grover's grumblings

SSWC10NZ

2010-11-09T18:55:00.002+11:00

The Event

The Steed

The Local

The Accommodating People

The 'carpark'

The 'bikelove'

The shenanigans

The international flavour

The race

The Winners

The 'swim'

The Video

Awesome!

The Ultimate Cycling Weekend

2010-10-07T19:31:00.002+11:00

Last weekend was all about bikes. On Friday night I soloed it down to Portarlington to meet up with a couple of other cycling nuts in James Mowatt and Rohin Williams.

I caught the sunrise as I headed off to the You Yangs to demo some big wheels at the Yowie 99km race. Unfortunately I missed a track arrow on the first 33km lap and came through 3km short. While I enjoyed being heralded as the lone leader I quickly clarified the situation, blaming it on the big wheels being too fast to see properly.

So with 30km in the legs the solution was to start again with the 66km race. This was going swell. The benefits of 29inch wheels were clear in the rock gardens as I neglected to pick lines and just rode over everything. I wasn't loving dragging them up the hills though until I realised it was actually a slipping seatpost causing such a burn in my legs. So next time through transition I stopped...and the coffee van was too tempting. Rohin came through about 15 minutes later so fueled by caffeine I headed out with him for a cruisy final lap.

The next day it was all about the skinny wheels as the best cyclists in the world threw down in our own backyard for the rainbow bands.

This was my hangout for the day.

It was definitely where all the action was happening.

Seeing Gilbert blast up this in the big ring on the final lap to get a gap was amazing.

Come the end of the race it was a decent groupetto.

Oh, and I found some time to build these.

Just have to block out a few evenings in a row to get them glued.

See the Light

2010-09-13T19:15:00.001+10:00

It's a great time of year. The daily commute requires no lights...or leg warmers. Even a gillet is surplus to requirements on occasion. That makes me happy. What makes me unhappy is the lack of riding time. Mid week I can deal with it. But when my weekends get taken up by non-pedaling activities I have to prioritise. That means MTB only.

The weekend before last was the final round of the DirtRiders winter series. Upper Beaconsfield is one of the best courses around and in amazingly good condition given the recent levels of precipitation.

Awesome fun and a great hit out. I even managed to see the front when AJ missed a pedal half way through the first lap after a muddy run-up. He soon remedied that though and took young gun Michael Crosbie with him as I slipped to third. I had a bit of a battle with Craig Borham for the final podium spot mid race but ended up with a safe 20 odd second gap across the line.

This weekend just gone once again only had room for one day on the bike. Having impulsively entered the You Yangs Yowie mid week I ventured out to reacquaint myself with the trails. I forgot how well that place handles the rain though and wore the tractor tyres. Not good when you're chasing two Chancellor boys around for three hours. It almost felt like a road ride as I groveled to hold their wheel north of 30km/h through the flat tracks. If one of them isn't a World 24hour Solo Champion in a months time I'll be amazed! Note to self: Ride a 29er for the Yowie.

Oh yeah, I've got a little project in the works. Apparently they're all the rage in Europe.

Up...down...rebuild

2010-08-22T19:34:00.003+10:00

WARNING: low level gore below. Don't say I didn't warn you!

Rewind three weeks ago and I was flying high. I'd spent the day racing around in a red bodysuit and was gearing up for a week off work to race the first round of the National Road Series aka the Tour of Gippsland. So how did that go?

160guys, 550kms, 8 stages, 4 of them 1km crits, 2 of them hailing and gale force winds, 2 crashes for me and a DNF. A few weeks later and I've got a hole in my face and can't sleep on my left side...

A recipe for disaster!

Positives? I had the legs/tactical nouse to finish with the lead group on all but the first stage, and on that occasion it was more the tactical nouse than the legs that let me down. That meant if I hadn't have headbutted the asphalt in Paynesville on the last day and registered a DNF I would have snuck into the top 50 on GC. I even managed to position myself in the top 10 within a kilometre of the line on one stage...but learnt how aggressive it is up there and ended up in the gravel.

Negatives? Well the DNF, the hole in my face to remind me of it for the rest of my life, and the resulting time off the bike...and work!

Cycling is a hobbie, a fun hobbie, and if it's not fun I don't do it. When there's oozy wounds and dressings to be changed with the risk of infection and more time off work a pedal isn't turned in anger. So what pedal turning has been done?

Melbourne turned on one of its clearest days in a while lasts weekend. I celebrated by taking in some roadie climbs. A perfect opportunity to test out the panorama mode on the phone. Not bad.

Then it turned on a filthy week so I took some of the young guns from Rollin Cycles out on an EvaEpicesque ride on some secret trails, tested the new 2011 Apollo Duallie (stealth!), and had another shot at the mobile phone panorama...it's seems to have broken my bike though?

Oh, and I got a fix for my cycling shoe addiction.

So now it's 9 weeks out from the first National MTB Round. Probably time to do more than one ride a week again. Final note. Sadly Rollin Cycles has now closed. If like me you appreciated their good advice and quality work then head over to BikesDirect in Carnegie as Justin the Mechanic is now spinning wrenches there.

SSWC10 Prep...the costume

2010-07-27T07:31:00.003+10:00

Dirty Deeds CX was on again on the weekend. I thought it the perfect opportunity to test out the SSWC10 attire. That and some carbon mtb tubular wheels. Both were awesome.

Visualise

Holeshot

Jump

Ride

Salute

Victory

Podium

Then a generous soul that obviously wanted to see me suffer some more lent me a CX bike so I backed up and went around again.

Pain

Hand-ups please!

What's that coming over the hill is it a mon-sta, is it a mon-sta

Flying

Mud

Avoid guy decking it...

...now.

Christmas in July

2010-07-21T21:45:00.005+10:00

The present this week was a trip to the function rooms at Sandown Racecourse to peruse the 2011 offerings from Apollo. Recently I've rung the guys on a Sunday or 10pm on a weeknight worrying about disrupting them only to find them hard at work at the office. It certainly looks like the long hours have paid off.

Most of the team were on hand for some happy snaps

Mens Road Team

Prime Estate Womens Team

MTB Team

and even a Trackie!

The ArctecM was the last bike I looked at. Mainly because I knew I wouldn't be looking at anything else once I got there. It...is...awesome.

It drops a couple of pounds for 2011, helped in no small way by the new Easton EA90XC wheelset. True UST tubeless at under 1400 grams!

They also appear on the Arctec's all new dual squish twin.

There's also a big wheeled aluminium brother in the line up for 2011

Which gets the BLING Haven 29er wheelset to keep things stiff and light.

and is dripping in new 2x10 SRAM X.0

The biggest change at the top end of the line up is on the tarmac though with new framesets for both the EliteC and ArctecR. It's PHAT where it should be and skinny where comfort is key...not to mention the stiffness upgrade by going to BB30 and a weight drop of more than 500grams.

SLIM stays look super comfy!

Complete with POWER...and still under 6.8kg meant the road guys didn't stray too far from the ArctecR. I think they're in LURVE...

There was even a new TT bike on show.

Rob Eva and the SRAM crew were on hand to run through some setup tips

Note the cool new FACTOR wheelset on the EliteC.

Oh yeah, I did some riding as well. Melbourne to Ballarat on Saturday. My first handicap and a real eye-opener. Positioning is so important...I was a bit careless and got spat. Note to self; don't do that at Midlands Tour on Saturday or Tour of Gippsland next week. I'd been given some Carboshotz gels to trial and stupidly used a couple in the race. They're terrible and 7 hours post race still didn't feel like eating. Back to the favourite Leppin for next time. I did manage to stomach a bit of the 'fat arsed gnome' though.

One of my favourite drops from Belgium last year. It's a bit of a rarity in Oz so when I find it I buy it. Props to the European Bier Cafe for having it. I was hoping it had plenty of carbs because it was my race 'food' for the next days six hours of Lysterfield trails for Chase the Sun round 2. My legs were shot and it appeared my partner was in no better shape, still being on the Carltons on route to the race at 7am Sunday morning.

OK so it was actually orange juice but he had had a decent night and wasn't too keen on being awake at that time. 'Bus still ripped it up all day on the single speed cyclocross machine though.

and I got around for a few laps as well. The speed was there to hang with the front guys...for about 15 minutes before the previous days racing and lack of food caught up with me. We went backwards after that and didn't even look at the results. Probably about seventh I reckon. Solid field of 480 riders and perfect weather (if you were off track during the last hour of rain like me) made for a very enjoyable day though.

Slip Slidin'

2010-07-04T15:42:00.003+10:00

I got a few hours of saddle time on both the roadie and mtb in my favourite playground, the dandenongs. While the weather man and radar said it should be pretty clear an eery mist was well set in all around the mountain, there was plenty of moisture on the ground and it was S-L-I-C-K. That meant a rather cold roadie ride as I held back a bit on the descents. However, it meant nothing but laughs on the mtb.

A good bunch of larakins embarked on the adventure and each spent their share of time with one foot on the pedals, watching their rear wheel come around in front of them, as they careered of the track and into the bushes. No damage done though. Well, except for this...

Rob found half his pedal attached to his bike and the other half still attached to his shoe. A common problem that Crank Brothers have hopefully fixed by replacing the bushing with a needle bearing in the latest version of their Eggbeaters. I'll let someone else be the test dummy though. For now I'll stick with the offerings from that company that makes fishing reels.

Lovin' It!

2010-06-28T18:38:00.002+10:00

It's been an excellent couple of weeks on the bike since the Gippy 3 Day Tour. I had a ball attacking and attacking and attacking in the final stage and was hungry for more. To feed the hunger I ventured down to Casey Fields the following Saturday for a bit of crit action. The field was small, and to be fair anything other than a win would have been disappointing. That didn't make it any easier though as everyone seemed content to try their luck in a bunch kick. It took me four attacks but I finally got away for the win. Add the commute to Cranbourne in and it turned into a quality five hours chamois time.

What better way to celebrate than to go and play in the mud on the mtb at round 2 of the Fat Tyre Flyers winter series on the very challenging Chum Creek course. Pete and I yo-yo'd within a few metres of each other until he snuck past a lapped rider on the penultimate lap just before the main decent. Aforementioned lapped rider then proceeded to go over the bars leaving his bike across the track as I entered a chute. End result was me also over the bars and my stem pointing sideways. So I lost a couple of minutes that lap, took back one of them on the last lap and finished second by 50 seconds. A good day out though with the 1x10 setup shining in ideal chainsuck conditions.

Fast forward another week of commuting to and from work in the dark when it's four degrees, at least it hasn't been raining, and you come to this weekend just gone. Saturday morning was a slightly epic five hour journey with one of the new Apollo signings. It was cold and Mother Nature made up for the lack of rain on my commutes to work. Jase made my legs hurt too! So he's seven kilo's lighter than me, and I was doing 310 watts to hold his wheel for a fair bit of the ride. Hopefully he puts that power/weight to good use during this National Road Series as it could certainly do some damage!

Sunday meant more playing in the mud. The 'nongs never get old when it comes to mtbing. Wheels did lots of sliding, people fell off, and my ride partners seemed bent on trying to find a hill I couldn't ride on the 1x10 setup. Once the mud was washed off post ride it revealed nothing but ear to ear grins though. There wasn't much time to hang around though as we hightailed it to Brunswick Velodrome for a historical day in Victorian Cycling. The first officially sanctioned Cyclocross race courtesy of these guys. Not yet having a 'cross bike in my quiver I was behind the lense for this one to capture Mr Ozriders in a terrible skinsuit. This format has to take off! So...much...fun.

The steeds ready for battle.

The calm before the storm.

Our winner. Never underestimate the power of a Belgian Champ Skinsuit.

Jimmy kept Campbell high on the bank.

Luckily this photo doesn't capture the true seethroughness of the skinsuit.

Fireman Sam shows us how to shoulder and run on his way to second.

Pick your vantage point carefully and you can almost see the whole course. Brilliant!

Getting Aero

2010-06-16T22:39:00.002+10:00

I got some solid roadie racing km's in on the weekend down in Gippsland. Thanks to the newest addition to the Apollo roster for food and a bed. Read about the happenings here.

The Grover Diet

2010-05-31T19:36:00.000+10:00

So the Dukan Diet appears to be taking Australia by storm. Well forget that...introducing the latest fad diet...the Grover Diet. Simplicity is key and this one couldn't get more simple. Ride your bike as fast as you can for a few hours wearing too many clothes.

You can't physically drink enough to replace the fluids you lost and the scales will smile when you next step on them. I lost a kilogram an hour on this diet!

Round 1 of Full Gas Promotions' Chase The Sun series was held yesterday. That severe CTL rise of last week still had me a bit under the weather so I rugged up for the start. Two and a half hours later I was sweating up a storm and I finally ditched some clothes.

