A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 2!

[ldrcycles]

The intention today was to conduct a very gentle and dignified commute, no sweating or straining, and then I would be nicely placed for some Saturday morning exertions.

The plan lasted for only a couple of kms, when 3 old blokes pulled out of a side street up ahead. I was doing about 37kmh after a slight downhill so decided to just keep it at that pace to pass. The lead old bloke decided to chase my wheel though, so I slowly wound it up to about 41, held it long enough for him to think he had my measure, then clicked up a gear and upped the pace to 47kmh . Rabbit #1 GONE.

I kept pushing a good pace through to the Peregian Slums roundabout where another rabbit popped into the crosshairs. After a short breather sitting behind him at 38 I changed up and overtook at just short of 50 and kept charging up to the centre of Peregian Beach. He closed the gap slightly between there and the start of the water tower climb, whereupon I got out of the saddle and gave it some welly, and by the time I reached the other side of the hill rabbit #2 was GONE .

From there on it was uneventful, just me, my Malvern star and my sweaty backpack .

Shortly after I reached work unfortunately a roaring southerly sprang up and kept howling for most of the day. It had eased off quite a bit by home time but it was still a pretty solid headwind, which for once was ok with me as it encouraged me to stick to the "gentle" plan.

And with that, the Oppy has ticked over her first 5,000km since I built her, and she still feels great. Tomorrow morning i'm up early to have a crack at the Saturday bunch for the first time .

[ldrcycles]

Oh the injustice of it all!


This morning I dragged my thoroughly uncooperative body out of bed at 4:40, and after downing some bacon and eggs, managed to get all my gear together to be standing outside the door at the right time. Sadly it was only then, after having locked said door behind me, that I realised the dangly thing I had picked up off the table was not my car keys, but a headlamp.

I tried the garage door, but then remembered that Herself has recently taken to keeping it locked at all times. After knocking on the door failed to rouse said She-devil, I tried to call her.

No credit.

So when I finally managed to wake her and gain access to Chateau de LDR a whole 10 minutes later, I commented that it would be greatly appreciated if she could go back to leaving the garage door unlocked so the poor cretinous cyclist could at least shelter from the elements, and she got the irrits with me! What's a bloke to do!


Thanks to that delightful little interlude, I was now well behind schedule and while my best efforts got me to the prescribed place only 3 minutes after the prescribed time, there was no one to be seen. Reasoning that they can't have got all that far in 3 minutes or less, I set off in pursuit and just as I started to fade I caught sight of the bunch a few hundred metres ahead. I redoubled my efforts and set a fairly solid pace for the next few kms but they had vanished and I didn't see hide nor hair of them (inasmuch as you can see hair on a cyclist).

Given there was a headwind at play I thought they can't have gone any faster than I had been, so must have turned off to do a loop around Sunshine Beach somewhere. It stood to reason then that if I casually made my way down the coast, they would catch up to me in good time and I could just hop on. Well 25kms later I still had not seen a bunch, so decided to just turn around at Seaside and take advantage of the tailwind to rip up the coast at full throttle.

Well after rocketing past a small group to do a 400m flat segment at an average of 50.1kmh things were off to a good start, but by the time i reached the northern side of Coolum I was greeted by.... a headwind.


HOW ON EARTH can the wind turn a full 180 degrees in less than 10 minutes, and why in the name of all that's good and/or alcoholic should it do so EXACTLY in time with me changing direction!?


So the expected 40+kmh smashfest turned into a fairly pedestrian slog, but at least the threatening rain managed to show some restraint.


Sometimes I wonder why I got into this lark, but then at the very least it gives me an excuse to get out of dodge when the lady of the house is in one of her (thankfully rare) moods .

[ldrcycles]

I had intended to get about on the bike on Sunday morning but was thwarted by my inadequate alarm, i'll be happy when we move out of this crowded suburban area to the farm where the only thing stopping me from having a dirty great old style alarm clock clattering away is my wife's murderous urges.

So from Saturday until this morning the only riding was 10 minutes of up and down the street on the bike Noah used to ride to school, though the heart rate still got up a bit as I built it fixed with no brakes purely for one short spin and I found out the hard way that fixed "braking" on a steep footpath on flat pedals while wearing thongs is somewhat ambiguous at best .


