“coming from behind” – ride report by melvyn (deliberately missing out capital letters)

i was inspired by the first warm weather forecast to drag myself out on sunday to do the ride.i was pleased that this would be a shorter ride, and not a “special” new tryout ride that pete dreamed up for those who are not racing. the first real climb would be gooseberry hill rd which always is a test, but the rest would be manageable (i hoped).

i even got to the meeting point early, having given the bike a bit of a clean the day before to find no huddled group of lycrans surrounded by flashing lights like some exiled extraterrestrials waiting for the mother ship to pick them up in the dark. i knew i was early, but really??? moments passed and i thought – what if no-one else turns up? do i do the ride by myself? it would be a bit of a boring blog with all this “i looked back to see myself pedalling furiously, so i attacked to just win the hilltop sprint against myself by barely a wheel…” thankfully john rolled up to join us (and provide someone else to write about). unfortunately as we eyed each other we still did not have the critical mass to qualitfy as a group ride. i’m sure we were both thinking if we could cheat a little if no-one else turned up and modify the course (perhaps doing gooseberry twice then kalamunda a couple of extra times?)

it was all academic when more joined in just after 0700. darren arrived with “greased lightning” (his bike must surely be inspired by the hot-rod that john travolta and his gang do up in the movie “grease”), ben (to give some credibility to the overall pedalling ability of our group), schneiderman (uneasy in his winter mankini), nev (who i cant recall coming out on a sunday before – poor befuddled boy must have his days mixed up), ronan, and a newcomer bronwyn who has chosen perth (!!!) to settle down in for a while after finishing a round the world trip. must have been lured by the vibrant cafe culture.

soon it was time to go off! if we waited we probably would have seen every cyclist in perth ride past. i had to lead out and pretended i knew the way. the secret is that really i don’t have to know the way for any of the rides because i always get to ride at the back. the only time i sprint for the front is when i actually recognise the roads and know i won’t get lost. anyway, after a bit of “no, turn left” we got onto great eastern highway to run the gauntlet of cold air, cars and hobos shouting encouragement after passing the casino. As we pedalled east, we were greeted by the warm rays to the sun. however riding into the sun is not to be recommended as mainly you don’t get to see. if you are in the front, all manner of glass and potholes come into your vision all too late. if you are in the back, you are hoping that cars will be able to see your 1/2 watt flashing tail-light against the sun which puts out 368 yottawatts (1024 watts)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(power) admittedly 93 million miles away. You get the picture.

i had not cleared our mind of those thoughts when the next traffic hazard presented itself. it was outside the 24hour macdonald on great eastern highway (who really eats maccas at 0730 on a sunday?), where a green hyundai pulled out to turn right. i’m sure he saw us as he wasn’t looking into the sun to look at us. i could see that his intentions were to pull out 10 metres in front of us. fine i thought, we’ll be right. we weren’t right, as he stopped in the lane in front of us. there were lots of emergency manouevres to avoid this car, but no one fell off. obviously (to give the driver the benefit of doubt) he had thought better of turning into the path of cars that he couldn’t see because of the sun shining from his left. as ronald macdonald says “look left then right and left again before crossing the street”. silly boy, no happy meal for you.

we soon interrupted our ride (near the cement factory) with schneiderman’s scheduled puncture. we usually have one later in the ride which is handy for catching our breath back. its impressive to see schneiderman extract a tube from the mankini (where does he put it), but i think that if he keeps this up, we will have to chip in to buy him a seat bag that fits two tubes. it was about this time that i noticed that mike b had joined in to add pace uphill. i later found out that he was trying to get back into condition after a holiday in europe where he actually viewed the tour from the mighty tourmalet. he obviously hasn’t lost as much condition as myself as he easily outpaced me on the mighty “kalamunda”.

soon we were at ridgehill road which doesn’t count as a climb. the ride played out like it always does with me attacking for the first 20m before running out of steam in the slope. at least it gives me a chance to check out if any others have made new purchases as they ride past. something very unusual started to happen on the flat bit of the climb. i actually started to catch up and pass people. i don’t usually rub it in, but i must say that that does not happen often. was it my new wheels (probably 500g lighter than my previous set), or was everyone taking it easy? the reality was that i probably don’t ride up that well, and there was not very much going up by that stage. evidently i had run out of power-ups as that was the last time that happened on any of the climbs that day.

the regroup point was the base of the zig-zag, and then it was down (yay!) before the left turn at the roundabout to gooseberry (boo!) we had egged newcomer bronwyn on about how steep this one was going to be but it was only half joking. in any case being a ex mountain biker from new zealand i don’t think many hills scare her. soon it was reverting to the familiar tempo of breathing and pedalling (two breaths for every pedal stroke) when before you knew it the hill stopped. really after several european experiences, these hills don’t come close to he definition of pain. these are just the light dripping of hot wax type of pain, and not the chained to the bedpost with a red ball in your mouth before being whipped by a cat-o-nine-tails by a suspiciously masculine lady in a leather mask named steve sort of pain. you get the picture.

bronwyn chose a good day to come out on a hills ride as the next stage was down the zig-zag, which truly made it worthwhile. the sun was out and warming, birds were singing, the air was clear and most importantly dry, and the scenery was breathtaking. I can see why people live in the hills. best not enjoy the view too much though as gravel can make the hairpins tricky. I wanted to push the cornering properties of the wheels a bit as that is apparently one of their strengths, but woosed out a bit, not wanting to do an oscar pereiro. it was over however all too soon.

a short transport stage found us at the base of kalamunda road which i find terrifying sometimes. mainly because of the honky nuts that often cover the outside of the road, and the hoons who insist on driving at full pelt. we planned to keep going past the coffee shop (sacriledge!) and regroup at the coles roundabout. i spent about half the climb thinking of excuses to shorten my ride and retreat to the coffee shop, but was disappointed to find everyone full of energy and enthusiastic for more. the power of peer pressure again pushed me down mundaring weir rd and up lawnbrook. at least this was a good form of peer pressure, as it usually ends up with poorer consequences in other instance. we rode single file as traffic was increasing, and had time to wave at russell and ian(?) coming up the other way.

by the time we got to the coffee shop it was already quite full. they obviously were short staffed that day. the conversation was considerably
cleaner that day as we were not up to our usual compliment of urologists. by then a few of us had elected to go home early, and after making short work of the food and drink it was time for us to head back. but that is another story for another day (a day which you are not doing very much because basically nothing exciting happened).

……………………and so children ends the chapter on the exploits of this small band of intrepid cyclists who went out to conquer far lands over infrequently travelled roads, laughing at what destiny would serve up to them (and still making it home in time to avoid getting in trouble with their wives).

the end