Stage 2 - Sunday  19th July – Geilo – Ardalstangen.

A BIG day. 171km timed, 207km total and 2,700m climbing Viking Tour Stage 2. The first real stage after yesterdays short hill climb, today was about racing, and we started in sunshine. I will bank that.

The day started with a mass start out of Geilo and about 15km of neutral riding as we got out of town and down a gentle downhill. The racing started as soon as we hit the first climb. It was a funny day of racing, as the peloton did not break up as expected, as the hills were not longer enough or steep enough for it to fracture, and when ever someone attacked, it was brought back together. The result was a bigger peloton than planned, and the expected first day crash, which fortunately happened just to my right, not in front of me.

In the end, with about 40km to go, there was an attack on a rough section of roadworks. Feeling strong, I went for it and joined the lone rider up the road, and we worked together until one other rider bridged across to us. It was fun to attack and to be off the front, but not really as there were two other riders up in front of us. Still good fun, until we came to a 300m climb up onto the final plateau of the day. This was just a little steep for me, and I suffered something good, but managed to get over the top about 1min in front of the reduced peloton. Little did I realize there would be a nasty on the nose headwind for the last 15km high up on the rolling plateau, and the reduced peloton eventually caught me. It was reduced down to about 8-10 riders, and i rode in with them, attacking the sprint, and winning the bunch sprint for 4th. 

A fun day on the road, and I know I am going to pay for it later this week, as I went deep. Fortunately it was a 20km downhill, then 10km flat run into Ardalstagen where we are spending the next two nights. 

Adding some flavor to the day, was a unique feature of the downhill. Hairpin bends inside a tunnel. The road switchbacked across and down a steep face, and it was so tight that the switchback corners were inside dark tunnels. Not something I want to experience again, although we need to go back up tomorrow for the hill climb day....

Leah had a good day, and missed the group over the top, and in the end pulled a couple of boys into the headwind home. A nice effort.