Dario’s Diario: Camp Life

Here we are very close to the start of a new season and things are going as normal. I have already been at a training camp in January and I am getting ready for the first race. I will start in the Ruta de Sol in Spain like last year. I would love to start in the same way even if I would slightly change the final.

Very good to win the first stage but I would like to keep the leader’s jersey and not lose it the last day… of course I am joking and would be very happy to win one stage.

Not racing is not exactly equal to easy training or I should better? I hope to start racing soon because it is less demanding than to do 5 days of quite hard training a week. At least at races you get massages, you are looked after, you are cheared along the road and you have a good excuse to take a few easy days at the end of a race. In training it is different, the only common thing is hard work on the bike.

Bright red jerseys signal the start of a new season.

We had a very good training camp in Portugal where we managed to ride for many miles even if we had to avoid the rain clouds a few times and got completely soaked on one training ride. It actually was the day that lloydy had won the Australian championship so I thought it was the price the team had to pay for his win.

Even if this was the case I would have been happy to get soaked as it will be nice to see him with his national champ jersey next time at team presentation. It is a good start for sure and will give him more confidence for next season so look out for him…

Between training rides in Portugal, Dario found time to take a photo of the beach.

My second hypothesis on the rain in Portugal was that Popo is taking it along. We had some rain at both training camps and south Spain and south Portugal are usually very dry so there is something strange going on…

Another big plus was that Albert, the team’s official cook was with us in Portugal. This meant we really enjoyed the food and especially the fresh fish. I must say Albert is really super and he has gone a long way since last year in the tour. He has learnt what the riders like and need and he is always on the spot. It will be a pleasure to go to races with him next year, even in France where the food is always terrible.

How’s this for a training ride… not far from Gaiolle in Chianti.

On my side not much is going on with the olives and vines since the plants are resting in this part of the season. The winter has been quite cold and wet so we hope they had the right amount of water and cold they need to start a successfull season.

Smile fellas – you’re on PEZ!

I have just bought an new hectar of chianti vines and am getting ready to restructure it but this will go in next month’s diary. For now it is all

Ciao
Dario Cioni

• See Dario’s personal website: CioniDario.com
• Buy some of Dario’s own Olive Oil: DarioCioni.com
• See the official team website: Silence-Lotto.com

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