Rollerski: French championship and World cup

Will talk about two races I did recently.

First, French Championship (weekend - 27-28 of august).
French championship in rollerski took place in Besse (Super-Besse) in France of course :) Where one of the Tour de France stages was finished this year!

Two days, first day prolog - 3 km on rather difficult track, with the flat part against very strong wind. It was very hard for me. I don't know what happened, but I felt very bad after the race and during the race the last uphill was very hard and I felt I lost a lot of time there. In any case I lost around 42 seconds to the first and finished 25th with time 6:41.

Next day we had an uphill pursuit race. Since I lost 42 seconds to the first, I had to go in 42 seconds after the start of the first person. The start went fast. I went with number 24 (I had 25), we did not manage to get to the guys in front of us (though should do it). Thus we went together. The uphill in the beginning was quite easy: it was still an uphill but not too steep. Then a guy from behind joined us and we went together for some time. In the middle of the race we had 1-2 km of rather flat area. Two other two people reached us and we went 5 together on the flat. The group in front was in around one minute distance from us. They all got together (around 20 people).

Then we had a 1.5km of 11% uphill. The groups started to break. I went forward in our group and pulled a bit. I and number 24 (with me in front) managed to separate from the other 3 guys. Bug a young one (number 40) reached us and at the end of the uphill we were 3. Group in front was also stretched. We saw its end not far from us. After the finish of the uphill we had some flat area and then two other small uphills and finish. Number 40 went away from us. Number 24 sped up at the top of the second to the last uphill and managed to get some distance from me. We finished the same way, he was half a second in front of me. In general the second races went quite ok for me.

Results

World Cup took place in Germany (2-4 september) - Markkleeberg.
Strange name for Germany :)

Prolog (7.5km on Friday), Sprint on Satuday and Pursuit on Sunday.

Prolog I did very well. It was a time-trial and I was 7th overall, 16 seconds away from the best - russian Alexander Denisov. I was better than the current world cup winner and other strong rollerskiers. Honestly, I was very happy! It's probably my best rollerski race in the world cup up untill now. Third among russians, even brought points to russian national team.

Sprint as usually not my strength. I finished 17th, just after qualification and two russians just after me. Actually, we were happy. We didn't have to wait for 1.5 hours under the very strong sun and went to hotel to recover before the next Sunday's race :) Though I got a very nice comment that visually I went very good but did not work enough with my legs (it was un uphill sprint).

Next day we had the Pursuit based on results of the Prolog of Friday. I started 16 seconds after the russian winner. We had 5 laps to go with a rather "good" uphill, downhill and some flat area. On the first lap after the uphill I and a person just behind me (very strong sprinter in rollerski from France) joined the group in front. We were 8 people and we went quite fast the guys behind us were left far behind. Then we started to play "cats and mice", nobody wanted to go forward, we slowed down and guys from behind (4-5 people) started to come closer. On the last lap they went very close. Unfortunately for me, my pole was broken in the middle of the uphill, and untill the end of the uphill I had to go with one pole.
My group made an acceleration and everybody from the pursuers could not keep up, since they were very tired trying to reach us. So everybody from my group went forward, but our pursuers still passed me by well enough, so that I couldn't get back to them once I got my pole. So I was 12ths, but could be for sure in the first 8 (I felt very good before my pole was broken) and even fight for higher positions. Well, shit happens. At least now I have a lot of confidence in myself and I still have my 7th place in prolog.

Next race is next weekend: Transroller (uphill race and 25km masstart).

Results:
Prolog
Sprint
Pursuit