My winter of contentment.

Before IM Cairns I sat down and mapped out the rest of 2012. My thoughts at the time were finish IM Cairns then stop swimming & running straight away, but continue on with cycling. I had originally planned to do the Northern Combine 3 day tour the week after Cairns (Queens b’day long weekend) but this was knocked on the head as my sister had a baby girl not long before Cairns so the long weekend was probably the only time I’d get to see my new niece for a while. Active recovery was the key word for July, I continued on with base bike miles with the longest ride being 100km’s. The events I had mapped out over the winter period were ‘A’ races – Melbourne to Ballarat, Alf Kimpton memorial at Broadford, Pop Stewart Memorial at Balliang & Brunswick club champs (Masters). Followed by ‘B’ races – Northern Combine ITT champs at Balliang, Vic club TTT champs & Sunbury Trophy race at Pastoria. All these were part of my macro/micro training cycle for my big A+ event, The Melbourne to Warrnambool to be held on Sat. October 13th.

I’ll go through my winters races below and give a brief description how each panned out.

• Northern Combine ITT Champs: 23 June, at Balliang circuit which is just outside Bacchus Marsh, I lined up in Masters 1/2/3 which is basically from 30 to 45 year old age groups, these are measured in the same year increments as Triathlon. It was a sunny but cool & windy day just 3 weeks after Ironman Cairns. The distance was 24km’s (I think) so it was on the rivet the whole way. My time of 34mins 23secs ave speed 41.9km/h was enough to secure 1st spot in Masters 1/2/3.

• Alf Kimpton Memorial Handicap – Broadford : 7 July. I love this race, I have placed 2nd in it previously & with no road racing in my legs for this season saddled up for this years edition off a generous mark of 15 minutes. The race is a 3 lapper which has some solid little climbs, quite luckily I was in a very good group who were quite organised, our task was made easier with the majority of riders in my group all doing their fair share of work. We worked hard to pull in the later groups but on the final lap the 12 & 9 min groups caught us so the group had swelled to approx. 50 riders. The last 10km’s is quite hilly, my legs felt good so I tried a few quick bursts to join in on a few attacks, knowing the pack wouldn’t let us get too far away. Then with 3 km to go I launched a solo effort which no one matched, I didn’t know how many were in front of me so it was just a matter of making sure I didn’t get caught. 2km’s out I passed 2 riders, in the last 300m before the hilltop finish I passed the rider sitting in 4th spot. This is where I finished out of a field of 120ish so I was quite happy about it. BUT, I finished & felt REAL GOOD, on hindsight I should’ve attacked 2 km’s earlier as I reckon the time difference between me & the winner was achievable given how good my legs felt. Oh well, that’s road racing - you live & learn.

• Brunswick Club Champs: 14 July, Another cold and wet day just outside Lancefield on a multi loop circuit where I again raced Masters 1/2/3. A small field assembled for the prestige of being called BCC Champion ’12. The race started well with all riders rolling evenly until we caught the Elite fellas who had stopped for an organised ‘nature break’. We rolled with them for a couple of laps then just before the biggest hill on the course on the last lap with approx. 20km’s to go we started to race. The elite fellas hit the hill REAL, & I mean real hard. I tried to follow but just missed their wheel and tagged on for 5km’s an agonising 50m behind through some seriously undulating terrain. The turn of pace was enough to drop all the Masters 1/2/3 dudes so it was solo time to the end. I ended up winning comfortably with a massive hail storm hitting me which was hard as I had nobody around me to whinge to about it ! Still it was an honour to be called the BCC Masters 1/2/3 RR Champ for ’12.

With Elite BCC club champ Luca Giacomin

• Melbourne to Ballarat: 21 July, This race starts at Rockbank & goes straight up the Western Hwy finishing at Lake Wendouree. It's another handicap race & jeez I love doing these ! I snuck under the radar of the handicapper and saddled up in the 24 minute group. Markers were off 33mins and scratch featured the likes of NRS Pro teams such as Drapac, Genesys, Budget Forklifts etc. My group was super keen until we got to the Pentland Hills just past Bacchus Marsh where the majority of my group of 30 odd riders developed a dislike for doing any work up hill. It was up to 6 of us to do the most of the work with an occasional hanger onner doing the obligatory 1 turn up the front every 5 mins..... SOFT, and not helping us A) win & B) keep away from scratch or later starting groups. We were slowly making up time until around the Gordon turnoff where myself & the half dozen fellas up the front were starting to tire a bit from all the work. A few of the 21 min. group caught us which was great news as it breathed new life into the pack. An even bigger bonus was all round good guy, fellow Rapido rider & solid athlete Brendan O’Loughlin had bridged across and I now had a partner in crime. There was still only 6 to 8 of us doing the hard yards up the front with the rest wheel sucking wheels or ‘hanging on for dear life’. Brendan & I orchestrated an attack with 10km’s to go with 1 other fella which lasted all of 3 km’s as the lazy sods in the pack had decided to work & not let us get away. The frustrating part was we put our effort to bed & retired to the pack, only for them to stop riding again............ The rest was trying to get to the finish line as quickly as possible until about 800m from the finish the Genesys boys flew past us like a V/Line train. It was pretty impressive, there was no chance for the win so they were riding for the fastest time on the day. It turned real messy from here on with a couple of nasty little 90 degree turns and a short sprint to the line which saw the possibility of a top 15 finish fizzle out to 39th out of 260 odd riders thanks to the Scratch riders mentioned above catching us. This is one of the things that frustrates me about road racing – short sightedness by your peers and the lack / willingness to put your balls on the line to ‘race’ to the line for a huge possibility of a win or place. As I said above.... Live & learn

The workers in the 23 minute pack - Melb to Ballarat

Inflicting pain with Brendan O'Loughlin, trying to break away.

