Well I finally made it out of Canberra and back to civilisation where I can access a computer. I have had lots and lots of thoughts and scribbled many of them down using old fashioned pen and paper in the time that I have had. I should start by saying that I did have an awesome time out there and enjoyed it much more than I had either anticipated or what follows may indicate.
Some random thoughts to start with because I don't really know where they fit.
1. I really struggled for motivation before this ride. I had put my hand up and paid for airfares a long time ago and that was as committed as I got. Have been really enjoying the riding I have been doing down here with the Audax and Hobart Gravel Grinders crews but I haven't done any training or ramp up in kilometres or anything serious like that. I suspect I really should have shown this race far more respect.
2. My body was really great for the two days I was out there which hasn't always been the case. Looked after my tender bits early instead of waiting to feel the pain. Didn't push myself at all when I was out there. There was no sprinting or racing or pushing harder up the hills. It was real old man cycling where you pick the right gear and the right tempo everytime and ride patiently but with an ever present sense of urgency.
3. I didn't take a sleeping bag or tent. Probably controversial but would consider doing exactly the same thing again for this race. Watch the weather forecast and take calculated risks. I had my bivy bag and an emergency blanket as well as all of my cycling clothing, down vest and beanie. I was certainly warm enough both nights I was out there. I don't know how sustainable such a strategy may be in the long term but it worked for a couple of nights. I did rip the emergency blanket on the second night getting out of my bivvy but I carried electrical tape as part of my emergency bike repair kit which would have fixed that.
4. I was more light weight than anyone which makes a big difference, particularly on this course with the cruel amount of climbing and hike a bike. The bike itself is the only place to sensibly lose more weight. I would love some uber light weight carbon rims and my Rohloff hub weighs much more than a 1x setup.
5. This really is an eating competition and eat early and eat often. You need to take a huge amount of food with you from the start line. There is no where to resupply prior to Nimitabel which I didn't reach until 1PM on day two. That is a lot of food to carry. I avoided sugar and lollies this time and what a revelation. I never had the darkness descend. I did have a bag of dried pineapple which is probably just pure sugar and a good handful of dried figs. Wish I had taken more salad rolls with me as proper food.
Keep going, keep going, keep going. I did want to finish quickly, mainly because I did not want to be out there for 8 or 9 days hurting myself. Better to get it over with in 5 or 6 and get down to dads to recover. Most people were better cyclists than me, particularly on the downhills where I am ultra cautious. Get your tempo right and try not to stop. Just keep moving forward, progress happens. There was lots of hike a bike in this which I was concerned about before hand. Just do it. Accept it and do it. It was more fun than I had anticipated, just know that hike a bike eats everyone's time and not just yours. Maybe the huge amount of hike a bike was why my legs and arse were still feeling so good after two big days. Make sure your cycling shoes and socks are suitable for hike a bike.
My race experience. Fell behind early as I always seem to. The first couple of kilometres Calvin and Patrick set a cracking pace up front and maybe half the field tried to hang on, I was not one of them. I understand why they race like that but I never know if it would be the right thing for me or not. If bikepacking was a boxing match, trying to keep up with these guys in the early kilometres would be like letting the other guy punch you in the head half a dozen times before the opening bell.
I didn't push myself at any stage, maybe I should have. Acutely aware that most of these guys would have more straight line speed but a week is a long time to ride your bike. However you like doing it, maximise your strengths. I was passing everyone for the rest of the day, with the exception of the two Americans who were in a different league.
It did rain for most of the first day and when the rain stopped we were still enveloped in a really thick fog. Others have complained about nothing getting a chance to dry because of the fog but wear good wet weather kit and you are usually a bit wet due to perspiration. Build a bridge people, kind of what happens out there.
There is no where to resupply on day one. If you want to eat it, you have to take it with you. Hot Cross Buns compact really well, are tasty and calorie dense. I did have a can of coke handed to me by the wife of one of the riders out there on course for him. Wish I had a support crew out there to bring me salad rolls but always kind of thought it was contrary to most of the point of this race. The heavily introverted like getting away from everyone and you don't achieve that introspective Zen state if your other half shows up every 100km.
With the rain there was thick gear jamming mud. Glad I had the Rohloff and it's single speed chain line. Carry chain lube and a rag. I didn't have a rag but used my long pants which was probably not the optimal situation. I am not sponsored or anything like that but Pro-link chain lube is excellent for bikepacking purposes with no fuss application.
