ride report by peter

a quick head count this morning and i think we had around thirty riders at the start. the nicer weather combined with some father’s day presents (the gift of being allowed to ride) may have assisted with the numbers.

today’s route was a pretty standard one with a trip up greenmount before a detour through parkerville finishing off with a passage past mundaring weir. we were looking at around 95 kms with quite a few climbs, but this particular route had quite a lot of transitional sections where we would be just cruising between climbs.

with my bike in the shop (long story) i had borrowed chris’ ridley for the week or so. this used to be the top of the line roadie, but now has been relegated to his wet weather bike. with the impending birth of a little chris less than three weeks away, my riding may be the last action this bike sees for a while. i did take out my time-trial bike on the saturday ride, but it is not really suited to the hill climbs and is very hairy on the descents.

so, what was the bike like??? well i don’t really know. it’s not that i didn’t ride it, it’s just that i can’t really tell the difference from one carbon to the other. i could crap on about lateral stiffness and vertical compliance, but really, it just rode like a bike. i really don’t know how the bike reviewers can pick little nuances between frames. i guess they are on different bikes often enough to be able to spot the difference.

we rolled out along great eastern hwy and through hazelmere to take the back way to the base of greenmount. this used to be the way we went when the group was quite small and needed to be off the main roads. we have since adapted the route as it used to jump on the bike path to access great eastern after we past underneath it. i think now we may be able to just stay on great eastern the whole way as the majority of it is double lane and traffic is light.

anyway, our convoluted way of reaching the base meant that we actually started the climb before we were back on the main road. once we turned and headed up the climb proper, brendan and i set the pace and were waiting for mike or someone to come around and attack. our tempo kept the group quite large and the lack of attacks meant the people hung on for longer than expected. brendan finally pushed a bit harder so that he could get in front of me and let some others come around. it wasn’t an attack and the amount of kms he has been punching out in readiness for the grafton-inverall race in two weeks, it was no surprise he said that his legs felt a little heavy. mike came around to force the pace, but again no-one really attacked. the group had settled to a final seven, with mike, brendan, carlo, ben, steve, mark and myself all sticking together. it was a good pace and i think i would have been in serious trouble if they had started to light it up halfway up the climb.

we regrouped at the entrance to the john forrest national park and did a pretend headcount. there seemed to be a few missing and apparently a handful turned off once we hit great eastern and headed back for a flatter ride.

the road through the park isn’t particularly nice and is dotted with pot-holes and soft edges but everyone seemed to get through ok. the road surface is very aggressive too so it tends to wear you down a bit as you really have to power through it. we had one turn to make up oxley rd and i fell back to make sure the group all got to the turn ok. the climbs starts within 100m of the turn so i accelerated around the group and started the climb with as much momentum as i could to try to gain an advantage. it is a steep, tight climb and you can’t see the next part of it till you turn the corners. if you have not done it before, it can be quite demoralising.

mike and carlo sped past me like i was standing still and headed up the climb. i was trying to set myself a tempo to survive to the top when ben casually came past. he commented that the boys in front could not possibility keep that pace up the whole way. i was hoping for a bit of a self destruction, but it never happened. brendan also picked me up before the climb reached the plateau and the four of them stayed in front once we hit the regroup point at the summit of the next uphill pinch.

we picked our way though the back blocks of hovea and through parkerville to the extra bonus climb that would take us back to great eastern hwy. brendan and i were setting the pace up the first couple of pinches but no-one was really getting away. steve came around at one point but brendan pit in a bit more power to put him in his place. no real serious challenges on this climb as since it was a bonus one, we were just tempo riding the majority of it.

at the regroup at great eastern we lost a few more riders. the departure of holly and bec along with josie and sarah cut our female riders down to two remaining. a couple of the guys also called it a day opting for the nice descent down greenmount to the inevitable slug past mundaring weir. in retrospect, it may have been the safer option.

as we came along phillips rd just out side of mundaring, disaster number one struck. we were neatly formed up two abreast, no traffic, no wind, no really pace. i was just moving to the front to let the pace makers know where we would regroup when i heard the sound of gravel under foot and a bit of a yell. i look back to see dr mark had got his wheel off the edge of the bitumen and suddenly sliding out from under him. he comes crashing down in front of the riders behind and some had nowhere to go. mike careened into him and i saw him take a forward/side roll over the top and carlo also headed straight into the carnage and over the top. bruce (who was out for his fathers day present) had to brake hard and managed to stay upright, but smashed his wheel straight into dr mark’s shoulder.

