Amstel and Amsterdam

It’s Sunday here, but this post is about Saturday.  I rode the Amstel Gold Race Course, 125 km (half the pros) and about 4500 feet of climbing, it was fun, but nothing like the thrill of Roubaix.  It is a cool event with some really neat roads.  It was crowded, 12000 total people and much of the time we were on bike paths, so passing became difficult.  Some video below shows a tiny sample.

I also drove in Amsterdam.  I was specifically warned not to drive in the central part of the city by the  rental car company, so in true Brian Oliver fashion, I attempted to drive to the hotel in the center of the city.  I made it, but the last kilometer took an hour and the sat nav sent me down two pedestrian only streets and a closed street (I had to back up across one of the canal bridges).  It was very challenging.

Half of my blog audience is in Amsterdam now, Amy flew in yesterday, so today (Sunday) we are tourists.  We had excellent Indian food last night in the Jordaan district which is multicultural, we even, accidentally, did some ‘window’ shopping.  

Videos of yesterday’s ride is below, One of them is me in the finishing straight, which was quite thrilling, because in my imaginiation, I was riding in from a 50km solo break away, where I left the peloton in my dust.