Alas, the damage was done. The right quad was the first to feel the effects with some minor cramps. I dropped from third to fifth. Whether it be from not having spent more than two hours on a mtb in the last ten weeks, or from the lack of quads control on my patella tracking stemming from the cramps, or a combination of the both I started to get some knee pain and pulled the pin at four hours. One hour short of the finish but with the depth of solo entrants in Victorian mtbing at the moment that dropped me from fifth to 19th. There is some serious growth going on in this sport!

Results

Other than the result the rest of the day was all positive. A sold out event with everyone in good spirits having a ball on a TAAGO (tacky-as-all-get-out) track. The 1X10 setup was perfect gearing for the solo onslaught with a 34tooth chainring. All other Apollo riders got on the podium. My 'moto' inspired mudguards looked awesome...even if you don't say so. Get in quick for the next round as it's already 40% full!

A fine line

2010-05-23T15:55:00.003+10:00

Training in the dark after work can get a bit eiry. The helmet hair doesn't help when you get home and a shadow is cast in the dark!

It's Sunday afternoon and a solid week on the bike is complete. The legs are tired, good, but there's a slight tickle in the throat, BAD! Cycling is becoming more and more a game of numbers. I'm still new to this training with power thing having only been at it for about 8 months. Only now am I starting to see trends and starting to understand how to use it. So what does the data have to say about that tickle in my throat?

I'm most interested in my chronic training load (CTS). From what I've gathered a rise of 1-4 in a week is an easy week, a rise of 5-8 is a moderate week and a rise of 9-12 is a hard week. The last time I got really sick was after smashing myself in and around Bright over the Christmas/New Years period. That was a CTS rise of 13. This past week has seen a rise of 10, a fine line between health and sickness. With some good sleep and nutritious food let's hope that tickle in my throat doesn't turn into anything more and there's nothing stopping me pinning a number on next Sunday for Round 1 of Chase The Sun. Five hours racing mtb's on four weeks training...should be interesting.

Enough of the boring talk though. On yesterdays ride I stopped by Albert Park for a bit of criterium viewing. A hotdog-esque course had the field whittled down pretty quickly to a group of about ten with all the usual suspects present. With three to go the moves started.

First Dan

then Eric

and finally Alex and Dan made one stick.

Alex got the maiden win for the new Search2Retain team with owner/manager (above) screaming and jumping up and down with excitement. Hats off to Apollo's newest recruit Kane Walker for winning the bunch sprint to take third.

Shut Up Legs!

2010-05-16T17:54:00.004+10:00

We've all seen clips like this but it never gets old.

That was the theme for my weekend. After a week of rainy, dark and cold after work training sessions Saturday dawned without a drop of precipitation on the radar. Excellent! A mate had told me to meet at Mordialloc at 8.30 for a spin down to Arthur's Seat. He hadn't mentioned it was with a solid bunch comprised of VIS and Australian Road Cycling outfitted fellas. I spent 5 hours with them. A good chunk of that time north of 40 clicks chewing stem. Not to mention the threshold effort required to avoid keeping them waiting at the top of Arthur's too long for me. Add the extras required post ride to do some errands and it was a big day.

What better way to follow that up than with a mtb race on a Rohin Adams inspired course. For everyone that doesn't know that means hills. Steep hills...and lots of 'em. A grade did 2 laps of 24km. It went up for 10km, then rolled for 2km, then down for 8km, then rolled for 2km and finished with 2km of muddy/sloppy double track funness (yes, that is a word).

As you could have guessed I was popped pretty early. Funny how you think you've recovered well until you try to turn the screws a bit and the legs start crying. I rode whatever tempo I could muster up the climb and let it all hang out on the descent to roll back onto the lead group as we reached the bottom. A bunch of 10 rolled through to complete lap one together and then it was a case of deja vu. The climb started the second time around and I got popped the second time around. I settled into that tempo again hoping the time gap wouldn't be too ugly. It was. Even more sideways action was had going down this time but to no avail. The leaders stayed away by a couple of minutes. I found myself in a two up sprint for 4th and 5th, except when I tried to open it up the legs said 'no sprint for you!' (think soup nazi episode of seinfield).

Looking at the sky post race it's hard to know how the bike's got so dirty! Hopefully we get more of the same next week. Training in the dark aint so bad, it's when it's cold and raining that it gets hard to swallow.

And so it begins...

2010-05-11T20:17:00.003+10:00

It was spluttering and blowing oil but it looks like the blog machine is up and running again for season 2010. I've enjoyed 6 weeks off where the only cycling involved visiting here (scroll left)

with bunches of good mates

for a few too many of these.

The result? I'm down 30 watts at threshold and 5kg heavier which means I'm operating at half a watt per kg less than 6 weeks ago. Some changes to the bike include some of those crazy rings from Rotor.

They seem to have helped maintain a smooth pedal stroke during the break but they'd need to pedal themselves to have helped me on the weekend. The race debut for 2010-11 season came on Saturday a week after returning to training. The Phillip Island Grand Prix is 25 laps totaling 111km's of wind changes and punchy climbs. It was a very good yardstick of were I'm at. 180+ riders started and approximately 50 finished. As expected I was one of the 130 DNF's. Some good race practice in a very sketchy peleton though. Being the mtber I am with limited bunch experience it was nice to find myself in the right place most of the time until I ran out of legs.

Next stop looks like being FGP's Chase The Sun series with a solo number on the front. Stay tuned for my take on this 1x10 thing everyone is raving about. The '10' part coming care of BlackCatBoneBikes and their custom 10 speed SRAM X.0 twistshift.

Yep it's got an extra click!

Dirtriders Twilight 6 Hour

2010-05-11T20:16:00.004+10:00

With monster balls of ice bombarding Melbourne the 2010 Labour Day weekend was quite memorable for most cyclists. Tales of desperate dives for cover to avoid being battered and bruised by these giants were heard from all areas...well except Upper Beaconsfield. No hail and barely a drop of rain was seen at the Dirtriders MTB Twilight 6hour Enduro. The club decided to put the Monday Public Holiday to good use and start this 6 hour at 3pm, allowing a bit of night riding to shake up the racing.

Pete and I fronted up with mud tyres already mounted expecting the worst. One look at the track surface and it was obvious there was no need. The Michelin XCR DryII treads were quickly wrapped back around our wheels and we were ready to harness the crazy speed and deceptive grip they provide.

Unfortunately the nasty weather in surrounding suburbs had left many wrapped up on their couches as home and after lap one it was obvious the race was between two teams and a solo rider for overall honours. A few hours later we were all still within a couple of minutes of each other, the sun was setting and the most solid shower of the day came through. That was too much for our solo friend and he decided to call it a day. As the sun dimmed further the other team reallised their light setup wasn't quite up to scratch and racing at night wasn't an option. That left us unchallenged to ride out the remaining time in the lead. Eventually finishing more than two laps clear of the rest of the field on 14 laps. Not the most satisfying way to win a race, but a win's a win... preparation is crucial people.

Pete even got to do a double lap as I missed transition thinking it more important to pimp my ride glow stick style.

Special mention to ex-Apollo roadie James Mowatt. The Rollin Cycles junior team were down a rider after one of the Matt's put his teeth through his jaw by crashing in practice and was rushed to hospital. James didn't take much convincing to fill the spot on short notice and was an instrumental part in the junior team beating home the more experience senior team led by shop owner Dale on his new Apollo ArctecM. Moral of the story? Even on a rocket ship like the ArctecM the legs are what decides the winner and the juniors had that department covered. Get that training done!

Finally if you want to see what the trails were like I wore the helmet cam on my dusk lap. The lap was slightly shortened as it was just after the heaviest downpour so it also happens to be the fastest lap recorded at the event. Only the first half in this video though.

Great Ocean Sports Festival

2010-05-11T20:16:00.003+10:00

A week after the Otway Odyssey Apollo Bay was once again swamped by outdoor adventure freaks for the Great Ocean Sports Festival. While the festival was in its fourth year, the MTB marathon was making its debut. Pete and I ventured down the Great Ocean Road to lap up the atmosphere and get some quality off-road saddle time in.

The course was simply the MTB leg of the adventure race with an added out and back loop comprised of fire road and bush track. After running, swimming and kayaking adventure racers obviously aren't too keen on the single track and so this course was faaast!

Come 8am Pete and I were lined up on the second row planning on following the early moves and seeing if we could match it with an unknown bunch of skinny racer boys...and girls which included ex-Road World Champion Judith Arndt fresh off her Odyssey win. The gun went and as per usual there were those guys that took off like a scalded cat. We were both quickly on the wheel sitting nicely in the top 10. After about 5km we found ourselves near the front on a steep, 500 metre, mossy climb. Pete turned the screws and half way up had a 30 metre gap. Looking around all I saw on faces around me was pain, I accelerated and no one followed. As Pete crested the climb I rolled up next to him, a quick nod and off we went.

At the turn around after 10km we took note of our time and as we headed 'back', the nearest chaser was heading 'out' and the gap was at 1'20". The course was rolling, although it seemed to be rolling a bit more up than down and we were both praying for that to change. My computer was telling me altitude gained was triple the altitude lost, my legs definitely concurred. The good news in that was that it was all downhill to the finish, 15km down to be precise and we pinned it! Not even the dragonfly could match our pace and I caught one...

...ok, so maybe it just flew into me but I'll claim it.

Anyway, the last few km's were sealed and I was spinning out with a slight tailwind behind us. The finish came into sight and it became apparent that Pete had a bigger chainring than me which meant he rolled me by half a wheel. End result, Apollo first and second. Third place about seven minutes back. If you haven't ridden the trails around the Otways call in sick tomorrow and get down there...they're SWEET!

Scody National MTB Series Round #1

2010-05-11T20:16:00.001+10:00

This past weekend saw the Scody 2009-10 National Mountain Bike Series kick off. The opening round was held at Glenorchy MTB Park near Hobart. Pete and I made the trip over early Friday morning, entrusting our shiny new steeds to airline baggage handlers. Thankfully they made it through unscathed and we soon had them reassembled and ready for their National Series debut.

Short up, short down, long up, long down, no flat in sight describes the course pretty accurately, in a word 'tough'. At only five kilometres it was short, but 4.5 of it was singletrack and all of it was rough, rutted and rocky...not to mention the 200m of vertical climbing each lap.

Photo courtesy Tim Rowe

Saturday dawned and seven laps were on the cards for the ~35 rider Elite Mens field. Race time was going to be on the longer side and in the sunny, dry conditions staying hydrated would be critical. Pete and I both started from the fourth row of the grid and managed to hold position through the hectic mess that is an XCO race start. We rode wheel to wheel through the first lap in a bunch of about six. Pete then decided to show his strength to the bunch as we climbed out of the feed zone to start the second lap. He rode away and blew our bunch into single riders scattered along the track.

For the next four laps I rode my own race. Forcing myself to find time on the tight track to drink a bottle a lap and have a gel every two. At the start of the sixth lap this started to pay off as I picked up and went past riders until I caught Pete again at the start of the last lap. We climbed together, catching more riders until one had a mechanical failure just as we caught him forcing me to dismount. I gave Pete a push which allowed him to stay on the bike and get a bit of a gap on the tough rocky climb. Not wanting to puncture he rode conservatively on the final descent which allowed our little bunch to catch him. The tight nature of the course was never going to allow any overtaking though and we finished as the leading two riders in our bunch, wheel to wheel as we started, in 15th and 16th positions.

Photo courtesy Tim Rowe

What followed would have made for quite a comical little skit as riders took turns suffering excruciating cramps as we warmed down together and shared stories of magnetic trees that we'd only just managed to avoid...or not in some cases. Thanks of course to Apollo including support from Michelin, Easton and Prologo for the fancy new bikes. Mine certainly didn't miss a beat, to quote one impressed test rider...'boy, they're light!'

Surfcoast 6hour

2010-05-11T20:15:00.000+10:00

While the roadies have been pinning a number on for a couple of months now this weekend gone saw the MTB team make our debut. PeterK and I ventured down to Anglesea for Southern Exposure's Surfcoast 6hour. This event is unique for being the only six hour event that runs into the night. The format is obviously proving quite popular with record numbers entered.

4pm came and the instructions from the race director was for solo riders to start first with a delayed start for team riders. With the relaxed vibe that goes with racing next to the beach I stood off to the side to watch the solo start. That was great, until there didn't seem to be many riders left and it became apparent that the start orders were being ignored. Everyone going on the first start! What followed was an exercise in patience as I looked for gaps to get past the 300+ riders that were in front of me.

We'd identified Felt Racing as our primary competition for the day. While we both had started at the back of the bunch Felt's rider had obviously been a little more aggressive in his passing maneuvers and I handed over to Pete almost three minutes down already. Over the next three hours lap times stayed consistent, transitions were smooth and we kept the pressure on. Felt's lead was just over four minutes as darkness fell.

