive from Roskilde to Ringsted, but this time I was able to enjoy the scenery from a passenger seat. Soon we won't have to drive the vans because they'll know the way on their own! Here's an example of the scenery along the roadside.

The benefit of all the rain

Tomorrow marks the start of the business end of the trip.  Sue races in her C4 time trial starting at 2.14pm local time (10.14pm AEST). Australia also has three other competitors in action tomorrow. Jing and Brandie and Kerry will be on course racing for the first time on Friday.

Tune in tomorrow for results and race report.

Bikes, Bikes, Everywhere Bikes!

The thing that has astounded us most here in Denmark is the absolute respect motorists have for bikes.  There are on road bike lanes on all the major roads and at intersections the bikes have right of way.  At face value this doesn't sound much different to at home in Canberra.  Except that here, the cars actually give way, to the extent of reversing back from the bike lane if they drive out a little too far then see a bike coming!

The law here is that if there is a bike lane, bikes have to use it, and the law is pretty stringently applied, so that may have something to do with it.  As a result of the mutual respect however,ignificant numbers of people ride, and there are bikes of all shapes and sizes imagineable, everywhere you look. The bike parking areas at the railway stations are bigger than the car parks and are full of bikes from people commuting to Copenhagen from regional centres such as Ringsted and Roskilde, and its impossible to walk down pretty well any street without walking past rows of bikes. There's a lot of 'town bikes' - upright straight barred bikes with all the necessary guards that allow people to ride in suits and skirts, but there's a lot of hybrids and the occasional mountain bike. 

Bicycle parking in Copenhagen

People ride in every sort of clothing imagineable and mainly without helmets - don't want to spoil the hair on the way to work after all!

Here's an example of one of the more modern hybrids around the place.  Note the brand name stamped into the frame.

A Copenhagen "Avenue" bike

And what of the other bikes that we're actually here for?  Today we spent some more time on the course.  The wind was even stronger than the last time, but coming from a slightly different direction.  With the weather so far, there's no question that the wind will be a significant influence once racing begins, unless the forecast for rain is accurate.  The wind seems to drop a bit when the rain comes in.  If we're really lucky we might get both!

Here's Sue and Kerry getting ready to spend some more time etching the twists and turns of the race circuit into their memories.  As you can see from Kerry's attire, it was a bit cooler this morning.



Sue and Kerry mounting up.  Note the Avis van - graffiti artists are alive and well in Denmark too.

I took the following photo to give some idea of how tights parts of the course will be.

This is the narrowest stretch of road that the bunches have to pass through. It's about halfway through the race lap.  You can see a street sign at the back of the picture.  This signifies the T-junction immediately after this little squeeze.  The competitors have to make a tightening right hand turn at this T-junction, just to keep it interesting. And interesting it will be when the field of 40+ men's tandems, 20+ women's tandems or 50+ men's C1-3 bunch come through. Could be a good place to take photos!

I had to include the following photo just to prove we really are in Denmark at the World Para Road Cycling Championships.  The picture is a lot like the rest of the country - a curious mix of traditional and modern.



Not the oldest street sign I've seen, but almost ancient by comparison with the UCI sign beneath. This is the turn onto the finishing straight

  The mixture of traditional and modern is illustrated everywhere in Copenhagen.  We took a train ride into the capital this afternoon and treated ourselves to a canal tour.  Everywhere you look there are original buildings built as early as the 1600s (maybe earlier, but that's what I noticed) and right next door something extemely modern. In fact the "Black Diamond" is a renowned extension to the original city library and is a huge black, glass encased building constructed off the original, centuries old library building. Quite fascinating.

From the canal tour you get a good appreciation of how important boats are to the Danish people, although from the state of some that we saw moored in the canals, some people are a little more familiar with the bridges now joining Denmark to surrounding islands and countries than they may have once been with their boats!

Some of the more impressive craft along the canals

With more rain forecast for tomorrow it looks like being another wind trainer day, but we will wait and see.  Only two more days til racing starts, so we're nearly at the serious stuff.  Stay tuned...


And then there was rain... Oh, and colds.

We woke this morning to the not so soothing sound of constant rain. Not so good for practising on a technical course and not worth risking falls so close to competition. It wasn't such an issue for Sue, who was given the day off to try to see off the cold bug that's been plaguing her since a couple of days after arrival.  Kerry also had the day off to try to prevent the onset of the same bug. Brandie has also had the bug but is on the way up again, so good timing for the commencement of competition later in the week.

Jing has managed to stay healthy - must be because she's part of a different team! We still weren't prepared to chance it by going out in the rain, so she completed a productive session on the trainer, blowing the cobwebs out of the system.

This afternoon saw us doing another reccie of the course in the van. Its not quite as good as actually riding it, but it allowed us to identify a few more important things that will help get the best possible result come race day.

The weather also afforded an opportunity to check out the Factory Outlet Centre across the road from the hotel, and another couple of coffee shops.  At between $7-8 per cup of coffee, we're on rations though!

We picked up our accreditation from Championships HQ without any hassles, although there were some raised eyebrows when three English speaking people fronted up representing Chinese Taipei!  At least Jing and Jenny look the part.  I just maintained that I was adopted.  It elicited some laughs, but somehow I don't think anyone took me seriously.  We now look very official in our very smart team kit AND our accreditation cards on our very special "Sport Event Denmark" lanyards.

We're hopeful of good weather for tomorrow to allow some more riding on the course and then hopefully a half day trip to Copenhagen for some R&R pre race day.

Shotguns, Vintage Cars and Electric Fences

Yep, today we've seen it all!