Anyhoo, no harm done to rider or, more importantly, the bike, so there was nothing to stop me getting up at 3:00am today (apart from the previously mentioned spousal homicide) to do some more repeats at Montville. I got underway from Palmwoods around 4:15, and after one run at moderate pace I gave it a red hot go and after reaching the top with black spots appearing in my vision I had taken nearly a minute off my PB .

My next run was more than 10 minutes slower so after going back down to the base I decided to just dawdle around the back streets of Palmwoods for a while until Wakatuki woke up and got on the bike. He was feeling a bit under the weather but I had no complaints about taking an easier pace, and on our way back down we met none other than Jacob_t. After much chinwagging Waka headed for home and JT and I went for another run up the mountain. It started off reasonably steady but the pace soon picked up and by the last km I was really starting to struggle, with a few hundred metres to go he opened a gap and my legs had nothing to respond with. Still put in a nice time though, only 8 seconds off my 2nd run .

In all, 82k for 2,600m climbing, not bad. Tomorrow may see a commute if circumstances permit, and then if I have Thursday off I have some very serious business to attend to....

[jacob_T]

Yeah, that was some seriously hot pace for a 5th lap Lachlan!
Very nice effort.

I wonder does that serious business involve Bellthorpe?

[H0LD THE LINE]

Just spent the last couple days reading through this thread.

Thanks for the time you've put into this, its a good read.

Keep up the good work.

[ldrcycles]

Just spent the last couple days reading through this thread.

Thanks for the time you've put into this, its a good read.

Keep up the good work.

Thanks a million mate, i'm always stoked to hear about people reading the thread, let alone actually enjoying it too!


Well Jacobim was right about today's serious business, it was time to head down to the Thorpe of Bell again and demonstrate my Authoritah to the good people of Stravastan.

But sadly it was not to be, after completing my first warmup run the ride back down was a bit hairy due to some strong and very gusty winds. This wasn't helped at all when I stopped halfway down to let the rims cool and found my front brake calliper was loose . As you can imagine, the pace was PARTICULARLY careful from there on!

I went back to the car and tightened the brake up but by the time I was back to the base of the range the wind had picked up significantly, and I decided that it would just be too dangerous to do any more runs in those conditions.

A very disappointing outcome but better than nothing. As I read on facebook, if you think you're having a bad day, just remember the guy who sold his 10% share of Apple for $800 in 1976, those shares are now worth $58 billion. So yeah, i'm doin alright considering .

[singlespeedscott]

I'm surprised the wind on Bellthorpe range rd is an issue. It's pretty well covered by the tree canopy.

[ldrcycles]

I'm surprised the wind on Bellthorpe range rd is an issue. It's pretty well covered by the tree canopy.

My thoughts exactly, but somehow it was getting through. Up the top where the vegetation opens up it was just insane.

[ldrcycles]

[Insert melodramatic song about heartache and despair here]

It is a sad time for the wannabe racer, as my trusty weapon, the Oppy C7 has signalled it's intention to depart this mortal realm. On putting it into the car after my ride at Bellthorpe on Thursday I found a mark on the seat tube and not wanting to believe it, took it to a local bike shop the next day. One look was enough to confirm that yes, it is a crack, and not just cosmetic . Given where it is I was reassured that it is unlikely to result in a sudden catastrophic failure leaving me hanging in mid air like Wile E. Coyote, but the Malvern Star's future is pretty well snart all the same. It may well be possible to repair it but cost is a severe impediment, so the steel frames will have to step into the breech for the foreseeable future.

On a more pleasant note, this morning I finally managed to join the Saturday bunch and it was most enjoyable. After a very relaxed run down the coast to Twin Waters I was anxious to set a good pace to get back in time to start work. "Good pace" was something of an understatement for what happened next, as the first few kilometres past the airport at Marcoola were covered at a blistering 50+kmh.