On one of the crazy steep descents, a rock or stick slammed into my front brake, pushing it out of alignment so that the housing was preventing the rotor from moving freely, causing a mighty racket. In my addled and frustrated state, I couldn't see what the problem was or how to fix it. About 10 minutes later Nijat as the next rider pulled up and had a look and immediately spotted the problem. It took me maybe 15 more minutes to fiddle with things and get things aligned properly.
Then there was some very conservative riding with me not trusting the front brakes. The real consequence of this was with all the mud and grime, I totally used up the rear brakes by the end of the day so only had the front brakes which I didn't really trust on the vicious downhills. I spent about 10 minutes in the good light and clear head space at Numarella tennis courts early on day 2 and sorted both front and rear brakes out properly. Made a huge difference and felt a huge buzz of achievement about having fixed something that went wrong. I probably did it quickly and at the right time. Feel the positives, take your wins.
Did I stop too early on day 1? At the time there is no answer for this. I wanted to reach Numarella on day 1, which really should be achievable if everything goes right. As it was, I was in outright third position and no one passed me overnight as I slept. I would have been happy to ride through the night to reach Numarella but my GPS was playing up and I was lost in a guys paddock unable to find the track I was supposed to be riding on. The path was very indistinct and hard to follow and I kept running into huge swathes of bracken and downed trees completely blocking my path.
It was only 11PM when I pulled up stumps and with daylight savings finishing that evening, I was going to get an extra hour overnight. I was maybe a little frustrated and not thinking straight so very quickly made the call to get some sleep and have a better look in the morning hopefully a bit more rested. I fell asleep really quickly but was woken up about 3AM by noise, there was no wind and heavy fog. I thought it was another rider but was instead just a wombat. Noisy bastard.
I couldn't fall back asleep so packed up my stuff and was moving again by 3.30AM. I was feeling really good and found the path I was supposed to be on reasonably quickly. Once I was cycling again it was a very quick ride into Numarella and wish I had done that on the first night. Reality is that you can't fix that.
In one of the best cycling books that I have read (The Rider), Tim Krabbe writes, "On a bike your consciousness is small, the harder you work, the smaller it gets. Every thought that arises is immediately and utterly true, every unexpected event is something you'd known all along but had only forgotten for a moment." It does get very like that. I know that Tim Krabbe is writing about being limited or propelled by your thoughts and understandings. Did I stop too soon? The truth is in that I did stop in that guys paddock, the rest is in how I adapt and evolve around that situation.
You spend a lot of time with your own thoughts and your own version of the truth out there and that is probably pretty much what I write about. The guys up the front and those way behind experienced a different truth. I suspect big training rides help prepare for this. Learn a bit about your mind and whether to allow a thought pattern to continue to evolve or whether it is time to find that circuit breaker. I do a lot of maths, always very simple, times tables learnt in early primary school by rote instead of understanding.
Also counting in an OCD way in tempo with my cadence. I sometimes get stuck on numbers, Having started at one and reached eighty but skipping back to seventy until I reach eighty again. Back to seventy and through to eighty. Sometimes it is just two numbers, 97-98, 97-98, 97-98, never reaching 99. Then you realise and start obsessing about 99 and it's quirks. 99 symmetry. 99 Luft ballons. Barbara Weldon. You need to find a way to skip past the skip in the vinyl. Reset at 1 or 12 or 142, doesn't matter, it is like breathing again after holding your breath for a short time.
I left Numarella prior to 7AM and was feeling great even though I missed a turn and powered down a big hill that I then needed to ride back up. I had fixed the bike and refilled water bottles and found the tennis club house to make myself a couple of cups of coffee. I knew I was in outright third, making good process and suspected everyone behind me was only just rising from slumber. Numarella is a beautiful little town and I was feeling very appreciative of the tennis club for opening up for us smelly cyclists. Very trusting. They could probably make some money if they stocked the fridge with wagon wheels or mint patties.
Following Tyre Tracks. During the Tour Divide, the tyre tracks weren't always obvious, maybe roads were much better over there, or there was thicker mud due to the rain over here? I was following Calvin and Patricks tyres for the whole of my ride. I was very aware of my own progress and pace but these other tyre tracks told of aggressive downhill lines and mad skills to just make the cornering at speeds I could only dream of and on the steep uphill where I was either grinding away in my lowest gear or valiantly pushing the steed, the preceding tracks told of supreme athletes dancing nimbly on pedals as they floated up hill quickly with very little effort. I started thinking it was important that I made my tracks as obvious as those tormenting me. Time to play some games with the slow fuckers behind me.
