HI ALL
Well this is an unofficial ride report as its my first ride and I can hrdly remember the names
I've spoken to the people on the ride and make them aware of the forum so we might see some activity
Anyway, alarm goes off at 5:00am, thats tragic but we need to get away early to avoid the heat. 10 riders met at the Undoolya round-about on the east side of town and we decided to do the Larapinta loop, think thats 40km or so, I couldnt tell as the stupid Garmin 305 kept turning off. I think its going in the bin and a 705 will replace !!
We rode out Larapinta drive to Simpsons Gap and then left into Ilparpa rd where the word went around that we were going to do some good efforts....ok, this was going to be interesting
Here I am with a damn Camelbak on, Ayup lights and on the heavy Scott while I'm surounded by some really nice carbon bikes So the message was, paceline, 1 minute intervals and try to hang on....We got down to 6 I think relatively quickly and believe it or not there is a rise 1/2 way along the 10km section that I thought we could drop some people on Well Tim and Rob (the two A graders) sucked my wheel up the rise and as the pace quickened the Camelbak started to give me the poo poos 
. 3 of us left just winding up the speed, things were starting to hurt but I jsut couldnt show any weakness, they weren't going to break the new kid in town The 3 of us made it to the Stuart Highway and waited for the rest of the bunch to catch us and then rode out to the Airport and back towards town ... A few of us turned right down the Ross River Hwy and rode into some seriously amazing country side. The West Macdonald ranges are absolutely spectacular to see and best of all no cars on the road
We dropped to 3 riders and turned around at a point I cant recall, once back into Alice we had covered just over 100km
Now that was worth getting out of bed for So I had a chance to meet some really great people, there is no better way to get involved in a new town than through cycling Appears that I'll be joining the "road sub-committee" when I return next year and will help out with some Crit/Road race stuff.
Some excellent riding comming up in the new year, we've got the 500km ride to Kings Canyon in Autumn, Anaconda 100 MTB ride and the Tennant Creek races where we go up there to take on Mt Isa. Looks like I'll be starting work late on Tuesdays, some very good riding up north out of town where we go up and down some hills close to town and excellent coffee afterwards
I must say I miss the Lifecycles people heaps and those dastardly M7 Footpath Racers but I've found that cycling help you integrate well into new places.
Cheers..Pete
Only your gentle persuasiveness can lure grown men to race 100km throughout the desert 