I got shelled in pretty short order and held on as best I could until a red light in Coolum put paid to any chance of me rejoining the bunch. A couple of other riders pulled up next to me at the lights (us Sunny Coast cyclists being the paragons of virtue that we are!) and with the change of lights I took off at my usual 99% pace. The hangers on sucked wheel as I motored northwards, and by the time I reached Emu Mountain only one was left. It took a little while longer to shake him but the climb to the Peregian water tower (poor though it was by my standards) got me clear and from there on he didn't get any closer than a good 100 metres or so. I was absolutely spent when I reached Giraween but tried to keep things ticking along until the end of my commute segment but though I managed an average of 37.8kmh and Coolum to Noosa in only 39 minutes (compared to 26 minutes in a car!) it was still some way short of my best effort, which was on a heavy steel bike! Perhaps the Oppy's retirement won't be such a bad thing?

[QuangVuong]

Sucks to hear that, but on a lighter note, my Cadex has outlived your Oppy! But then again, I have not pushed it anywhere as much as you have. Is this a sign for a new steely to replace it? Something Columbus or Reynolds, rather than your usual ones.

[ldrcycles]

Well there is the remote possibility of a Reynolds 501 frame, but the 2 Columbus frames I've ridden (an SLX tubed Pinarello and a Max frame) were utterly uninspiring. I'm happy with steel for most rides but when it comes to climbing the much lighter Oppy has been great. On some of the most vicious climbs even the Oppy has fallen a tiny bit short in the stiffness stakes. I'll be keeping my eyes open for 2nd hand frames on fleabay.

[foo on patrol]

Jeez you're hard on the gear Idry!

Foo

[ldrcycles]

Well not sad really, more damn annoying.

I finally got around to removing the SunTour Power Shifter levers from the Mercier as I think something is amiss with the ratchet mechanism and causing dangerous autoshifting. I had a set of plain SunTour Cyclone friction levers sitting in the shed from a stripped down Beretto so popped them on and headed out for a test ride. All seems to be going well with the shifting now and after a bit of JRA chasing a bunch i was set to do a quick 40-odd k until half a stubbie went through my bald rear tyre only a k from home. Then i found out the hard way that said tyre is a ridiculously tight fit on the rim and dopey here pinched the new tube. Might have only been a km or 2 but that's a damn long way on foot!

But in MUCH happier news, i went for a ride yesterday arvo to the shops WITH MY WIFE! That's right the Very Expensive Hybrid (i got it for her at Christmas a couple of years ago) finally saw another ride and as we were able to find a mostly flat route she really enjoyed it . Now to just get that to happen again, i could still get her into cycling yet!

Off to the farm now, and then an early night ready for a big ride tomorrow (as for where exactly, your guess is as good as mine!)

[ldrcycles]

A "challenging" day this one, as I abandoned the planned 3am start (oh gosh what a pity ) to save energy for the anticipated Big Push out at the farm.
Well for various reasons (one of which is why Beloved and I are not speaking at the moment ) the Big Push didn't happen, and only a minimal amount of work got done. So after getting back to Coolum I hopped on the Oppy to get in as many kms as possible in the short time I had. The hot north westerly wind was difficult but I still ticked along reasonably well, looking forward to the tailwind on the way back.

Now I don't necessarily subscribe to reincarnation, but if I was Jack the Ripper in a past life it would go some way to explaining how the wind manages to mirror my movements exactly. After a quick run from Eumundi to Yandina a violent south easterly change hit and had me down to 20kmh on a downhill!

Luckily for my mental health there was one section on my return run that had the wind in a favourable direction and I was able to sit on a comfortable 50kmh for a while .

Only 72k instead of the planned 160+ but much better than nothing, and I've finally ticked over 7,000k for the year .

[foo on patrol]

Well Idry at least you did some work at the farm. That's better than none I believe, isn't it?

Women, you're dammed if you do and dammed if you do and you can't live without them or with them!

Foo

Sent from my GT-I9210T using Tapatalk 2

[ldrcycles]

Too right Foo! (it is worth noting that Herself has apologised and all is well once more ).

Today's itinerary was a commute on the Mercier to see if the new shifters really had fixed the problem, and to my great relief it looks like we're finally in the clear . Just need to strip those Power Shifters at some stage and find out what was going wrong with them.

