Vince DeJong at the Nationsl

Update from Vince De Jong, HCC Executive member, at Dieppe, NB for the Track Nationals. Normally racing for the CoachChris.ca team, Vince is in Dieppe as a member of the Ontario Team. 
Hi Everyone,

I arrived in Dieppe Thursday afternoon around 7 local time, 6pm Ontario time after spending a relaxing weekend in Montreal. Got a few good training days in while I was there and a lot of sleep. 

Dieppe is a nice city, right next to Moncton. We are staying in some nice suites in downtown Moncton that back right on to a tidal basin/river. Twice a day you can look out and see the sludgy bottom of the river. We're nice and close to everything, food, groceries. 

Weather has not been great since we got here. It's been very windy and cold. Ontario had track time today at 1:30 and it was so windy it was sometimes hard to control the bike. We were all wearing full leg and arm warmers to try and stay warm. The track facility is very nice, a beautifully groomed infield, concrete areas for tents, even a guard at night to watch our bikes so we can leave them at the track. The track itself is not so nice. The plywood is a little soft but there are new boards. When you are riding at full speed through the corners and you hit the new boards it feels like a speed bump because they don't flex. Other than that it is quite smooth and feels fast. 

Tomorrow the racing starts and my first event, the points race, starts at 3:30. It is 40km, 160 laps, with sprints every 10. It is always one of the toughest races, and one of the most prestigious track races to win. There are a bunch of guys who came all the way here from out west just to do the points race. There are 23 guys in the race. Ontario has one guy Daniele who has a shot at winning a medal. I hope to be able to do my own thing and get some points in the race instead of just being a workhorse for Daniele. If I can do something tangible to help Daniele podium I won't hesitate to help though. 

This is all I have to say for now, I'll send another update tomorrow after the race to say how things went.

Day one of racing was intense. I didn't do as well as I wanted, but the racing showed who is strong. 

The temperature was a little warmer today and not quite as windy. Went for a road ride this morning to loosen up and make sure everything was working ok. Got to the track around 1:30 today to get the bike set up and get a good warmup in. The race started right at 3:20 with 23 riders. Right off the gun it was incredible, it never stopped. A few laps into the race I glanced down at my computer and couldn't believe we were doing 55/56km/h. Team Ontario rider Daniele won the first sprint and then two laps later Eric Robertson went for a lap. He got about 3/4 of a lap and people started chasing at the front. It all stretched out and Rob ordered us to the back of the pack. We managed to get back far enough to allow Eric to reach us. 2 of us spent the next 20 laps dragging Eric up to the pack. I knew at that point that I wasn't going to be able to finish the race so I dug as deep as I could and managed to bring Eric up to the pack to complete his lap. 

I tried to recover from my efforts but the pace was so high that wasn't possible. By this point we had lost almost half the pack. One bad crash happened early in the race as well that took out two riders but I managed to cleanly avoid the carnage. Daniele asked me to go to the front again and string things out for the sprint. After the sprint I was shattered and could not stay with the pack. I swung up the track to get lapped and take a break. Once the pack caught me I jumped in again to help Eric get some points and stay out of the wind. After a few more turns on the front the tank was empty and I pulled out of the race. 

It was frustrating for me because I don't like not quiting races, but of the 10 people that finished the race, 6 of them were professional riders and all of them have done several or more elite level points races. I was the second last person to dnf, so putting things in perspective I was satisfied with my race. 

Looking towards tomorrow I'm excited for my individual pursuit. This is the event I've been training a lot for and I'm very motivated to go fast. My start time is 12:00 sharp, hopefully the wind will not be strong. That can make it difficult to choose a gear. I'll update tomorrow again regarding the pursuit. Because were only racing 4km, we will likely all go for a road ride tomorrow afternoon..

2nd Day. Today was very exciting!! A short day of racing with only the pursuits, but a very encouraging result.
   
Arrived at the track around 10 this morning to get the bike set up with the aero wheels and bars. Decided on an 88" gear because of the fairly windy conditions and spongy track. They opened the track for some warming up and I got about 20minutes on the track doing 2 short efforts to try out the gear. Everything felt good so I got my caffeine boost, music, and got on the rollers. I was the first heat off and had to face against my teammate Daniele. I was scared of him catching me so it was good motivation to stay away. After an hour warm-up I was totally pumped and ready to race. Right at 12 pm I got on my bike in the start line. After a little incident with me almost falling over in the gate the countdown started. Those ten seconds when they started the countdown clock felt like my life ticking down, I had spent so much time training for this moment, and here it was. 