I hadn't seen anyone since about lunchtime on day one when Nijat drifted slowly off my back wheel up one of the climbs. I am very happy and it is probably a bit easier to ride like that. Nijat is a great guy and it would have been a pleasure to ride with him but I would have had to converse and that takes mental energy. I only saw a couple of dogs in Numarella, no commerce so there was no body out and about.
Then the pain starts with a very tough ride from Numarella to Nimitabel. About half way up the climb, (I had broken my glasses early on day one and more or less riding blind.) out in the middle of no where on some god forsaken goat track a stunningly attractive athletic goddess in her Gucci/Lorna Jane running kit is out trail running. I pulled off the track to let her pass/strike up a conversation , because I was feeling so pretty myself and she says that she is out trail running with her daughter who is behind her riding a horse. I immediately think of the horse v bicycle thread on the BN forums and make a note to pull over and let the horse pass appropriately. I make some lame joke about not having seen the Easter bunny out there that morning and she laughs and says something about the Easter bunny being evil before we both get moving again.
Heaps and heaps of hike a bike between Numarella and Nimitabel. Took me almost exactly 6 hours to go the 40km. Steve as the organiser had told us to budget for 5-7 hours which is probably about right. If I hadn't had navigation issues I might have knocked half an hour off and a stronger rider could take at least another half an hour off that again.
Really spectacular views and interesting countryside. No fog or rain on day two, just heavy cloud keeping the sun away and temperatures moderate. Just really good riding on tough terrain. Happy to reach Nimitabel and the much talked of Bakery as the first resupply opportunity. Was a fraction disappointed when the girl in the bakery told me that day light savings had finished the night before. Meant that I had slept for an hour longer than I had given myself credit for. I had been thinking, "gee, I only had like 3-4 hours sleep and was feeling great, I can replicate that again at least a couple of times in the race." Suddenly you find out that you may have had 5 hours sleep and you will need at least one night with more hours shut eye than that to keep feeling human.
The sleep and sleep patterns is something that I have spent a lot of time thinking about to help me finish this one faster, a bit about pushing some limits. I think I am learning more all the time on this and didn't feel anywhere near as crappy as I had anticipated. The Audax Oppy was good training for this. It may be that in the past the only time I have had to rely on such silly small amounts of sleep there was probably copious amounts of alcohol involved whereas this time, I was out alone on my bicycle in some amazing country in good weather and riding much better than I had predicted. Why not feel good?
Nimitabel. I probably made some mistakes at the bakery. I wanted to be fast and not get caught wasting time at the resupply points. I ordered a pie, two sausage rolls and a custard tart so there would be no waiting. I should have ordered four or five big salad roils with double cheese. I then got stuck talking to people that I didn't want to. I had course notes to look at but wasn't able to. Then my resupply at the general store was not good enough. I bought a couple of boxes of muesli bars that were way too sweet for my liking and a packet of mint slice biscuits which were awesome but started me in that slippery slope of sugar and chocolate consumption that I had avoided. I didn't need the sweet stuff and suspect that more salad rolls, hot cross buns and a big bag of salt and vinegar chips would have been better.
My push out of Nimitabel was very slow and I stopped and read the course notes once I got away from human contact so I could focus on the moment. It is a bit like getting drunk at this stage of the race. You can focus very well if you choose but only on one thing at a time and not the multitude of things that are required. Still an awesome place to ride.
A couple of river crossings went really well. Don't think about it, just wade right through quickly. You will be across before you realise how cold and wet your feet are. Start riding again. I have wasted a lot of time in the past trying to do this differently, just get across.
In comparison to the rest of the ride, it was actually a fast and fun ride through to Cathcart from Nimitabel. You do go through a National Park on Easter long weekend so I did have to contend with car traffic for the first time in the ride. Most of the drivers were very good and slowed down, gave me plenty of space but I did have one complete fucking idiot happy to drive his Chevvy Ignoramus straight at me at speed. I mean you are on a dirt track in a National Park, enjoy the serenity you fool instead of feeling the need to be so angry at the cyclist you read about in the Daily Telegraph. Just because you haven't been healthy enough to see your own tiny penis let alone sustain the kind of erection that may provide some kind of pleasure no matter how fleeting to yourself let alone a mutually agreeable partner. Hmmmm, maybe I was getting a bit grumpy at this stage myself.