The commute should have been straightforward, and it was until Coolum Beach. I was riding pretty much in the middle of the lane doing 47kmh in a 50 zone after trying and failing to catch the slipstream of a ute coming out of a roundabout, when I hear a horn blaring behind me. Apparently I was going too slowly for old mate in his Mazda 323. I turned and held my finger to my lips in a "ssh" gesture because he was making rather a racket and people could be disturbed, perish the thought.

Special Cecil then decided to pass over double white lines (presumably while muttering about evil law breaking cyclists), swerve in front of me and hit the skids.

Just at that point I must have hit a HUGE bump, as my water bottle just sprang out of it's cage all by itself and went rocketing into the bloke's boot lid and rear window. Made an incredible noise too . At this point i think Special Cecil remembered an important appointment or somesuch as he took off up the road like a cat with it's tail on fire .

Other than that (and the fact the bottle lid had come off leaving me with no water) the remainder of the commute was uneventful, and the ride home was all fine and dandy too.

Happy hump day all, and watch out for enormous invisible potholes .

[ldrcycles]

After a couple of days with no riding I was starting to get restless, so when I finished up at the shooting club this morning (after posting quite a nice target with my trusty old Sportco-Martini) the very strong northerly winds had me taking the bottle cages off the Oppy, throwing on the aerobars and heading for Peregian.


The ride north was even slower than I expected, down to just 20kmh at times but I just grinned thinking how good the return would be. And in line with my hopes, when I turned around things got hectic! I overtook a van on the speed bump in Peregian and he didn't get back past me for about a kilometre, at which stage I was sitting on 56kmh. The best part was the young boy in the back who was absolutely losing his nut at how fast I was going, and stared at me with eyes agog as I tried to get into the slipstream. Unfortunately the 52-12 top gear was too short for my out of the saddle kick to work (my high cadence ability puts the wannabe in "wannabe racer") so I had to let him go, but still completed the 1.8k segment at an average of 50.5kmh for the KOM .


There was only 50m between the end of that segment and the start of the next, so effectively no rest before getting back on top of the gear. Again the top gear was too short, while I have had it into the mid 80s on one occasion that was spinning up super fast, and I am a grinder through and through, especially when i'm on the aerobars. But I was happy enough with a 48.4kmh average and 4th place. The Oppy was less happy though, with me WAAY out on the extensions, my magnificent toned bot perched precariously on the very tip of the saddle and my Incredible Hulk mashing pedalling action the poor girl was twisting and squirming around quite a bit.


After that effort there was a good stretch to cool down before the next target, the first hill south of Coolum Beach. As it starts on the other side of a set of traffic lights, timing is everything, and it took 3 goes before I got a clean-ish shot at it. I still had to overtake a dawdling BMW but didn't lose any momentum and managed to clear the climb in top gear for another KOM at 48kmh (uphill!)


The final segment before home was one I regularly hit, and with the wind a bit gusty I wasn't too keen on hitting the chicane too hard, especially after getting a wobble through it at about 65kmh the last time I gave it a good go. So after taking the corner at quite a conservative pace I had to make up time on the flat and got it up to 62.8kmh before settling back to the low 50s. The average for the 1.8km segment came in at 55.7kmh and I went from 7th to 3rd (the KOM is 58.7kmh which is one hell of a tall order to crack).


The next month or so is going to be a challenge, as on one hand there is going to be a lot of work happening on the house, while on the other I will be trying to get in rides to hit some important targets. Regardless of how that goes, I am definitely going to be shedding a few of the kilos I picked up over winter as part of getting into full race trim in time for the next Stanthorpe train race at the end of November, and the Buderim 9 at Christmas time.

[ldrcycles]

After a couple of days with no riding I was starting to get restless, so when I finished up at the shooting club this morning (after posting quite a nice target with my trusty old Sportco-Martini) the very strong northerly winds had me taking the bottle cages off the Oppy, throwing on the aerobars and heading for Peregian.