• Victorian Club TTT Champs: 22 July, This one is a pretty tuff gig. This year was no different as one of our team members called in sick, so all team plans went out the window and it was a matter of looking after each other as the time for the team is taken by the 3rd out of 4 riders to cross the line. If you have a strong team, generally you’ll all finish together, if not the team will sacrifice your weaker rider at ½ to ¾ distance and roll over the finish with 3 riders. I’m unsure of our time, the TT course which starts at Buninyong is a very tough course and not conducive to fast times – Bummer !!

• Pop Stewart Memorial H’cap – Balliang: 18 Aug, I had a small spell so that I could start punching out some miles for the Warnie, after that it was back into an intensity block so what better way to do it than another handicap ! I saddled up in the 7min group which had several strong riders, notably Brunswick boys Rich McCorkell, Steve Duggan, Jarrod Peck & the eventual winner Nick ‘Spiro’ Edwards. Outside of the Brunswick CC road champs, this is the race the BCC boys most want. It was tough from the start with flooding on the roads, heavy intermittent rain, 3km’s of potholed gravel, a brute of a southerly wind and some gnarly hills. Steve Duggan was quite easily the ‘alpha rider’ in the pack, controlling things & upping the tempo to shell out the weaker riders when they looked like they may hang on for a shot at our glory. Unfortunately he punctured on the 2nd last lap which left the above BCC boys, a St. Kilda CC rider and myself. The last lap was difficult as we caught the markers in the crosswind and had to work real hard to ditch them. The rest of the lap was spent going hard so scratch wouldn’t catch us, at one stage they were only 45 seconds behind. We worked hard to keep them away and once things looked good, the tactics started. I stopped doing turns for a minute with about 4 km’s to go. We were on the dirt road so rolling was quite difficult and once off the dirt it was about 2 km’s to go. I sized Nick up as the probably the strongest looking sprinter in the pack so was very weary of what he was doing. Unfortunately Jarrod rolled around me and had a slow gear change which Nick heard and bolted. He started his sprint with 800m to go, by the time I slowed because of Jarrods mishap then accelerated around into 2nd spot Nick was already 100m up the road. Try as I might I couldn’t reel him in, 2nd it was for me. Fortune favours the brave – Well done Nick !

Racing - Northern Combine style ! Pop Stewart H'cap - on the front

2nd place - Pop Stewart Handicap

• Sunbury Trophy race, Pastoria loop, Kyneton: 8 Sept, A pretty good field assembled up near Kyneton for the Sunbury Trophy race, a 3 lapper on some undulating, typically slow roads with a touch of wind thrown in – very Northern Combine !! The race started with an instantaneous attack by a few fellas, then ½ a lap later a solo rider took off to bridge across. One of the original attackers was caught at the start of lap 2 but there were still 2 riders up the road. We caught another of the attackers 10 minutes later which meant only 1 up the road. Nobody was doing much work, so I took it upon myself to close the gap down. Richard McCorkell must’ve had the same idea as he came thundering past me and it pretty much lit up the B grade peleton. There were a few dummy ‘attacks’ by some weaker riders who had sat back for the majority of the race, these didn’t last long as they couldn’t sustain the pace. We caught the last break away rider with about 10km's to go, he was still trying hard but looked spent, gutsy...... On the preceding laps I worked out where I wanted to attack and throw it on the line for the race win. About 3 km’s out there is a pretty solid hill, it would’ve been pretty predictable to attack at the foot of that hill. 300m before the hill was a good downhill section where I noticed on the first 2 laps riders were relaxing a bit before the 1.5km climb. So it was on this downhill section before the hill where I launched a big attack which caught all but one of the pack napping. I hit the foot of the hill doing 52km/h and carried the speed up until half way up it when things started to burn a bit. I jumped out of my seat to keep my pace up then sat down. David Ransom (StKCC)was the rider who wasn’t napping and he had bridged across. He passed me easily, even giving me a push and telling me to keep up as he passed me. He kept his momentum up all the way to the top where he was about 50m in front. At the crest I looked back and it was safe to say the pack wasn’t going to catch me. It was about 1.5km to go to the finish, a 500m downhill run then a 1km flat. David was still 50m in front of me when we hit the flat but I started to reel him in. I caught him with 400m to go and went straight past him. I was praying that he wasn’t foxing and then latch onto my wheel, but his body language suggested he was spent. I rolled through real hard and a few hundred metres later I crossed the line in 1st place. There was no time for a salute, a ‘Call me maybe’ telephone handpiece with my fingers a la GreenEdge & a lot of other Combine ridersor even a Luca Giacomin piece of brilliance. It was just steamroll all the way to the finish. I was the strongest & this is how I roll – all the way to the line, flat out.

Powering to the line for a B Grade win at the Sunbury Trophy race

• All the above races were of course all part of the BIG PICTURE – The Melbourne to Warrnambool. Many thanks to Rapido Cycles for maintaining and helping out with the bike – a great bunch of blokes, XOSize for equipment and nutritional help, Rudy Project – the best glasses to sit on your face & very comfortable and stylish helmets as well, and also for John Quinn - He got me here.
Also very special thanks to Jo Upton Photography, a very loyal and handy photographer who catches great images of us racing in the Northern Combine.