ride and breakfast report by peter.

spring breakfast was on today and as is always the case, rain was predicted.  i think that the easiest way to break any drought is to schedule a club breakfast every weekend as there has only been 1 out of 6 that was relatively dry.  a different venue was on the agenda with mark opening up his house in booragoon with the opportunity for us to christen his new patio.  as such a different course was planned to finish up at the new address.

the normal round the river ride was on the agenda and would take in dalkeith and mosman park before hitting attadale and applecross.  from there we would cut across to risely ave and up past garden city to marks house.

there were 40 rsvp’s to the breakfast so i knew that we would get a decent turn out and wasn’t disappointed.  there would have been over 50 riders at the start with some a little wetter than others after being caught in the last minute downpour.  the idea was to be a very sedate pace today with a couple of fast points to test the legs.  the novice group were also set on their course and i gave them a little laminated map to help find their way to the breakfast location.

as we wound our way along mounts bay road, a couple of other groups past us by as we were taking things that easy.  some of the guys really had to curb their enthusiasm as cyclist in general really don’t like to be past.  nice and steady pace though, and there were only a couple of stragglers coming up from crawley but we managed a shortcut.

out onto stirling hwy and there was a little confusion in which road to take to cut back in towards mosman park.  the group started to take the 2^nd road when it is the 3^rd one we need.  a little evasive action bought those boys back on the right road.

we made it down the normally fast, speed-humped road in damp conditions to eventually be greeted by the mosman park hill.  lisa had in her training program to do some intervals and had already gone off the front earlier along mounts bay but went again on the hill.  with the time trial the next day, i was not going to be stressing the legs any more than i needed to so i slowly meandered my way up to the top.  there was a regroup point at the water tower at the top of the hill and we found the group waiting patiently. 

once we made our way through freo and onto preston point road, the group started to break up a bit.  as it is familiar territory for most of the group, the pace seems to step up slightly so there were a few people struggling at the back.  by the time we hit burke drive there must have been at least three groups spread along the road.  i ended up doing a bit too much work to try to get the back-markers up to the next group but eventually caught them when we found them waiting at canning hwy.

the last stretch through applecross allowed a few people to turn off as they were not going to stay for the breakfast.  the rest of the group headed up risely to marks house.

lorriane, kate and joan (mark’s wife) had done a great job and everything was all good to go once the group arrived.  the novice group had found their way in and by the time i got in there, it was in full swing.  the patio was well sheltered and had the added bonus of not having to worry about dropping brownie crumbs on the floor (they are every sort of evil).  hot food was continually brought out and i am sure that everyone had their fill.

we dug up some prizes and besides the couple of pbk gifts there was also stuff donated by cycling wa, carboshotz, yas’ bikeclinic and some stuff from brendan’s trip to the grafton-inverall race.  with the kids helping draw, read and distribute the prizes we managed to give all the stuff away, so congratulations to you but there was so much stuff i forget who got what.

a big thanks to mark and joan for providing the house and a big thanks to lorriane for providing the wonderful food.

so another breakfast done and dusted and the next one will be the christmas breakfast close to…well, christmas.  for those that came along for their first breakfast, i hope you got something out of it and at the least a welcome to our group.  for everyone else, thank you for making the group what it is.