Ireland's Sam Bennett didn't get the welcome to Liverpool he had hoped for on stage 1 of the Tour of Britain.
By: Sam Bennett
Sunday September 7, Stage 1: Liverpool (104km)
With a wedding in our team hotel last night before stage 1, my first night on the Tour of Britain didn’t exactly go to plan.
The wedding was so loud, with people going up and down the hall outside my room all night, that I just couldn’t go to sleep for ages.
Having eventually nodded off sometime in the early hours, I was woken up early by somebody knocking on the door and calling my name.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
“Sam...”
Knock. Knock. Knock.
“Sam...”
Knock. Knock. Knock.
“Sam!”
When the noise eventually registered with me, I bolted upright up in my bed and stumbled towards the door in preparation for an early morning visit from anti-doping control.
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As a professional cyclist, I have to fill in what’s known as a ‘whereabouts form’ to let the dope testers know where I will be for one hour of every day so that they can come and test my blood or urine whenever they like.
Although it can be a bit of a nuisance to have to get up that early, I always fill in the hour between 6am and 7am as my available time because I know I will be in bed wherever I say I’m going to be on that day.
Bennett, second rider from left, with his NetApp-Endura team being introduced to the Tour of Britain crowd at the start in Liverpool.
So there's little chance of missing a test through forgetfulness or something stupid like being down the shops or out training.
As the knocking continued, I hurriedly made myself presentable before opening my bedroom door, still half asleep.
On doing so, I was unpleasantly surprised to find nobody there, apart from some late night reveller banging on a room door a few yards down the hall in the vain hope that his friend Sam would let him in.
Exasperated, I closed the door and fell back into bed, glancing at the clock to see that it was actually only 4am.
While I woke up a bit the worse for wear this morning, my roommate Daniel Schorn was as fresh as a daisy at breakfast as he had earplugs in and never heard a thing.
I had a pre-race meal of a bowl of porridge three hours before the race and my NetApp Endura teammates and I left for the stage start at 12.15pm.
We ended up getting lost in Liverpool and came upon the start line from the wrong direction.
Unfortunately at this point we were met by an over zealous man with a flag.
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Instead of moving the barrier and allowing our team bus drive the few hundred yards to the start area, he insisted we had to go all the way through Liverpool city centre again in ‘the correct direction’.
Marcel Kittel - front left - on his way to the stage 1 win, with Bennett a little further back; to the right and behind the rider in bright green.
There was so much traffic that we only arrived 45 minutes before the 2.15pm start.
Having been in Norway and Belgium lately, the last time I rode a race where it wasn’t raining was the national championships in June so it was a relief to have clear skies as we rolled out of town.
My former teammate at An Post Chainreaction, Mark McNally went up the road in a four man break right from the gun and this quartet stayed clear until the closing kilometres.
Macca got the king of the mountains jersey for his efforts before two big sprinters teams, Giant Shimano and Omega Pharma Quickstep wound it up and hauled them back in the last kilometres.
This morning my NetApp Endura team had planned to hit the front early in the finale of the stage because the downhill section before the final right hander into the finish was so quick.
We didn’t want to be in any danger and thought it would be easier to go early and push backwards into a line than to be trying to catch the coat tails of someone else’s sprint train.
I’ve found out the hard way that if you’re drifting back and pushing your bum into somebody’s handlebars they’re more likely to let you in than if you’re just trying to nudge them with your elbow.
The guys got to the front with five kilometres to go and I got an absolutely awesome lead out to go under the red kite signalling the final kilometre in third wheel.
It was the easiest run in to a sprint I think I’ve ever had but in the end I messed it up a bit with my positioning.
With about 400m to go, Daniel was in front of me ready to kick on but two Giant Shimano guys suddenly came up on our right with a Belkin rider and a guy from Tinkoff-Saxo right behind them.
I tried to implement the plan and push into the line but all of a sudden they swung over to the left and stalled.
As Adam Blythe from NFTO took a flyer on the right hand side with 300m to go with another Giant guy on his wheel and their sprinter Marcel Kittel chasing, I was caught in the middle of the bunch with little hope of getting out.
I tried to accelerate again to get on the right wheels but it was a waste of time and once I realised I wasn’t going to get anywhere I just rolled to the line for 12th place on the stage.
After a fantastic lead out I was a bit disappointed not to be able to repay the lads with a decent result today.
Deep down I always want to get on a podium in a bunch sprint but it’s a long week so hopefully there’s more to come.
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