This is where the tide started to turn, our conservative riding in the lap traffic appeared to be paying off. Our lap times stayed steady under lights while other teams started to slow. It was with an hour to go while I was riding our 11th lap that I spied a familiar flashing tail light up ahead. Not long later the catch came and it was race on, five hours down and we were riding wheel to wheel.

For the next 15 minutes we rode together, not wanting to put all our cards on the table, trying to gain an insight into how the other was feeling. As we cornered onto the main fire road climb I upped the tempo a little bit, got a gap and decided to go for it. I handed over to Pete around a minute clear and he ripped the track apart recording the fastest night lap of any rider for the whole race.

He came in with 10 minutes left on the clock, assuming Felt would also come through before the end of the race I headed out for lap 13. In the end it wasn't needed as Felt didn't chase, calling it a night on 12 laps. A wise move as well as it was during that lap that the rain came. Oh how I was wishing to be back under the marque clean, dry and warm. I crossed the line at 10.25pm to take the honours in the Male Pairs and the Overall. Quite satisfied to finish a lap up on the rest of the field.

Thanks to Southern Exposure for running a slick event once again, very enjoyable. Even racing at threshold is relaxing with cliff top views of the ocean as you ride. Thanks to Michelin for the excellent XC DryII tyres and latex tubes. We knew by looking at them that they'd be fast, what Pete and I were both surprised by was the amazing amount of grip they had in the loose, sandy conditions. Of course thanks also go to Apollo Bikes for allowing us the opportunity to do this mtbing thing that we both enjoy so much. See you on the trails!

Trust House Cycle Classic

2010-02-03T21:02:00.002+11:00

Last week I played roadie over in NZ at the UCI 2.2 Trust House Cycle Classic or Tour of Wellington. In short, it was hard, although I certainly didn't do it the easy way.

Day 1 - 125km, well 140km if you include the 15km neutral that was actually a motorpace session at 50km/h, including two categorised climbs. 5km after the flag dropped and we're doing 65km/h just about to hit the bottom of the first Cat 1 climb of the tour and a team mate has a front wheel issue. Now my sleepless nights watching some bike race in France in July tells me that I should wait to help him get back on. I soon found out that at that speed just before a big climb I'm no help to anyone and so I spent the next 105km's chasing/holding onto team cars/drafting in the hope I'd make the time cut. With 10km left in the stage I caught sight of the grupetto cresting the second categorised climb, put everything I had left on the road and managed to catch them on the decent. Final result, 23 minutes down on GC.

Team Apollo

Day 2 - 130km including 2 categorised climbs, one which we hit 90km/h coming down the previous day, the other which is 10km and doubles as the mountain top finish. With legs not exactly fresh I managed to drift climb my way over many rolling hills to still be with the peleton until it exploded in the feed zone with 40km left in the stage. Grupetto time again and I was the envy of everyone with my 11-28 cassette when we were doing 9km/h up that steep climb. No risk of missing the time cut meant I could soft pedal my way up the final climb in the hope that legs were good the next day. Final result, a further 20 minutes down on GC.

The day before, what have I got myself into?

Day 3 - 165km with enough rolling hills to plant a seed of fear about getting popped 20km in and getting eliminated from the race. The ride up the front, drift climb over the top, descend back to the front plan was working well. I even played domestique and went back to the car to stuff my jersey full of bidons and food for the team. Felt very pro. That was until 105km down, at an average of 43km/h, I managed to throw my chain off the outside of my big ring and wrap it around itself resulting in a stop, wheel out, detangle and motorpace through the convoy. Unfortunately the commissaire frowned on my getting any help from the convoy and with Drapac on the front doing 60km/h I wasn't getting back on. 60km doing 40km/h myself and I made the time cut by about 10 minutes. Those fresh legs I saved from day 2 weren't so fresh anymore. Now 90 minutes down on GC with lantern rouge in sight.

Top of the first climb of the tour, zipping up in preperation for 105km chasing off the back. Ouch!

Day 4 - 130km including three 30km circuits that included a few km of crosswind gutter action and a 1.5km climb that was sure to play host to some attacks on the Yellow Jersey. Legs hadn't exactly bounced back from my mad dash to make the time cut on the previous day. Lap one, not too much trouble. Lap two, couldn't hack the gutter action and watched the strung out peleton ride by only to latch onto the last rider as we turned out of the crosswind. Lap three, that crosswind gutter action had my hanging in the convey of team cars only to rail the inside of the corner that turned out of the crosswind and roll back onto the peleton. Being the last lap though the pace was on and I wasn't able to get to the front. No drift climbing this time around and as the road went skyward I went back ward. I just missed the end of the cars over the top and settled into another grupetto ride home. Another 10 minutes down and yet somehow I still had to lose 20 odd minutes to take the lantern rouge.

Yep, I really wasn't hurting myself too much on the Day2 hilltop finish.

Day 5 - 60minute+3laps on an 800m course through the Wellington CBD. Well that was until the skies opened, GC was neutralised and it was decided a 30 minute + 3 optional exhibition race was to be run. I had my kit on so figured I may as well line up. With man holes, road markings, traffic islands and cobbles littering the circuit the safest place was definitely out front. From the start I played mtber and got the holeshot into the first corner. Three riders had a similar idea and we spent a few laps off the front. Back in the peleton I wasn't feeling great after a pretty terrible pre race coffee and the wheels I was following didn't instill much confidence in my staying upright so I pulled the plug. As GC was neutralised and your finish result in the tour was locked in many others had the same idea. Only about ten riders completed the crit.

So I made lots of errors and nearly finished dead last but I got a solid week of training and didn't get sick. Many lessons learnt and hopefully a few more watts to play with in my legs. Time to go enjoy some mtb trails I think.

Comfort 'Food'

2010-01-21T07:51:00.002+11:00

MTB National were in Adelaide last weekend. Read about my race over at OZMTB. While you're there at it to your bookmarks. Fair to say my race was a bit of a disappointment. Got these yesterday though, now I feel better.

Road Nationals

2010-01-10T21:38:00.008+11:00

There I am tucked in nicely behind Mr Rodgers. Cool how anyone can race with the stars eh! My road nationals in short;

- Got in the break with Fly V and Garmin represented.

- Found the going too tough after a lap.

- Fell back to the peleton.

- Found the pace quite manageable.

- Didn't drink anywhere near enough.

Fast forward a few laps.

- Cramped and got dropped on the climb.

- Descended back on while sculling a bottle.

- Sculling was too little too late and I got dropped again...for good.

- Fly V and Garmin represented up the road weren't helping.

- Three riders wasn't enough firepower for HTC-Columbia.

- Break stayed away.

- Travis Meyer follows Cam's ITT jersey with his own road jersy.

Goal for next year, drink like a fish and finish the damn race!

The Numbers Game

2010-01-05T21:35:00.001+11:00

Unfortunately I didn't figure it out quick enough. For the last few years my Boxing Day to New Years has been spent in Mount Beauty alternating days on the mtb with days on the roadie for a solid block of chamois time. This time around being a member of the full time workforce I had to scale it back to three days and packed as much as I could into them.

Decent view from the summit of Mt. Buffalo

For those familiar with Trainingpeaks my TSS for the 3 days was 750 which raised my CTL 13 points. About 250% of my usual training load. Can anyone guess what the result was?

Don't fall!

Sick! Yep you guessed it. The positives; the last day I was still fresh enough for a 40 minute climb of Falls Creek at 310 watts without feeling trashed at the top and I certainly know a bit more about my limits. The negatives; a week later and I'm still producing record amounts of fluro yellow sputum and the calendar until Feb 1 includes Road Nationals, MTB Nationals, a MTB National Round and the Tour of Wellington. This is gonna hurt.

Hobart National Round One

2009-12-16T20:43:00.005+11:00

Read the full report at apolloraceteam.blogspot.com.

Thanks to Tim for capturing me in flight.

Kona 24hr

2009-12-02T22:03:00.003+11:00

Before

Photo courtesy Jo Wall

After

It was wet. Bike was sweet. 'SRAM all sorts' won our category, 4th overall. Michelin XC AT tyres were the key for me. Endless predictable grip in the slop, rather handy when you don't have any brake pads left after three quarters of a lap.

New Colours

2009-11-22T22:32:00.002+11:00

So you may notice new (shredded) kit in the gore photos below. The exciting news behind that is the return of Apollo Bikes to the Australian racing scene. To coincide with their new product range they're throwing support behind five under 23 road riders and two mountain bikers in Peter Kutschera and myself. We even got our mugs in some mags!

The (successful) mtb team debut came at the Surfcoast 6hour a few weeks ago. We're currently riding the 2010 TeamC. A high modulus full carbon frame is dripping in the best from Easton, Michelin, Prologo, SRAM, Rock Shox, Avid, Truvativ and Mavic. At a retail of $4000 it's a very strong contender in the hardtail market.

Not to mention it looks wicked as well. Enough with the plug though, stay tuned for complete pics and a review once I get some hours in the saddle. If you spy me at the Kona24 this weekend don't be shy, you're welcome to take it for a spin.

For all Apollo Race Team happenings including the Surfcoast 6hour race report by yours truly check the team section on the Apollo website or the Apollo Race Team Blog.

A First Time For Everything

2009-11-22T21:47:00.002+11:00

So you've had a lovely morning out on the road bike. Good friends, sunny weather, hard climbs. It's your mum's birthday and you've got to get home to do birthday related stuff. Not to mention the 6hour mtb race the next day that you still have to build a new bike for. Let's role turns down this descent that we've done at least a hundred time before and time trial home.

Nothing new so far.

Fast forward nearly 2km and you're carving up a favourite sweeping left hander at 60km/h, a little bit of sun in your eyes...and a lot of gravel in the middle of the road. There's that familiar metal crunching and grinding on bitumen noise but for the first time it's followed by you personally doing your best cheese grater impersonation.

A week off work to avoid nasty hospital infections allowed time for the skull CT (clear) and a rebuild of both SRAM Red shifters with new shifter bodies and lever blades that hadn't been turned into carbon dust on the road.

So tomorrow it's back to work, still partially mummified.

New shoes and socks ease the pain though...

Holiday Over

2009-10-04T20:22:00.004+11:00

Daylight savings is upon us and with it comes crit season. My torture of choice this morning was Carnegie Caulfield's opener at the popular Glenvale circuit. As always the report and results are up in a very timely manner here.

48 starters in A grade covered 47.5km in their hour + 3 laps. I spent most of the time trying to keep myself thereabouts in the first 10 wheels and getting some much needed leg speed. Everyone was on high alert with a protour representative fresh off the plane being very closely marked.

As the bell lap came there were three away. Sitting third in the lead out I swung off through the last corner and kept well clear of the potential carnage that followed. The break just held on, but more to the point it was then bakery time. A first time visit to Topbread in Glen Waverly for a delicious Blueberry Danish.

10 points to the first person who guesses who said protour representative was...hint above.

World Champs

2009-09-07T13:14:00.004+10:00

Now that I'm a full time employee my World Championships adventure was a bit of a whirlwind. Still enjoying the spoils of the full time paycheck I shelled out for some airtime with a 7.15am flight arriving in Canberra at 8.30 on Saturday morning. From there it was straight to Stromlo where it was nearly showtime.

A perfect day greeted us and it wasn't long before the Aussie ladies got their chance.

The techy climb quickly showed who had skillz. If you stayed smooth and rode smart there were places to be made as Jo demonstrated just after this.

Up front Lene was showing the field a clean pair of heels and had all spectators convinced the race was for silver between Sabine and Willow. Irina had quickly taken fifteen spots in a lap after some first lap mechanical issues and was on the charge though. Putting 20 seconds a lap into Lene and more into the others she rode into fourth on the second last lap and it became apparent that Willow and Sabine didn't have quite as strong a grasp on the Silver and Bronze as we all thought.

A bigger shock was to come though. As Lene rounded a fire road corner with a couple of km's of racing left Irina was on her wheel having caught and passed Willow and Sabine. We all know the story after that. Irina won her second world championship having dropped the fastest lap of the race on her final lap.

Special mention to Row who was struggling to walk on a badly sprained ankle but still rode strongly and looked set for a top 20 finish before a final lap flat. All the Aussie's finished on the lead lap. A big improvement from being unable to field a single rider a few years back.

A couple of hours for the crowd to refuel and it was time for the men. Macca found some secret lines on the bitumen and led the bunch out from third row on the grid. When he came through hammerhead about fifth the noise was deafening.

A lap later and the 'heads of state' (thanks Phil) had come to the front. Florian, Nino, Abi and Jose were almost swapping turns roadie style for the next four laps. With two to go it was time and Abi turned the screws.

We'd decided cardiac was where it was gonna go down and last time up Abi gave it everything. Nino stuck like glue though and just as they rode by Abi sat down, blown, with Nino still there and just waiting to show the winning hand.