Five seconds to go, I got my breathing in time with the clock and boom a fantastic start. I never looked at my computer but after two laps Rob Good gave me my lap time and I was bang on. My opening two kilometers were fantastic. Through the third kilometer I was starting to struggle and the fourth kilometer was just trying to hang on for dear life.. When the dust settled I did a 5: 07.337, good for 10th place. Not as fast as I hoped for, but the result was good. Everyone went slow because of the track and windy conditions. I was 2/10ths of a second off of 9th place who is a pro on the road. A big thanks to all my friends like Terry at the Bicycle Shop, Professor Lorne, and the guys at All Seasons in London for making sure I always have the best equipment to help me perform!! 

Overall I was satisfied, I am one of only two first year espoirs, and the other one went to junior worlds the past two years. More importantly I was the third Ontario rider. That guarantees me a place on the team pursuit squad for tomorrow. Even more exciting is that I have an awesome partner for the madison tomorrow. Jamie Sparling from B.C. who was silver in the pursuit today is my partner. Last year he was second in the madison, this guy wants to win, not just ride. I'm a little nervous because I'll have to pull out the ride of my life to ride up to Jamie's expectations. 

Tomorrow will be a lot of racing, but I feel very rested and recovered. I had a leg massage today and sat in ice water for ten minutes. Tomorrow will be a very big day for both me and Team Ontario, if we race to our potential I could walk away with two medals tomorrow. Stay tuned!!! 

3rd day Finally a national podium!!! Today I had perhaps the most proud moment of my life standing on the podium at Track Nationals.

        

Day 3 started hot and continued that way all day. The wind was light and everything was set for some fast team pursuits. Based on yesterday's individual pursuit results the team was composed of Eric, Daniele, Dave and myself, all resplendent in full Team Ontario skinsuits. Everyone put a 92" gear on and after an hour warmup we were called to the line. I was chosen as the starter for the team because my technique starting out of the mechanical starting gate is very good. I truly think I have never been so nervous in my life. We were the third team to go, after a composite team that set the fast time. 

The countdown began and we were off. Everything happened so fast I can't even remember it. Going all out on the front, trying to recover in the draft and stay tight on Eric's wheel in the formation.. I did my 3 pulls and then I was blown. I'm realizing that I need to work on my endurance, I'm great for 3km, but struggle with the final kilometer. The other guys did an amazing job of finishing off the pursuit to take the provisional second fastest time. On to the rollers to recover and bite our nails to wait to see if we made the gold medal round. Quebec was the last team left to go and the only ones that could challenge us for the second time. Rob was keeping track of their time and when they finished thought we had been bumped to third place. But no, when the official time came out, we were in second place, 3 tenths of a second in front of Quebec, we were guaranteed at least a silver medal. Two people from other provinces came over to me and told me my start was the reason we beat quebec but I thought they were just trying to say something nice. But sure enough when i looked at the audits of the pursuits, my starting lap was 3 tenths of a second ahead of Quebec's starting lap!!! 

After an hour break to recover and eat some food it was time for the gold medal round. We were 8 seconds behind the first team in qualifying but were determined to go as fast as we could. I had the start of my life and we all rode faster than qualifying, but with 500m (2 laps) to go our opponents caught us. A little disappointing, but still a fantastic result for Ontario. That silver medal made up for the false start at nationals last year and is better than any medal I've ever received before. 

The last race was the madison. Jamie Sparling and I finished in 5th place. It was a tough madison with only 6 teams and we could not get away. Neither of us are sprinters, so to get points in the sprints was difficult. We held our own and even managed to set up the other ontario team to get second place, and almost the victory. 

Tomorrow will be another tough day of racing with 5 races in 4 hours. Daniele has a good shot at winning the omnium, and we will try to help him in the mass start races. It's been a fantastic track nationals. Great weather in general and good organization. I'm confident I can score another good result tomorrow in the last event.

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