It was a huge sigh of relief when I arrived at the finishing line of the 210km Around The Bay Ride in a Day Ride on Sun. There were a few occassions where I do feel like hitching a ride back. The road seems never ending after the ferry ride to Queenscliff. Maybe it's mainly due to the long stretch of road with nothing much to see, other than flat green lands. The only thing that really kept me going was the thought of embarrassment if I register a DNF in the event. So I kept pedalling, no matter how weak my legs felt. It was lucky that riders caught a tailwind heading back from Queenscliff.
Maybe I was just too tired from a 84km ride a day before with my cousins and our very own national track cyclist, Josiah Ng. It meant to be an easy ride but probably my definition of easy was different from my cuzs' dictionary. I went down the apartment @ 8am, to wait for Den and Andrew. Josiah stays the same apartment as I am, so we met up just before my cuzs arrived. Josiah just got back from racing in Japan. It was an honour to go out on a ride with one of the world's best track cyclist. We head out to Beach road, out to Franskton, which is about 40km away. As usual, there were plenty of riders out on the road, hundreds, or maybe thousands of them.
There is one occassion where a lady cyclisy came passed us, and shouted, "Oh! I love you Josiah! I watch your track rides all the time" - I think she said something like that, but I didnt get the first part wrong. How did she know that it wass Josiah from behind? Well, his butt says it all. He got his name printed on his tight pants. Haha. Me riding with a celebrity, how cool is that.
We reached Frankston and had our food/drinks near Bayside Shopping Centre, before heading back to the city. Speed was constantly above 30km/h. And the thing I hate is when there's a slight slope or them pushing the pace harder. It was so hard for me to catch up. Near the end, they put up a little sprinting finish and I just watch them sped off like the wind, kissing their butts goodbye! Come on, look at their thighs man. Josiah's thighs probably twice my size...that's where all those power come from. : ))
Riding on Beach Road, you bound to tag along with other groups
Reaching Frankston
Having our little break in Frankston
After reaching home, had a quick shower and rested for a while before riding to Den's place. I will be staying there for the night before the ATBIAD event. We went out to watch the penultimate stage of The Jayco Herald Sun Tour. It's held just a walk away from Den's place. Bradley Wiggins won the yellow jersey in the end. After the race, a lot of the teams were selling off their bikes, accessories, apparels, etc @ a good deal. There's always temptation to change to a new bike, after watching an event like this, but being an amateur, maybe not. Not going to make any difference even if I had a good bike. I'll still be slow! LOL!
For more photos of Jayco Herald Sun Tour, please click on this link.
Riders taking the corner at full speed
Garmin Slipstream Team leading out
Bradley Wiggins off his saddle
The next morning, I woke up early at 5am to get ready. But my cuzs, who had a late night attending a birthday party, had a hard time waking up. The alarm must have went off for a long time but still they were not up yet. So I had to wake them up myself.
We rode out around 6am from the apartment, knowingly that we will be missing the start. Getting out from the apartment, I can already feel the chill. Temperature was below 10C. I think I am underdressed. We reached Alexandre Avenue start line soon after. Only a few riders who were late too were there. So we went off to chase the other group, it wasn't long before we caught up with a big bunch of riders at the back. I guess the fast ones were already way ahead. I wasn't too worried, as long as we have groups to ride with, it should be alright. Just too bad I couldn't take any photos of the start to post here. But catching up with tail end of the group, the numbers are still massive.
Starting our ride @ Alexandre Ave
The wait - Traffic light
Most part of the ride towards Sorrento were in a moderate pace, averaging around 30-35km/h. Den can't seem to hold back his speed as he was out in the front most of the time. We stopped for a while @ 25km before riding on to Sorrento. We also passed Frankston again. Just after Frankston main town, there was this steep hill climb, called Oliver's Hill. Man, that hill really took my lungs away. And we still have about 165km to go!! It offers a breathtaking view but I didn't stop at that point and pedalled on. You can see some photos from this link.
Climbing on the dreaded hill!