Florian pipped Jose for third and K-bomb rode an ITT for fifth, pushing a single chain ring all day (as were Abi and Adam Craigh).

Coops and all the other Aussies were still riding strong spread from fifteenth to fiftieth. Well except Blairy who had had a minor digger that resulted in major mechanicals. As he attempted cardiac for the third time a bent hanger threw the chain behind the cassette and wasn't budging. A few minutes there plus the extra time lost meant he was destined to fall victim to the 80% rule.

Haas gave him a bit of extra sustenance to get him over the line. I'm sure you'll figure out what it was. Top ride Blairy!

The Trails Call

2009-08-30T14:40:00.004+10:00

I was pretty tempted yesterday. The trails looked to be in prime condition as I cruised by on the roadie. The roadie spin wasn't too bad though...until the heavens opened.

I took refuge at Emerald bakery for what must be one of the best apple cakes on the planet. The weather wasn't letting up though and eventually I gave in and braved the conditions for a very long hour's ride home. It was made even longer when the rear tyre started going soft a little too quickly to be nursed and required a change. On the plus side after more than four hours of hills and cold the legs still had some spark.

Back to the trails though. I snapped a (possibly worst quality ever) photo of a fancy new offering from Apollo at the SRAM X.X launch on Friday night. Whether it be the X.X or X.0 spec I don't know but I think I've found my new mtb.

Back To It

2009-08-15T10:50:00.004+10:00

For two weeks I've been a full time employee. Yuck! The nice part is a bit more routine. Normally I'd be just wakig up and heading out riding about now. With the body clock now used to early starts instead I'm finished riding and finding time very a long overdue update. Lucky too as it's overcast, spitting and the wind is picking up. Perfect weather for blogging and a long way from the perfect conditions a couple of hours ago.

Sunny, clear and still...well until we started heading home when the wind picked up nicely behind us to blow us home at about 45 clicks.

Plenty of others had the same idea with the 1in20 resembling Chapel Street last night. Our group was nine and it certainly wasn't alone nor the biggest. For the most part cars and bikes were playing nice which was unusual to see. Maybe we can co-exist?

Tempting the Wind

2009-07-22T17:20:00.006+10:00

I can't seem to buy a tail wind these days. After an hour yesterday pushing straight into the wind a childhood memory surfaced, When The Wind Changed. I can tell you it was all lies.

No matter the face I pulled the wind just wouldn't change and I was stuck pushing into it the whole way home. On the plus side my face isn't stuck in any of the above expressions.

2010...Buy Australian

2009-07-19T16:30:00.003+10:00

This is going to look like a bit of spam, but I'm quite excited. Forget what you thought you knew about these guys, they're back. I went to their 2010 product launch last night and met a whole new beast.

Euro styling...check

X.X...check

1-1/8 to 1-1/2 head tube...check

Red...check

SRM...check

ISP...check

Finishing touches...check

And that's just their high end. There were multiple low end models cool enough for me to consider exchanging cash for as well. Once again Australia has a domestic brand capable of occupying the dominant position. Forget buying Apollo to support the Aussie industry, buy them if you want the right tool for the job! They've got it all covered. Add them to the list of brands to consider.

Now to find a higher paying job...

Fingers Crossed

2009-07-01T18:40:00.002+10:00

Tour starts this weekend...

...lets hope the majority have a 'pure' mentality.

Cross Training

2009-06-25T11:38:00.000+10:00

Getting Organised

2009-06-19T13:22:00.002+10:00

Part of getting organised post Europe is figuring out what races I'm going to do, and therefore when I'll start riding again. This one is definitely on the calendar. 24th October...can't say no to the beach and the bike in one day.

Down Time

2009-06-17T16:52:00.005+10:00

With the roadie dispensed with in order to get to Europe, and the mtb finding a new owner on the weekend to wipe out the credit card I'm now bikeless. Actually I've still got the rigid bitsa commuter mtb but that doesn't count. Anyway the result of being bikeless is a break from the bike, time to organise non-bike life and of course no content on the blog for a while so I'll leave you with a hot tip...SQUIRT Lube!

I've been using it for 18 months but 9 weeks in Europe, 3 World Cups, 3 Random National Rounds complete with mud, dust and jetwashing has reminded me how far ahead of the competition it is. After all that you'd think the chain would be suffering. Imagine my surprise when preparing the bike for sale when I found the chain was practically new. No sideways slop, and stretch barely registering, I've seen new chains in worse shape. Now I know why it's a favourite at the Croc Trophy. Available at all good bikeshops, like Rollin' Cycles.

See you in a month or so. PS...need race wheels...check the garage!

Europe in Pictures

2009-06-09T18:01:00.002+10:00

First up, check the Garage to help me pay off the credit card, then enjoy the pics.

Eti-Had F1, the first flight out of Melbourne.

Lago Lugano, Cadel's hood.

Lago Maggiore from Stresa.

Milano Centrale Station, prior to boarding the all night train to Germany.

Our Offenburg accome from the Schloss on the hill.

4X track at Houffalize.

The Frites post Houffalize with Cal, Sarah and Nathan.

Traffic jam Belgium style.

Black DH UK style...Jackpot!

A little bit of trick photography at 2000m altitude.

That's were the Michelin magic happens.

Couldn't resist a Scooby Snack.

Metres of beveridge in Madrid.

Lago Maggiore from the East.

Giro advertising featuring SRAM specced bikes in Napoli.

Vesuvius, was a long walk.

Pantani is still a crowd favourite.

Should have got the road train instead of walking.

This is to show your significant other next time they complain of sore feet, try an 8 hour round trip to the top of Vesuvius in those.

Sastre soloed for the win up Vesuvius.

The journey down in process.

Unsure if it was the 8 hour walk or the Napoli secret sauce but this is the greatest pizza I've ever eaten.

Old school shop window complete with wooden rims in Rome.

Numerous De Rosa's, Colnago's and other Italian beauties hang from the roof.

Cervelo had a very cool custom truing stand.

Menchov hit the deck and sent the Italians into a frenzy in the ITT but still held off Di Luca to take the final Pink Jersey.

Simon buries the drinks for a cool drink on our return trip from the summit.

Cat entertaining the crowds in Munsingen.

Munsingen gave the crowd plenty of viewing as the course wound through multiple obstacles before heading of into the singletrack.

Road K's tick by easily with views like this.

Wolfsdrop, Offenburg.

Northshore Drop, Offenburg. As demonstrated by Cal Britten.

Dual Speed, Offenburg.

Snake Pit, Offenburg.

World Class Drop Offenburg. As demonstrated by James Peacock.

The quick guys get cool stuff, Roal Paulissen's Mavic R-sys tubular crossmax complete with Racing Ralph tubular thanks to Dugast. His duallie is 8.8kg.

Our hike gained a soundtrack when these guys decided to follow us for about 20 minutes and the bells went crazy.

Got to sample some snow while enjoying Lake Maggiore from afar.

Even found some snow caves.

Our first look at Dalby Forrest in the UK. Thanks to Joolze Dymond for capturing it.

Why does the photo never look as steep as it is?

Aussie invasion on the XC World Cup Series.

9 Weeks In Europe

2009-06-08T15:50:00.006+10:00

After avoiding the $500 excess baggage Etihad wanted to charge me on their innaugral flight out of Melbourne I landed in Milan on March 31. I quickly put my English to Italian pocket book to use trying to determine where my bike box was and after a nervous wait those big doors open and out it came. The next hurdle was getting the 30kg box to Castronno via public transport, fair to say I was happy to have a little lie down when I found the accom.

The rest of the week was spent riding around the local lakes that run into Switzerland. Even bumping into Cadel and Chiarra out motorpacing along Lake Lugano. I can see why so many road pro's choose to call the area home.

Next up was Easter in London visiting big sis before a plane, a bus, seven trains and 30 hours without sleep had me meeting up with Team Torq in Munsingen, Germany. That weekend I found myself next to Macca and Mike Broderick on a three person back row of a 130 strong field at a German National Round. The start went straight up a grass climb and there was a lot that could go wrong. It did, a chain went pop and we were all off and running. Back on the bike I soon reallised that going down I could pass people, going up the euro's go quick and that from 130 on the grid you're half a lap behind by the end of the first lap. I lasted four laps, Mike made it through five and Macca pinned it passing 80 on the first lap and finally finishing in the top 30.

Next on the calendar was my first experience of the big time, the Aussie run Offenburg World Cup. It was an Aussie invasion with 27 riders pinning on a number across the XC categories. While World Cup courses get a bit of stick for not being techy enough Offenburg certainly has its challenges and I lost some bark on my first practice lap. Come race day I was confident riding everything but it would have been a different story in the wet.

Race time arrived and even the call up was cut throat. With 200+ on the line a sneaky little move while awaiting the gun could gain you 20 positions and many a dodgy euro was trying them. I even scored a gash across the back of my calf when one tried to push past me. The gun went and the enevitable happened, a crash. The poor dude was ridden over multiple times and his wheels resembled crinkle cut chips at the end of it all. I squeezed through leaning on the fence and got caught behind two more crashes before completing the start loop. Even riding in the high 100s it was race on and perhaps there were some people very determined to not be beaten by a dude wearing kit with a cartoon character on it. I was eventually pulled and watched Absalon destroy the field to win his third straight Offenburg World Cup.

The next road trip was to Belgium for the legendary Houffalize World Cup. Taking over the town meant the crowds here were amazing and a few laps in it was only their shouting that meant I wasn't walking up the granny ring climbs. This time the leaders lapped me just before a long descent and I was able to follow them all the way down which meant getting my face on telly. Reaching the 80% mark I was once again relegated to the sidelines to watch Absalon continue his dominance and become the winningest XC rider in history.

We then journeyed over the channel to visit Torq headquarters where Macca, Kat and I raced the local club time trial half an hour after finishing the 9 hour drive. Macca stunned the crowd finishing 4th overall on his mtb and Mr Torq, Matt Hart finished 2nd but was left dissapointed after being unable to catch Macca, his minute man, despite time trial bike and helmet.

A couple of days of endless laughs were spent riding trails at the local mtb park and through sheep filled paddocks into Wales with bakery stops replaced by pub meals. It was then time to load up the Torq bus for a visit to a UK National Round at Dalby Forrest who just happen to have a bid in for a World Cup next year. In the womens Kat had the number one plate and held position start to finish. Macca had the number two plate in the mens and would have improved on it if not for some breathing problems still managing to come home second. I managed to finish this race improving on plate number 50 finishing in the 30s. The next day we covered every trail Dalby Forrest had to offer and with a bit more riding in will be attracting riders from anywhere and everywhere.

Next stop was Hauback in Germany for another Bundesliga and after a two day road trip we arrived at our lovely accomodation complete with slaughter house and bowling alley. The track had been described as up then down, and they weren't wrong. Climbing from the gun for 4km with prolonged sections over 20% meat a fair bit of granny time, then descending for 3km with prolonged sections of the DH track thrown in the course was the most physically and technically challenging I'd encountered. Add to that the week of rain and while the crowds got blue skies on race day the course was trashed. I did a few laps before that Absalon guy lapped me again. I go to follow a few of the top ten down the descent and was happy to see they were finding the muddy mess hard. I played it safe and left a gap to them which proved a smart move as it meant I didn't ride over Mr. Paulissen when he axed himself in front of me.

Next stop was Madrid for another World Cup and we broke up the 24 hour drive with a couple of days at the home of Michelin in France. We put together a brilliant road loop which started with a 10km climb from the front door and wound its way along deserted roads through a pine forrest with never ending views. Add to that finding chocolate eclairs that used chocolate mousse instead of cream at the local bakery and times were good. The setup was less good in Madrid with barely a gap big enough between the four beds to get to the toilet at night.

The course didn't have anything of note and funnily after Offenburg and Houffalize being dry Madrid was wet and made a similar mess of the bikes as the You Yangs do. That being said if I thought Houffalize had good crowds the Spanish love their cycling and I almost found myself wishing for earplugs so defening was the noise. Add to that their willingness to jump the bunting and give you a push when you're suffering up one of the stupid steep climbs and you have a very memorable race. It became extra memorable when I got stung on the throat by something and found breathing a task until once again Absalon caught me and it was race over.

After Madrid I put the bike away to go and watch some roadies suffer in some little race called the Giro di Italia. First up was Napoli and the Vesuvius hill top finish which meant walking 13km up and 13km down the mountain. Sastre pinned it for the win while unfortunately Dodger lost time and his GC hopes. I then spent a few days in Rome taking in the sights and the final ITT managing to surround myself with a few thousand very enthusiastic Di Luca fans, especially so when Menchov crashed a few kms from the finish with seconds between him and Di Luca for GC.

