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## The First CCA Winter Training Camp Report - Portugal 2012 ##

edited February 2012 in Members only
The First CCA Winter Training Camp Report

03:45 Friday morning, in the snow, 5 CCA athletes loaded their bikes into Strappy’s mates mini bus and off to Stansted we go! Thankfully all the roads were clear (ish) and we arrived with plenty of time to spare. All went to plan and touched down in Sunny Portugal and were on our way to Casa Oleandro! Bikes built in record time and off for a gentle leg turner and some lunch. With a tail wind the leg turner switched to a rather pacey ride to the coast. As I wasn’t sure what would be open at the time of year we headed for the luxurious resort of Vale do Lobo for our feed.

~~CRASH~~ First of the weekend and hopefully our last! James just lost his front wheel on a mini roundabout and picked up some Portuguese road rash… ouch! Fortunately just ripped shorts and battered pride!

Wind chill a little more than expected, however the food was delicious! First of many many fish dishes! Oh and also that snake in the grass –John Terry – was skulking around at the same beach restaurant… his knee didn’t look injured to me!!!!!

Returning to the villa we took in our first climb of the weekend, out of Almancil and into Loulé and West back towards Bouliquime. Nothing too exciting to report here … well apart from a mapped road that turned out to be a dirt track (fairly common in Portugal!! ;-)

Day 2 – plan = ride from Villa to Loulé to Tavira and North to Cachopo and back c 90 miles.

Great ride, a few dodgy surfaces and a relentless climb to Cachopo along a deserted road that just got steeper!! Lunch at Cachopo.

Cachopo is a totally remote village where we stood out like sore thumbs! To put it into perspective a coke here was under €1 vs c€4 on the coast!!! At our café stop up the mountain the lady wouldn’t accept a €20 note… too big!!!
History bit – Cachopo (pronounced Cashop) it’s a very traditional village with about 1000 permanent residents, it remains still very attached to it’s origins and the touristic resources are not around the corner. In Cachopo you will be able to find knitted garments, and woven blankets decorated with embroidery inspired by the wild flowers found in the fields.

So the journey home was tough. I will let the guys add their tuppence worth on that leg of the trip but needless to say it was rolling steep hills all the way home!

Day3 - out with our friendly Portuguese Club – the Montanelas – a good bunch of guys who looked after us well. We did a typical club run out and back with their very own Phil Adams & Jezz belting off the front in some quite exciting breakaways. I managed to get on to their last one… holy crap it was tough! We regrouped and stopped on top of the equivalent climb to Mow Cop!! I hasten to add Shaun was hot on ‘Phil & Jezz’s’ wheel up that climb!! Here we watched the U23 Tour of the Algarve do the climb! Photos to follow! A nice gentle cruise back to their local Café for a warm up & drink. C 45 miles. Shaun and I did a quick out and back adding another c20 miles to the tally for the day while the others caught some rays I believe! me = totally k-knackered!

Day 4 – plan = ride up Monchique! = The Serra de Monchique (Monchique Mountains) is a chain of mountains in the western part of the Algarve region of Portugal. The chain's highest point is the peak of Fóia, at 902 meters.

I think we got to about 550m?? I didn’t think I’d ever hear myself say this but ‘What a Magnificent climb!’, perfect road surface and temperature just right. Well, until the decent and it was f’ing freezing!!! What was that??? Who was first up?? Who got the ‘Monchique’ sign??? Well we weren’t really interested in all that competitive stuff BUT as you’re asking….. That would be me :-) by a country mile ;-) – sorry lads, couldn’t resist…

Home was a bit of a slog, a big old head wind and that’s about it! James stopped off at the beautiful City of Silves for some touristy bits and we all slogged it home… a couple more hills of course!

So that’s it really…

Well you’d think so wouldn’t you?

Apart from one of the group was a little late for his plane??

He’d booked his return home the day before .. Doh!!
Fun and games :-)

So a great villa, weather = better than here – blue sky every day and sunshine but a bit ‘Pearl Harbour’ as they say. Great bunch of guys, good routes and very, very tired legs now. Total mileage is between 250 & 270 I believe.

Who’s coming next year then???

PS – the flight home….. OMG – we did a ‘go-around’ … you don’t want to know if you’re a nervous flyer… I think that plane will need new suspension though!!!!

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