lower mountains ridathon Monday Public Holiday

[Chuck]

What an awesome day for an awesome ride! Many thanks to Don for setting up the trip, and also for patiently waiting for me at the top of each climb/bottom of each descent.

Some highlights for me...
- Making it up each climb (eventually). I think we even did all the ones Don wanted to do?
- Seeing Don get dive bombed by a magpie when descending from Kurrajong at about 60kph, then getting hit on the back of the helmet by the same bird.
- Appreciating the views from the lookouts more when you've ridden up from the bottom.
- Facing Old Bathurst Rd with 100k+ in the legs.
- Saying yes to the Lapstone climb after Old Bathurst.
- Setting some personal-worsts on m7 strava segments in the limp home.
- Most climbing I've done in a ride.
- Longest ride I've done. First metric and imperial century.
- Best post ride shower ever.

[zozza]

What an awesome day for an awesome ride! Many thanks to Don for setting up the trip, and also for patiently waiting for me at the top of each climb/bottom of each descent.

Some highlights for me...
- Making it up each climb (eventually). I think we even did all the ones Don wanted to do?
- Seeing Don get dive bombed by a magpie when descending from Kurrajong at about 60kph, then getting hit on the back of the helmet by the same bird.
- Appreciating the views from the lookouts more when you've ridden up from the bottom.
- Facing Old Bathurst Rd with 100k+ in the legs.
- Saying yes to the Lapstone climb after Old Bathurst.
- Setting some personal-worsts on m7 strava segments in the limp home.
- Most climbing I've done in a ride.
- Longest ride I've done. First metric and imperial century.
- Best post ride shower ever.

+1

[joomz]

Well done, sounds like a solid ride! Got a Garmin or strava link to post? I'd like to try it sometime...

[coops]

Well done, sounds like a solid ride! Got a Garmin or strava link to post? I'd like to try it sometime...

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/228829363

[Xplora]

^^^^^ I only just survived my ton and we weren't climbing much

[leximack]

Awesome day on the bike. The weather was perfect, wind was calm, no mechanicals and we made it home safe and in one peice. Thanks for coming along Chris, these rides are much more enjoyable when you have someone to talk to along the way. Congrats on getting some personal records too. 160 km and 2000+ meters climbing is a great achievement. We set out to do 5 climbs and we made them all.
Until next time......

Sent from my X10i using Tapatalk 2

[Spiza]

Well done gentlemen.



What happened to doing "Glenbrook causeway (both sides)"? Looks like you have some unfinished business...

[biker jk]

That's a great ride guys. I did 2,000m of climbing and 162km on Monday with some friends. Our route was Hornsby-Galston Gorge-Wiseman's Ferry-Mangrove Mt-Peats Ridge-Calga-Hornsby. Perfect weather for a ride.

[coops]

What happened to doing "Glenbrook causeway (both sides)"? Looks like you have some unfinished business...

Sheesh, what an oversight! Please make sure you come along for the ride next time Spiz to make sure we don't make any similar mistakes

[rogan]

A question guys, what was the hardest climb, and where did Bowen Mountain fit in?

[coops]

A question guys, what was the hardest climb, and where did Bowen Mountain fit in?

Don asked me the same question at the end of the ride. I found it really hard to be objective. The standouts were...

Bowen. It was the first climb of the day and I knew there were plenty more ahead. I was getting worried seeing Don disappearing in the distance as I was dying from lack of breath .

Old Bathurst. There's no room on the road shoulder and a fair stream of cars. At the start one of my legs gave a twinge clearly indicating that it'd prefer to be on the sofa in front of the TV . We'd just done the Mitchells Pass descent which seemed to go on for a while and it set up the expectation that the climb was going to continue similarly. Thankfully it was shorter though steeper. It sounded like the cars were struggling getting up that one.

I guess Old Bathurst felt a little steeper than the steepest bit of Bowen, but it's relatively short. On the day it was great having the variety of the different climbs.

That's a great ride guys. I did 2,000m of climbing and 162km on Monday with some friends. Our route was Hornsby-Galston Gorge-Wiseman's Ferry-Mangrove Mt-Peats Ridge-Calga-Hornsby. Perfect weather for a ride.

Sounds interesting. Any garmin/strava of that one?

[leximack]

What happened to doing "Glenbrook causeway (both sides)"? Looks like you have some unfinished business...

Sheesh, what an oversight! Please make sure you come along for the ride next time Spiz to make sure we don't make any similar mistakes

dont worry about him Chris, he's just jealous

[leximack]

A question guys, what was the hardest climb, and where did Bowen Mountain fit in?

my order from toughest to softess (not sure if softess is a word but im sticking with it )

Bowen
Old Bathurst Road (OBR)
Bellbird
hawkesbury lookout
Lapstone

Bowen is hardest as you have about 7km of climbing (gentle grade but still climbing) before you get to the steep stuff. Its would be a tough climb to do at the end of a ride. The last 500m is genuinely steep with out of the saddle grinding at super low cadence

OBR is steep as bowen (probably a bit more possibly) but its fairly short and no climbing before the actual climb itself so you can hit it fairly fresh. Tough as has no shoulder whatsoever and busy with cars. If you need to stop and recover your in trouble. Lots of out of the saddle grinding.

Bellbird is possibly longer than the rest ?? but the gradients are not too bad. You can sit and spin up 95% of it

Hawkesbury lookout is easy and can sit and spin up all of it. No super high grades

Lapstone is a sit and spin also.

There all good climbs in the own way. I prefer these climbs than the gorges as the gorge gradients are too low, i like to get out off the saddle and grind up 20% rather than sit and spin on a 10% climb.

[NotFlyingScot]

i like to get out off the saddle and grind up 20%

Macho Man

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nnjcKr1UR4
I understand this was recorded the last time the boys went down to Jindabyne for some "grinding" Ahem
It's just an ugly rumour that I'm on piano accordian.

[joomz]

Some highlights for me...
- Making it up each climb (eventually). I think we even did all the ones Don wanted to do?
- Seeing Don get dive bombed by a magpie when descending from Kurrajong at about 60kph, then getting hit on the back of the helmet by the same bird.
...

Just did a couple of those climbs myself - they're beauties. Got hit probably by that same grumpy magpie on the way down from Kurrajong. First in the back then in the helmet. First time I've actually been hit by one - I've only ever had warning swoops before. Good thing the road was wet and I was concentrating on not losing it on the descent, so didn't have the headspace to worry about the magpie!

[TimW]

Some highlights for me...
- Making it up each climb (eventually). I think we even did all the ones Don wanted to do?
- Seeing Don get dive bombed by a magpie when descending from Kurrajong at about 60kph, then getting hit on the back of the helmet by the same bird.
...

Just did a couple of those climbs myself - they're beauties. Got hit probably by that same grumpy magpie on the way down from Kurrajong. First in the back then in the helmet. First time I've actually been hit by one - I've only ever had warning swoops before. Good thing the road was wet and I was concentrating on not losing it on the descent, so didn't have the headspace to worry about the magpie!

Strong riding Joomz Top effort. The gorge looks like a little bump lol.Thats a HTFU ride for sure.Tim

[joomz]

Thanks Tim! Those hills do dwarf the gorges. The old legs still felt the last gorge on the way back though