CCCC Les O’Mara Handicap

After having success at the last Modella handicap, I decided to give it another go. As always I wasn't highly confident as my legs were still store after ripping apart the Thursday night bunch ride in Sale. There was large numbers all round and my bunch off at 12min was exceptionally big. Conditions were great with no wind and for once it wasn't even that cold (Garmin showed 14degC). The group worked fairly well together given the size with large rest times between efforts which assisted recovery. It didn't take too long for us to catch the 16min group which had some strong riders including the infamous hard man Tommo from Warragul (Geoff Thomson) who won the Gippsland 3 Day Tour back in 1977. He was riding his stealth black Parlee which was easily one of the nicest bikes there. The now combined 12 & 16 min group continued on rolling consistent turns but it wasn't to the 2nd lap where we picked up the last remaining riders becoming the front of the race.

Entering the final 20km's we were told that there was only a 60sec gap on the bunch behind. A few k's down the road, the gap was down to 40secs and a majority of riders decided it was time to sit up and recover before being caught. Once caught, the large Lycra train of men (and one woman) steamed forward towards the finish line. With 5km's to go, the pace was high and the road was full riders making it hard to move towards the pointy end of the bunch. 1km to go, the pace had increased to near on 50km/h and was starting to turn into mayhem with a few riders slowing down mid bunch. I was too far back and content to roll though in the winning bunch. I had felt surprisingly strong and had made a big improvement over my race there previously. Overall the 12min bunch averaged just over 41km/h with Tommo taking out 2nd. Now time to focus on my recovery in preparation for another ITT tomorrow at Kew Boulevard.

Local Combine: Stratford to Dargo - B grade Winner

You have to be it to win it, and today I was. The numbers in B grade were slightly down, but I think everybody heard I was racing. Following play numero uno in my Playbook, I broke not long after race neutral riding solo for the 80 of the total 90kms. Luckily, I pulled it off and in the process pased the back end of A grade. I was even courteous not to yell out, 'B grade passing.'

This is a great ride with beautiful scenery including rivers, lakes, mountains and plentiful roadkill. My Garmin  recorded 1400 meters of climbing with a few nice pinches thrown in. By the time I got to Dargo, I softed out continuing on further opting for a cold can of scotch and coke instead at the infamous Dargo Hotel. The new cassette was a winner and I defiantly got my monies worth spending more time than I would like to admit in the 28.

Heavy legs and looking onwards to Friday

This week has been flat out on the bike with a few decent intervals on Monday, Tuesday & Thursday smash fests with the SEMC and finally to top it off, Wednesday night racing.  Click here to see my Link to my Garmin file.

Wednesday night was one of my hardest efforts to date with my heart averaging 174 bpm at approx. 37km/h. I spent a large amount of time at the bottom of my V02 max zone ( Great document on heart rate zones ) and hopefully like everyone else, was doing it tough. But it was great to survive and hang onto the back of A grade as they rocketed past.

Friday brings rest and more importantly after work drinks. And yes, I am aware that a good Friday night session will most likely end up in Melbourne's China town  for cheap Chinese at a place that accepts large groups and slabs. Luckily on Saturday I have a gentle coffee ride planned along Beach Rd with the hope that on Sunday I will ready to race the SKCC crits in South Melbourne.

P.S. I am reading a great book that I'd recommended to any cyclist, Bike Snob NYC (Check this out). It is very dry and surprisingly right up my alley .

The new toy...........

After a year of road cycling, almost 10thou kilometers on the red bike (rounding up of course), a week in Adelaide bike gazing and purchasing my first yearly CSV license -  it was a good time a upgrade. Now, it wasn't too hard to upgrade over an alloy bike with the trusty shimano 105 fishing reel running gear.  My main constraints being monetary and hedging bets where the bike will reside (and therefore which is the closest LBS - local bike shop).

1) Dollars - I couldn't justify spending  the price of a new small car on a hobby and racing the lower grades on a brand new 8k Quantum Team with Dura-ace and Zipps. 

2) LBS - The key to buying a new bike is too buy local as the LBS will support any issues going forward. Otherwise, everyone would buy online and save money upfront.

After a few weeks of research, I ended up finding a new older model Avanti Quantum 3.0 running Ultegra and carbon wheels from the LBS down the road. After purchasing it on a Friday after work, I raced a crit on Sunday. The bike felt feather lite and I noticed the cornering improvements straightaway. From here, I just feel sorry to the other people who I race and train against cause I feel like a million dollars on this new beast.