Once again, ProBikeKit are pleased to be supporting a team of cyclists in Finland for 2010.

Like most Scandinavians, the Finnish are brilliant at making the most of the cold winters. Even with the roads covered in snow and temperatures bordering on the insane,  training and fitness carries on regardless. I don’t think many people would complain about taking up skiing for 3 months?!

PBK Team Finland 2010

Here is Ville’s outlook on the coming year:

It seems crazy that racing season is just around the corner. Watching out from the window there are about 10 inches of snow on the ground and the temperature is -8 degrees Celsius. Still we have to realise that there is only one month until the first race.

I am more than happy to announce that PBK Finland is now registered as an Elite
Team. Last year we tried and tried to ride under our hometowns name but that was chaos. At the time co-operation didn’t work well especially because the cycling circle here in Finland really is not big. You would really think that in these small circles such a co-operation inside teams would work.

Well enough of that last season talk.

There is not a man in our roster who isn’t hugely exited about this season. I think that is common in any new team, guys are like those young horses which are held inside all winter long and now they smell the fields where they run.

Training has gone well, we haven’t had huge injuries like last year. All the skiers in the team have been very pleased because of the nice winter. Skiing which has been fantastic here and guys have collected those miles week after week. It seems all of Finland has had a skiing fever, perhaps due to Finnish skiers having good success in World Cup?

At Christmas we had a small break from training but we are all now back on the track. In recent years my interest on going out with my mountain bike to that chilling breeze has decreased by 90%. Turbo Training is the work tool for me in winter time. And why not? You can ride with short bib shorts and you don’t need three layers of clothing to breath through. Also it really is much more effective training and you can push yourself much harder than outside. We have also been running quite a lot. Couple of weeks ago we ran with the teams sprinter Matti for 5 hours in three days. That included a half marathon. Knees and feet were pretty sore the rest of the week… We both agreed lets not do that again in near future!

Racing scheme for the team is still under construction. It starts overseas though, hopefully in the next blog update we can already share some good results with you guys.

Pre-ride preparation We’ll keep you up-to-date with the results and any more news we receive from Finland along with our Elite team in England and the local boys and girls in the North West of England.

Tuomas Lampainen

PBK Team Finland takes part in Triathlon…

When you’re feeling like you are in quite good shape it’s time for some racing. That’s why Team Finland takes part in some triathlon competition because there hasn’t been so much going on in cycling in the last month. I got the idea to compete from my triathlete brother at the last minute.

The first competition was a short triathlon in a place called Ellivuori which included 500m swimming, 20k cycling and 5k running. Swimming worried me the most. Although I am an old swimmer, I haven’t trained in three years and this summer there was only two wetsuit training sessions before that race. Anyway, swimming was the second best thing that day, the best thing was the amazing run. The competition began with a good swim, I was second right behind the best swimmer. We almost got a runaway from the chasing groups but one guy from the second group caught us in the last third of the cycling. The rest of the cycling was excellent “team work” and the others didn’t have a chance to catch us. Even though the cycling stage was the worse thing, luckily my legs felt great during the run and I got enough lead from the other two guys in the uphill before the downhill section. The race was tough but fair.

This fantastic race gave me lots of confidence and a couple days later I signed in in a half Ironman competition in town called Nokia. The Finish Ironman Championship was given away in same race so lots of people and many good athletics would be on the start line. In our group the amount of triathletes was more than double the Ironman start so that made me nervous when reading the startlist. Seven days between these two races went fast cycling with my team members and swimming and running with my brother.  My race bike needed fixing for the 90 km time trial, so Ville borrowed his clip on base bar and my Cervelo S1 has the option to shape the seatpost to a more suitable position for time trial.  1.9 km swim was like a thousand times bigger monkey on my back compared to the last weekend’s race and I was afraid of the cold weather which was promised in weather reports only a couple days before the start date. Cold weather makes my legs powerless, so 90 km cycling would in that case be very difficult. Even though I had worries about my swimming, it felt very good after 500m and got better and better the further the swimming went. I got to the transition zone in second place.

Tuomas Lampainen Nokia Triathlon Win

When I got near my bike I saw the leading guy and I knew that the swim was excellent. The weather wasn’t warm enough for my legs yet and I had to remind myself many times that 90 km was a long distance so I tried to cool my head down all the way to the first turning in 22,5 km. I hoped that my plan was right, ’cause the leader was taking more advance a few kilometers after the turning point. Luckily my legs started to warm up half way through the cycling I had my first good look at the leader’s back. Then I knew that he would stay on my back for a while. I drove second the second lap more than five minutes faster then the former leader and all other competitors were also slower than me.

High 5 gels gave me enough energy to survive the running. Therefore it was quite easy to smile and give interviews on the finish line although the running stage wasn’t easy, it really gave me a hard time. I want to thank the whole team and specially Ville and Matti for mechanic support. I had fantastic supporters and a mechanic during the race. My all time best cycling  performance gave me the opportunity to win. Hopefully I’ll have the chance to compete against my twin brother the next year.

Hi,

Team ProBikeKit Finland - Final Lap

Best greetings to ya all!

