BR44b – The Half Pint

Perpetrators: DaveB, GPLama, hippy

Woke up after a crappy “on/off” sleep (waaay to gee’d up from Sunday..)

2pc Vegemite toast for brekkie.

Greased my nipples.. hey, this jersey chaffs!! 😛

Rolled out and started HRM.

Look down two minutes later to find HRM showing all 8’s.. WTF?

Press Start again.. HRM totally resets! ARRR!! CRAP! There goes yesterday’s race data!! WTF?!

Determined not to let it get to me I ride on, now with only a rough idea of the time since the clock reset to 10am. I reset my wheel circumference so I’d at least have accurate distance and speed measurements.

Ride past the clocktower in Ringwood and feel guilty about not participating in some kind of ANZAC service. Roll another 20m and, as if by magic, the guilt disappears 🙂 (I am a bad person..)

Arrived at Doncaster shopping centre with, I guess, 15min to spare. Rolled around not sure of exactly where the start point was, as I’d previously joined the bunch around Blackburn Rd.

Rolled over to 7-11 and took advantage of the 2-for-$4.50 offer on Powerade bottles. Tasted the Powerade. Regretted being such a tightarse. Bleh! Oh well.. I only wanted the salts not the flavour.

Rolling back towards Donkeyaster Mopping Polenta I spot a bike. It’s GPLama. Hiding in the bushes nearby was DaveB. Wait. Chat. Roll out when no one else arrives.

88.7kph down the fast hill, without trying as Dave said something about a sharp dropoff and road works cutting something.. I dunno.. wind noise! 😛

After the big climb (timed apparently, from, the Bus Stop – “The Rock”) we turned left instead of right at the round-a-bout. Lots of mostly downhill followed which was good for me – my legs still ‘tender’ from yesterday’s race.

107.9 down Foote St. (BULLCRAP!! Must be sensor glitch.. I did ‘see’ 88kph though)

Through lots of suburbs I’ll never remember and eventually deposited back around Doncaster, where we split.

On the way home, I decide to take it easy so ride no hands for a while.. At a set of lights (perhaps Blackburn Rd?) my front tyre suddenly goes squishy! WTF?! Puncture? Arrr!!

I check the tyre and see no evidence of a puncture so I pump it up and ride away – seems fine? Next set of lights.. stop.. flat front tyre!!! WTF?! It’s like the valve is operating on centrifugal(?) forces and opening every time I slow down.. kinda like Speed the movie just without a bomb! This is the weirdest ‘flat’ I’ve ever had!

I pump the tyre up a second time and this time I hammer. Any time I come to a set of lights I find another way around that doesn’t involve stopping or I time my arrival so I get a green light.. crazyness!! I make it the rest of the way home without having to inflate the tyre – it _must’ve_ been a valve issue! :S

Eat some Vegemite toast, drink some Ice Break IC, type this while thinking about the Snickers in the cupboard and a shower.. mmm.. shower.. what a top idea!

I think I recovered most of the Polar data from the “glitch” and now present the stats:

Distance: ~71.2k

Time: 2h:53m

Almost the perfect race! Fast, No B-graders, perfect leadout for a bunch sprint. If only I wasn’t slower than those four guys in front of me! 🙂

I’d been beating myself up about this race all week, worried that B-graders would sneak down a grade and steal another potential result. That didn’t happen. The last race was just what a C grade race should be – standard ~40kph pace, a few break attempts that get chased down almost before they begin, some pedal clashes on corners, a crash and me not quite getting in the money 🙂

Race morning: Listened to some Megadeth, Sepultura and some Stamba electro mixes (strange combo I know!) to fire me up. Leave a bit later than usual so I’m not riding for an hour to get there and THEN doing another hour of “warm up”!

At Glenvale Crescent the “BR” cheer squad, flyingdutch and Gags are quickly spotted.Lindsay and Jazmo appear on the line. Louise is being a wuss bag and riding D-grade 😛 The other two Bourke’s, Brian and Sean are racing C. DaveB is racing in his first crit and has also entered D grade.

On the way to the race I’d decided that I was NOT going to chase a damn thing. If someone wanted to win in a breakaway, so be it. So, for the majority of the race I sheltered in the bunch, reacting to the surges and keeping an eye on anyone who looked threatening. The pace seemed consistent all through the race. It was obvious there were no B-grade time trialists in the field this week!!

Inevitably the pace hotted up towards the business end of the race and at one stage I managed to lighten my pedals a smidge with a nice “corner grind”. Gets people off your wheel quick!! haha! 😛

3-to-go was called early at 47min. There was brief uncertainty about this but the pace soon increased to reflect the impending chaos.. It didn’t matter (this time!) as I was up near the front. Saw a clear bit of road and moved up around the outside of some more riders.

With 2-laps-to-go I heard a nasty crash behind me on turn 3. Cringe, thank Lord Shimano it wasn’t me and race on.. I later found out it was Dutchy! Poor bastard! Good into to C-grade. :S

Bell Lap: Gags and Jazmo had also come to the sharp end and saw that I was trying to move further up. Gags motioned me to sit on his wheel, which I did. He then powered up the field. We passed a few riders and on the back-straight it was Jaz, Gags, 2 guys and me as I’d lost Gags’s wheel at some point. It didn’t matter, because Jaz and Gags did an awesome job to deposit me in the optimum position of 3rd place, ready for the final corner and sprint.

There wasn’t the usual ‘last corner bunch storming’ so it was still Rider 1, Rider 2 and yours truly after the last corner.

