Stage 2 Volta Tarragona

Today Matt and I rode the stage 2 route of the Volta Tarragona from Alcanar to Cambrils. This route was pretty tough. The first thing we had to figure out was how to leave the town of Alcanar. After about twenty minutes of asking people how to leave town and them telling us the race starts that way(pointing to where the area where the race leaves from) we just said let’s just go, get to a road and roll with it. About an hour later we arrived on the course further from town. The race passed us at the top of the first climb and I got two water bottles from Steve. At this point John was sitting toward the front of the group and was looking good. All the other guys were further back in the group. The fans here are amazing. They cheer for everyone whether they are first or last. Then we continued into the mountains and I felt like crap from dehydration because it was very hot out. I was so bad that I ended up holding on to Matt’s jersey up some climbs. It was very hot out and I couldn’t get any feeds anywhere. This feeling like crap went on for about two hours until we finally stopped at a store. We were both very stressed because we didn’t know where we were and didn’t know if we would make it back to the hotel that night. Then we finally got out of the mountains and realized we were about thirty kilometers from Salou, the town where our hotel was. I began to feel better and started riding on the front. We finally got back to the hotel for the end of an epic day. As far as the race goes John ended up seventh on the stage. There were three main groups on the road and everyone left in the race was in one of those. Hopefully tomorrow won’t be the same for Matt and me.