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The Ellen Plas Diary 2003
Welcome to the Ellen Plas Diary. Ellen is a soigneur with the top German women's team Equipe Nürnberger Versicherung, a job that's 20 percent masseur, 20 percent gofer, 20 percent morale-booster, 20 percent den momma, 20 percent chef and 20 percent organisational wiz... and 120 percent busy.
Ellen Plas interview: Taking care of business with Equipe Nürnberger
Tour de l'Aude: Victory party!
Stage 9 - May 25: Saint Hilaire - Limoux, 109km
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Finally the last day. There is this weird feeling in the air… everybody seems to be longing for a big party after the race. And frankly I am too.
I still have to pinch myself to believe that Judith is starting in the yellow jersey. Those girls of mine have done such hard work the whole week, while everyone outside the team had given up on us already. You can't really blame them, though; Lyne Bessette is a very strong and talented rider, and she had four very strong team mates by her side.
They must have had a tough week, defending Lyne's yellow jersey - always riding in the front, no easy time, no relaxing, no riding in the "laughing bunch" or the "Bus"…
And those Saturn girls, Manon Jutras (the revelation on this Tour, she also got the 'Combativité' prize), Jessica Phillips, Katie Mactier and Ina Teutenberg, did an amazing job. Winning four stages with three different girls in ten days, that is extraordinary.
Today was going to be a hard day, cause I'd also have to get organised for the drive back and our flight to Montreal next Thursday. I had to make sure that my equipment went into the right vehicles and clean up the truck and make sure that there was nothing perishable left. All that to be taken care of after the race.
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I made some tea, just to be on the safe side. The weather didn't really look that promising. And it's always better to be prepared for the worst.
I brought some more bottled water out to the girls, and I encountered Madde (Maddi Mudguard, our Swedish sunshine) and baby Trixi in the hallway. Trixi had given one of her pink jerseys (best young rider) to Madde, and autographed it "from Miss Piggy".On the sleeve she had written "You have respect" - making fun of me there! When we returned from yesterday's stage, I had Margie, Trixi and Judith in my car. I had told them about all the different teams that had come to congratulate me after Judith took the yellow jersey. I'd said "You have respect in the peloton", because otherwise all those people would not be that happy for Judith. And now Trixi was making fun of me. Those girls of mine!
At 12h20 we would leave for the race. Conny came out in nothing but a tank top, because someone had told her that she should let her road rash dry out. Because of that she wasn't able to wear anything on top of the injuries, as it was very sticky. I was really upset, her road rash was way too deep to let it dry. I had the perfect patches to make it heal quickly, without bandages. To let those wounds dry, would make them tear open again with every move she'd make. Plus I cannot have her get sick on top of that! So I sent her back in, to put on warm clothes and went with her to put 'second skin' patches on the wounds.
Margie underlined that it was important for Conny to come, as Gabrielle (AIS, Australian Institute of Sports, Aussie national team) would definitely know what to do, as they are specifically trained. As it turned out later, it was their nurse/mechanic who took care of Conny's road rash.
We had a lot of fun getting ready for the start. Music loud, singing "Life is life" …
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Judith wore yellow overshoes to match her yellow jersey… I told her she looked like a Maxim bidon (bottle), as they are also blue (like our pants) with a yellow cap. They all looked at me funny and started to laugh, as that didn't really sound as a compliment. But hey, that's the way to boost morale; just be silly and take them by surprise. It's always good to be laughing!
I went to the start line to take of my blue-assed babies' jackets. As I was running towards the start, being loud, as usual, I noticed this really weird silence. No people moving, no hectic bustle, no speakers… Just silence. I looked at somebody from the organization with the question in my eyes, "What's the moment of silence for?"
It turned out that the mother of Anne-Marie Thomas, who is the organiser and driving force behind the Tour de l'Aude, had died the previous night. Dear Anne-Marie, our condolences.
I took Petra's jacket and she asked me to take care of a picture she had received from a fan. It was a picture taken last year, with the German national champion jersey on her shoulders. She asked me to translate to the Polikiaviciute-twins, who at first thought that it was Judith on that picture, that she still is as skinny, just wearing blue race shorts this year, not black ones any more (yes, yes, black makes you look skinnier).
Off they went!
Ina escapes, Judith secures the win
I went to the feed zone with my colleague Thomas and my little injured Conny. As we were waiting there, I made the sandwiches for after the race. Just bread and honey, nothing fancy. But it still tastes good after having raced.
They would be passing three times on that hill. The first time was too early to feed. The second time was at about 55km, and the last time at about 70km (about 26km from the finish). Thomas and I would both would be feeding electrolyte mix drinks the first time, and then I sent him off to the finish to set up, while I stayed to hand out Cola for the last 20km. I got a ride from a Dutch team, which was really nice of them.