we dragged everybody off the road and got the bikes clear as well. dr mark said that he was ok, but we wanted to wait a bit for the adrenaline to wear off a bit to make sure he really was. there was a bit of running repairs with some bent brake levers but everything else seemed in order. i got dr mark to rotate his cranks a bit to make sure that the rear derailleur was ok. it looked a bit crooked, but it seemed to run through ok. we saddled up and kept going, thankful that there were not real injuries and no blood at least.

the group seemed a lot more subdued as we headed towards mundaring weir and the pace was reasonable. it picked up a bit as we headed down that final dip and climb that precedes the long run into the weir. i was hanging back making sure that everyone was ok and talking to brendan and steve. we could pick up most of the group on the main climb so were not too concerned about the gap opening up. as the road pitched up i came past dr mark who was changing down gears to take the climb. there was a distinctive clinking noise that i didn’t think sounded good, but dr mark did not seem concerned. i came up over the climb and briefly looked back to see him stopped by the side of the road with brendan and steve looking at his bike. brendan waved me back and what i saw would make any bike owner cringe.

that distinctive clinking noise was the rear derailleur touching the spokes as the wheel went around. it had taken a blow when he went down and the drop out must have been bent sufficiently well enough to move the derailleur off line. it caught in his spokes and ripped the derailleur off and was sitting above the cluster when i got there. no chance of a ride home now hence disaster number two. dr mark’s first option for a pick up was his wife who had gone to melbourne so this made it hard. after a few phone calls he managed to get a taxi to come and get him. he told the three of us to keep going as he would be ok.

we were in no mood to chase down th
e group and just settled into a easy rhythm on the climb out of the weir. towards the top we picked up davina who was not having a good day in the saddle. it was pretty much a tempo ride to the coffee shop so nothing to really write about.

the return trip was a bit more exciting, and i was keen to see if chris’ bike would be different on the descent to mine. we almost all kept together for the majority of lesmurdie rd so by the time we hit the fast section of welshpool, we had a group of about eight. as the pace increased past the servo, i got stuck behind jens and anna who wer not accelerating as fast as the others. i came around and pushed hard to try to make up the ground between us. by the time we reached the bottom i was about 75 metres in arrears and they were still working to extend the gap. i have no idea of my speed on the descent as there are no speedo’s on this bike, but it felt fast.

stuck in no-man’s land, i had a choice of sit up and wait for anna and jens or push on and try to catch a bunch of about five riders. i had nothing to lose so i decided to switch to time-trial mode and see what i could do. it felt like ages and i didn’t really seem to make a dent on the gap. i was starting to feel lactic in the legs but thought that i should just push on regardless. as we turned past the vet clinic, i noticed that i was gaining fast as the bunch had split and was chasing two others. i powered past and came up behind brendan and mark (i think). i still had momentum to i just kept going till we approached the lights at tonkin and mark and brendan came around me again.

all safely down from the hill and it was easily an extra 5 degrees warmer on the flat. we had a nice run home made even nicer with no-one attempting a sprint along welshpool as we headed towards maccas. it looked like everyone was saving it for the berwick finale. as we turned onto berwick i ended up on the front as traffic dictated that we needed to go single file. as we got a good run on the lights, i ended up on the front all the way to the end.

as we came down the hill towards maccas, i was constantly looking behind me to see when the move was going to come. brendan was on my wheel and i was mostly worried about him coming around. someone shouted something and i looked back to see heiko and anna coming around the pack with a lot of momentum from the hill. i jumped up and started sprinting before the past me, but they still managed a gap. i held close to anna who was dropping off heiko’s wheel and yelled that i was coming on the left as there was still a gap. i bridged to heiko and came around into fresh air not far from the finish line. brendan had a spot of indecision on whether to stick on anna’s or my wheel, but came with me to slingshot past at the last minute for the win.

so, apart from the issues with dr mark it was a good ride and i think we were lucky that their weren’t any serious injuries. his bike was looking at the chopping block anyway as he has a new one almost ready to go, but drop outs are made to be replaceable for this exact reason. as for chris’ ridley, i guess that the final sprint showed that the bike is quite stiff as i feel i managed to get a lot of power down when we were going hard. it will be interesting to see when i get my fondriest back if i can actually tell the difference.