Photo: © Casey Gibson

Time for a change: The Kimberly Bruckner Journal 2003

Last year the 2001 US Road Champion Kimberly Bruckner left the number one ranked women's team in the US after two years with Saturn and joined the growing force that is Team T-Mobile. With her sights firmly set on the Worlds in Hamilton and the Olympic Games in Athens in 2004, Kimberly's diary is sure to provide compelling reading.

• Index to all entries

Up and down at Flèche Wallonne

Huy, Belgium, April 23, 2003

When we arrived in Maastricht on Tuesday at our Van de Valk hotel, the big Team Telekom bus was in the parking lot. Kim and Stacey were so excited! They had each found a packet of Team Telekom trading cards in the back seat of our borrowed car and were hoping to get some signatures. Immediately upon walking into the hotel lobby, Mari saw Bobby Julich and went over to talk to him, since she knew him. The rest of us looked on in awe, whispering like little girls. We had just seen him on Eurosport the day before at a race in Germany! Bobby rode the elevator up with us and finally Kim and Stacey got the nerve to ask him for his autograph on his own card. Now they've only got about 20 more guys to go. But unfortunately, the guys were just leaving, heading off to a hotel in Charleroi, Belgium to be closer to their start of Flèche Wallonne.

The last two years I've raced Flèche Wallonne, it's been in defense of the overall Women's World Cup series jersey. In 2001, we raced here for Anna Millward and last year we raced for Petra Rossner. But now I'm on my new team, T-Mobile, and I'm not riding for the overall World Cup series win. It's a very different feeling! Of the six T-Mobile girls here in Europe racing Flèche Wallonne, only Mari Holden and I are familiar with this course. We had originally planned on riding part of the course Monday so the girls would know the climbs and the finish. But as it turned out, we were staying too far away from Huy and the extra five hours in the car just wouldn't have been worth it. Mari and I relayed the details of the course to Kim, Kristin, Stacey, and Amber as best we could and shared with them how the race has played out for the past two years. But one can never guess exactly how the race will play out in the current year. Competition is different, teams have different motivations, and Lord knows, weather can always play a factor. Especially in Belgium in April.

But as luck would have it, we had an amazingly sunny and warm day for the World Cup. I saw things during the race that I had not seen the previous two years due to inclement weather. It was a perfect day for racing. Last year, the majority of the team had had the misfortune of not lining up in time for the start and we were completely caught off guard. The gun had gone off and I was still trying to rip off my warm-ups and heavy outer layer clothing. My boyfriend had been there watching the race and as he saw me go by already off the back in the first 400 meters, he just shook his head. So this year, I made sure I was at the line in plenty of time. It paid off too because the start of the race is so fast and soon we're headed on a twisty descent that ends at the base of the first climb at 13.5km. The T-Mobile girls each had a piece of tape on our stem marking which kilometer the three major climbs appeared, along with the final kilometer wall, the Mur de Huy. But there were many more than three climbs. We were either climbing or descending all day - at least that's what it felt like to me.

In typical Flèche Wallonne fashion, the pace was high all day, set by teams protecting their World Cup hopefuls. We had decided at our team meeting to work for Amber since she's climbing so well. Kristin did an awesome job staying at the front of the peloton watching for any attacks in the first part of the race. The racing started getting more aggressive during the second 'major' climb of the day, which was a couple of kilometers long. Jolanta and Rasa Polikeviciute's team, 2002 Aurora RSM, became very aggressive and kept sending off their girls on attacks. They were riding for their teammate, Fabiana Luperini, three-time winner of this race. With these attacks, they hoped to force chase and tire out some of the top contenders.

But the depth of the field was great and each time they were brought back. The same thing happened on top of the final longer climb before we descended the valley for 10km back to the town of Huy and into the final kilometer climb finish. The top of the third climb is flat and very windy. I remember it well from past years! It never fails to make the legs ache. At one particular point, I was head down, staring at the wheel in front of me trying not to lose it, when I heard a big commotion at the rear of my bike. I swore it sounded like my derailleur and my rear wheel had just fallen off. But then I heard someone hit the ground behind me and I realized what had happened. The field was so strung out at that point and the poor girl behind me had run straight into my rear wheel and took herself out. Considering the importance of not losing the wheel in front of me, I didn't even look around to see who it was. I just hoped it wasn't one of my teammates! If it had been, I knew I'd hear it over the radio anyway. Now my wheel was seriously out of true. When I looked back at it, it was weaving back and forth. But oh well, there was nothing I could do now anyway!

I made sure Amber and I stayed in contact with the top 10 during the barrage of attacks and four of us - Kim, Kristin, Amber, and I - came to the 10km to go mark in the front group of about 30 girls. Now it was a race for positioning in the final kilometer. The twins' team kept up their attacks and so Judith Arndt, (Nürnberger), went to the front and hauled ass down the valley towards Huy. Once Judith gets to the front of anything, it's pretty impossible to pass her. Both Kim and Kristin tried to help Amber and me move up by speeding up the side. But we still got nowhere near the front since Judith was going about Mach nine at that point. And of course it's all about positioning going into the final climb.

I was supposed to give Amber a super leadout into the climb, but the best I could do was... well, it wasn't that great. So we just climbed as fast as we could past people instead. Amber did an awesome job and finished seventh. I made it up the wall in 15th. Kim and Kristin finished 29th and 30th. Our goal was a top 10 finish... achieved! And I'm thankful it wasn't raining, because at 22 percent, if the road is wet, the names written in white paint become very slippery.

Now we're headed back for a few more relaxing days in Holland near the home of one of our directors, Jean-Paul Von Poppel. Then it's off to Switzerland for the one-day Tour de Berne.

Until then, ride easy!
Kimberly

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