It was then back to Castronno where I caught one of the post Giro crits, and was educated on how spectacle races like these are 'organised' in Italy. The crowds were either oblivious or didn't care though and loved it. The final day was spent hiking up to 2000m altitude with a school mate turned roadie pro where we made some mountain goat friends, caught some awesome views of Lake Lugano and Maggiore, did some trick photography and froze our feet in the smatterings of snow that remained...in Summer!

It was then back on the plane, avoiding paying excess baggage again. I did score a 2 hour delay at my stopover in the UAE but was soon back in freezing Melbourne sleeping during the day and staying up all night. Hopefully the body clock is back on GMT+10 soonish. Stay tuned for pics.

Busy Bees

2009-03-30T13:22:00.001+11:00

Venturing out to Lysterfield today for the first time this year. It seems the trail fairies have been rather busy.

Up...

...and over. Makes for a nice new entry into the Comm Games bermed descent.

Speaking of the bermed descent...

...a new one has popped up. Very appropriate considering it's the one you carry the most speed into.

Still a gazzillion too many of these destroying the flow though.

18 to spare!

2009-03-25T16:22:00.003+11:00

Newsflash. UCI updated their rankings.

I've got 38 points next to my name, 18 more than required to line up in Offenburg and Houffalize. That'll be the best seat in the house for any spectator.

Got me a fancy licence with my photo on it as well.

It's all coming together...

Ergo for Earth Hour

2009-03-24T19:27:00.006+11:00

Played ring in for TeamMONASH in a Future Spark attempt today. An hour on the ergo pumping watts into storage to power the Earth Hour concert on Saturday.

That's a team of five, when we were meant to have ten to rotate through the four bikes. On mtb's we kinda ran out of gears but an hour on the ergo is an hour on the ergo and I still don't like it. Must be why I just sold my windtrainer on ebay...

With half a team and a ten minute computer dropout we nearly took top spot. So if you're bored sometime this week and can round up a few mates go steal the number one step yourself...but take an ipod or similar device as tunes are not provided.

PS. Anyone have a contact in Milan that would be willing to house me for a week...next week? Plans kinda fell through.

2009 Oceania Championships

2009-03-22T14:37:00.003+11:00

Click that for the vid. Travelling company was the Peacock family this weekend and James pulled out the win in the Juniors. A very entertaining race from the sidelines with the top 5 separated by a minute. Understandable that he neglected the fact that my bike and kit was locked in the car while he carried the keys (and not his mobile) around seeing the sights of Thredbo post race. A little birdie must have whispered something in his ear though as he remembered with 45 minutes to spare and my worry was over.

Having never earnt a UCI point in my life before I found myself somehow sitting third row on the grid next to Dylan Cooper. Jokes were had as to how the rankings had been done but I certainly wasn't the one complaining. The gun went and the Tahitian rider in front of me was obviously experiencing that kind of start speed for the first time as I almost rode straight into the back of him before making my way around and latching onto the field mid pack. That was the end of anything resembling my being competitive though. As expected the combination of altitude and sickness was making breathing tough on a course that never seemed to reward all the climbing that was being done, not to mention being the course from hell for a back that hadn't been in a riding position for three weeks.

Long story short I kept the climbing smooth, stretched the back whenever possible and let the brakes go on the descents while watching the time gap to the leaders blow out. Knowing I was only a couple of minutes from being lapped by a flying Dan McConnell I upped the pace a touch to ensure I was in front of any nearby riders when that happened and hoped that it left me in a position to earn those 20 uci points.

Results are up and show me in 27th place. I believe 26th to give 20 uci points. The good news is I'm told that Under 23 and Elite riders have seperate points which puts me in 17th and points to spare. If not then I plan on visiting a couple of other races prior to the World Cup experience so hopefully I can pick up the remaining few then. If not then the original plan comes into play...I'm going to watch the Offenburg and Houffalize World Cups! How cool is that?

Some pics thanks to Russ Baker...very white eh.

Country Air

2009-03-20T16:18:00.004+11:00

Was pretty hard to swallow this view as I sucked in some fresh Jindabyne air this morning. Spent some quality verandah time building the bike while taking it all in. I'm told that's Thredbo straight ahead, doesn't seem that high. I'm sure that the combo of a cold and altitude will make it quite a task to race tomorrow though.

The Travel Begins

2009-03-19T15:34:00.004+11:00

Sitting at the airport munching a chicken, pesto and salad sandwich while testing out the blogging capabilities of my phone prior to europe. The good and bad happenings are tied at one all. Stuffed up the flight bookings and had to purchase a new one...bad. Cafe chick liked me and i scored a buy one get one free cookie...good. Oh yeah, yesterday was the first day i've been well enough to ride since Tassie. So the total saddle time in preparation for oceanias stands at one hour. At least i'll be fresh.

Sick!

2009-03-11T11:18:00.002+11:00

I felt a few days off were in order, obviously they were as the body decided to crash. Plenty of fluids, fresh food and the makings of an echinacea junky will hopefully have me back on the bike at full tilt come Oceanias the weekend next. The hope is for 20 UCI points, which mean I can pin on a number instead of playing spectator in Euroland next month.

Less bike time has meant some photo time. A gallery of bits I need to get rid of before heading OS, details to follow but if you're interested in anything let me know.

The Garage Re-Opens

2009-03-04T22:13:00.002+11:00

I board the big bird in the sky in under four weeks. Unfortunately the Aussie Dollar barely buys half a Euro now so it's time to raise some more funds. Keep your eye's on Grover's Garage over the next week as more stock arrives. First up is my fixie which will just be gathering dust so needs to go.

Bush Mechanics

2009-03-01T21:42:00.002+11:00

I can't lay claim to this first hand, rather it was shown to me by Justin at Rollin'. Work is sometimes monotonous, it's things like this that keep the game interesting. Apparantly this customer left their bike to have a tube replaced saying he'd repaired the original and didn't know why it was still leaking.

Upon removal it was discovered that the 'repair' consisted of wrapping a stock standard crepe bandage around the tube...ten points for trying though.

National Round 5

2009-03-01T19:42:00.004+11:00

Hobart's Dirt Devils hosted the National Series Finals last weekend. Results are up already. Sean and I made the trip and elected the lesser used boat as our travel option in conjunction with Simon and the Flood boys who had accomodation sorted for all of us.

Welcome to sunny Tasmania, the view upon arrival was less than stellar after a suboptimal night trialling alternatives to the oceanview recliner for some quality shuteye.

Making good time to Hobart including some L-plate hours for Sean we kitted up, grabbed a number and did some laps before heading south for the hour drive to our accomodation. Ninety minutes later and still a way off the decision was made, time to turn around, scrap that accomodation and hope we could find something in Hobart.

Calling ahead to try and find a place with some vacancies our luck turned and we didn't have to book a place. Gen turned lifesaver and offered up some vacant beds with Team Torq Nutrition fifteen minutes ride from the course. Upon arrival I had a very fitting little friend on my bed. With that we head to race day.

The hope was to turn that 303 into a 302 and with a little luck a 301 by the end of the day to finish out the series. Getting the holeshot as I've done in three of the four rounds I've attended things were going to plan on a course that didn't allow much passing. The one section of extended fireroad was through the start/finish and feed zone. First time through and we all looked to a roadie strongman wearing Praties kit. As expected he made his move and we all forgot about the top step.

We were down to a bunch of four with everyone trying their hand to get away over the next two laps before I got a move to stick and a gap opened. Unfortunately for me the one rider that had been dropped early in the cat and mouse games was the unranked rider I needed to occupy a position between myself and the others to guarantee a move up the rankings.

Up the final climb the two chasing were out of sight so I was able to descend risk free to cross the line second. Damien and Sean had never lost sight of each other the whole race with Sean winning out in the end to take the final podium spot and the series overall win. The good news for me was the extra gap to Damien meant I snuck into second overall. Sean summed it up pretty well post race, 'Welcome to Elite'.

Still a rather successful weekend for this little travelling party.

Well except for the boat. If wasting time in quarantine and a terrible nights sleep floats your boat then you may love it though. Us, we'll be flying next time.

Goin' Aero

2009-02-24T21:05:00.002+11:00

Decided to drop the stem 10mm today, supposedly aero is where it's at. Must have saved me some energy as for the first time I had the kick to crest Burgundy Street first on tonight's Tour De Burbs...that or the fact that I got through some lights on the orange while Clacka, Rohin and the multitude of roadie hardmen had to wait out the red.

Noticing something else, those DT Swiss hubs are like a good wine getting better with age. I really shouldn't be able to out roll people with 15kg's on me, but it happened repeatedly tonight. Speaking of hubs check out today's workshop highlight. It's ok to make mistakes, just be upfront about them...

Customer - Can you true my wheel

Me - Sure

Mount in stand, attempt to spin, wheel jumps out of stand.

Me - Actually no, it won't spin.

Customer - Oh

Me - Did you try and service it?

Customer - Um

Me - These two bits are back to front, do you want me to fix it?

Customer - Yeah, may as well, I didn't know which way they went in.

When you pull something apart set it out in order, a foolproof way of getting them back in the right spot.

That Odyssey Thing

2009-02-22T21:39:00.005+11:00

This guy couldn't race. The entry was only for 50 clicks though so I became Mr. Comport for a day.

Needed packing time so riding was done pre-work at stupid o'clock.

Not many keen on joining me at that time.

Even this guy has a snarl to him in the early morning light.

The early bird...struggles later in the day and requires sustenance.

Race day dawned with a pleasant lack of downpours compared to last years race. Nice weather means a bigger turnout.

That's after the 100km race has started. Imagine the fuss with three times the bikes!

Got me a front row possie, wouldn't want to miss a pedal.

Then the gun went. I planned on an easy ride, chatting, taking pics, but that white line fever thing happened so all you get is text from now on. Managed to pass the lead car in the rollout down the Great Ocean Road, took line honours for the KOM then rolling turns with Peacock Junior on the roads and getting the bike all kinds of sideways making our way through hundreds of 100km riders. Then I flatted...so chased, then couldn't evade a somersaulting 100km rider and took a tumble myself...so chased, than got caught in a 30 rider congo line through the 'Timed Descent'...so chased...and then it was over. Results. Special mention to Crazy Craig who obviously found it too easy on a standard single speed last year, so brought the rigid singlespeed 'cross bike this year and managed to cover the 100km in 5.45!

After doing the hundred last year I wondered why people entered it over the 50km race knowing they'd be out there 10+ hours. Now I know why, it's all about reward for effort. The first 50km is the effort of endless climbing, the second 50 is the reward in sweet trails. Once you've done the first 50 you may as well ride the second 50. It's the hundred or nothing for me from now on. Or maybe the reward for effort is form and going fast in Taswegia next weekend is the reward, fingers crossed.

UCI Knows Best

2009-02-16T22:08:00.002+11:00

I thought it'd be novel to race a UCI sanctioned road race with a bike under the 6.8kg limit. That plan went well for about half a lap of the 13 lap race. It was then that karma decided to release my rear quick release skewer through a corner to make a menze for my flouting the rules. This quickly jetisoned my rear wheel and I could have been mistaken for a cowboy straight from the wild west as I struggled to control a bike that had transformed into a bucking bronco.

Good news was that I stayed upright, and so did everyone around me. Bad news was that I now had to try and solo myself back to 90 of the best roadies Australia and NZ can offer up, and it was just at the stage that they were all trying their hand at an early breakaway. After 30 minutes the gap started to blow out and I started catching shelled riders that had sat up, so I followed suite. Bit soft but that appears to be the roadie way judging by the near 50% drop out rate the results show. That was reflected in our car with Dmac and Neil finishing strongle in the main bunch, while Jimmy and I have a DNF next to our names. Note that Jimmy was going along rather nicely with a peak power of almost 1700 watts, until he took a digger over the bars at 60 clicks when someone decided to have a lay down in front of him. All bones intact and only missing a little bark he was keen to fight on, unfortunately his front wheel had decided it didn't want to stay intact and his day was done.

Then it was off to the You Yangs to drop in on the Bush Fire Relief Enduro. Awesome turnout and plenty of cash collected thanks to Big Rich's creative 'fining' for anything from skidding to mismatched jersey and bike brands going into the Red Cross coffers. We even got a fine for racing road instead of mtb...harsh but fair.

Lastly I'll leave you with this gem by Mr. Random...Neil VDP...had Dmac and I in tears. Upon entering Subway and prior to this photo being taken (in which he appears to be turning on the charm) he proceded to the middle of the counter where the white feet are stickered on the ground. When informed that the correct place to begin his order was his pictured position he replied with a shocked face, 'I was just standing where the feet told me to'.

Roadie Carnage

2009-02-13T21:54:00.002+11:00

A first for me today, a tubular blowout...and they're damn loud. Being almost home I decided to test one of the 'for' arguments in regard to tubulars. I can now say from first hand experience that they're definitely safer to ride flat than clinchers.

