Animals and today's MTB ride

Todays' ride took us along single tracks  we wont attempt again firstly because they were too hard for us and  we were off the bike more than we were on but more importantly for me because  there were

...yeetch.....shudder...leeches.

I had a mega girlie moment when I discovered a whole heap on my leg but, after being scoffed at by my riding "friend", carried on..albeit rather reluctantly.

I *had* been keeping an eye open for :

of any variety or colour, but hadn't even considered leeches.

We're off on another jaunt on Sunday....the last mega jaunt before my real training for TTing starts...all subsequent rides will have to come under the heading of "recovery" rides...

Rollers, MTB, track

In reverse order

Track:
 2013 is a bit of a transition year for me.. it's the last year I'm in my current age group of 65-69 and since there is a paucity of people competing in this age group,  my competitive spirit has to be assuaged by going for records (state/national/world) in the timed events...pursuit and time trial.  Lyn Miller has put the Time Trial world record waaaay out of my reach (brilliant ride Lyn) and I currently hold the  pursuit world record (although the time is not one I'm particularly proud of). Consequently  I have made the decision to hang up my track bike for a year and concentrate on road time trials, which is the road discipline I'm best at and also where there are more ladies my age still racing. 


MTB:

Is mega fun and for me is also a great way for retrieving  power/strength; it's also where I began my cycling life. I was never much good technically,  but now that I'm riding a 29er some of the issues I had on the older type of bike have magically disappeared...some haven't...!

Rollers:

I've had rollers somewhere in the house for a long time, but always tended to avoid them.  'cos I wasn't comfortable using them ...scared actually.  They're too big for me  both in height and length.  Firstly the drum size is big ..this makes it difficult for me to get on and  makes falling off more scarey.  They also are made for a taller person..ie when my bike is on the shortest setting the bike's front wheel hub is too far behind the front roller making the whole set up more unstable than I like. 

I've been on the look out for a set that would work with my shorter wheelbase bike and finally I found a second hand 1 on ebay. I failed to win it at $152.40 (!) but while researching the brand found the exact same brand was on sale in Melbourne for either $199 or $150 and so I am now the proud possessor of one bought new at $150...yay!   

I've been practising every day.... building up my skill level...however I don't think I wobble quite as much as my Garmin would have you believe!

 and finally, for no particular reason...

MTB in the Dandenongs

A cruisy 1 hour ride in the hills near to home

 which  netted me 1 animal sighting......

Mr Reynard

yet another animal imported in Australia by unthinking  European migrants and which has since thrived and  damaged our native wildlife population

http://www.landmanager.org.au/managing-pest-animals-wildlife-conservation-european-red-fox-vulpes-vulpes

and 1 Crimson Rosella

I'm sure there were more......!

Animals

Seen on last Saturday's MTB ride in the bush near St Andrews

 Seen on last Sunday's MTB ride  in the bush near Castlemaine (mini mob of 3)

Seen on Friday's road ride along the suburban  Eastlink bike path

hmm think I prefer  MTB animals!

Apple from the Apple Isle

Apple

from the Apple  Isle

= a broken tooth in an already well filled premolar with 1 cusp sheared off and another cusp sporting an undisplaced fracture (not sure what dentists call that).

= mega financial pain at an unfortunate time of the year.  The first ramifications being a rapid accommodation downgrade for my 2 MTB orienteering races in Beechworth after Xmas from motel to unpowered camp site and the temporary cancellation of private Italian lessons.

I try to pretend I'm not just a year or so away from being in my 70's, I don't feel as though that is so but parts of my body  keep reminding me.

Still hanging in there

Pursuit and hour record

http://www.cyclingmasters.com/records

Tassie pix

Peacock and peahen at Cataract Gorge, Launceston.  Peahen not impressed...more interested in food!!

Road  side whatevers on the road somewhere on the scenic route between Devenport and Launceston.  There was more....much more(!)

Is this what they mean by "Money laundering"?..a $10 note surfaced a bit later..and of course they were mine.....

Recycling is tops..first of all ..... and count them..7 shipping containers...what else can you see...?

and finally the reason we were in Tassie......

Alex waiting for the rest of the Road Race guys to arrive.  He ended up 4th and the big guy next to him????....possibly/probably shelled on the first major uphill attack.

The Crit..30 mins + 2 laps

So what happened was that there were 6 of us of which I think 2 had never ridden a crit before, so it was decided we would start off easy, however after 2 laps of parading round at a pace I normally train at, I decided to crank the speed up and so came from behind at a decent pace (? was that an attack??? it wasn't really meant to be) down the long side of the oblong course and with the wind behind me.

