Well, the short version is that on Sunday I had an absolute blast. The long version follows. (and be warned, it really a long one!)

Woke up on Sunday morning at 4am. Showered, ate, got bike gear together. Liz and I were in the car driving to the start line by 5:30am. One and a half hours seems like a long time, but in reality it was monumentally fast for Liz (she’s a super sleepyhead in the mornings).

We only had to wait for one ferry at Webbs Creek Crossing and rocked into St Albans at about 7:30am. The weather was good. There was a slight crispness to the air and dragon breath was rampant, but all in all it was great riding weather as I registered and set up the bike.

Bar ends went on. Tyre pressures were checked. And backpack was geared up. As I rode around the 50km day parking area, I was still quite worried about the bottom bracket. It had recently had a self tightening bottom bracket installed, but in the last few days had started clicking with each pedal stroke. Towards the end of my minishakedown, I found the BMU guys so we wandered down to the start line together.

This is the bit I hate, waiting around for the start. It was worse the previous time I did Dirtworks, as that was at 6:30am and was positively freezing. Still though, before I knew it we were underway and cruising down Settlers Road at about 30-35kph.

I kept up that speed on the 8km or so of dirt road, which wasn’t that bad an effort. It basically required me to sprint at well over 100rpm cadence for a few seconds to build up speed, then relax for 10-15 seconds or until my speed dropped too much. It’s tough work, but it’s the only way I know how to go quick on a single speed that’s geared for the hills.

Speaking of hills, the hike a bike section hit and hit hard. Riding the first small section of it probably wasn’t the best idea, but I still did it. Then, for about 15 minutes I walked my bike up a stupendously steep hill. It astounded me at the number of people that were riding it. I’ve always known that the elites would ride it, but those that were riding it near me were doing it at about the same pace as I was walking. Really, there’s got to be something said for walking and using different muscles for a while.

With calves and lungs burning at the top of the hill I climbed straight back on the bike and started pedalling. Last time I did Dirtworks, I was off the bike for a good 5-10 minutes at this point recovering. Much like paying rent is dead money, this way of recovering was dead time. The result was that I must have picked up a handful of places and I recovered while still moving forward.

The next 15 kilometres is honestly a bit of a blur. I know that by the time I’d gotten to the 28km water station that I’d …

• walked up a lot of steep/long hills.
• powered up a lot of short sharp hills, often overtaking several riders.
• realised putting the bar ends on was one of the best moves I made of the day.
• gone downhill over rocky sections waaay too quickly more times than I should have.

At the water station my task was simple, get more water and remove my pesky leg warmers in as short a time as possible. I reckon I did pretty well too. Possibly only a minute or two and I was out of there.

As with the first section, the next section of the race is a blur. The same process followed of walking up hills at about the same speed as people were riding and blitzing the occasional hill and overtaking a bunch of people. I did also get overtaken by a few people every downhill, but most of them I pegged back on the next uphill. It was at about this point that I had the though that I could be setting a good time as I seemed to be overtaking more people than overtook me.

The steep section the organisers gave warnings about at the briefing lived up to their warnings. Initially I wondered if my mechanical bb5 brakes would be up to the task. Later on in the descent I wondered if my fingers and forearms would able to keep braking; such was the force needed to keep the bike at a safe speed.

Once out onto the road, it was a sprint to the finish. I nommed another quarter of my powerbar, put my head down and started pedalling. I drafted as many people as I could and generally sprinted with high cadence for a few seconds before resting for a few seconds. A few times the beginnings of cramping were felt, but easing back and more water managed to suppress them.

My final time? 2 hours 41 minutes and something seconds, way inside my expected time of between 2.5 and 3.5 hours. For my troubles I also picked up a second place in the single speed category. Never mind that there were only three people in the category, I still think it’s quite an achievement.

The bottom bracket held up as well. I only noticed it clicking and creaking a few times over the 50km. I shall have to have a good look at the bottom bracket and decide whether the frame can be saved. We’ve been through a lot together and it’s still the best fitting bike I’ve ever owned, but by the same token I don’t want to ride it in to the ground.

To echo back to the short version of the wrap up, damn I had a fun day on Sunday. Yes it was exhausting, but it was a very enjoyable type of exhaustion.

Tags: 50km, BMU, Dirtworks, giant, Giant Iguana, single speed, singlespeed, St Albans, Wrapup
Categories: bikes, boythings, local | RSS 2.0

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