Oceania Road Champs are Sunday so I'm glad it happened today. Good excuse to replace the Conti Giro with a nice new Vittoria Evo Corsa, making the bike weight a little more illegal. In other carnage news I don't know the full story behind this one that came through the shop, but I'd say he's lucky to have his teeth.

Keep On Rollin'

2009-02-12T22:45:00.002+11:00

The bike didn't want to stop yesterday, k's continuing to tick long after I'd stopped for work.

Wheel not spinning, magnet nowhere near sensor. It was an indicator of what was to come that night as I was sans lights a long way from home with the sun setting. More k's than expected and some seriously tender trigger points in the legs.

A visit to Kew Boulevard Crits care of Hawthorn Cycling Club meant 25+ hill sprints and no doubt contributed to the soreness. I haven't been there for years but still managed to get plonked in A grade.

Willo made it a couple of mtbers in the bunch and was very active in the early moves. With 10 minutes left I managed to move clear of the bunch and found myself working well in a group of three chasing another two off the front. We didn't catch them, but I did nail the final corner and cross the line best of the rest.

Like Glenvale and Sandown all placegetters of course donated prizemoney to those affected by the bushfires. I did score a bidon to forever remind me of the tragedy that continues to unfold around us. We all know someone that has lost their homes and/or loved ones.

We're a nation that stands behind each other, as illustrated above cyclists tend to be pretty good at it so get down to the You Yangs this Sunday for some fun on bikes while fundraising to help those affected rebuild their lives.

The Main Event

2009-02-02T20:43:00.002+11:00

Saturday's race was purely the warm up to what could have very well turned out to be an Eva Epic exploring Klingsporn.

Practically hunger flatting when we rolled out after a lengthy delay collecting people from all over Buller the pace was on. We crisscrossed the DH track during their race runs managing to avoid a collision and then soon reallised XC race bikes probably weren't ideal for the trail.

Fourty minutes later, with a group average of about one digger each, we reached the bottom with disc rotors sizzling. Special mention to Ben, Sid's thirteen year old cousin, who had three of the biggest over the bar adventures I've seen and not only got right back on the horse but was happy to lead the way.

That's him to the right ignoring the routine face washing and bottle filling in favour of stripping off and going for a dip. Meanwhile I checked how my wheel building skills were holding up and am happy to report that 1300 gram race wheels can survive Klinsporn at least once without developing a single wobble.

As to the Epix boys trail ranking criteria I will have to make some enquiries about it. If the decision is made purely on the section of trail being ranked then I can understand their decision to put Klinsporn at the top of the list. Unfortunately I'm going to have to deduct points as the remainder of the ride was a plain old death march.

Up...for 90 minutes...with a distinct lack of shade. Good for you but not so fun. Shuttles anyone?

National Round #4 - Mount Buller

2009-02-01T21:41:00.003+11:00

Things went better this weekend...

...much better.

It was looking good when I got time to do TWO practice laps. The theme to the course was 'baby head' rocks and bull dust, the plan therefore was to get the holeshot, ride smooth and maintain momentum.

Come race day I started from the back row, missed a pedal and was dead last and a few metres off the back as we looped our way around Buller Central on the bitumen. On reflection it couldn't have been a better way to start as I closed the gap to the bunch just as we hit a small rise, and used the extra speed I had to roll past everyone as we crested it. The holeshot was mine. Now all I had to do was ride smooth and maintain momentum...which went well for two and a half laps before I spied second place for the first time in the race a few switchback behind me on the climb.

The rest of that climb was a flashback to National Champs last weekend. Worrying about the other guy, riding off my line while checking on the other guy, losing time to the other guy. There's definitely something to be said for the mental side of racing as the difference this week was that I then forgot about the other guy and focused on this guy. Going back to riding smooth and maintaining momentum I nailed the decent, floated up the granny ring climb and got the bell lap.

It was easy to keep the focus on my riding from then on, 'the other guy' was nowhere to be seen as I zigzagged my way up the switchback climb. That focus was well spent aswell as my front derailleur managed to rotate around my frame. Big ring...tick, tick, tick...hmmm, hitting my crankarm...can't use that one. Granny ring...grind, grind, grind...not changing...can't use that one. With no big ring available and the gap reopened the final decent was a bit more cautious not wanting to flat or drop a chain. As I approached the final granny ring climb my right hamstring gave me an ultimatum, find the granny ring or I'm gonna cramp. I ignored and pushed the middle ring over the first section getting some strong reinforcements on that ultimatum from my hamstring. A slight levelling of the climb gave me opportunity for a desperate ankle flick towards the chain, or should I say precision ankle flick as the chain dropped to the granny ring, the threats of cramp disappeared and I set sail for home.

So I had a win, the results tell the numbers story. The podium was a reverse of the top three series placings which tightens it up nicely with one round remaining, and my final Expert race before graduating to the Elite ranks. If that podium were to repeat in a months time Sean would hold on to take out the series two points clear of me with Damien one point back in third.

As always there are some thanks to give out. Tim for capturing the podium shot, Jimmy for transport and being a very helpful practice lap buddy, DC for organising accomodation, Rollin' Cycles for having the solution to all things bike and finally the fatties for running the race and having the sense to place a neutral water station half way around the course in this record heat wave.

The Whirlwind

2009-01-26T20:47:00.003+11:00

Results are here. Unfortunately I can't offer you much more as the camera didn't get a look in for the whole weekend.

Nationals was a blur this year. An important meeting on Friday meant an evening flight to Canberra. One practice lap Saturday before retiring to air conditioning for the rest of the day. With the starters gun firing at 8.30am an early night was on the cards and before I knew it I was on the startline wishing I'd had a couple more laps to dial in my lines through the technical challenges Stromlo's World Champs course offers up.

The race itself...after a warm up that consisted of rolling from the car to the marshalling area...went pretty well. Followed wheels and stayed out of the wind along the fireroad, was second into the singletrack climb and when the leader made an error I found myself leading the race with a good gap. I probably should have exploited it but feeling pretty tight and weak with no warm-up I just tempoed my way around the first lap being caught by two riders as we began the second lap.

One went away, we brought him back, the other went away and stayed away before I mad some errors on the technical climb and a gap formed to the second rider. Trying to concentrate on just riding smooth I probably eased the intensity a little and was put into fourth place as we started the bell lap.

This guy was flying and I didn't have the legs to hold his wheel up the climb. Knowing I was faster on the decent I let him go, the floor in my plan was the lap traffic I encountered on the decent which I was only able to pass half way down. I nailed the rest of the decent and ended up negative splitting the race, but it wasn't enough and I crossed the line fourth, a two second gap to third and 11 to second. I'd like to say next time, but looking at lap times I think next time will be with an elite plate on and I've got a ways to go before challenging for the podium there.

Straight home following the race due to work today meant I was only in Canberra for about 40 hours, and didn't even see the Elite boys and girls go round. Buller next weekend, looking forward to those Glen Jacobs trails.

In the Nick of Time

2009-01-22T23:46:00.004+11:00

Saul got them Wednesday, express to me today and an evening of tweaking nipples followed...

From 200901

...let's call that 30% done.

Is building your wheels the night before departing for the big dance a bit last minute? The good news is tension is amazingly even and they were a very easy build. Should be a solid race wheelset at 1382 grams.

PS. Jarrod was showing off a new steed at Sandown. No doubt courtesy of Garmin-Slipstreams visit down under.

From 200901

bah-ling!

Speed Work

2009-01-18T16:17:00.002+11:00

Glenvale was on from the gun today. Brauny must have been having flashbacks to his mtb days and wanted the holeshot bad. Nothing was staying away today but that didn't stop every man and his dog trying. Glancing at the speed down the main straight showed 50+ more often than not. Quite happy to see the three laps to go, get out of the way and let the thoroughbreds do their thing to the line.

Extras followed...four hours down and still 25 clicks from home Jimmy was still spending some quality time with Larry Lactate. Smashing the flat at 45km/h wasn't on the agenda for Dmac and I on the homeward stretch and we just followed, but hats off to him for still having the legs.

A Normal Hour

2009-01-18T00:22:00.002+11:00

I was awoken by the message tone this morning, I think I was expected to show for the hell ride. Alas, I rolled over opting for more sleep and did my riding around 11, when normal people are awake. Still plenty of people belting up and down the beach, which meant laps ala Chapel Street on a Saturday night. The mission was a simple hell ride loop with Chloe and Kate but with so many familiar faces I did U-bolt after U-bolt in order to have a chat and the km's just ticked away.

Noticed the Mounted Police had a presence today...gave me visions of horses escorting the hell ride around instead of the usual car/bike/chopper. Would be carnage.

Bushy Park Take Two

2009-01-14T21:17:00.002+11:00

With the cool change coming through as promised I returned to Bushy Park tonight to experience the normal graded racing.

Starting at the back of our six man A grade field I followed through the unknown start loop.

Hot Dice rode straight off the front and was opening a gap.

I eventually picked my way through the field and got onto his wheel where I stayed for a few laps watching lines and trying not to get dropped as he powered up the climb.

I made the move and as planned got a gap. Not to plan was the gap slowly closing as Chris wasn't giving up. Luckily the bell lap came while the gap remained and I was able to stay away solo for the win.

Mechanics Mayhem

2009-01-13T19:30:00.004+11:00

That be the trail name, sister trail to one with the initials SS and definitely worth skipping Glenvale for.

Especially on a perfect day like Sunday.I also thought it'd mean I didn't have to taste breakfast again, until we found this hill which just needed to be used for some efforts. Definitely compares to the ominous Gut Full Marathon climb.

At the top I stumbled across these two burnt out trees that I later likened to the pearly gates of heaven. Roll through them and just keep rolling through berms, doubles and the occasional wooden 'structure'.

With every epic trail comes the mandatory creek crossing, this particular one had a rather tricky exit.
Like Stink above none of us quite had the HP to clear it on the first run.

Jimmy went back for a second go though and seems to have it mastered.

With little use these trails are littered with debris of the natural kind...

...sometimes it's quite sizeable and even the SPEX wasn't up to task on one occasion which brought James to visual obscenities.

A stop by Damo's Cog Cafe to oggle the oldschool bling...

...and then it was time to make tracks as the shadows lengthened.

Unfortunately for me I'd been running a little late to the start, so met the others at the top of the first climb, which meant an ascent to finish my ride.

So much up that I was dreaming of down, which my camera seems to have realised as the photo below is of one of the steeper sections but somehow looks downhill?

Or is it just me being forever scarred by the climb?

The locals were certainly surprised to see me.

Lastly, Elixers...get on them. Saved my bacon a number of times as I rode lines that probably shouldn't have been ridden blind...

...no doubt the all new SID didn't detract from the surprising amount of control I had either.

Variety

2009-01-08T22:49:00.002+11:00

Just to keep it interesting I ventured out to Bushy Park last night for some dirt crit action care of Knobbysports.

A good bunch of mates that congregate every Wednesday night to smash themselves for bragging rights. Unlucky for me my first attempt coincided with a handicap race rather than the usual graded racing. Upon arrival the handicapper eyed me up and down and proclaimed, 'you look like you're off scratch'...great!

So a five lap individual time trial followed as I tried to peg back one and a half laps to the 'bunny'. That was mission accomplished but a few snipers also got past him and I rolled over the line about fifth. I say about as no one really cares, it's just good fun as everyone tries to keep it just out of the red. We even followed it up with a team relay of hot laps just to give everyone a change to taste their lunch one more time. With some creative handicapping mid race it came down to half a wheel on the line.

Good to see Rollin Cycles' newest recruit Richard out enjoying the two wheeled life aswell. Be warned, he doesn't go slow.

Eccys

2009-01-03T23:09:00.003+11:00

Today started simple enough with the plan to join Trent for a westside crit adventure.

Based at a driver training circuit it brought back memories of belting myself around the METEC circuit in high school. Good surface, small field and I decided to have a dig...I just dug a bit too deep and when I was caught and the counter attack went I was straight off the back never to rejoin.

Now is where the eccys come in. 'Hey Trent, bay crits are on in Geelong, let's go watch'...'OK'.

That view would have cracked a few riders in its time. Ride straight, then keep riding straight.

We had to overcome a few hiccups.

The trailer of fairy floss that had exploded all over the road.

The mandatory puncture...yeah that's right, hide your face, you should be ashamed.

But then it came...

...a bend!

Followed closely by Geelong and with a hunjie already in the legs it was bakery time.

A lovely 'French' bakery, that had some odd 'French' symbols beside its name.

Perfect timing saw us arrive to see the start of the main event.

Many a familiar face and many a famous face in that field.

One of those familiar face's was Rob's

who flatted in the dying laps for the second day in a row.

