A Division 1 team borrows from a Div. 3 team

Today we started building bikes. We were a few items short to get all bikes built. Although, we had not planned on building all of them in one day. Lucky for us the Saturn team (mechanics) were three miles away. I traded/borrowed the items we were shorted and drove back to our hotel. Not three steps out of the car while walking towards the team truck when Julien told me one of our suppliers/sponsors had sent the wrong size part. I called Ian and he had a handful of the part I needed. I did a 180 and got back into the car and drove back to the Saturn Hotel. Lucky Ian no longer needed the old ones as they had a different version of it for their 2003 bikes.
We have today, Sunday and Monday to build 26 bikes between 5 mechanics. Today Julien said he wanted to try to get 10 built. All told we built 13 bikes without trying too hard. That’s only and average of 2-1/2 per mechanic today. I was busy doing errands in the morning and almost to noon. So I was sort of useless in the bike building task today. I only built two bikes. We’re a Division 1 team but we needed to borrow stuff from the powerful Saturn team even though they are a Div 3 team. I feel a little weird being a Div 1 team and having to ask Ian to borrow/trade stuff. I always strive to be self sufficient. Thanks Ian. I got your back!
Juan was on fire. He built 5 or 6 himself. He did not count but it was a matter of elimination. We subtracted Geoff’s, Chris’s, Julien’s and mine from the total of 13. To answer one of the questions I know I’ll get, NO I did not build Lance’s. It did get built today. Juan “Speedy Gonzales” Lujan got that honor. There is not specific mechanic for Lance but Juan will be doing most of the same races he does. Last year, Jean Mark was in that role but he transferred to Quick Step – Davitamon team.
We have a person here at the hotel who is our liaison, getting what ever we need. Yesterday she came out to the truck while we were working. She was guessing the riders (when they arrive) will have a strict diet to follow. We agreed. She then said we mechanics were not here to ride/train and were not on the same strict diet. We agreed again. So she said she had a friend who was high up with a local beer distributor. She asked if we wanted some and the guys did not hesitate to say yes. Two hours later the Beer guy showed up with literally cases of beer. Wow! We’re set for any party we’ll be throwing. I had to share the wealth and took some over to Ian and his men for his help this morning.
The beer guy also distributes water. Beer is a precious commodity for mechanics and water is a precious commodity for the soigneurs to get for the riders. We’ll go through about 80 to 100 water bottles per day on training rides if this great weather continues. Multiply that by 9 days means we’ll need between 700 to 900 bottles of liquid for rides. This is only the quantity of bottles/water for the training rides. Add some for riders to take to their rooms and the amount of water is astronomical. Freddy the head soigneur will be hitting him up for some H2O for sure.