Trudi flew back to Kansas City from Brussels yesterday.  She had been working full-on for the past 30 days and now gets a couple days off before having to head out to the Tour of California.

Flashback to when she left, the Brussels airport had been attacked a few days earlier, so she flew to Paris and had to drive back to to the BMC service course in Belgium. She did a race with the BMC development team and then flew to Pisa and drove a team car to take a ferry to Sicily.

She sat on top of Mt. Etna for a couple weeks while BMC shuttled riders in and out for an altitude training camp. She got back on a ferry, drove back up to France and did the Tour de Bretagne.  She was working once again for the BMC U-23 guys.  An American, Adrien Costa, won the race overall.  Pretty stellar result.

She went to the Brussels airport on Monday night, expecting chaos, which it was.  The airport is open, but under super security.  She was flying with Rohan Dennis and Michael Schär, who were going to Colorado to train a bit before California. They were staying in the Sheraton, across the street from the airport.  Like a stones throw from the terminal.  It still took over two hours in a line outside, to get to the tents set up outside to do security and check luggage.  Man, is the world jacked up.

Anyway, Tucker was ecstatic to see her.  She got up at 4 am this morning, which is par for the course returning from Europe.  I bet she can’t wait until she get to California where it is 2 hours earlier.

She is usually pretty done, so I doubt the 4 hours sleep last night will do her for the day.  It isn’t really that glamorous of a life supporting professional bike racers as one might think.  Lots of long work and travel days.

Alright, the weather is looking perfect for her couple recovery days back in Kansas.  High around 70 and lows around 50.  The roses are just starting to bloom, so spring is in full swing.

Both Trudi and Tucker were very happy to see each other.

Hotel up on Mt. Etna.

Ferry going and coming from Sicily.

Tucker was running around like a crazy boy at the airport before Trudi’s flight arrived.

I feel a little sad because I failed to remember that Bromont has been gone for over a year now. It was May 3rd, last year, and the time has seemed to pass so quickly.  I guess I should feel alright about it, because I’m not dwelling on missing him so much.  That is a good thing.

I know having Tucker for the past 3 months has been a big part of that.  Tucker isn’t a replacement for Bromont, he’s his own guy, but he is super fun to be around.

Travelling with a dog is challenging at races sometimes.  But Tucker is a good traveller.  He is nearly past his chewing stage, and didn’t do too much damage.

I think that it would have been great if Bromont and Tucker had known each other.  There are completely different, personality-wise, but for some reason, that is probably more important to my mindset than for any other reason, it seems like it would be better if there was a connection, or continuity between them.  Whatever, it didn’t happen, so it is what it is.

Tucker likes to sleep more than Bromont.  That is saying something because Bromont really liked to sleep.  As soon as Tucker gets into a car, especially the diesel van, he snoozes.  And he can stay in bed for 9 hours without any problem.  That is super good for race travelling.  When Bromont was his age, he got up with the sun and wanted to go out to check on the birds.  That was really bad at races.

Tucker is just starting to get “birdy” now.  The women we got him from said he was going to be a very birdy dog.  I didn’t know what that meant, still don’t, but have a better idea of it now than I did a couple weeks ago.

Anyway, life goes on.  I still miss Bromont, as I do all the dogs I’ve have the pleasure of living with.  Bromont was special.  I’m hoping he’s running around somewhere in doggy heaven.

Bromont loved to run more than just about anything else.