Winners are grinners!! Brilliant efforts by all of Didos
My apologies to the birthday boys who mixed it up with their senior
competitors with much aplomb.
Munro did indeed have a great final climb - the speed that the boys flew up
Towonga is amazing. Oh to be so young and talented.
Day 2 was another beautiful alpine day - cool but warming fast as the sun
rose. It was a straight run from Bright to Harrietville and then up Hotham.
The pace to Harrietville was livened by a couple of sprint points and made
more exciting in Masters 4/5 by some poor bloke losing his entire bottom
bracket, cranks and all at 40+ km/h - somehow he stayed up and the pack
moved on. With a few riders escaping after the 1st sprint point the pace
settled as everyone’s thoughts move upwards.
Harrietville and the hill arrived and it was everyman (woman) for themselves
- the legs quickly reminded me that we had ridden hard the day before and
that this was going to hurt. The lead group quickly moved off into the
distance and I tried to stay with the second group of 15 or so but simply
could not hold them. Shortly thereafter Banger came past and I began to
wonder whether I would make it up the hill but soon the Meg can and I caught
Banger and started to focus on getting through the first third. A few came
past but a group gathered behind me, including Banger and Linton (Sonia’s
friend) and we made it to the flat as a group of 10. Swapping turns on the
false flat, the pace was high but the legs did not want to hear about it -
It felt like I was dragging a brake. Towards the end of the middle third I
lost contact with my group and dropped into survival mode, with Banger also
losing the group not long after.
Soon it was CRB hill and if I had a speedo it would of had single figures -
ugly, ugly, ugly. The only nice thing was the weather, which by now was
approaching 30 deg and we were beginning to bake. The rest of the climb is
a memory I have blocked out other than to say, that the combined calf and
hammie cramp at 1kmk to go was not pleasant and had me off the bike walking,
as the Womens A grade leaders speed by.
Over the last 10 kms I lost about 8 minutes to Banger, with Ray only 3 mins
behind me- a great ride.
Soon Sonia arrived with a big smile - she had ridden well and posted a time
between Bangers and mine but no sign of Deb’s - she was ahead of Sonia, and
only latter we found out that Deb had won with a sprint to the line, having
had to turn herself inside out to get back onto the wheel of the youngster
who had 15m on her with a couple of kms to go. So Deb’s finished with 2 x
1st and 3rd - we was proud just to share a Harrietville beer with her.
I cant say how the Boydell boys (men!) went as they were going down the hill
by the time I got up there.
www.tourofbright.com.au
Big thanks to Ann-Maree for support car duties on Sunday.
And to Grant (and all organisers) for long days of well run events - this is
really impressive.
Ps: my brake was rubbing which may explain a little of why it felt so bad.
KIWI.
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