Inside coverage of the Tour de Qinghai Lake and the Jelly Belly Pro Cycling Team.
By Nick Reistad
Jelly Belly’s latest task is the Tour of Qinghai Lakes, a 10 day stage race in the Qinghai province of western China. We’ve been here, at an altitude of approximately 7500 feet, since Tuesday, slowly acclimating to the thinner air. While we’re not located near any of the recognizable cities, we’re by no means isolated. The nearest city, Xining, is a constantly growing epicenter of (some sort of) trade with a population of nearly 4 million. We made a pit stop to the down town area to buy DVDs for 5 yuan (less than a dollar). The selection is quite current. Or, I should say, they have every DVD that is out right now, and many that are still in theaters. Matty bought a DVD player, too, so we are able to enjoy a slice of home.
Photo ©: Mark Johnson/www.ironstring.com
This year, instead of staying in Xining, we’re staying 15km away at the Duoba National Center of Sport Base. It’s quite nice, and we’re sharing it with the Chinese national speed walking team, archery team, boxing team (who live on mats in their gym… pretty abysmal), and women’s power lifting team. I went down to watch the speed walking practice yesterday. While I do not understand that sport, and it looks like they don’t have joints, the two guys were hauling butt.
Here at the Sport Base, we have internet connection, I can send and receive text messages, and we can skype back home. I’m sure we could do an old-fashioned telephone call, too, but with so many other options, we’re all able to stay in touch. Facebook and Twitter have both been blocked (Sorry JPows fans, you’ll have to wait until August for some more updates), but other than that it’s amazing how far away we are from home yet how close we still are.
As I write, one of the many Euro teams is blasting off fireworks outside my window. Fireworks in China? No…
THE PROLOGUE
We just finished the prologue this afternoon. Will had the fastest time for a large portion of the day, ending in 6th overall. Keil, Jeremy, Phil, and I were only a few seconds off the pace as well. There were literally tens of thousands of cheering fans lining every foot of the 4.8km course, with thousands more flocking in to catch some of the action off the course.
We were all suffering quite a bit, gasping for air at the 8000ft course, but we put on a good show today. Afterwards we were left with altitude pursuiters cough. “Pursuiters cough” is the term we lovingly give to the cough everyone gets when throwing down 110% for a short distance that usually lasts for an hour or two after the race. Throw in some high altitude and we’re hacking up a lung by the end of the race. Gotta love it!
Tomorrow we have 170km, with our first big climb of the tour jumping up to 10,200 feet. Should make for a good cough tomorrow, I think! For the next few days, we’ll be staying in the mountains, and won’t have as good of connection with the outside world, nor will I have the energy to update, so look back on Monday for some more Tour or Qinghai news!
Jelly Belly Cycling Team Prologue Results:
6 Will Routley (Can) Jelly Belly Cycling Team 0:00:10
16 Kiel Reijnen (USA) Jelly Belly Cycling Team 0:00:16
25 Phillip Gaimon (USA) Jelly Belly Cycling Team 0:00:18
29 Jeremy Powers (USA) Jelly Belly Cycling Team 0:00:19
42 Nick Reistad (USA) Jelly Belly Cycling Team 0:00:24
86 Matthew Rice (Aus) Jelly Belly Cycling Team 0:00:36
Stay tuned for more reports from Nick in China.
