What a weekend that was, more ups and downs than any rollercoaster!
The drive up was excruciating, with my old man insisting on doing around 10kmh under the limit everywhere and playing classical music for the whole 6 hours (I do think of myself as reasonably cultured but all things in moderation!) The seats in his car didn't agree with my back either.
The "Siesta Villa" motel wasn't fancy, but was perfectly clean and tidy, and cost a mere $65 for the night. Being barely a block from the start line was great too. We headed out to Mt Larcom for a recce of the first 30kms, and although there was a fair bit of climbing as I expected, I was pleased to see nothing steep, and the road surface looked quite good.
I got to sleep at a reasonable hour (if not quite as early as I wanted), but then woke up at midnight
. Obviously my subconscious was concerned about getting up late, and I only had patchy sleep from then until 3:30 when I finally gave up, as my alarm was set for 3:45 anyway. Whether it was the interrupted sleep or something else, I didn't feel quite right, but dismissed it as nerves and headed for the Post Office.
To my amazement, a car pulled up as I was getting my shoes on, and the lady driver introduced herself as Antonella from Channel 7.
She got a little footage of me getting ready and setting off before heading up the road to film me passing. She contacted me afterwards to say she had to repeat the exercise several times as she couldn't believe how fast I was going and didn't have enough time to get out with the camera before I caught up to her
.
The first few kms were fantastic, Gladstone glows at night from the millions of lights on the coal terminals, and riding past the massive gladstone power station is an experience I won't soon forget. I was sitting in the mid to high 30s just taking it easy and waiting to warm up before the climbing started. The road to Mt Larcom was a bit odd, in some places I seemed to float along at an excellent pace with no effort, other sections made me work for little return. There were a few patches of solid fog around, and it combined with the soft pre dawn light to make a beautiful sight.
There were plenty of smooth downhills to rest on, so I really enjoyed myself out to the Bruce Highway. I still wasn't feeling as good as I should have, and straight away I was onto coarse chip bitumen that sucked speed and energy almost as well as an ungraded dirt road.
It was all downhill from there, my body simply wasn't working and I soon realised the morning would just be about surviving. At best, I was only doing about 34kmh on the flat, and was often down to just 29-30. This was despite the forecast headwinds being absent (although the southerly change that had been predicted and would have been enormously helpful didn't eventuate either).
I was careful with drink and gels to make sure I had enough without upsetting my already upset stomach, and just kept the pedals turning over. The existing record only required me to average 24kmh, and with multiple news crews waiting at the finish pulling the pin wasn't an option no matter how bad things got.
At the 60k mark the usual tenderness in my legs started (though normally it wouldn't have taken so long to get to that 60k mark!) and by 90k there was a bit of tightness around my knees when pedalling out of the saddle. The traffic throughout was remarkably light, and there were a few who gave cheery toots after passing. Around 70k in an empty coal train running alongside the highway gave a big toot and the driver stuck his head out the window to give me a thumbs up, which was a fantastic pick me up
.
From the Burnett Highway turnoff onwards I felt a lot better (and the road surface finally smoothed out) and I averaged 35.6 over the Yeppen Bridge. I got swooped by a magpie coming through the south of town, and after successfully navigating the only 2 turns that were required, I made a somewhat feeble charge up to the Old Post Office, relishing the prospect of being able to get off this accursed machine.
The Old PO now houses a cafe, and there were a few other cyclists there who clapped as I came in (even though they didn't know what I was doing, just that there was a support car following so there was obviously some significance), and the reporter from the Rocky paper was there along with some bloke who had read about the attempt.
You might notice the white car (which was the support) disappearing from the 2nd photo. What happened there is that due to some miscommunication, the 7 News cameraman didn't get to the finish until well after I had arrived (and had been talking Maddelin from the Morning Bulletin's ear off). He needed video of a man on a bike, so I had to ride off down the road and come back into the finish in a convincing manner, and to get the right angles took 3 takes. 3 sprint efforts is exactly what I needed after 3.5hrs of hell!
The end result was a time of 3:32:06, 1hr4m22s ahead of the record
. My conservative target was 3h28, so given how poor I was feeling it was a pretty good result.
Eventually everything wrapped up there and after popping over to my brother's place to say hello and upload the GPS, it was back in the car again. After a short stop at Mt Larcom for one of the best meat pies I've ever had, and a phone interview with ABC Capricornia, it was another 5 or so hours of slow, uncomfortable travelling. The classical music was replaced by NRL coverage, which was like replacing syphilis with gonorrhea, not necessarily an improvement, but at least different. (I am strongly contemplating alternative transport arrangements!)
So on one hand, there were a lot of unpleasant moments over the day and a half, and I'm terribly disappointed not to have put in a much better showing. However, there were also a few wonderful experiences, and breaking a record by over an hour is nothing to be sneezed at.
To me the best thing to come out of the weekend was my newfound confidence with the press. Now that I've determined to set up a replacement for the League of Wheelmen to encourage other people to get on the record breaking bandwagon, it's so much easier than saying "well I'm a weekend hack harvesting low hanging fruit"
. I did really well at getting the message across that the exploits of Opperman, Les Cecil, and their contemporaries are extraordinary achievements that deserve a lot more recognition, and that today's cyclists should commemorate those achievements by getting out there and pushing the bar higher.
I'm feeling a lot better today, so I think yesterday's troubles were down to the combination of a long, unpleasant drive and poor sleep. I'll make sure that isn't repeated on future attempts.
I did point out that I left Innisfail in pitch darkness, but the policy down here is open and shut, no night riding. Deary me.
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