Last week, I went on my first ever overseas training camp with my team, Tofauti Everyone Active. A week long trip to Mallorca enabled us to not only get in a good week of training, but also gel and bond as a team. Although most of us knew each other from racing, and I’d been on the same team as 2 others from last year, it was good to spend some time together as a group before the start of the season. We learnt about each other’s goals, skills and abilities on and off the bike, and the time allowed us to see a side of each other away from racing.
Coming into the week, I didn’t know what to expect, having never been on a team training camp before. However, after arriving in our hotel in Alcudia and an easy ride a routine was quickly established.
The block began with a day of easy riding, down to the famous lighthouse at Cap Formentor and back, just to get the legs moving before the serious training began the day after. Most days would be ride out to the climb, do efforts up the climb and then roll back. Each day was around 3.5-4hrs, and we had a nice mixture of efforts throughout the week, some shorter, intense efforts and some longer ones.
It was great to ride the famous climbs that I had only ever seen pictures of, like Sa Calobra, Sa Batalla, Col de Sóller and Puig Major, even if we didn’t get time to take it all in on the way up sometimes. My favourite day was the all out effort up Sa Calobra, just because of the fabled nature of the climb, and it’s iconic hairpins. With it being used by so many pro’s and amateurs it is a great marker to see how you compare with other riders and also other juniors, many of whom you may be up against later on in the year. It was also interesting to compare Strava times on the descents with the Challenge Mallorca races, as it shows how fast the pros can really go downhill!
Generally, it was good weather as expected, although it did rain quite heavily for a while when we were up the top of Sa Batalla, making for some good descending practice in the slippery conditions.
Getting the warm weather while others were at home in various storms definitely boosted the morale, and really made me saviour the experience of being out in Mallorca.
I’ll leave you with some stats for the week, but first of all I want to say a big thank you for all those involved at Tofauti Everyone Active and Mallorca cycling for putting it all together. It really was a great experience.
Also I want to say thank you to Pedal Potential who will also be supporting me this season.
Stats:
22hrs 40mins
670km
4932m of elevation gain
40 dinner plates
8 cups of coffee
6 energy gels
2 caffeine gels
And lots of fun!
Nathan Hardy 
👍
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