A group of about 20 gathered on Sunday morning for the challenging 113 km jaunt (including 6 KOM climbs) to Kalamunda. Conspicuous by their absence were (a) Lorraine’s mobile phone and (b) Peter – with the former containing a message saying that the latter would not be able to make it. Unbeknown to the rest of the group, Jerry had also received the message and this was confirmed after we called Peter to see if he was coming.

The group set off at a leisurely pace down Manning Road and Albany Hwy and there were many happy comments about the lack of wind. Surely on such a great day there would be big pack to tackle the ride ahead!! The climb up Mills Rd began steadily and soon Ben, Stu, Mike and myself had a gap on the rest of the field. We made good progress and continued uneventful until Ben threw down the challenge about 300 m from the finish to take the points.
KOM 1 (Mills Rd). 1, Ben 2, Julian 3, Stu 4, Mike 5, Jerry

At the top, the first murmurings of a shorter ride were heard but we pressed ahead to the Peet Road climb and the finish at Roleystone High School. Stu, Ben and Mike made a break in Peet Rd and fought it out for points. Jerry finished hard but couldn’t quite get the points for 4th.

KOM 2 (Peet Rd/Raeburn Rd) 1, Ben 2, Mike 3, Stu 4, Julian 5, Jerry

The shorter ride murmurs became loud shouts after the climb and most of the group turned left at Brookton Hwy and headed directly to Kalamunda. However 5 hardy souls, not sadly lacking in intestinal fortitude, continued on to complete the whole ride, safe in the knowledge that everyone in the group would get points today. The climb up Soldiers Road was not too bad with the familiar pattern of Ben, Mike and Stu clearing out from Julian and Mark bringing up the rear. This continued for all the climbs, although at the Canning Dam turnoff we weren’t sure where the points were on offer. Ben and Stu realised somewhat belatedly and took off and subsequently missed the turn off! Mike, Mark and myself rode up and a more leisurely pace and negotiated the turn without problem.

KOM 3 (Soldiers Rd) 1, Mike 2, Ben 3, Stu 4, Julian 5, Mark

KOM 4 (Albany Hwy) 1, Stu 2, Ben 3, Julian 4, Mike 5, Mark

The decent into Canning Dam was fairly quick and was punctuated with lots of motor bikes coming the other way. Once we hit Araluen the climbing group split as above before we re-grouped at Karragullen for the final 15 km. By this stage there were a few tired legs but we all keen on getting to the Cafe by 10.45 am.

KOM 5 (Araluen) 1, Mike 2, Ben 3, Stu 4, Julian 5, Mark

The earlier climbs finally took their toll on me and no records were set this week. Up the front, Stu hit the 50 km sign first to take out the last of the points on offer.

KOM 6 (Mundaring Weir Rd) 1, Stu 2, Mike 3, Ben 4, Julian 5, Mark

We enjoyed a good recharge at the coffee shop and caught up with Brett and Simon, back from a Mountain Bike trip near Mundaring Weir. Finally we headed home down the hill and managed to get home before midday, thus ensuring I may even be allowed out next Sunday!

 Just a reminder for those who are travelling down to the Busselton Half Ironman on the 2nd of May, we’ll be doing a bike course familiarisation ride on Friday for anyone who’d like to come along (competitors & supporters). 

Meeting at the car park behind the Loose Goose Café (the ‘original’ transition area) ready to leave by 3:00pm. We’ll do a full loop of the 30km course and be back in plenty of time for registration. 

Contact on the day will be mobile: 0430 162 291 

Supporters 
We’re going to aim to set up a central spot for all the SPR crew to be during the ride and run. We’ll scope something during the bike familiarisation. Keep in touch with either myself or Lorraine. 

Looking forward to a great hit out on the day, and can’t wait to back it up in Collie (…mmmm) with the full SPR contingent out in force!

Tom Lowry Memorial Race is on Sunday May 3rd

Monday 27th April midday is the cut off for nominations

There looks like being a great turn out

of SPR riders and supporters!!! So grab a lift off someone, even if it’s just to come down, wear the gear and cheer us on.

Melvyn… we may require the talents of a team doctor/photographer/poet laureat…  Are you free?