After passing Frankston, we went thru the hilly Mornington. Along the way, I lost contact with Den and Andrew when we were going up one of the hills with a group of riders. I was boxed in, and was a little too weak to catch up with them. Anyway, Sorrento wasn't too far away, so I rode at my own pace. Legs starting to feel like jelly already then. Sorrento is exactly 100km from where we started. Thousands of riders were there, either waiting for ferry or resting or some are getting ready to ride back to the city thru the way we came from. Some are doing their rides from the opposite direction.
The wait and the queue for the ferry was a long one. During the time, we were handed our lunch pack which includes chicken sandwich, a cake, banana, energy bar and gel. Also given a bottle of water. I was glad that we managed to get through the cut-off point for the next ferry, otherwise may have to wait for the next ferry. The big ferry can fit in 300 odd riders. My body was already shivering when we stopped at Sorrento. Temperature averages 10-12C on the day and with the wind, I was freezing!
We board the ferry and parked our bikes inside the ferry before walking up to the cabin/lounge. It felt so good to be inside the warm cabin. The ferry took about 40-45 mins to reach Queenscliff where we will continue our ride back to the city. At Queensclilff, there were thousands waiting to board the ferry to Sorrento.
The queue for lunch and ferry @ Sorrento
Andrew and Dennison
Andrew & Me
Boarding ferry
Inside ferry & parking bikes
The stretch along the highway after Geelong suburb heading towards the city was a long and boring one. As there were many rest stops along the way, group gets broken up. I tried to stay with my cuzs with a bunch of other riders but my legs just gave up. I told Andrew to go ahead without me, as I can't keep up with the pace. I was on my own. There were a lot of groups riding pass but I just couldn't find the energy to follow. I couldn't really find ones which I can follow, so I just told myself to pedal on at my own pace. This is the time when I felt like giving up but one thing that surprised me was the speed I was going. Although I can feel that I was not pedalling hard, but I was going like 33-38km/h. I must be catching a tailwind, I thought. So I just pedal as hard as I could while the tailwind lasted. I saw a sign saying we had only 35km to go, but on my meter, I thought I only had 25km to go (we found out in the end that the distance was a little further than 210km).
I caught up with Den and Andrew at one of the rest stops and soon we were riding together again. Since this was the home stretch, I just stayed with the bunch of riders for as long as I could. Soon, we could see buildings in the city. I was pretty excited about it, as there is no way I will be giving up at this stage now. Then came a detour out from the highway, into the smaller streets, but we end up back into the highway, as someone must have taken out the route sign. Idiots! We didn't know where to go, so someone suggested to head back out on the highway. There were about 10-15 of us inthe group. Boy, was that a bold move. It's one of the busiest highway in Melbourne and crossing the highway with an exit was extremely dangerous. But I'm glad everyone got through it fine, and soon, we were back on the right track. Later we found out there were others who lost their way too but rode even further than the course.
As the city buildings drew nearer, ahead lies the West Gate Bridge. This is the only time where cyclists get to ride on the bridge. Two lanes are closed for this event, but to get across, you will first need to make one long climb up the bridge before the descend.
The long climb up West Gate Bridge
How relief it was to see familiar buildings and also the sight of Alexandre Gardens (Finishing). Me and my cuzs came in together, and we were just slightly under 11 hours on the clock. Our riding time was about 7 hours 36 mins with a distance of 217km. I've actually done 300km in 2 days. That is almost the triple the mileage that I did for the past 10 months or a year!
Andrew - The Future King of Sprint, Mark Cavendish?
Dennison - The future King of the Hill, Alberto Contador
Me - ?????!!
Participants resting and chatting
Andrew, Dennison and Me
For more photos of Around the Bay in a Day, please click on this link. Here are some videos from the event:
The finishing area
The riders across the road heading back to the city
At Sorrento
West Gate Bridge
Glad that this over. For 2 successive weekends my body has been two punishing events (it is for me), I think I better take a rest for a while before resuming workouts. I really have great respect for the tour riders or those who have done Ironman. Tours like Tour De France, riders go thru an average of probably 180km each day (20-21 stages I think) and also through the mountains, with minimal rest days. Ironmans, well, they do a 3.8km swim, 180km ride followed by a 42.195km run. All in a day!
Insane but amazing! But I'm pretty happy that I've done both the events and successfully completed both in a respectable time. Will I do it again? Who knows? I'll definitely do another marathon, as I want to improve my timing. The longer rides, if there's a a good group or an event, why not?