The ride north was even slower than I expected, down to just 20kmh at times but I just grinned thinking how good the return would be. And in line with my hopes, when I turned around things got hectic! I overtook a van on the speed bump in Peregian and he didn't get back past me for about a kilometre, at which stage I was sitting on 56kmh. The best part was the young boy in the back who was absolutely losing his nut at how fast I was going, and stared at me with eyes agog as I tried to get into the slipstream. Unfortunately the 52-12 top gear was too short for my out of the saddle kick to work (my high cadence ability puts the wannabe in "wannabe racer") so I had to let him go, but still completed the 1.8k segment at an average of 50.5kmh for the KOM .


There was only 50m between the end of that segment and the start of the next, so effectively no rest before getting back on top of the gear. Again the top gear was too short, while I have had it into the mid 80s on one occasion that was spinning up super fast, and I am a grinder through and through, especially when i'm on the aerobars. But I was happy enough with a 48.4kmh average and 4th place. The Oppy was less happy though, with me WAAY out on the extensions, my magnificent toned bot perched precariously on the very tip of the saddle and my Incredible Hulk mashing pedalling action the poor girl was twisting and squirming around quite a bit.


After that effort there was a good stretch to cool down before the next target, the first hill south of Coolum Beach. As it starts on the other side of a set of traffic lights, timing is everything, and it took 3 goes before I got a clean-ish shot at it. I still had to overtake a dawdling BMW but didn't lose any momentum and managed to clear the climb in top gear for another KOM at 48kmh (uphill!)


The final segment before home was one I regularly hit, and with the wind a bit gusty I wasn't too keen on hitting the chicane too hard, especially after getting a wobble through it at about 65kmh the last time I gave it a good go. So after taking the corner at quite a conservative pace I had to make up time on the flat and got it up to 62.8kmh before settling back to the low 50s. The average for the 1.8km segment came in at 55.7kmh and I went from 7th to 3rd (the KOM is 58.7kmh which is one hell of a tall order to crack).


The next month or so is going to be a challenge, as on one hand there is going to be a lot of work happening on the house, while on the other I will be trying to get in rides to hit some important targets. Regardless of how that goes, I am definitely going to be shedding a few of the kilos I picked up over winter as part of getting into full race trim in time for the next Stanthorpe train race at the end of November, and the Buderim 9 at Christmas time.

[ldrcycles]

Just a quick post this one as I have to get mineself off to bed in time to do a long ride tomorrow (assuming all goes according to plan). Today was a fairly uneventful round of commuting, noteworthy only for the fact that I was actually riding to work on the national day for doing so (something which rarely manages to come together for me) and that I rode the Mercier and she didn't try to kill me even once. Yes i'm very pleased indeed with the way "Ol' Bloodthirsty" is conducting herself lately .

So, Bryton and lights all charged up, protein shake consumed and off to bed for an early start .

And many thanks to those reading this thread, over 8,000 views for the year .

[ldrcycles]

Well the early start for a long ride didn't happen, I woke up a couple of minutes before my alarm, switched them off, rolled over to hug Wifey and then fell asleep again . But sleeping from 7:30pm to 8am was WONDERFUL .

Though I was disappointed not to get out on the bike the rest of the day was spent in a very productive manner out at the farm, livened up somewhat by finding a Night Tiger in the shed, and I still managed to get some exercise in by hiking up to the back of the block with Stef.

A mate on Strava had laid down a fantastic time for a segment in Noosa Heads (helped in some small part by drafting a van ) and so Friday morning I resolved to head up there early on to give it a crack. As I arrived at work to park I found my brother and a workmate had a similar idea and were just about to leave, so I got my stuff together and the Dream Team rolled out.

Some Dream Team that turned out to be, my legs felt like rubbish with no power whatsoever, my brother had a cold and was coughing his guts up everytime we stopped, and I found out our colleague has asthma . All the same we nipped through the first fairly short segment on Goodchap St at a reasonable sort of pace, then gently rolled round to the next one, from Noosa Outlook over to Noosa Bike Shop.


This one was 5.5km long and mostly flat with just a bit of roll to it, and started off very nicely with me hitting 62kmh on a gentle downhill but it didn't take long for that speed to drop back a lot and while I gave it my best shot the speeds were well down on what I know i'm capable of. We regrouped again and moseyed over to Hastings St for a perve (sadly no talent about) before turning around and taking on The Big One, the length of Noosa Parade. As with the NBS segment I started out alright but couldn't maintain the pace I wanted and had to settle for a much slower speed. After this I was completely shot and the roll back to work was very slow indeed.