We drove over to Roskilde this morning to familiarise with the course.  Our little Chinese Taipei team was lucky enough to go the 30-something kilometres in convoy with the Australian team, since we hadn't been there before and they knew where they were going.  Made it much easier than finding our own way!

We drove around the course first to make sure we knew where to go, but we needn't have worried as the Danish organisers had already been out on the course and there were helpful arrows clearly identifying every turn. Next step was onto the bikes for Jing to do a semi dress rehearsal on her time trial bike with me hanging desperately onto her back wheel offering advice on cornering lines etc, when breathing permitted it!

Jing taking in the scenery on the course

The course quickly leaves urban Roskilde, the road becomes quite narrow and winds its way through small country villages that are only a very few kilometres away from town, but in appearance could be 100 years away - thatched roofs, doors opening onto the road and so on.

The view towards Roskilde from the back of the course

So the reference in the post heading? Well first of all, we rounded a corner to the sounds of shotgun fire to discover a full blown duck hunt going on around the shores of a small lake between a few cottages.  One of the shotgun wielding crew looked to be no more than about 12, but, safety first, at least he was wearing protective earmuffs! We quickly carried on in case they mistook us for flightless birds and showed us a different kind of Danish welcome. 

Vintage cars.  I think there must have been a vintage car rally on somewhere because there was a constant stream of rather old cars passing by.  For the most part this wasn't an issue, but a couple of times it caused a bit of nervousness when confronted with an old 1950-60s Rolls Royce or similar, which took up the entire narrow country road, or an even older, "real" vintage car (1920s), which seemed to have difficulty with the steering, heading straight for us on a bend, but then veering back onto its own side of the road at the last moment!

In spite of various suggestions that Denmark is totally flat and there can't possibly be any hills on the course, it's actually quite undulating and to add to the interest, has several quite tight corners, which when combined with the narrow roads, will make for some interesting racing if anyone is feeling a bit daredevil.  One of the Australian hand cyclists, Michael, tried out one of the sharp downhill corners today and overcooked it a bit. After a spectacular barrel roll/flip with a degree of difficulty Matthew Mitcham would be proud of, he ended up in the long grass adjacent to the road.  This of itself wouldn't have been an issue, except that in true Tour de France style, he ended up tangled up in the fence.  Fortunately not barbed wire, but as it turned out, an electric stock fence.  Needless to say, a great deal of care was taken extracting him!!

Since there was a cast of thousands on hand to see Michael right, Jing and I continued on our way and made friends with a local Danish para cyclist, Bo and rode for a few kilometres with him before Jing rode off to complete the course on her own.

A matching pair...


On the drive back to Ringsted, we took the time to get in touch with our inner Monets.

On the road between Ringsted and Roskilde

And as any dedicated cyclist knows, a good ride has to finish with a good coffee, so let's do the same for this post - 

Cappuccino and Latte, Roskilde-style

Greetings from Denmark

Where the days are long and the weather is warm....

After a long 24 hours or so of travel we've arrived safe and sound in Denmark.  We landed at 7.30 this morning and now, 13 hours later, I think the jet lag is starting to set in!  A good night's sleep should see that off though.

It turned out that the New Zealand team and one member of the Australian team were on the same flight as us from Singapore to Copenhagen, so it was quite the invasion of the Paras.

On arrival at Copenhagen we cleared Customs and Immigration pretty quickly, then were fortunate enough to have all the bike gear come into the terminal from the plane in one piece and at the same time as the other luggage. We picked up the other Aussie, Mel's, gear for her so she didn't have to manipulate luggage, hand cycle and wheel bags from her wheelchair. This brought our total luggage to three bike boxes, a hand cycle, two wheel cases, two wheel bags, four wheelie suitcases cases, two soft bags and various backpacks!  Not surprising then, that we had a bit of fun getting our four trolleys and a hand cycle out of the baggage collection area with only three people pushing, but we managed with the help of a random stranger!  We handed Mel off to the Australian crew there to pick her up and set about finding out where to get taxis and where we could make a pickup after we picked up the hire van.

Jing and I set off in a taxi to downtown Copenhagen to get the van, leaving Jenny a forlorn figure on the side of the road "guarding" three bike boxes, two wheel cases and various assorted other pieces of luggage.

We returned in record time, with only one wrong turn on the way, and without ever straying onto the wrong side of the road (given they drive on the 'wrong' side over here).  Jenny and all the gear were safely waiting, so we set about loading up, only to be accosted by the Kiwis, whose van hadn't turned up to pick up their gea. A few minutes later we set off for Ringsted with a very full van loaded up with Kiwi equipment.  Had we not just stepped off a long haul flight and been a little more alert we could have enhanced the Aussie hopes of medals significantly by conveniently losing a truckload of bikes.  Oh well, lucky we're nice people!

Once registered at our hotel - the Scandic Ringsted, the bikes obligingly went together without any hiccups and we all set off for a ride to blow the cobwebs out, Jenny on a townie bike borrowed from the hotel. The law in Denmark is that if there's a bike path running along the road (separated by a narrow grass verge or a concrete gutter) bikes of all types have to use it - apparently that rule applies to motorised scooters as well, because we encountered quite a few of those on the paths as well as bicycles. Fortunately the lanes appear to be well maintained, wide and uninterrupted for the most part, and bikes have right of way at intersections with side streets and the local motorists seem to be very well behaved.

 Jing and I managed nearly an hour.  Jenny lasted really well on the ton-of-lead townie, but turned for home at the first sign of the road going slightly uphill.  Who could blame her with only one gear, tyres twice as wide as ours, and a bike that probably weighed more than all the bikes we transported from the airport put together!

A reccie of the course is planned for tomorrow morning, but now it's time to give in to the need for sleep.  More soon.....