Rumour has it that there is even

a keen enthusiastic lunatic triathlete who is doing the half Ironman the day before and then playing domestique for the boys in C grade the next day!!!  Extra brownies for you… “Mere Male”

If you are heading down, a SPR race pack can be found here.

 

Some of the details are below and cost will be confirmed as soon as I know a rough idea on numbers.

Date:  Saturday 9th May

Venue: SPCC (South Perth Church of Christ)

Time:  TBC but around 12.00pm

Cost: TBC

If you could let me know on lwood@claytonutz.com or post a comment that would be great and if you have children could you please let me know their age.

Thanks Lisa 🙂

This race lends itself to an awesome weekend away in Kalgoorlie and sees itself high in prize money with the saturday criterium hotdog circuit and sundays handicap drag race from Menzies along 132km mostly flat terrain with people graded from A through to D eligible for the money.

Personally as I lived in Kal for 10 years this event is always popular and guaranteed to get big size bunches and with the case of C grade for the last few years they have actually split the grade in half and have a B1 + B2.
For accomodation I have booked at the Railway Motel
http://www.railwaymotel.com.au/
but there are heaps of differnt options and price ranges relitivly close to the city centre. See here http://www.kalgoorlietourism.com/accommodation.asp  

For more info on this great event Kals website is here
http://www.kalgoorlie.com/cycleclub/  

Which explains prize money, courses for sat and sunday and the events rich history.

In regards to travel there (I personally am flying for $300 return) but if time is no problem you can always train it up on the Prospecter or Bus it up on Goldfields Express services.

Skywest dont fly saturdays anymore but Quantas fly up saturday mornings and out monday lunchtime (not forgetting Monday is a public holiday).

Hope to see a large contingent of our SPCC members there for what promises to be some great racing.

Brendan

If anyone wants or requires more info please feel free to contact me and I will endeavour to help out as req’d.

Hey Peoples, I have mentioned this to a few people who were interested in sharing it around.
You can option to just save the home page to your web browser or actually subcribe online and yoy receive a free weekly email (every thursday). It has hundreds of great tips/stories/latest offerings from manufacturers etc.

Always a great read I find and you never stop learning new ideas and tricks relating to Bike racing/training or maintenace tips.

Link is here   http://www.roadbikerider.com/newsletter.php 

Hope you find it of some use..

Ride report by Brendan.

Well after a pretty ordinary sleep and a niggly thigh I dosed up on some deep heat and set out the door realising I was running abit late sped down to the to see the group still there so that saved me chasing them down 🙂

Lorraine was quick to point out Pete wasnt coming and asking if I knew the way which I did but the brain wasnt clicking into gear yet so a quick chat with the guys and we knew the route.. It was great to see a decent turn out of riders aprox 25-30 with several of the girls from lorraine, Lisa, Bella, Sam and several others that I cant remember the names of sorry. We also had 3 of the Aussie Crates boys which is proving just how popular our rides are becoming 🙂

So off we set through Douglas heading out to Albany Hwy to enjoy the flat section for a while before the fun starts at Carrawatha… Lisa had other ideas and wanted a stop 2/3rds of the way out as she had a rear punture, so a quick stop and some help from the gang and we were back of in search of them there hills 🙂

As we hit Brookton hwy a few of the others headed off towards kalamunda via a shorter route as we crested the hill looking for the turn into the heart starter known as Carawatha, after saying regroup at the top go as hard as you want a few of the boys tok off and we were quickly strung out over the smaler lead up hill as we hit the steeper section and with a crunch of gears we were up at a reasonably quick pace with the points at
KOM 1
Brad R
Darren R
Mike B
Ben

Brendan

Once everyone was up we headed down teh other side and into the rough hill at carradine, I always hate the rough section of this hill but after yelling to all regroup at the top Tee intersection the Aussie CRates boys took off and after a while Mike,Paul and myself headed after them as at first I was reluctant as just didnt seem to have the gogo today.
We caught them 1/3rd of the way up and I figured may as well set the pace so pushing pretty hard sat tempo until teh top section where the hill finishes but the tee is still a little bit ahead, I had done my part and let the guys sprint it out for points with the following results
KOM 2
Darren R
Matt
Brad R
Brendan
Mike

So once we were all up we headed down around to the turn leading down into solidiers road and a nice quick decent and it was nice to see the previous loose blue metal all but gone so we could safely decend at speed and down to the brookton hwy regroup before heading upward of the infamous Peet road 🙂 which we all know and love.