It was with great apprehension that we embarked on the return journey. Things were looking up when we reallised the wind had swung around to give us the round trip tail wind.

Before we knew it we were 5km from home smashing our bike track section with the yellow jersey in sight.

The catch came at 1km to go and there was no response leaving us to take line honours and complete a nice round figure of 100 eccy's on top of race distance.

Oh, we spotted another of those interesting Kennedy cycle fits aswell.

How aero can you get with a steerer extension? Whatever works for ya I guess.

The Sun Sets

2008-12-31T22:19:00.001+11:00

Goodbye 2008

Hello 2009

View Larger Map

The Daily Chuckle

2008-12-30T20:53:00.003+11:00

We've all seen the stickers on the top tube...'this bicycle is not designed for offroad use' blah blah etc etc. This however was a first for me.

That's on there to stay, 'grip firmly at both ends for best performance'. Good tip, and had me in silent stitches while wrenching away today.

On the riding front Sandown had the Christmas/New Years week off tonight and not wanting to miss my weekly pain session I soloed my way out to the 1in20 for some SE fun.

Looks like the mini-cold that kept me from the Mt. Beauty adventure hasn't knocked me around too much. 15.49 is a 34 second PB. Maybe the secret is in the lack of numbers. Doyletime has the Garmin to track the Nationals TT course so no heart rate, no cadence and I even restriced myself to only checking my speed every so often and not checking the time until I crossed the line. Suffering in its simplest form.

Good to see more mtb crew out for some bergs aswell, stumbling across Mr. 'EPIX' Jackson on the way home after having a chat to Alex Randall...who started descending the 1in20 just as I got to the top and decided not to wait. Meant I had to choke down whatever food was trying to jump out of me, turn and chase immediately...thanks mate.

Change

2008-12-28T19:33:00.002+11:00

Although I didn't mention it I had a gander at some track racing a few weeks back. One of the most surprising things was being recognised by people I've never met. How you ask...Grover's Grumblings. Apparently people actually read it, which gives one motivation to continue.

Motivation brings us to change. You don't have to be too observant to notice there's been a facelift to freshen things up a bit and welcome in 2009. 2009, a year of change not only for the blog but for me. Fulltime work, hopefully broken up with some travel before I find myself a gig putting that piece of paper I collected a few weeks back to good use.

PS. Google has plonked some adds on the blog over on the right. Dunno if they're there to stay, but the more you click on 'em the more currency I collect to help get me overseas...so click on 'em.

Easy Rollin'

2008-12-26T22:00:00.003+11:00

Still expectorating some funky colours so I remain resigned to the easy life. Never mind aerobic threshold, I'm working on the sweat threshold...if I sweat I'm going too hard.

Lucky for me Christmas combined with birthday shenanigans last night meant there were some others looking for a similarly easy roll, 3.5 hours chamois time for 65km along the beach kinda easy.

Rob is the (un)lucky guy that gets to share his birthday with Jesus...pictured practicing his 'cross skills in preperation for a trip to Belgium. Either that or doing his best 'Beloki just ate s*!^ and now I'm riding across a field' LA impression.

Every good beach roll deserves a nutrition stop, and seeing as it was 5.30pm by the time the others were in any shape to ride (yep, rough night) our stop was about 7...hence pizza instead of bacon and eggs or bakery treats.

Chrissy Hap'nings

2008-12-25T22:00:00.000+11:00

Early bird catches the worm they say, the worm in this case was open road...

...and I caught it. No one in front...

...no one behind.

The body clock is well set to work hours so a chrissy sleep in was out of the question. Instead an easy traffic free roll to free up some of the congestion that this cold has left me with. Then home to unravel the Chrissy bling!

What's in the box?

Some new Avid stoppers!

Unfortunately I haven't quite shaken this cold so not wanting to spread it around and forever be known as 'the germ' I'm skipping the annual Mt. Beauty MTBers gathering...shattered.

When Racing Goes Wrong

2008-12-21T20:00:00.002+11:00

I've got some travel plans for next year, and I want to get quick so they eventuate.

So today I strapped on a single digit number, that means lining up against the serious hitters in Elite! The flaw in my plan was the cold that's slowly overtaking my body combined with the fatigue that follows a good friends wedding the day before.

Nearly missing the start after embarking on a practice lap with 30 minutes to spare was a good indicator to the length of the lap, with six still to come I was in for a long day. The extreme race length was confirmed with Mr Liston taking line honours in 2 hours 29! Results show I did four laps, I'd say half a lap was racing before realising it wasn't happening today, followed by 2.5 of riding...

...then one playing trash collector. Is it so hard to stow wrappers on your person to be disposed of properly post race?

Big thanks to DirtRiders for the race and XMAS BBQ, which included an appearance from the local road pro home for the offseason.

Judging by Mr Eva's gel inhalation witnessed on our trip home T-Lowe's offseason doesn't mean he goes slow.

Summer Days

2008-12-18T23:50:00.002+11:00

How good is summer! With the blue skies, warm temps and lack of bike cleaning to be done...well atleast that's how I remember it.

MTBers In The Money

2008-12-16T21:49:00.002+11:00

Sandown tonight with a few fat tyre enthusiasts crossing over as always.

Lukie, Scott and I...we gotta stick together when outnumbered by the darkside.

Scotty soon ditched us though.

Got in a group of four that stayed away to the finish. Can we still claim Mr. Braunsteins?

They had the field nicely strung out.

I'm in there somewhere, found myself nearish the front crossing the line aswell which was surprising.

Looks like it's Scott's shout.

Fixing the Skillz

2008-12-16T21:48:00.001+11:00

That wind is playing havoc everywhere, even the dog walker highway has trees down. Good for working on the skillz fixie style.

Results

2008-12-14T18:41:00.003+11:00

Found them...courtesty of Farkin. Apparently I was second behind a stupidly fast Craig Borham on a single speed, that man is a machine!
Thanks to Jo for backing up from her podium ride to play master cameraperson, and yes the Super Grover jersey came clean.

Fun In The Mud

2008-12-14T17:18:00.002+11:00

GMBC hosted the third round of the National Series at the ever dry You Yangs yesterday.

Going over the Westgate we began to question the 'ever dry' status.

Jimbus had come prepared with tyres to suit the race lines.

Make that gumboots to walk through the puddles and leave me for dead as I tried to find a dry route around.

Apart from the race centre the course held up well, and just quitely I'm quite happy with myself for cleanly riding that uphill rock garden just before decending back into race central. There was no choice but to get through it though with the amount of support out on track, especially considering the constant drizzle accentuated by downpours...cowbells make racing fun, awesome atmosphere!

In terms of the race, I'll await some results as I don't know where I came and didn't hang around to find out. I will say my start was at snails pace...but from there I felt pretty consistant, battled some chainsuck, went past a few and didn't get passed by many so should be up there.

Special mention to Brian John and our telepathic connection yesterday in the feed zone. I ran out of hands to take on what I needed, so just opened my mouth as I rode past and Brian was right onto it stuffing the unopened gel in my mouth for me to deal with after putting everything else where it needed to go.

The new long sleeve thermal Rollin' jersey was gonna debut at the You Yangs yesterday, but stayed in the closet an extra 24 hours and kept itself clean on today's recovery spin.

Got some go fast bits at the shop this week, lucky they were post TOB or I may have been tempted.

Commuter Cup

2008-12-10T19:59:00.004+11:00

It's been quick this week. Not a spare second to work on my own bike means it's still in race trim...

...complete with number.

The HC climb, good for laying the smackdown on the fluro army.

The dirt, good for dialling the roadie drift style.

Darwin Awards

2008-12-10T19:54:00.002+11:00

Is this guy a candidate?

Came into the shop saying his cranks kept falling off, I was amused thinking the tape was to reinforce what the bolt is meant to do. The amusement turned to disbelief when I removed the tape to discover the bolt was absent.

Tour Of Bright

2008-12-10T19:41:00.004+11:00

Here's a few snaps from the weekend.

The 'chrono' machine from the pilot's seat.

Some of the carnage courtesy of the Tawonga decent. This guy was in a pretty bad way but as always the cycling community looked after their own...managed to get him breathing again and choppered out.

The entry goodies. Best entry pack I've ever received.

BBQ dinner Saturday night after everyone decided GC was out the window and could afford to carry a few extra grams.

The morning of the Hotham ascent, fog in the valley meant chilly at the top. Eight degrees chilly.

My race was finished after I forgot to tune the gears to the race wheels for stage one, with not enough adjustment in the barrel adjusters to do it on the road. The only gear it was happy in was the 26, which was way to small to follow any moves up Tawonga and the bunch rode away. My goal was revised after that to being less than 20 minutes down on GC at conclusion of the Tour, I missed it by 12 seconds...but did take five minutes off my Hotham ascent from last year trying.

Takin' Da P!ss

2008-12-10T08:05:00.003+11:00

Rode You Yangs National Round course last note...in the wet.

I got lucky and crashed/rode into a tree in a section that's actually on dirt so the only damage was an Ay-Up mount down (yes, I was planning to do some laps under light). The rest of the course resembles a cheese grater though being never ending rock...oh, except for the start/finish area that was like quicksand and unrideable. Could be a matter of bring your running shoes if the rain hangs around, and make sure you've got ambulance cover. There will be carnage.

Oh, ran into these guys on the trail who have taken social riding to the next level.

Post ride trail side BBQ and beers! They've got it dialled.

The Whirlwind

2008-12-05T12:48:00.002+11:00

Bit busy at the moment, AJ and I are just about to commence our trip to Bright for a weekend of roadie stylings.

TT machine and all thanks to Clarkey. Not gonna help as rumour has it one Paul VDP is the competition in B grade.

Oh yeah, in between returning from GVBR and departing for TOB there was a little thing called graduation last night. Apparently I'm now officially educated.

GVBR...I'm home

2008-12-03T22:10:00.004+11:00

The notorious 'bus chamois time' pair...they were later outdone by a dude who hadn't taken his knicks off for 3 days. That means riding, eating, sleeping and no showering. I reckon I could almost see the chamois mushrooms sprouting.

Of 4500 people associated with the GVBR supposedly I was the first to question this dude about his setup. A little backyard invention that is soon to turn into the first proto production run with patent and all. The idea is that the springs are loaded with the more powerful sections of the pedal stroke which then release some of their energy through the dead spot to snap you over it. It also loads up with accelerations to give you a bit more kick as well as being able to be preloaded for track starts. Not gonna be UCI legal but I'm sure there'll be dude's snapping them up to beat their buddies with. I can also see it smoothing out the pedal stroke a bit which could be good for the commuter crowd, considering the numbers I saw with knee pain this week.

This is the result of waking up at 8am to find breakfast all packed up. Was quite content with my scrounging.

The line of finely tuned machines that were my transport around the numerous country towns we visited. I'm not sorry to see the back of them.

GVBR attracts all types. I heard report of average speeds less than 10km/h. So while some were doing 10 hour days we enjoyed the local attractions, like $3 mini golf, which we weren't very good at...Chloe.

Supposedly there was some fancy smiley face constellation that we're not gonna see in our lifetime, I didn't capture it too well.

The Grampians were the drawcard to this years route, luckily no EPIX style hike a bike.

Every morning that was beginnings of the pace bunch...Chloe, Kate and Simon.

By the end of the day there were 20 or 30 hangers on and about 4000 riders passed.

That's my borrowed setup for the one day I rode. Please excuse pretty much everything; jousting sticks, odd shoes, foam dome helmet, fire engine red bike and kit, casual sunnies etc. etc.

Not much water around.

The skills a few seasons in Europe teach you...if anyone asks it says Teschner not Trek.

While the food was good considering they were cooking for 4500, the $10 lunch specials were a welcome change in Halls Gap.

Graduation tomorrow meant a mission to get home from Halls Gap. Five hours of bus time, Stawell was half an hour into the trip, all I saw for the rest of the trip was the back of my eyelids.

GVBR Day 2

2008-11-30T10:03:00.003+11:00

Making the transfer from rokewood to cobden at the moment. Bus driver has us lost...Got some happy snaps for you but rural reception isn't playing ball to upload them. A couple of trends I've noticed are serious chamois time, ie. dude's rocking the lycra from Melbourne to Ballarat on the bus, the second trend being a disturbingly early hour of waking. I missed breakfast on the first day, apparently waking at 8am is too late! In an effort to keep the legs turning for TOB I did get some pedalling in though, did it in style on one of those free GVBR bikes. No wonder there's crashes, those things are seriously unsafe.

Stuck on Repeat

2008-11-27T21:54:00.002+11:00

That's been me for the last week and a bit, chained to the work stand. The shop has moved from a downstairs dungeon to an outdoor showpiece, it came with a heap more floorspace which required about 250 bikes to be built. Worse than Groundhog_Day!

It takes a fair chunk of time as well when the bike come with forks and headsets out of the bike...WTF!