2nd wheel made a move around the guy in front and I accelerated to go around him too.

We stayed like this almost to the line – I just wasn’t able to get past these riders! Then, perhaps I slowed or whatever, but two guys just STORMED in from behind me! Arrgh! Bastards!! That was MY place!! Oh well.. race was run and I didn’t have a place to show for it. It went almost perfectly and I was, surprisingly, very happy about the whole thing! Yay for not being a bitter loser this week! 🙂

I feel bad for Jaz and Gags, not taking a place higher than 5th, after their self-sacrifice to get me in the perfect spot. If we race together again I’ll be more than willing to punch a hole through the wind for both of them!

After the race I caught up with a bunch of racer buddies while A & B grades circulated. Eventually, everyone had talked enough crap, prize money was collected and off a bunch of us rolled.

I heard a “Seeya Stuey!” as everyone except me turned left near The Glen, and that was that. Possibly the last time I’ll see any of these guys and my last race.. .. for now..

No race stats because my Polar went nutso before I retrieved the data from it :S (I heard the average speed was 39.x)

Photos of the C and D grade races here:

https://thehippy.net/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=98

Thanks to a.b rider “essendon93” for taking these!

I managed to restore the Polar data, so race stats are:

Distance: 34.5k

Avg. Speed: 39.9kph (actually a bit faster, stop delay)

Avg. HR: 172bpm (snore.. piece of piss!)

Max. HR: 202bpm (see.. I WAS trying in the sprint! :P)

Temp: 23degC

Yeah.. you.. C-grader my arse!

Wins C grade and then races B grade straight after.. driving the bunch into the wind.. not a chance in hell he’s a C-grader. Cheat. (self-censored)

–

Ahh.. now that that’s out of the way and a day has passed.. here’s a more detailed race report:

Listen to Megadeth’s “Rust In Peace” for a pre-race psych up.

Ride to Glenvale, arrive way too early (8am) for the 9am start.

Ride around with Mal for a bit and not-so-casually ask if there’s gonna be a B-grader in C-grade again this week. He tells me “No, he’s been bumped up”. Cool I think, I’m back in with a chance.

Ride around some more chatting to people, upping the pace just before the start, so race pace isn’t a shock.

Eat a snake 5min before start.

Wait for the ‘start shuffle’ to happen as everyone finds their position in the bunch.

“I don’t frickin believe it” I think, as I spot the Freedom Machine rider who should be in B-grade!

I thought I’d make use of him and stuck to his back wheel like glue.. well.. like glue that eventually comes unstuck, as after a few laps I lost his wheel on a corner and he took ‘that’ brief oppurtunity to launch his attack – I didn’t see him again.

The rest of the race was a sad example of people unwilling to do any work to catch the break. Why the hell do these people pay money to soft-pedal around the circuit while a break is getting away? Did they not know he was the rider that kicked everyone’s arse the week before and that, no, he wouldn’t just give up and let us reel him in like most other breaks?

It was pathetic – myself, Brian, and maybe another guy and girl were doing big turns at the front. We’d roll off, trashed from riding into a strong headwind, only to find the schmuck behind coasting around like they were riding to the shops for milk.

This happened for quite a while, while I got more and more angry and used more and more energy. Carl was shouting the gap times to us: “20sec”, “22sec”, “25sec”, “30sec”, “25sec” etc. All this while I’m getting more trashed and the bunch is twiddling its thumbs. It would’ve been easier to simply collect their donations at the start and hand them straight over to the place getters. They weren’t racing.

I got so pissed off I actually started yelling at people to work (something I don’t think I’ve ever done) and when that failed I told myself “fuck it” and raced off the front, getting a half lap gap, only to be reeled back in.

“Oh, so you fuckers in the bunch will chase me down but you wont fucking work to get back the winning break! Frickin’ wankers!!”.

I basically give up. There’s only a few minutes to go. NOW these idiots in the bunch start to up the pace!

Shit! 3 laps to go, they’ve already let the break go and now they want to sprint for 4th and 5th! IDIOTS!!!

In the end I was quite a way back after doing ANOTHER turn and my sprint started too far back. Probably 6th in the bunch but it was a half-hearted effort (actually, it seemed like my HRM was reading 180-200bpm for most of the race, so not THAT half-hearted).

I later find out that the initial break was two riders (as I knew) but they were later joined by three more. Probably just after Brian and I had done big turns to start dropping the split – thanks, love your work, losers.

The second placed rider was a.b’s Jazmo who said he struggled to hold FM gyu’s wheel! Two or three of the riders that bridged pulled out with 2 laps to go as well! That’s how hot the pace was in the break.

In the end, I think FM guy actually broke away from the break and won solo – that is not a C-grade rider.

I was furious.. for the second week in a row.. beaten by a cheat.

Freedom Machine cheat then went on to ride in B grade (apparently did the same the week before – how does someone race B AND C grades!!!???) and he wasn’t just sitting in the bunch, this scumbag was driving the bunch into the headwind, AFTER our race!!

I was destroyed. I actually had to get off my bike on the way home because I was cramping up so hard I couldn’t pedal. I rarely have a problem with cramps (high fat, high sugar, high salt diet.. mmm!) but I think the effort on Sunday was a bit much for my body.

I had a rotten post-race hangover for the rest of the day – walking around like I was a zombie, barely able to see, drinking loads of saline to stave off the cramps.. I was a mess. An angry mess.