There was a breakaway with Ina Teutenberg in it. That would make it hard for any of the other girls in that group to win - Ina is one of the fastest sprinters in the world!
Perfect scenario for my blue squad though. Ina being away meant that nobody from the main peloton could win, so there would be no more attacks and then we just had to make sure that Lyne would not take time back from Judith.
I was so nervous while waiting for them on the finish line! Ina won, which also brought joy to all of us. But seeing the peloton finish was the most important thing for us. My girls all crossed the finish line smiling.
Hug frenzy
About 200m after the finish line they all stopped, I ran towards them… I love the hugging! Judith couldn't help letting some tears after all the pressure, finally the dream coming true! We just won Tour de l'Aude for the second time in a row! We all hugged! Tons of photographers were standing around us, taking pictures. And then the first interviews. Always the usual questions. I got to be the translator, with even a little bit of freedom in my answering.
Judith added specifically that she's so proud to be riding in this team, Equipe Nuernberger Versicherung. She was so right though, I think we are all proud!! To be honest, we had great chemistry last year on Saturn also, but this beats everything! I have never seen a group of girls that work so well together, and where there is practically never any tension between them. I'm really proud of my blue squad, proud to be the one they chose to be working with them.
After all the hugging, we all went back to the car for the podium clean up. Trixi took the pink overall, as the best U23. That was the extra cream on the cake.
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I pulled out my camera, of course. And this year I wanted to do an effort pushing the "unimportant" people aside, as last year, I always had somebody's hair or hand or camera in my pictures. I was determined to be on the first line of photographers this time! I always shoot a lot of pictures, then at least I have the chance of having one good picture for sure!
It was heaven! Ina Teutenberg hosed down Judith with Champagne, and Judith took a little sip after.
After the ceremony, I went up on to the podium to see Trixi and Judith. They had received a bathing gown, cap and slippers from the Tour de l'Aude sponsor "Pruneaux d'Agen", which they put on immediately, and had me take a picture of them. Always in for a joke, my babies!
Then we took off, back to the hotel. That meant packing up the truck for me and Alex, and showering for the girls. I finished packing up, then grabbed a quick shower too and put on make up for the first time this week! I actually hadn't felt that clean, fresh and feminine since I left home. And being ill hadn't really helped me feel good this week either.
I ran down, as Jens (our team director) had limited my clean up time to a strict 10 minutes, which of course I extended to 15. I have the right to work and sweat, then I also have a right to shower!
Party time
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We looked good, all nicely dressed up in our team jeans, team blouse, Puma shoes. Very recognizable. The big hit was Anita Valen though (the green jersey winner), who wore a halter top with a big shining star in the front, cargo pants and high heels! And tons of make up, but she can have that easily! She's incomparable! The vitality she has is amazing!
We got to the Tour de l'Aude party diner in time… See, I could have showered even longer! Tsss, men!
Relaxed atmosphere, everybody happy that it was over. Smiling faces everywhere! A lot of getting together, tables mixing; mingling is the word!
First the food, then the "cérémonie protocolaire".
When they called up the pink jersey U23 winner, I went with Trixi as translator. I don't think she likes to be on a podium in front of so many people, though. Whenever I moved back a little bit (as I'm not supposed to be the centre of attention here), I felt her move back with me. I bet that if she could, she would even have been hiding behind my back. The sweet little thing.
So the compere asked the question in French, I translated it into German, and then translated Trixi's words back to French. Trixi took the honours and off we went…
For the blue jersey (queen of the mountains) they called up Rasa Polikiaviciute to accept the award, as the second in the classification behind her absent team-mate Fabiana Luperini. She was reluctant to go, so Mean Machine Teutenberg (I'm trying to rebuild her reputation as a tough chick, after I told you too many nice things about her last time) just picked Rasa up and ran to the podium carrying her over her shoulder. Rasa's shoes got left behind somewhere as Teut delivered her to the MC...
Finally, the yellow jersey. Judith also asked me to join her on the podium. We were probably equally nervous. And this time they had a lot of questions to ask. Was easier to win the second time? What are the next goals for the season?
"It's always harder to repeat a win than to win for the first time," Judith said. "After you won the first time, the competition knows your strengths and weaknesses, which they can use to beat you."
"Next goals… Well, we're going to Montreal on Thursday for the next World Cup race next Saturday. Then we're off to Philadelphia. La Grande Boucle (Tour Féminin) is also a very important goal, and a priority is the World Cup race in Nürnberg, where we'll do everything to please our sponsor (www.nuernberger.de)"
One of the race sponsors offered Judith an ensemble. When he came to see us after the finish and asked what size she was, me and Judith and I looked at each other, both thinking "It'll probably be a dorky suit, one that'll stay in the wardrobe forever, or give to your mom."
