?fun ride?

This week I got an email from Ernie Smith with a series of 6 pix from the World track champs TT..they'll make a great sequence..this is the first one..would you check out the muscles!!! The photography thing at the worlds is a bit weird..ernie wasn't allowed to sell at the venue and whoever the official photographer was hasn't got his pix up on the website. Well I'm sticking with Ernie..he's taken some great shots of me over the years and I'm happy to remain loyal to him.

This weekend sees the end of my foray into days full of empty calorie eating and drinking. It was fun and with both my birthday and a farewell for 3 staff members at work , I had plenty of time and opportunity to indulge. However I quickly became tired and lethargic..reminds me of that bloke (? Michael Moore) and his trial of eating only MacDonalds food, so back to the healthy lifestyle again.

This weekend's rides changed from the plan of Death Valley revisited and MTB Orienteering... to the approach to Death Valley and return on Saturday and a modified tour de rural industries on Sunday.

Saturday's ride was with Lawrence, but after flogging me up ALL the hills on the way there she felt stuffed and wanted to bail. So..since I'm doing these hills for her and not me(!) and since the effects of all the week's empty calories made me feel VERY second hand...we turned. Where upon she flogged me on ALL the hills going back....what a wimp!! 60km. Death Valley is the fine line that runs north from beyond the word "Tarrawarra" to the word "Melba". Its correct name is Long Gully Road.



Sunday's ride morphed from the MTBO out beyond Ballarat (2hr drive) to an MTB ride at Lysterfield (20 min drive) to a road ride with a non existant carbon foot print. The reason I chose to do the tour de rural industries was because yesterday afternoon I was a marshal at a race along part of the route (Killara road..see the top of the map). What a suffer fest..long before the race was over I saw cars with bikes on fleeing home..talk about attrition. I watched grades A through to F struggle over the hill where I was doing my marshalling duty. First time round all the groups (well ok, not F grade) swept up hill then down towards Coldstream airport and the turn around, on their return to complete the first lap they looked just a bit bedraggled but when they returned on their second lap the shattering of the groups was staggering to behold with only A&B grades staying together. eventually all groups shattered except for B grade. As a result I just had to re-ride the circuit to see what the problem was and today's ride made me realise I was doing the ride the easy way... next time, I'll do it in reverse. 80km

Points of interest on the two rides..on Saturday, the dead snake, the poor half dead magpie and the car that hit Lawrence when she was stoppped at a roundabout. Damaged his car but not her bike and he didn't even bother to get out to see what damage he'd done to the car. And on Sunday the lack of cars, the beautiful views and the chocolate coloured earth around Monbulk..the reason why it is such a good rural industry area.

This week I'm gonna try to do a crit on Tuesday and on Thursday I have to frock up for the VicSport award bun fight..last week I spent one entire lunch break posing for a photo for the local rag. ..the spoils of winning! And I'd better get my MTB out since next Sunday I am riding a 25km MTB race..wisely avoided the mistake of chosing the 45km and didn't even think of attempting the 105km...there are just not enough daylight hours!