Lucky me had enough slack in the chain to get some grub straight from the supermarket bought in bulk (3 lunches, 1 dinner). Scotty and I also managed to let our creative juices flow with an abundance of Maxxis stickers.

Scotty contributed the 'bird'.

I was also quite excited to finally use these.

Thinsulate water proof socks, seemed like a waste of money in our never ending drought until I kitted up for the commute to work this morning and reallised my shoes were still wet. Kept me dry as a bone and plenty comfy.

Updates may go AWOL for a week as I tag along behind the GVBR playing physio...wish me luck. I may even resort to running to get some fitness for TOB the following weekend.

Winds of Change

2008-11-25T23:24:00.002+11:00

Last post had a hidden test, to see if the new gadget had what it takes to produce blogworthy pic-a-tures. I found a camera to take up too much valuable real estate in the jersey pocket, hence no pics, hence no posts. Now that regular ride snaps are a possibility I have no excuse to slack on the updates.

Without further ado I bring you tonights Sandown crit. A solo deathmarch to get there on time was hampered by a right brute of a headwind. I beat it though, pinned on a number just in time and was plenty warm at the start. Unfortunately I couldn't beat it a second time and lasted not much more than the start before being spat. I wasn't the only one though as there were wheels being lost left, right and centre as the cream of the A grade bunch showed their strength and the peleton was splintered.

That's four bunches, how it was when I was spat. It ended in two bunches, a select bunch of 13 holding of what was left of the field which was down to about 20. AJ stuck it out and finished in that lead 13 to keep the mtb flag flying.

They're the strong ones, duking it out for line honours after an hour.

In mtb news I found a pic from the weekend. Looks like I'm running scared from that scaffolding. Must have been before the Fireman Sam threat forced me to harden up and ride it.

Plus I've now entered the modern age, my bottom bracket bearings have finally migrated outside my bottom bracket shell like everyone elses thanks to some Truvativ bling. Minus 80 grams aswell, bonus!

Road Trippin' Take Two

2008-11-24T21:54:00.004+11:00

Last weekend saw the inaugural running of Cyclismo in Bendigo. In similar fashion to Adelaide a couple of weeks back I played follow the Jayco windbreak. The black and orange of Torq turned white and red of SRAM though. The base station certainly suits the mtb scene.

Empty roads were due to leaving at 6am! Aparently we got out just before the deluge however arriving in Bendigo the grey skies and brutal winds weren't too welcoming.

Not to mention it was 5 degrees!

Camp SRAM was setup which included some Eva mods to the urban mtb crit course to dial it in.

We did get some rain which made things a bit hairy, visualise 4 riders gunning for the holeshot onto wet steel scaffolding.

Wet scaffolding that played host to a left turn to line up for this.

Robbie took the W and a fine pay day, leading most of his races start...

...to finish.

Special mention to fireman Sam who in the words of the commentator 'probably isn't the strongest but is definitely the best bike handler' and used those skills to round out the podium in third.

Mr Bach talked me into riding that lovely scaffolding, threatening me with 'a fireman Sam up my clacker' if I got off and walked it in front of him. I was quite happy to make it through to the semi's myself, missing the final by a bike length in a two up sprint after having a mischief in one of the four water crossings.

The rest of my weekend consisted of flying the SRAM flag as neutral spares for the pro road crit on Saturday night, where Mr D Braunsteins showed his form is coming along nicely to take a win from a two man break. The SRAM support continued to Sunday for the the mass participation Gran Fondo.

Not quite as quick as the boys on Saturday night, but a huge effort for everyone who completed it buffeted by head winds the whole way. A bit more variance in work than the pro crit wheel changes aswell, the most random being a pedal falling off just as I drove past. Right time, right place and a very grateful rider.

Breakfast had been an $8.50 bacon and egg...

...half sandwich? Yep, I felt ripped, and rather hungry come the end of the ride so the mandatory post cycling event MickyDee's stop was in order.

Where we noticed McCafe seem to have borrowed a logo we're all familiar with, perhaps encouraging people to 'make the leap' to a healthier menu.

Home, to blue skies. 100mm rain and hail, we missed it all.

Cup Day K's '08

2008-11-06T00:28:00.003+11:00

A public holiday and sunshine always means k's, and with Norri now in town permanently and wanting to crack a hunji we embarked on a roadie adventure in the 'nongs.

A sighting run to dial in the corners led to the mandatory coffee stop

Where I opted for extra weight to assist my downhill velocity in the form of a white hot chocolate and a French vanilla slice.

Rossi's new bike isn't used to it's environment yet and needed some love

A second speed run and unfortunately Norri's speed-0-meter only showed high 90's, so up we climbed (may or may not have involved walking by some persons)

Third time lucky...we had corner marshall's, so crossing the double is ok right?

The happy boy with 100.8km/h on the clock...

Road Trippin' with TORQ

2008-11-03T14:12:00.004+11:00

Headed to Adelaide last weekend for round 1 of the 2008/09 National Series. Jimbus finished work at 6 so we grabbed some dinner...

filled the beast...

and were on our way...

darkness came...

and Jimbus got to try out his new driving lights...

Picture doesn't do them justice, would love a set of them on the helmet for some night trails.

Gen's instructions were spot on, but Adelaide is a maze so after a few u-turns we managed to find Hotel Torq at 3am.

Eagle Park got a recall to the National Series after a successful event last year and what a track, after a few laps on Friday post sleep-in I was rather looking forward to another five the next day.

Sidenote; Robbie has very mobile patellas.

Raceday came and event central was super busy, especially with SRAM launching their Hammerschmidt cranksets and Sam Hill in attendence.

SRAM was everywhere, even giving Steele some compressive goodness on a strained calf.

Thanks to Tim Rowe for this pic...who shouldn't have been walking around in the sun taking pictures an hour before his race.

I managed the wholeshot in Expert, came through the feed zone with a 15 second gap and was feeling quite comfortable tackling the switchback climb for the second time...until my freehub turned fixed hub and my chances were shot. Removing the chain I walked/rolled the remainder of the lap on which I went from first to lapped out. Ah well, that's racing. At least I scored a finish.

Tagging along with Team Torq was definitely one of the best ways to do it. Friends make the best team mates and these guys and girls are all friends. Rockin' the skinsuits was a good talking point and they seemed to help with solid results all weekend, especially from the girls who couldn't keep themselves off the podium. Dominant in the start...

Dominant climbing...

Dominant descending...

I also had a crack at the short track although this time I suited up in Elite, with Torq all over the front again.

I had goodish legs, but got too excited early and fried myself.

I rode in no mans land until I was lapped.

Thus brought an end to my first visit to Adelaide (next time I'm taking a map). Results are up. Thanks to Gen, Dean, Jimbus and the whole Torq crew for their hospitality.

Road Trip!

Surfcoast 6hour

2008-10-28T13:32:00.003+11:00

Post exam celebrations continued from Thursday down to Lorne until Monday. It just so happened that the second running of the Surfcoast 6hour in Anglesea fell on the Saturday...perfect!

The 4pm start time meant my wonderful 'warm-up' consisted of a surf at sunrise and an early afternoon nap. Sean made the trek down from Melbourne and we signed up for the full six hours as a pair. With such choice in race categories and the wonderful beach side setting the start line was packed full of fresh faces eagerly anticipating their introduction to mtb racing.

Rolling on his new bike bling (yes those are Nino Schurter's tubular mtb wheels with dugast tyres) Sean took first lap honours and sent me out in the lead bunch.

With so much time spent on the roadie of late I couldn't ride the singletrack to save myself but the sand wasn't sapping my legs as much as those around and I set about establishing a gap on the rest of the field. Sean went through one of those 'bad times' on his next stint and we were back to second by a couple of minutes.

I managed to erase that in my next stint and sent Sean out with a gap, which he built on, then I built on, then he built on...etc

With a couple of hours to go we had a comfortable buffer allowing us to roll around, not chewing so much stem and enjoying the stunning views the track had to offer.

Results are up, pics are up, Stephen got some as well although I managed to evade him. A special thanks to Choma, who strained a heart muscle (read 'was soft') after a couple of laps, pulled out and lent his lights to Sean who managed to leave his switch at home.

Final tip...I have no affiliation with Continental but if it's dusty/sandy get on the Race King 2.2's, at 460 grams they aint heavy, especially considering the amount of volume in 'em. I was floating all day, definitely helped keep the legs a little lighter.

Return to the Trails

2008-10-21T13:05:00.003+11:00

I embarked on my own Chase the Sun on Sunday. Finished work and decided to christen the new steed with an evening burn around Lysterfield.

Running some old parts...

Some new parts...

Some Ozriders parts...

There's those Rollin' guys again...

and still stuck with old school cranks

surely it's time for someone to make something with a q-factor less than 170mm again. I may have to resort to some creative engineering of my own soon.

Finishing up, I found just enough sun for today.

Sidenote...Rhino pledged his allegiance to Pearl Izumi socks the other day...I'd just like to confirm that they're awesome. Although be careful...they can get confusing.

Same socks...

Different socks!

Funny Numbers

2008-10-21T12:20:00.002+11:00

Some odd things were seen on the Garmin on Saturday...problem is they were consistently odd which probably means they weren't errors. The odd things were pain resulting from Herald-Sun Tour critting.

The pace was on from the gun, the HR flashing 97%. I heard mention of anywhere between 100-140 starters, so inevitably there was a split in the field. I resorted to domestique duties. 57 minutes averaging 93%max.

We were in the second bunch on the road, but points were still to be had so James made his move with one to go, which officially fried me.

Ah relief, rolling around on the final lap. Last finisher, which meant about 30 or 40th with the huge attrition rate. Happy with that.

Then the chicks went around...

and Catherine were both aggressive and attentive. Representing for the fat tyre community.

And finally the big boys stepped up...

who are way fast! That's my best attempt at capturing J-Blood on the attack, which just happened to stick to the end. Second on the day to partner his win up Buller. I pity the guys trying to beat him in Adelaide in a couple of weeks at National XC #1.

Oh yeah, SRAM did a ripper job at neutral support. Hooked me up when my jockey wheel shat itself. Thanks Snozza.

and Mr. Eva on the bike rescuing all from the flat tyre demons. Wish I had've double flatted...could have done with a lap out and some Zipps.

Lab Playing

2008-10-17T14:25:00.004+11:00

Monash Sport got some new toys, so I played guinea pig to figure it out today. Bit of video, few sticky dots and some computer analysis. My position felt good, so it was nice to hear nothing needed changing from the side on analysis.

Footage is squashed sideways for some reason after the export from Dartfish.

The rear view footage confirmed what I thought about my foot/ankle/knee/hip/pelvis alignment, so I'll be playing around with some cleat wedges in the near future. 1mm on the medial border of my left foot to begin with.

In other news, no more sandbagging for me...I've qualified for A grade on the road after scoring a W on Sunday.

Two man TT off the front for the last 10 minutes, holding 8 seconds to the peleton for the last lap, and the plan working perfectly to win the two up sprint. Quite happy after having a souva for breakfast at 4am and 3 hours sleep.

A baptism of fire for fast critting tomorrow though...Herald-Sun Tour support crit pain begins at 12.50pm. Some big names in the 97 starters, and with right hand hair pins there's sure to be carnage. Come down for some entertainment.

Crittin' Away

2008-10-07T21:48:00.003+11:00

To follow up the return of Glenvale last sunday, Sandown kicked off tonight. Massive bunches again. Ten minutes in and I soloed across to a break that looked dangerous. Good move, it stayed away to the finish. Nine in it, I snagged fifth so some more cash to join my third from Sunday.

Now I just gotta learn how to win these things, which will no doubt result in getting the boot to A grade. We were only 0.3km/h slower than A grade tonight, so the jump shouldn't be too bad. I certainly won't be going off the front in a hurry though.

Other news...

Packages arrived...

The summer race bike, lets hope I remember how to ride the knobblies.

Roadie Madness

2008-10-06T14:11:00.002+11:00

Perhaps I've got a little dose of the roadie bug. Daylight savings kicked off yesterday and with it crit season. Nearly caught out by the lost hour I suited up and TTed my way to Glenvale, pinning on my number with minutes to spare.

A few attempted breaks, a few breaks closed down and I decided to sit in awaiting the bunch kick. With five to go though the legs were getting itchy again, and I found myself in a bunch of four working well. The bell lap came with the bunch at 50 metres, two were shelled and swallowed by the stampede following as we rounded the last corner, all the cookies were spent and it all came together on the line. In the washup it looks like I managed third, so I'll have to venture down next week as well to collect some monies.

The prep is needed though as over lunch on Friday I put my name down for some guaranteed pain. The Herald-Sun Tour rolls into town next week, and come Lygon Street on the 18th I'll be involved in the festivities, pinning on a number in the support race.