Last year Clint and I went on a Veloclassic tour and we rode Flanders, Gent, and yup..the King..Paris Roubaix. It was a rainy day when we did the Kemmelberg and the descent was one of the scaryist things that I've ever done without falling off my bike. Cobbles, sand, gravel, barbed wire.. and I was only going 20mph. We went to watch the descent during the race when these guys are going full speed (40-50mph) they are holding on for dear life. Bottles were flying, wheels were creaking and a few tires were popping. I don't remember any bad crashes like this year, but thats one race I wouldn't want to do. The funny thing was the Spainish guys were all descending the cobbles at a snails pace, I guess they are better at going up hills..
The day we rode Paris Roubaix was very very cool. WE started off getting CSC radios and our DS for the day was Scott Sunderland of CSC. We started the ride with the plan of all staying together, then helicopters, camaras, cars...wtf is all the fuss about???
The next thing I see is a train of Quick Step coming by with Boonen leading the bunch. I look to see where Clint is and he was bridging across to the QS train. I looked back at Peter (owner of Veloclassic) and he says go...
There were about 20 of us Freds...riding the QS train ocassionally getting yelled at by the paparazi on moto taking pictures until we started hitting the cobbles. The QS/Boonen would hit the front and put my SRM up to around 400+ watts of hell, Clint was in his element and after about an hr and 15 sections of cobbles we were the last Fred's hanging on....we spoke to Boonen a few times and he was pretty cool...then pop goes my tube....shit! I left my tube and pump in the CSC car which was back a few miles...
Clint hit the brakes, said later to Boonen and helped me with the tube. Thats what I call a friend!
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I met Clint before the days of Spine, he has always been a great guy and a hell of a rider.
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