But then I uploaded the GPS and got quite a shock, I had done Goodchap 1 second faster than my PB and was in 8th place with an average of 46.5kmh, I had taken over a minute off the KOM for "Ride to NBS" at an average of 42.6kmh and to my utter astonishment got 6th place for Noosa Parade with an average of 46.1!


As my wife said, if you're doing that when you feel rubbish, what the hell will you do when you feel good!

Yep it's a hard life being #semipro.

[ldrcycles]

As my wife said, if you're doing that when you feel rubbish, what the hell will you do when you feel good!

Well yesterday i found out what i could do when i felt good, and it was bloody brilliant .

After knocking off work i spun over to Hastings St and after 5 false starts due to cars getting in the way and slowing me down (really) i finally got a clear road and lit the fuse. The first 600m segment (the Noosa Grand Prix crit course) saw an average of 52.7kmh, then i overtook a scooter and after a bit of a dip in the middle i maintained a reasonable pace to the end of the segment to clock an average speed of 49.5kmh . Not one but 2 HUGE KOMs!

But boy did it take some effort to get that speed, while i was at the job the determination blocked out a lot of feeling but as soon as i passed the finish point the pain came flooding through and i've never felt anything like it, i was almost in tears. And people say cyclists are weird?

Today was some more high speed flat work, riding from Coolum to Kawana to chauffeur my dad home after a doctors appointment. As i was running late it was time to pump hard and in spite of a difficult cross/headwind i managed to do the 27kms at 36.3kmh and nab a 3rd place for a 44kmh segment .

Tomorrow morning will be a commute from Kin Kin to Noosa, and with the aerobars on the Oppy and a northwesterly wind forecast i'm hoping for a good result .

[ldrcycles]

Well once again those accursed Norwegians have given me the bum's rush. I'm starting to get the idea that when the supposedly UBER accurate yr.no forecasts a tailwind, I should just take the car.

So yea, this morning's anticipated tailwind was actually the opposite, and far from threatening my 1:04 PB for Kin Kin to Noosa, I rolled in at 1:14. To be fair, that's actually still pretty reasonable, especially with rather tired legs and after doing Kin Kin-Pomona in 28 minutes I remembered that when I worked in Pomona a few years ago my normal pace had me at about 42 minutes .

So after a long and physical day at work I was somewhat philosophical about my chances of riding back to Coolum at pace, even with the good tailwind that had finally developed. That was another forecast that was well clear of the mark, as I shot along incredibly well. I was already joint KOM for the "Ross Crescent" segment at 44.9kmh but this afternoon that bumped up to 48.4! I kept that momentum going down the coast and after a 6th, 5th, 2nd (at 50.8kmh for 1.7k!) and another KOM I managed the 26.4kms at a ridiculous 39kmh average!

I'm really starting to surprise myself now, there's no way I thought I could do that sort of pace, especially on tired legs. The near future is going to be very interesting .

http://www.strava.com/activities/90789492" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[kb]

Was going to suggest http://www.bom.gov.au/australia/meteye" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; but they haven't rolled QLD or NT yet.

[ldrcycles]

Was going to suggest http://www.bom.gov.au/australia/meteye" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; but they haven't rolled QLD or NT yet.

Ooh wow that's cool! Detailed stuff for Qld isn't available yet but basic info is there. Thanks for that I hadn't heard about that one .

[ldrcycles]

No cycling to report on since Wednesday's efforts, as I am resting up for some big rides during the coming week .

But today it was off to the shooting club again and after supervising the new shooters I was able to have a little competition with my brother, he shooting his 1970s vintage Voere and I using my trusty old Sportco Martini. For something that was rebarrelled in the 50s and originally built sometime between 1913 and 1887 she still shoots spectacularly well, certainly far better than my ability . Not all that great a result but i'm happy with 449.8 from 500 and I walloped my brother's 403.




And this is a sportco martini (not mine, mine has much prettier timberwork )