 No-one followed me, I hesitated, looked behind and then kept going.  The next lap I checked again and finally realised I was on my own.  By then I was too far ahead to sit up and let them catch up so the only option left to me was to keep going.  So I did.

I lapped 1 of our group and 1 of the group that started 10 mins before us and won solo a good 1/2 to 3/4 lap in front of the rest of my group.  My laps were not totally equal in time, but they are fairly close.

I had a great work out and am now well and truly stuffed.

Waiting for the presentations was a bit nerve wracking as we had to get back to our house, pack the car and get to Devenport for the ferry home to Melbourne, so I ended up asking them to get on with it!

Back home now doing the washing, reading the mail and being adored by the cats!

AVCC championships in Tasmania

Sorry no pix..forgot to bring the card/computer interface..they'll go up when I get home.

Friday's weather for the TT was ..to put it mildly...... blusterous.  Not a steady wind..front, side or more rarely rear...nope...today's icy blast was  variable,here one minute, not the next.  Added to that, the course changed direction frequently and the hedge/tree cover at the sides of the road was there/not there/there. The weather therefore was definitely an added challenge to the course and the dead road sections.  I was happy with my ~45 minutes, winning my age grade, Alex got 2nd in his grade with ~37 and Lorraine scooped the pool with ~41 ...the fastest female.

 Yesterday was road race day and my group was last off.  Sadly Alex's group was second off so we had a longish wait between the 2 races.  Both Alex and I were 4th over the line and I won my age grade...I  have to try and remember to stand up to sprint(!)...too much time trialling!! Lorraine had decided not to race the RR.  Alex had a great race and was delighted that there was alot of attacking.

 Our race was...well....different...Grouping all 50+ riders together will always throw up surprises since there is the need for various riders to get rid of their age grade competition before thinking about being first across the line. Today there seemed to be times when there was more social chatting going on than attacking  however..I put in 2 attacks , 1 significant in that it spat my competition out the back  and the second in that it at least animated the race a bit. Some one else put in another but that was about it........weird.I was 4th across the line in the company of of 3 50 year olds. We were on TV.must have been a slow news day. Crit today..more on that when I've ridden it!

TT practice

Bright and early today and 3 of us were at the TT course ,Bishopsbourne near  Longford.

feels like a good course with the middle 8km, ie last 4 km out and first 4 km in being the tester...lumpy,a dead road and today a bit of a head wind when you least want it.  I did 2 laps ie 50 km which is about 25km more than I normally spend on the TT bike and by the finish my back was complaining bitterly.



Food was definitely next on the list so we went into Launceston CBD, ate and followed this up by inspecting all bikes shops in the area.

Then to Cataract gorge where the stars of the show were 6 peacocks and 3 peahens.....the one (peacock..natch) vainly trying to impress the other (peahen) who was blithely ignoring all fanned out tail displays complete with feather rattling, preferring to eat!...most amusing.Or it was until one peacock wanted my icecream.......

Tasmania for a week

the car was (over)loaded with 4 bikes, 11 wheels, 2 ergos, 1 track pump...and a partridge in a pear tree.....! ie food and clothing
Needless to say with that  much of a load we travelled across the ditch on the night ferry.  Both Alex and I were in 4 bunk cabins..his 3 companions were noisy, my 2 were totally silent.

Arriving in Devenport at 0630, we had time to spare since arrival time for our house was not til 1400.

What to do?  First of all...brekky.  Experience has led me to avoid all caffs close to ferry crossings, so we went into Devenport and using the tablet app and a council worker talking rather loudly outside our car, we went to The Laneway cafe.  Gold dust...100% fantastic.see trip advisor.....

Then we did a bit of a  round trip to Launceston via .....not quite sure where we went actually but we did manage to visit our TT course to do a prelminary recce.  Looks to be a good course mostly flat with just  a couple of lumpy sections.

And finally we got to our accommodation...www.braemere.com.au   a house I've stayed at before when the  Aus masters track champs were here......great place and well recommended.

MTB

I loved last weekend's MTB  so much I upgraded the 15 year old bike to a Specialized Fate 29er...got a good price on a 2012 model.

the bigger wheels smooth a out the trails more than the 26" wheels...thereby helping to make experts of us all.

Alex is enthusiastically suggesting upgrades..I'm happy to let it and I settle in together....the possie is a bit upright when comparing it to my road and track bikes, but I'm not complaining!