Other foreigners in France

This past weekend got the opportunity to race against a good chunk of other nationalities. There was a group of 10 Japanese, 8 Poles, another 8 Turkish riders, few spanish, some german and some Russian folks too. While this isn't that big of a deal, the housing situations of these others puts the larger sense of racing here into a new perspective. My last post talked a bit about how overly dangerous I felt that the racing was here and the amount of risk that many riders were willing to take for a little bit of cash.

Well, here in France teams can have no more than 2 foreign i.e. non french rider on a team so racers from foreign countries get split up on teams but often live together, such is the case with the Japanese. They have 10 people in an apartment, no kitchen, a sink to shower, yes thats right, no showering, no washer and dryer, just rinse clothes in sink and call good. What do they do for food, they have a little MSR camping stove to cook pasta-breakfast and dinner everyday. They came here with very little and if there is 2 euro for 35th place, they will race as hard as they possibly can to win that tiny bit of cash even if it means wrecking out half the field.

The polish riders have it a little bit better, each rider has his own room which again consists of a bed and when sitting on bed, can touch all 4 walls. In this room is a sink for a shower again and a microwave to cook with. Once again, came here with very little and living from race winning to race winning.

And lastly, as explained to me, the Turkish riders here are living in someones cold basement on little mattresses on the cement.

From what I can understand, many of the racers here come from extremely poor backgrounds and this is their way out of that. While these conditions here may sound quite rough, as is often the case it is much better than what they have back home. What happens if they are not able to make it in cycling, they go back home and work in the fields or even worse, there is no work and panhandle on the streets. This situation is not just limited to the foreigners as many French racers here also come from difficult backgrounds and are also living from race to race.

Because of this, even though I find myself in a less than ideal position, I am doing quite well-I have a bed, I can shower, I can cook a bit and I can make some tea to drink. As it was put to me, I am in paradise. Upon finding out this information about many others it makes a little more sense now to me as how aggressive the racing in and why there are so many more risks taken here. It certainly brings into perspective what America has to offer.