Pia Sundstedt

The first night of my week long training spin across the alps we spent in Seefeld in Tirol. A winter Olympic host city, if you can call Seefeld a city. A small mountain village in Austria is a better description. After a delicious dinner in the hotel I went up to my room and switched on the television. Euro2012, Spain against another team. I don’t even remember who Spain played against and who won. I switched off the television and slept instead. I woke up early and we had an early breakfast. Start was already at 8.30. We got everything set and were ready for the first stage. The start was like in a MTB marathon race. Full blast up the first tiny climb. There was pretty soon a front group and Carsten and myself were in there. It is better to ride in a smaller group than in a big one. Especially when many riders are not used to ride in a bunch. Everyone was also fresh today and eager to fight for good positions. Sometimes it was a bit scary and especially in the downhills many riders risked a lot. Not me, I want to train, this is not a race for me.  I made the pace up to Kühtai. It was a 20km long climb up to 2000m and we were able to stay in a group that brought us to the finish in Sölden. We had a beautiful sunny day today. Now we are in Sölden and the sky has turned grey. Tomorrow we will ride up Timmelsjoch and Jaufenpass. The weather forecast says some rain. We will see tomorrow what we will be facing. In worst case we will have to wear our rain gear.