Starting on Peet I set the tempo up to just prior where the turn is and MIke came through with a slight surge to put most into higher Heart beats with some dropping off the pace. MIke and Darren were setting a solid pace and I was hapy to let them go with Matt trying to bridge the gap but as we know the second turn still keeps heading upward and Matt was spent and I crested the hill well clear of Matt and the group and not that far to Mike and Daren so bugger it I bridged up to them although did it steadily rather than flat tack and caught them as the road heads upwards prior to the round about so surged past them just to let them know I was still there but they too picked up my pace and we settled in towards the line for KOM 3, Mike came through and Darren was keen for the uphill sprint so I just sat on his wheel and let Mike set the pace with Darren constantly looking back at me wondering when I would go ( I didnt have the heart to tell him I wasnt going to sprint as my thigh was hurting and on the verge of cramping but he lept off only to see me not chasing so results were
KOM 3
Darren R
Brendan
Mike
Brad R
Matt

So after a few photos of people coming up in loking in sheer pain (although some where smiling, I think they are abit sadistic 🙂 ) We headed towards Karragullen for some water and after a brief stop we were off toward canning road in readiness for the final timed ascent towards our well earned coffee and muffins.

By this stage a few of the guys had headed off homeards as they live out that way but we still had a good size group and with people sharing the wind and talk still hapening I figured people still had some fuel in the tank.

As we crested the lead up hill we hit the start and it go on the timer Lorriane hit us hard looking for a PB up into Kalamunda. At first I wasnt really interested in chasing but as the testosterone kicks in and that competitive spriit always hits out a few of us set off in pursuit, I ended on the front as we passed Lorriane and knowing Mike was due for his attack due any second which he didnt let me down we were off I jumped on the wheel with Matt and Paul there somehwere too I figured as we started semi slow it wouldnt be a cracker of a pace but with Mike charging up the, it got the better of me I jumped to the front to bring the group up onto the flat part pushing very hard I looked back thinking I can lead Mike out for a PB time and I was bymyself so thought bugger it keep riding tempo and hope I recover if someone bridges so I can go, I heard a wheel get on mine and thinking it was MIke I surged again on teh flat but it turned out to be Paul who surged on the flat and I recovered quickly once behind Paul we hit the final 2 bends as it kicks up to the round about, Paul by now was starting to slow from his effort so I jumped with everything up to the line (50km speed sign) and looked down to see a time of 7.24 with Paul bringing close behind so KOm as follows.
Brendan 7.24
Ben 7.29
MIke (unsure of time)
John (unsure of time)
Julian 8.09

Many riders commented of PB’s today and it is great to see just how far everyone has come in terms of strength and times so we were all up in quick succesion and down to the coffee shop for a well earned drink and food but the place was pretty busy so we had to spread over several tables.

After afew laughes and refreshments we were off again but not before Julian had to change a fat and another re charge the front tyre. The run back into Perth was pretty quick but only managed 83 down Welshpool and no where near the PB of 92 set some months ago.

We all stayed together but soem of the guys waited a the School to ensure everyone came home safely. We set good tempo back through town and down Berwick. A quick chat in South Perth and we went our seperate ways home.

I decided to make use of the sun and head around the river for a cool down ride and to check out the beach fronts 🙂 too nice of a day not too i figured but after several car doors swung open on me and several driver strying to take me out I figured I should of headed straight home as I am sure I used all of any good luck I had during that ride but finally made it back to Raffles bridge but I had run out of food n drink and teh bonk had set in, silly me should of stoped there and re fulled but I figured I could make it home, how wrong I was. I pulled into the red canteen down where the water skies run under the narrows and added some urgent chocolate and coke and headed home.
So all in all a great ride with everyoneand some hard, fast hills with some laughs thrown in and with me ending up riding for some 6 and half hours, looking forward to the next one, cheers.