Castlemaine To Daylesford

My last post was a me whining about my knee and I didn't mention the awsome ride that would have been Castlemaine to Daylesford. My riding buddy and I left my place at about 7:30 and headed north to Castlemaine. We got there at about 8:45, used the public connivances, got suited up for the ride and headed off towards Daylesford, using the directions in "Off Road Cycling Adventures. It didn't take us too long to make our first wrong turn, but not to worry we were soon back on track.

After a bit of riding we got onto some single track, and it was good single track at that, nice and flowing and up and down hills. After a little bit of this the track went along side a water race, so there was about 1m of track, water race on one side and a steep drop off on the other. This was made even more challenging by the small shrubs that you could ride through, be you couldn't see the ground, lost of fun.

After about 30 minutes of this we then came across a sealed road, which we were on for all of 100m, then back up some rocky fire trail, which soon enough turned into single track. It was about this time that we came close to the Dingo farm. It must have been feeding time because there was a lot of howling coming from that direction. We took a moment to take in the sound then pressed on.

In this section of the ride was where we came across some ruins, it was kinda funny to think people lived way out in the middle of no where so long ago, but at the same time we came across these ruins we could hear mining machinery working. This contrasted the old and the new.

After a bit more pedaling we came across a small town, went through this and I think we started going along the Telecom track. This is fun flowy track with a few gotchas to watch out for. The most notable was a drop off with a tree at handle bar height right at the bottom, which luckily I saw in time. My buddy called me a whimp for walking down, but after he spotted the tree and after a challenge from me he soon backed down.

Then next thing of note was Vaughn Springs, this was where it all went pear shaped and we became very navigationially challenged. You have to get off and walk down into a gully and across a creek, we did this bit, but where we got it wrong was we should have turned away from the next bridge we came across, just like it saids in the book. We didn't do this, we crossed the bridge, track didn't go anywhere really. So we went back. Then after a bit of head scratching we decided just to follow the dry diggings trail markers.

We did this for a while hoping to see something that was in out directions, but nothing was in there. This didn't matter so much because we were riding and it was fun. We stopped and had some lunch at which time we decided that we'll ride until 2pm then turn back. Back on the trail and my buddy realizes that he left his sunglasses where we had lunch, but we pressed on and we got them on the way back.

Riding seemed to be getting harder and harder, I couldn't work it out, I thought I must be getting tired, but I plugged away. 2pm came and we turned around and it became apparent why I was finding it hard to ride. We were going up hill. Gravity gave me a new lease of life and we flew down to the bottom of the gully that we were working out way up.

The ride back was uneventful, but it was a hard slog, I was getting low on food. But we made it back to the car at 6pm. This was 9 hours, 70km, 3 litres of water and 690ml of GU and a fun day . Then I had the drive back to my place, which we stopped for some dim sims to break up the trip.

Dodgy Knee

About 2 weeks ago me and my riding buddy attempted to ride from Castlemaine to Dayleford, following the route in the book Off Road Cycling Adventures. Anyway after a few wrong turns we got a bit lost, decided just to follow the bit of single track we were on. Just by the by it was a nice track. We decided that 2pm was a good turn around, so when that time came we pointed our trusty steeds in the opposite direction and rode back.

On the way back my knee started to feel a bit sore, I thought this was just because I'd been riding for 5 hours. So I gritted my teeth and pedaled back. I got back to the car, got off my bike and my knee felt fine, 9 hours in the saddle, 70ish km all in all a good day. I took a day off and rode to work on the Tuesday, knee started hurting about half way in, same story on the way home. So I decided not to race Dirt Crits and rest until the weekend.

We decided to do a road ride so on Sunday I set off for Frankston. First hour the knee was fine I felt good, felt strange to be back on the skinny tires though. Then the knee started hurting again, first a little bit, then no pain, then a little bit more. This continued for a while, then it became almost impossible to get up hills. I had to go down to granny gear for little rises. Again I struggled home, laid on the couch and iced up my knee.

On Monday I decided to go to a physio. The news wasn't good, he thinks I've strained a Medial Ligament and I have to rest it. That means no BMC Classic for me. He thinks my pedaling action caused the strain. I've got some corrective exercises to do and I go back next week to get my advice. I just hope I can start riding to work again soon.

Dirt Crits

Its been a while since my last post because I've been riding heaps and then I got a cold :(. Anyway I've been riding Dirt Crits. These are a lot of fun and it is good ringing with a large number of people. I've done 2 so far and I think I'll be doing this every week that I can. So far I'm managing about 14 minute laps, but I want to get it down to 12, so there is another goal. Other than that I've just been riding the Yarra trails at every opportunity that I get. This weekend we're heading to Mt Buller, so hopefully we'll get a heap of riding in there.

Road Crit

A guy from work rides road crits on a Thursday evening and he talked me into having a crack at one. So last Thursday I went along to have a ride. I was a little apprehensive because although I've been doing a lot of riding it has all been on my mountain bike.

I got there with not much time to spare, threw the front wheel on my bike, payed my money, forgot to put my water bottle in the bottle cage and before I knew it I was racing. About 10 minutes in I was regretting not having any water and since I was racing D grade there was someone barking instructions at me, anyway they went and got water for me. When I got the water, I had a drink, felt like I was going to vomit, this is when I got spat off the back. I spent the rest of the race just cruising around the track. I actually started to feel good towards the end and actually started to catch people.

After trying this I realised a few things. Mountain bike fitness is different to road bike fitness, I still find road riding boring and I could probably get good enough to stay with the guys I was racing with but I would rather concentrate on getting out on some sweat single track and go hammering up switch backs than jumping on my road bike and clocking up big miles.

A new Challenge

Well having completed Around the Bay in a Day I was looking for a new challenge. I liked cycling but was getting bored of riding on the road, mountain biking was the obvious choice. I already had a mountain bike, but it wasn't quite up to the task, I used this bike on my daily commute and it was showing signs of wear. I found a bike shop that would let me take bikes for a test ride, www.mymountain.com.au and I decided it would be fun to take a duel suspension bike for a spin. I told them the sort of riding that I liked to do and they recommended 2 bikes for me to try, a Garry Fischer HiFi and Felt Virtue. I fell in love with the Virtue and as you can guess from the picture this is what I bought.

Now it always good to have a goal so I entered the BMC Classic. This is a 100KM event, with 2000m of vertical gain. So I'm really going to have to do some serious training for this one. At the moment I'm doing a mid week ride and 2 rides on the weekend, but this is going to have to ramp up. I'll keep you posted.

Away

I've been doing a bit of traveling of late so my riding has been restricted to the weekends and one Wednesday. The ride on Sunday was particularly hard there was a bit of a wind, I almost didn't make it home, but I sat on the side of the rode, ate a K-Time and then got back on my bike, gritted my teeth and made it home, then promptly curled up in a ball and fell asleep. I feel a lot better having done that, I just hope the wind isn't that bad on the big ride, if it is it will be a long day. I hopefully will be able to ride to work on Friday. I'm suffering withdrawal from my bikes.

Sorrento

Today I set out from my place and rode down to Sorrento and then back to Rosebud, where my lovely wife picked me up from. This was a trip of 130km and I'm tired now, I started pedaling at 8am and finished about 3pm, we stopped a bit. Anyway it was good to do one side of the bay, just to know what to expect. Next weekend we're thinking of heading the other way and going towards Geelong. Now I'm feeling a little nervous about the ATB ride, 130 seemed hard enough, but what is another 80km between friends hey.