Plouay World Cup 2^nd September 2007

  I was contacted a few days ago by my Manager asking if I could get to France as the team have decided to race in Plouay world cup.  I was going to France with Rene from Rapha to Guest ride so I thought going a few days earlier would not be much of a problem!   I eventually found a flight from Exeter airport to Plouay and met up with my team for the world cup race.   I was excited to be racing in the world cup as I have not had any hard races for a while now so it would be good to give my muscles a wake up call at least and help Monia gain valuable UCI points for the team.      The course was hard with 3 climbs in a 19k circuit.   The pace was high from the start with Bastanielli attacking on lap two from Italy.  Chantelle Beltman from T-Mobile was hot on her wheels with Cantelle from Bigla also bridging across.   I was having a really bad day unfortunately and on the 3^rd lap got dropped from the bunch but found some other girls who where also having a bad day to ride the rest of the race with.  A lot of  girls pulled out but I was damned if I was going to drop out after so much hassle to get out here in the first place! Plus I wanted to continue no matte how bad I was feeling! Monia was having a great day which I notices as she spinned past me on the last climb of the circuit!  She stayed with the second group to finish 6^th place and Naomi Cantelle took the win in fine style beating Nicole Cooke into second.    A great race and a hard one!!   Nicole Cooke is still the World Cup leader with Marianne Vos in second place so it will come down to the last round of the World Cup in Germany next to see who will win overall and with both competitors in form who knows what will happen!!

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