It was a good place to ride none the less. The climbs and descents were less steep and to prevent erosion they have these ski jump mounds at regular intervals all the way. I was thinking that this really plays into my hands as the profile would prevent others from cycling that much faster and more aggressively than me. For once I would be competitive on the road.
As always pride does truly cometh before a fall. Just when you think that you have things under control is when things are most likely to turn pear shaped. I had some problems with the GPS on Saturday turning it back on after it timed itself out when I was lost in the guys paddock late in the night. I suspect that water on the pins at the dyno end is an issue and I should have had electrical tape covering all this to keep the moisture out. This is the second etrex that I have blown up and that gets very expensive very quickly. I have always like my setup, certainly in preference to any others I have seen with the SON28 hub, ewerk regulator, etrex 30 and Exposure Revo light.
Anyway, about half way between Nimitabel and Cathcart I was feeling good, making some progress and planning a much later push into the night to keep resupply options open when my GPS just stopped. Unfortunately the GPS was my only source of navigation and I was well out of mobile range. The panic about being lost was surprisingly quickly replace with acceptance that my ride was over and I can just kind of make my way back to civilisation with plenty of food and warm clothes with me on a busier trail I was never in any real danger.
Unfortunately in my desperate attempts to get things working again, I had changed the batteries in the GPS (no difference) and did not clip the etrex back into the mount properly. I have read negative reviews about the mount and needing to tether the unit as well but I have never had a problem and know that it was an error on my part that I lost my GPS when I hit a bump at speed and it rattled loose. The unit even in it's broken state was worth a significant amount of money to me and I was very down about things when I realised it was missing.
As soon as I got back in mobile range at the top of one of the ridges, I made a phone call to Steve as the race organiser with my tail of woe. I had had an hour or so to ponder things prior to making the call and was pretty reconciled with my situation at this point. Steve did all the right things about getting me to Bombala and seeing if I could come up with a solution but it had been a very expensive trip for me already and I probably would have been putting myself in quite some danger progressing through some of Australia's most rugged countryside without GPS or any previous knowledge or experience of the area.
Cathcart was another really nice looking little town even if it was well after dark when I arrived and everything was closed. Easter Sunday, probably fair enough. A very impressive Art Deco Memorial Hall had public toilets and showers which I would have loved but had no towel. Anyway, that was my race. Looks like there won't be too many finishers. Tough race but well worth the attempt and if you come with the right setup, attitude and levels of fitness, should be achievable.
Post race speculation. All academic really. I know I will speculate in my own little mind but need to keep that to myself. I cannot allow this to be a pattern. It appears I finish any race wondering "what if?" I am guessing that is probably pretty normal for everyone but I am not certain it is healthy or good or not. I know that I have a lot to learn and I continue to make errors, many errors. The guys up front, much younger than me are not making these errors, I know they are still learning as well.
Was it right to come in with such low expectations and levels of motivation? I wasn't trained or prepared properly which made me very uncommitted to finishing. I was so no nervous before the ride that I even had a great nights sleep before hand which never happens. I couldn't get excited or motivated so why go and rac? I enjoy touring and will go and do that again next. Anyone else up for a Helsinki to Moscow ride?
I enjoy the racing because I am out there cycling and my competitive nature pushes you further for longer. I kind of think I could be pretty good at racing in this format if I ever got organised. If I am good at it, what is holding me back? How is this for screwed in the head. I was clearly outright 3rd and like to think pushing on strongly for well over a day prior to losing my GPS. Whilst out there I was pushing hard and did want to ride harder for longer than I had in the past. I was well aware that I was third and that probably scared me a bit never having done that well in the past.
Why be scared of doing well? I was thinking third - podium. You beauty and then third, that is nearly the best place. First is too much pressure and expectation for every and any other time that I jump on the bike. Second is just the guy who didn't win but third is podium. You rode hard, lifted and extended to claim a coveted spot up there with the guys who really know how to ride. Something to be proud of. All of this fits in the speculation basket. I was a DNF.
Get out there and enjoy, really happy to have supported this ride and I hope it succeeds in a very similar format from here on in.
