Thursday, March 28, 2024

Hump Day & Humdrum: TdF Stage 11 (bunchie)

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HomeJournalsGarmin Physio Toby WatsonHump Day & Humdrum: TdF Stage 11 (bunchie)

Hump Day & Humdrum. As the physio on team Garmin-Transitions, all I can say is this is a dangerous sport. All things considered, 3rd place for Tyler yesterday was a fantastic effort by the whole team, with Dave Zabriskie helping to control the break for most of the day, Johan Van Summeren bringing our boys to the front of the peloton with 4km to go, Martijn taking a big turn to maintain our position at the front, Julian doing the perfect job to put Ty where he needed to be to contest the sprint and then Tyler eking the absolute maximum possible out of his body to gain third place. It was a brilliant team performance.

Hump Day & Humdrum
Sharing a laugh here, but Tyler wasn’t pleased with Cav’s lead out man yesterday.

My day was a slightly less glamorous one, helping out at the hotels with transferring everything from one town to the next.

We rotate the people who help out at the hotel, and these past few dayshave been my shift. We collect all the bags in the morning, get to the hotel as quickly as possible, set them all up in the rooms (including massage tables for those who use them), and then grab lunch.

If you’re lucky, the hotel has a pool (ours did), and so the majority of the afternoon was spent flitting from watching what was happening in the race, and heading back to the pool to play Arrowman.

We also had to do a shopping run, to restock our medical supplies (we’ve gone through some strapping!), water supplies (we consume masses of it daily), as well as stuff like fruit, washing detergent, sandwich ingredients, etc. All of the little things to keep the roadshow running!

I have one more day of this, and then it’s back onto the race. Just in time for the Pyrenees! Bring THAT spectacle on.

Toby Watson
Toby Watsonhttps://www.veloveritas.co.uk
Ex-Garmin Transitions physiotherapist and soigneur Toby Watson brings you inside the squad, and shows you what it's like to be working with a top team on the biggest races in the world. Through his regular blog updates, Toby shares his sense of drama and fun that were essential parts of his job. Toby is Australian, and currently lives in Girona with his fiancee Amanda. If he has any time, he enjoys reading and running, and occasionally skiing too, when he can.

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