worked that out I hope—was very well traveled, having worked for DHL, and she had lived in Australia. She had friends everywhere: Belgium, Holland, the Czech Republic, Poland. Wherever I went, she seemed to know someone, so after a while I said: “If you think you might want to be with me, come and see my life. Come and see what it’s like.”
It was a great time. In 2013 I had my best spring so far, picking up my first classic at Gent–Wevelgem and my first Monument podiums with second places at Milan–San Remo and the Tour of Flanders. Traveling with Katarina shone a new light on everything, and I felt stronger for having her point of view and support alongside me.
The problem was the problem that all of us face at some point: time. Some of us have not enough, some too much. At that point, it was certainly the former, with the training, racing, commercial responsibilities, family, friends, and girlfriend all deserving a bigger chunk of my attention than they were getting. We started picking races to go to together, so we could enjoy a bit more: no quick turnarounds, no training camps, no long transfers. The Tour of California was a perfect place for us, providing the chilled-out lifestyle we both wanted. We could carry on and be together at a relaxed, personal altitude training camp in Utah or Tahoe. The Tour Down Under is a great place to go, too, and usually the world championships is as well as you’re in the same place for a few days and in the more informal atmosphere of the national team rather than a sponsored outfit with professional demands.
We decided that the classics would be too much. Maybe, say, Paris–Roubaix, or Flanders, but to do the whole period together would be too intense. The same thing goes for the Tour de France. A stage here or there is fun and something to look forward to in the middle of the madness of the Tour, but you get dragged into the routine grind if you do it all the time, and that’s no good for either of us.
There’s also the team and my teammates to think of. Togetherness is important in any team in any sport. At some point, you’ll need to rely on each other, and the unique pro-cycling system of first among equals will be put to the test. There wasn’t room on the Tour, for instance, for nine riders to bring their families along for the ride, let alone the directors’, mechanics’, and soigneurs’ families. Plus, much of the communication and planning at big races takes place when you sit around the breakfast table or dinner table. Big team training camps were not ideal places for us to go together for those reasons, too.
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