@Ian Yes, very succesful for a first ever.

@Shonak Yeah, i just hope he doesn't become too much of a Rojas.

@mvhoogdalem I agree, and i'm looking forward to the later parts of the season, where Jack has matured a little.

@Sutty Yes, i hope he can be as good in Qatar too.

@Jak Yep, and the .2 races won't get too much harder either competition wise, so i'm sure he'll have a good few successes there too.

@Welker It is indeed, but a podium would've been outstanding of course.

I'm home now for the first time in three weeks, which is a great feeling of course. I'll be leaving for Qatar in a few days, so I have a lot of things to do before then. There's one thing I need to decide on especially soon, between Qatar and Oman anyway. It's the small matter of where to live. As it stands at the moment, when i'm not away racing, i'm at my parents place on the north of Dublin. I don't really want to stay here forever though, so now I have a few option.

1) To stay in Ireland, maybe get an apartment a bit closer to town. This has the advantage of being close to my friends and family, and I can hop over to England easily for the races there. It's not so convenient for the European races though.

2) To move to England. Somewhere in Wales maybe, or close to London. This means i'm always in reach of the English races, and it's not too hard to get to Europe, especially France and the BeNeLux region. Disadvantage is, it's England.

3) To move to Belgium. Our team is based there, so I can stay at one of the shared team apartments in Oudenaarde or Brussels. This would be ideal for training and racing, but on the other hand I wouldn't be in Ireland to see my friends and family very often.

Since this is a blog, and I want to actually gain something from this too, I ask you, my readers, what do you think is the best option for me, both for me as person and for my career?

@Hobbit Yeah, i've always been wondering if it's really that nice there.

@mvhoogdalem I actually had to check this ( ), but Jack is just turned twenty now, so he'd be old enough to leave for Belgium. Not that he couldn't train properly or anything in Ireland though.

@Sutty Also true words. Training often enough with his team mates might be something that could further his results too. Then again, it's not as if every An Post rider lives in or near Belgium either.

@Welker Yeah, staying close to friends and family has it's advantages.

@Ian It is, especially as he doesn't even have a contract for 2014 or anything. He could need to go somewhere completely different, or even retire if things go really badly, depending on how this season goes.

I've been really busy for the last few days, between training and getting ready for Qatar and all. I haven't fully made a decision yet on where to base myself for now, but you've shown me that England possibly isn't the best place to be. I've decided together with Kurt that we'll see how I roll on the cobbles at the end of the month, and if I do well I'll be moving to Oudenaarde, to train hills, sprinting and cobbling easier at once, and if I suck, I'll stay in Ireland.
Anyway, today we had the first stage of Qatar. This will be a real test, since we're up against ProTour opposition, though the best of the best did not make the trip. Kurt said that the first and the last stage were guaranteed for me, and the rest we'd have to see who was feeling good. Our train was looking good in the finale, when suddenly Kenny van Hummel caught in to my path. This made a huge gap between me and Sam, and i lost so much energy that i could only finish 14th. Edvaldas Siskevicius of Sojasun won in the end. Really annoying, since i felt if Siskevicius could win, i should at least have managed a Top 10. Man, i'll have a word with Kenny before tomorrows stage, that's for sure!

@Sutty Will do!

@Ian Maybe yes, maybe no.

@Sutty

Today was the day of the team time trial. Since our team isn't that great at it, and it was my first ever, it's not surprising to hear that we lost 53 seconds to Cancellara's RadioShack team, and finished second last. Four man Movistar managed to be last, loosing 5'23“!!
Since this is a very, very boring stage to tell you about, I will instead talk a little about Qatar. Because you see normally we just stay in a roadside Motel or whatever during a race, or at least that's how we did it so far. But in Qatar things are different. The race organizers brought up a really nice and swish Hotel for us to stay in, so we're fully enjoying that at the moment, keeping well out of the desert heat. The food is also really nice, not just the usual pasta, but local seafood, nice steaks, everything a cyclist could dream of. I'm just happy I'm no climber, at least I can afford to put on a little bit of weight. Anyway, I just got the dinner call, so that's it for today!

@Shonak -fade in- -dramatic music- -chair turns- -The Rider laughs evily- -fade out-

@mvhoogdalem Jack's not as stupid as Rogers, neither for eating chinese meat, or for using it as a cover up.

@Sutty Yeah, i suppose not.