Boy has it been a season for me this far; the whole winter I was sick with a flu, my back has been killing me since last January and now I have had nasty hemorrhoids for a few weeks time. It really starts to tick me off, not to be able to ride with full throttle. Good thing though is that studies at University have ended for a few months and I can now concentrate myself on riding the bike. I have also opened my racing season with couple of races on the track and on the road. From track (team sprint) we got also our teams first win. The most competitive rival teams were not at the start line but we got official time from it and sow our teams early season level.  And hey, win is always a win! I have a long waited new frame for this season; Cervelo R3. No need to say that I am very pleased how the bike handles itself. It is very fast in corners and sprinting with it goes very smoothly. I think that the frame has increased my top speed by 5km/h, at least! I rode last race with Easton wheels and the bike almost flew on the road. I had a stupid grin on my face the whole race.  I am very happy how our team has rode the first races. Because my condition is still far from my best peak, boys have been practicing to control the bunch and doing a good lead out.

I have now slowly begin to ride longer rides and test how long I can sit without pain. Luckily it seems that the worst is now over and I really can start to push myself to limit in upcoming weeks.

I have heard that in England you have very big cycling event coming up. I wish that next year me and the boys are also there at the bikeradar live event! Good luck to all the contenders, have a good one!

Matti Suominen

Team PBK-Finland rider

Team ProBikeKit Finland - Leader of the pack

Hello from Finland!

 I have had a bit of a difficult season start, but finally now everything seems to be OK. Little knee and flu problems still keeps me on my toes. Anyway, lets start this blog on more positive side. Weather is getting warmer and the whole teams spirit is rising after very good team training sessions. Temperatures are now at 15 degrees every day and it feels great not to wear those leg warmers anymore. Strong and chilly wind is still there so PBKs gillet remains as a must wear in to that headwind.

Because of my knee problem I have not been able to collect those important road miles so much. It is an old injury on my right knee due to overstress. It first stroke me in winter 2004 and lasted till early spring. Injury didn´t mess the whole summer then so I am very optimistic that the knee would also heal for this summer and I could start training and racing soon. Winter training went really well. Lots of mountain biking and that all important gym training. I have now a good and solid base to build on my condition so this little setback wont ruin the whole season. I just have to be careful. The hardest thing is just to rest and keep it low. I would like to do those hard training rides with rest of the team already but I have to be patient so that I wont put my main goals for the season in danger. I hope that next time I have better news for you guys and more of those road miles behind me. I will try to keep my mind on the brighter things and learn from these difficulties.

Have a great time on the saddle!

Tuomas Lampainen

PBK-Finland rider

Happy Easter to you all!

Finally, it seems that summer is coming. Even though we are not in a t-shirt / shorts phase yet, it is looking very promising. Wind is still pretty chilly but temperatures are quite near ten degrees Celsius every day.

Training camp went pretty well. Riders schedule included running, mountain biking, stair climbing and gym. It was pretty hectic but surely worth a while. Truth to be told: I was pretty tired already at the start of the camp. Week before had also been tough with long rides and time trial tests. Every winter I have the feeling that : this is as much and as hard I can train, and every year I will find out that again I went longer and harder than before. Hopefully this season it will also show. Teams main goals for this season are later this summer so I am not so worried about that fatigue in my legs. Next Saturday we will have our first race here in Finland. It is pretty flat profile, suitable for a mass sprint. Unfortunately our sprinter Matti as well as the major part of the roster has been ill with a flu for last few days. It remains to be seen how much effect that will have in our condition. Hopefully we can still perform well in the race. After Saturday there are couple of time trial-and track races in teams schedule before the next road race.

Next weeks blog comes from different rider so best of luck to you all for this spring. Ride safe.

Cheers,

Ville

A long wait ended this Saturday when Finnish road season finally kicked off with Klimcheffskjy memory race. Circumstances anyway could have been better. It was very chilly with 4 degrees and stormy wind blowing 15-20m/s. With this kind of weather it was clear that the peloton would shatter to pieces all over the road. Crucial breakaway happened already in the second lap with a small bunch of riders. From that breakaway, four men lasted till the end. Sadly for us our only guy was not in that breakaway. A nasty flu kept the rest of our team away from the start line. By leading the main bunch we still got good advert and attention even though the cost of that was not finishing the race.

Team now has couple of weeks time to test out new gear with couple of track races and time trialling before the next road race. By then we have the full roster healthy and running. We are hoping that teams first win comes soon. That would ease up some pressure from the riders and give more self confidence going towards our main goals this season.

Results

1. T.Liias TuUl 02:04:10
2. U.Utar KCT st
3. G.Leppik KCT st
4. J.Rissanen CC st
5. J.Mäkelä Team Continental 02:08:03
6. M.Göös KaTa st
7. A. Utar KCT 02:08:20
8. J.Timmerbacka Chebici-Isku st
9. T.Hämeenaho Team Continental st
10. P.Leppänen Team Continental st

Team ProBikeKit Finland

A warm welcome to PBK Finlands team blog. In this blog we will put you guys in the middle of our group and experience the whole season with us.

First of all we want to thank PBK for giving its support to this team. This will be our first full season with PBK and we are highly motivated to represent its colors during this upcoming season. We have a strong roster with very interesting athletes (more of them and the team in teams introduction). Not needing to say, our hopes are up and so are expectations.

There are only few weeks to season opener and yes; we still have snow. It is crazy. Us riders are going insane not to be able to ride on the road. Those 3-4 hour interval – or uphill rides on trainers are really killing us.

We will have teams first minicamp at Easter. Hopefully by then the snow has melted and the spring is on the way. At camp we will take team photos, hopefully test the new frames and try out new kits.

Whole camps report as well as photos in the next blog.

Until then: keep those legs moving and BBQ’s ready!

Cheers,

Ville Suominen, rider in PBK Finland