Hi Everyone,

I am racing the Giro d’Italia, a 10 day stage race with Team SATS, a Danish team.  The race started in Naples, southern Italy yesterday and finishes in Venice next Sunday.

Prologue – 2km

We had a 45min drive from our hotel to Grumo Nevado, the venue of the prologue. The Italian drivers must really be experienced as words fail to describe what driving in Italy is really like.  A 2 lane road will have 4 cars across it, indicators are rarely used, the speed limit is ignored, roundabouts are negotiated from any direction and one-way streets are not really one-way.  The Toyota’s, our team cars also have electric fold in mirrors to squeeze through the tight back streets.

The prologue was an individual time trial where we were set off at 1min intervals.  In typical Italian style, there was a band playing, women were dancing and the race was nearly an hour late in getting started.  The start list changed at least 3 times and so in a mad panic, I rushed down at 9pm thinking I was riding at 9.06pm but I ended being the 6th last rider off and started my time trial at 11.20pm.  It was so dark at nearly midnight and the corners were really tight so I didn’t take any risks on the corners.  Given I had been standing/sitting at the start area for over 2 hours, I did an ok time, 3mins 23sec while the winner did about 3mins 6sec.