Morning All,
Wrap up from yesterday’s roll through the gorges for anyone interested….
Woke up to hear the wind whipping around the apartment, and thought i’d better don the arm warmers… The legs still had some lactic acid from the previous gorges roll on Sunday- but figured that’d work itself out on the spin to Bobbo.
Met up with harry and drastic at 6.35. Drastic’s first comment “i thought you had a proper bike!!”. not yet- i’d have to make the ride on the “fake” bike again this morning. A bit itchy to get going we jumped the gun, without Pete K- but after a reminder from Harry (on his flatbar, with mudguards and sand shoes), doubled back to the highway to collect Pete (on the Avanti with shiny new drivetrain), who was really only 15 seconds late. Down to the vets to meet Doc (Alex H) and Schleck. 6.45 came and went- no Fahsl but we had to move on.
Conditions were good for the descent, nice and clear, crisp, but a bit windy. Much better than the fog and mist which blanketed us on Sunday morning. First PR collected for me on the descent, although I was ripped apart by everyone else on the descent. Time for the first “climb”. More like a 10 minute bout of wrestling. I wrangled the bike to the top (taking 19 seconds off my previous best) to then wait for the others. Cadence was hovering around the 50 mark all the way up
Enroute to kalkari- we saw the remains of a bad crash. Someone decided to shave their face on the aspahlt. Ambos and coppers passed by to assist. We’re not sure exactly what happened- crossed wheels- front tyre blowout maybe??? the guy was moving- didnt seem to have any neck/back problems- but had spilled a lot of blood on the road. Not a good way to start the day.
After 5-7 minutes of waiting for Schleck- Drastique and Doc decided to go check everything was okay- as this was quite UnSchleck like. Anyways- no sign of him. A message came up from a passing group to “tell drastique and bambam that Schleck had a mechanical and was limping home”. I phoned in to drastique who still couldn’t locate Schleck, so they came back up bobbo to meet us. It ended up being a 35 minute wait- 8.4 degrees my garmin told me, and with a 30KPH south westerly we were freezing. I didnt really get warm again until the Galston climb. Schleck i think it’s time to get some shimano or Sram gear…
Doc had to turn back at the bobbo west gates for family duties. The galston east descent was good also- another PR. Corners were dry, and dropping in behind Harry and Pete meant i could get some good drafting and not have to pedal too much to keep the speed up.
After getting to top of Galston- drastique floated the idea of a future ride- the 4 gorges of galston (East./West/Crosslands and other side of crosslands). Sounded tempting until Pete K gave notice that Crosslands hits between 20-24% at the bottom. Not much chance of building cadence and momentum- so i may have to wait til i have gears before attempting that one. Drastique then turned back to round out 4 gorges (2 BH West and galston E/W) as he also had to get back to attend to a wife provided list of duties. From what could have been a peloton of 7, we’d been stripped down to 3.
We worked together pretty well over to the ferry, steady climb out of berowra waters, and up onto the highway. The wind never really seemed to push us along. More like swirling gusts which were either across us, or coming straight at us. Pete then took the highway to turra as Harry and I took on the last gorge.
Bumped into Phantom and Collette luckily who had a table and some spare seats at the bakery. The bakery didn’t know what to do with themselves as everything else was closed, there was a line out the door and they just couldn’t take the money or make the coffees quick enough. Acouple of coffee hits and it was time to get home ready for the ANZAC day traditions. Pete K rounded out his trip by taking on BH west again.
Cheers for the ride all who came and went and assisted me to some more PR’s etc.
taking ideas for Sunday- but considering an Akuna West head or maybe gorges again…. who knows
cheers
bambam