But when he took the ensemble out of the bag on the podium, it turned out to be a jeans ensemble from Moschino. Very modern, very Judith.
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After Judith's interview, we offered Conny's crash jersey to Anne-Marie Thomas, since she had been so kind to check up on her while we were waiting for the ambulance after Conny's crash. (t's hard for me to forget that crash, every time I stand up I feel my sore legs from sprinting down that hill to make it to Conny as fast as possible. Judith handed the jersey to the vice-president, since Mrs. Thomas was absent because of the loss of her mother.
As cherry on the cake they invited Petra on the podium, as she is the 'nestor' in this race. She was first here in 1986, and has done 15 Tours de l'Aude! The organisation wanted to honour her whole career and the MC asked what was so special about the Tour de l'Aude. She picked the thing everyone likes about this Tour: the good organisation.
The next question was how long she's planning on continuing, as this fall she'll be turning 37? "I'm not thinking about quitting yet, we'll see what the future will bring," she said
Let the cake come!
We stayed until midnight, had cake, danced, joked around and got a champagne shower, as every team had received a bottle, and it looked like a champagne war. Fun! Then the big goodbye, and back to our hotel. A good night's sleep and the long drive home in the morning.
The day after
I would have to do 1300 km, and luckily I had convinced Trixi to return with me by car. It worked out better for the both of us: I would have company and she would be home five hours earlier then if she had flown.
Our hotel bill was a big hit. I was so pissed off. A few days before I had bought groceries for us to return and eat at the hotel when all the other teams stayed at the race in between the two stages at the last double day. The hotel billed us 80 euro, for the groceries that I had bought myself.
We noticed during the Tour that the bottled water on the table had been filled up at the tap. When I talked to the hotel manager about that, he said that he just poured the half empty bottles together to not waste any water. Ah-huh.
When Petra smelled one of the bottles, she said it smelled like chloride. And if I have learned one thing in the last year, then it is to always trust Petra's nose. In Spain, at the Vuelta a Castilla y Leon last year, she had said that the meat and the pasta smelled weird. Not even a week later, they had closed down the hotel on hygiene grounds - salmonella in the kitchen. No wonder all the teams that had stayed there got sick.
I recommended this hotel to my team management, as we had been treated really well last year, so I'm losing credibility here. To cap things off, they had given me the so-called 'luxury room' but the last night I discovered that the whole carpet underneath the bed was soaking wet. With all that humidity, no wonder I'm not overcoming my sickness.
After all the hassle, I was so pissed off, I took back the flowers, from yesterday's podium, which we had given the hotel. I'd rather have one of my girls making somebody happy at home with some flowers. I know, very petty of me. I didn't care.
So, a fast breakfast, packed up the car, and off we went.
I drank a lot of coffee. We listened to the radio - we'd got so bored of the tapes… we tried to find a tape adaptor for our CD player, but it's definitely not something you find in highway shops. We zapped a lot, as French radio isn't our favourite, and sang along when we found something we liked. We're both big '80s fans, so musical taste is not a problem for us.
In the end we were so tired, we had a hard time to find the exit where Trixi would be picked up. I had reached that point where I could not get forward nor backward any more. Time for a Mc Do, and a laaaaarge coffee.
I made it home by 21h. Parked my car and ran immediately to my neighbours' door! Jerry (remember, my everything!) ran out the door, looked at me as if I were Santa Claus coming by in Spring time. Not sure if he recognized me or not. I cuddled my little ball of fur and let go of all the weight on my shoulders. I cried of happiness, I cried because I had missed my little dog so much. Silly me. I'm home now, all is good. I'll be cuddling Jerry to death so he won't forget about me the next time I go.
Now I'm going to play dead and sleep for the next 48 hours. And I want a giant sleeping pill for the flight to Canada. Gotta conserve my strength. From what I've heard we have big plans for a night on the town in Montreal after the World Cup, and the party after First Union in Philly is also a big hit.
Cheers
Ellen
Photography
Images by Ellen Plas
- The team gets ready for the start of another day
- Margie and Judith get ready as injured Conny watches
- Worrack and Arndt relaxing
- Judith Arndt celebrates her win on the podium
- Judith Arndt on the podium with Lyne Bessette of Saturn
- Cheers! More celebrations!
- Team Saturn accepts the team prize
- Judith Arndt celebrates with a small drink
- Trixi Worrack accepts the best young rider award
- On the podium Luperini, Worrack, Slioussareva, young Sergey and Arndt
- Judith and Trixi model the latest in post-race apparel
- Judith and Trixi bust a move
- Team Bik Powerplate featuring green jersey winner Anita Valen, 2nd from left
- Jessica Phillips (left) with Ellen at the post-race dinner
- Conny at dinner with Thomas and Jens
- Margie, Petra and Madde consult the wine list
- Conny gets a lungful of the team's 'lucky' jersey
