Retail therapy or how to keep Australia's economy afloat

the above is my new bike as it is sold 

 ...however this is my new bike as I have it set up..there is a drop between seat and bars although it doesn't look as if that's so in this pix:

and the differences are:

•  saddle...I've got  my Specialized Jett for now but to be UCI legal I will have to get a shorter one  Adamo or Fizik.
•  drive train...durace not SRAM Force
•  handle/aero bars
•  head stem
•  wheels

hmmmm so what have I kept?!...only the frame, fork and seat post, with the latter needing a bit of work to make it UCI compliant.

To afford this I sold a wheelset which has made it almost cost neutral, and with a few new things to put on ebay, as well as my old TT frame/forks/seatpost, I should be able to keep on helping Australia stay away from the fate of so many European countries.  Well...I guess when I'm over in Europe between July 13th and September 1st I'll be helping them too.

Liz Randall... philanthropist!

Race schedule Feb-June 2012

February
26th - Cottlesbridge ITT. 24km. Coburg CC

March

4th -   Humevale ITT. 14km. Coburg CC. 1
24th - Winton ITT. 26km. Wangaratta CC.
25th - Masters Crit Champs Castlemaine

April

1st -    Cottlesbridge ITT. 24km. Coburg CC.
6-8th - Maryborough RR, 300m sprint,TT and crit
28th -  Warby Range ITT. 18km. Wangaratta CC.

May

6th -   Warburton/Donna Buang ITT
13th - Hume Vets ITT
26th - Boweya Rd ITT. 40km. Wangaratta CC.

June

9-11th Hume vets, RR,RR,TT,RR
16th -  Cloverlea ITT. Warragul CC.
23rd - Cloverlea ITT. Warragul CC.
30th -  Paraparap ITT. 20-28km?. CV/Geelong CC.

this is not set in concrete since many clubs are still to post their winter schedule, so there will probably some additions and some omissions...whatever, it should keep me out of mischief!

Still alive!

and Sunday's race wasn't too awful although hills are something I will 110% have to get into and vigorously too!

The decision to go with the road bike (1.5kg lighter than the TT bike) was, for me, the right thing to do as every time the road tilted upwards I was passed by the guys who started after me, although I was then able to claw back some time once the road levelled off again.

I would have liked 2 things to have been available..a toilet closer than 5km away and a coffee van in attendance afterwards!..that aside, a very good, honest, tough TT course.

And today I am testing a loaner Trek 7.8 TT bike since my current TT bike is getting a bit old.

Generally speaking this blog is more of a diary but today I'm incensed enough to go political.

UCI and it's affiliates rant..my own opinion

While searching for lightweight accessories for all my bikes I hit on Walser bikes and especially their  TT bars,  bar 2 of which weighs in at 1/2 the weight of my current Teschner track TT bar. So a rapid fire email is sent off and the reply sets my hackels rising since the UCI (insert irritable sigh here) are now legislating on the size of TT bar elbow pads and so "bar 2" is now illegal for UCI races. FFS.  grinds teeth

Then I read that Jan Ullrich who has been out of the racing scene for years has now been banned for 2 years and this includes Gran Fondos...again...FFS.  So years after the time he "sinned" he is being punished yet again despite the fact that Alberto Contador's 2 year ban is applied retrospectively and he will only sit out of racing for 8 months.  I guess one can argue  an amount of clenbuterol so tiny it's laughable against an acknowledged long period of doping but...Ullrich's doping was done when it was the "norm" whereas Contador's was not.....   I'm sure I read somewhere that if you took Ullrich's  tour win away from him you'd have to go as low as 10th to find someone who has not been convicted of doping......

Sunday's TT

 how benign does this ride look!...so how come after yesterday's recce I'm totally stuffed? and how come so much of it shows up as being flattish when I distinctly recall something very different!!??

Too much training at the velodrome perhaps?? got soft.

The result of the recce is that the TT bike is staying at home and out comes the lightweight Baum steed.

If I'm still alive you'll get a race report.  no report =I'm no longer upright!

January...a lost month

Vague health issues have blighted my January and training went down the tubes.
I'm okay now and yesterday raced the Victorian Master Track Champs...500m TT only.

I did 44.052sec which is somewhat better than at the worlds where I rode 44.716secs and is agonisingly close to the World Record of 43.838secs ie .2 second.

A while back I'd planned to go to the Nats in Sydney but last week I decided not to and am sticking to that plan despite the closeness of that result.   I'm now in road mode.

I'd like to thank CA for creating a rule to allow older age group riders to keep on being competitive.  For the timed events we race to a standard...yesterday to get to gold standard I had to be faster than 47 seconds. 

Shirley Amy and I are singleton racers in WMAS 7 and 8 respectively and yesterday we both earned our gold medals.  Standing on the podium with her is always a priviledge and together we represent 12 rainbow jerseys and 4 current world records!!!

Today's recovery ride was up the 1 in 20.  Yesterday I sold my Mavic Comete and IO wheels so now I'm off for some retail therapy...a compact camera, a torque wrench and torx bolts followed by  a new TT bike.  Woo Hoo!

Another longish gap

The weather in Melbourne , when it decides to move up into the high 30's low 40's with the accompanying high humidity that this part of Aus serves up leaves me  in moribund state.

Can't do anything, can't eat can't think  can't can't can't.  It's the humidity not the heat.  So my Rapha 500 came to a grinding halt after a New Year's day ride when the heat and humidity soared upwards.  Sad.  It takes me a coupla days to get over it, so even when the cool change sweeps in and we're all rugged up again, I take a while to get back into gear. 

As I said to my colleagues at work (ahhh! air conditioned comfort there), I might have broadened my accent, installed many Aussie expressions into my vocab and Aussie attitudes into my way of thinking, but my body is still 100% Pommie when it comes to hot weather.

Anyhow, my thoughts have now turned to the Masters track State and National titles which are looming very close on the horizon.

Sale notice...I'm going to sell my track Mavic Disc and Io wheels and also my Zipp road/track disc, so if anyone reading this is interested...contact me

Check this out.. nativity...2012

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkHNNPM7pJA&feature=youtube_gdata_player