You shall know them by what is not seen: neither a pump fitted to their frame, nor a bag to their saddle. These things are hidden in their raiment.
This I have learned today: their drinking vessels exceed not one-and-twenty ounces, except in the most extreme heat of the desert sun.
And they are stayed neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed.
This Tuesday’s regular lunchtime ride saw the Doctor resplendent in full ESCC kit, complete with colour co-ordinated helmet. All present agreed that it is a splendid ensemble and very worthy of association with the esteemed CCC. Note that the Doctor even risked life and limb posing in the middle of the road so that he would be facing the sun…
With the girls at Rotto, I did the honorable thing and signed on to the Due for Swan Valley. It was a bad idea, but that has never stopped me in the past. I stayed the night at Chez Doctor, and got a lift out in the morning. It was a tad cold, and I’d forgotten my ever reliable rain jacket, which along with gloves is my only concession to cold weather gear. The rest of the Due were rugged up, but at least they wore their extra layers under the Coglioni jersey, unlike the Uno.
The ride to the start was chilly, but as soon as you stopped, the sun was marvelously warming. So we lined up. The Doctor, new boy Mark, O’Dirty, Gobi, Babel & me. We set off well, and within half a lap were rolling like a circular cheese down an English hill somewhere. The pace was good, and commendations go to Babel & Gobi, for dropping in beautifully, and dropping the pace as soon as they did drop in. It was my great pleasure to sit behind Babel most of the race, and so good was he that when the inevitable overtaking move put me behind another rider, I would conspire as soon as possible re-attach to Babel’s wheel. Mark gave the impression of working hard all the time, but never actually slowed at all. The Doctor was well within himself, as I suspect were Gobi and Babel. O’Dirty was his usual uncomplaining cheerful self.
Around the end of lap 1, the Uno passed us. Quite a few teams passed us actually. Going very fast, some of them. Funny how they don’t do that on the more hilly courses. Soft, front-running flatlanders the lot of them. Anyway, while we were happy to let teams of semi-professional cafe racers pass us, we aren’t quite as happy with the Uno going by, and there was a distinct lift in tempo, and for a while they didn’t gain much ground on us. But then we started to hurt a bit, and I breathed a sigh of relief as our pace dropped to a more sustainable level. O’Dirty, as captain, was doing his usual quietly effective job of ensuring the well being of all. Consensus was even reached that we would make a 3rd lap comfort stop at the top of the hill just after the photographer on the back stretch of the course. Its hard to estimate how long the stop took, but I’d say roughly 4 minutes 50 seconds. Gee isn’t that a coincidence? If you take 4′50″ from our time of 2h 21m 56s, that gives us a time of 2h 17m 6s, just a shade faster than Uno!
For a while we jostled with another team doing about our speed, until we heard a thump behind us as one of them went down. He was Greg(?) a volleyballer from SDR at Loftus. However, he only had minor head injuries, so he remounted and they soon caught us again. On the last lap, the two teams became intermingled, and formed one larger roll. What had seemed such a pleasant ride was now hurting some of us a lot. O’Dirty kicked off the sprint to the finish, and we came in together, after a brilliant team ride.
The post-ride food was great, but my enjoyment was somewhat marred by petty officialdom who told me that I could not remain in the velodrome without shoes. It was useless to argue that being out on the track was considerably more dangerous than not wearing shoes. A bouncer stood at the entrance watching me as I stood outside holding my raffle ticket (and Cookie’s and Blinder’s), wondering how to get in if one of the tickets won. My mind wandered back to the late 70’s and early 80’s, when I would go on a Saturday night to “The Shents” (now an old peoples village) to see Dave Warner and Matt Taylor (with Dave Hole). You could get into the Shents without shoes, broken glass and all. You could stand on the tables to watch. We have gone soft, unreasonably, and unconcsionably soft. Australia’s decline, from a can-do nation of bronzed Gods, to the current nanny state where everyone is wrapped in cotton wool and people’s main thought is how to protect their arse in a rapaciously litigious society of bludgers with lotto mentality, can no doubt be tracked back to the rise of compulsory footwear.
After 2 pieces of wholemeal toast, topped with a can of cold tinned spaghetti with HP sauce on top I was ready to pack the Toyota. Mental check list….. yeah I think I’ve got everything. The only thing missing was a red Jersey which was being delivered to me via Gaz which was on loan from the very obliging Paddles. So although Paddles wasn’t going to be there he was still getting a mention via a least one arm band.
Arrived at the Speed Dome about 8am, plenty of time to get acclimatised after riding in the “Toasty Toyota”. It was cold, bloody cold, should I have brought another layer? Gaz finds me and I settle for 3 layers. Gaz had seen Spunker and we worked out that we would leave from the roundabout at 8.45 as planned.
With both Uno and Due teams altogether except for Stuey who was meeting us at the start line (something to do with an anniversary and a quick getaway… there was a concern his knees may have already trembled but we were all hopeful that would occur post race ) Apologies to Mrs Stuey.
After a very cold ride to the Herne Hill Primary School a vision of a long line of men awkwardly walking down 
a fence line trying to find a shrunken part of their anatomy was found quite amusing by some of the female riders, but I also detected a note of jealousy…a cold seat in a Primary School Dunny Block certainly wouldn’t be my choice. Stuey was found and with a hint of sunshine there was an opportunity to offload a layer or 2 into the boot of the Ford.
The call came from Spunker…. time to move. After a narrow miss from a local resident driving his Land Rover as if we shouldn’t be there we were ready to roll.
9.20 and 30sec and Due were off.
9.21 and 30sec and Uno were off.
The roll started immediately and we fell into a nice rolling rythem. 1st bend coming up…… (remember reading Paddles rules) come out of the corner and continue to pedal …. a slight split in the group….. ease up and regroup and continue the roll… all good again. Shortly after the start finish line was a left turn which took us onto the most difficult part of the course. It must have been a false flat or the slight breeze because as each lap passed it was always the difficult bit. Speedo confirmed this with a readout of 29-30kph. We caught up to Due just before the finish of the first lap. We just cruised past and they were looking pretty tight. We certainly didn’t fly past. As we passed through the start finish line it seemed to be an appropriate time to feed and water after each lap. This was the time for a slight ease up, but only for a minute.
Our little faults were being picked up by the ever vigilant Capitano Spunker.
Cookie….. Whoa horsey
Boab…… Is that a gap between you and second
Gaz…… Are you overtaking the front rider before he actually gets to the front.. very enthusiastic
Blinder….. Keep pedaling after dropping off the front
Stuey….. C’mon stuey you can do it
Spunker kept us all in check and there was not a lot of frustrated yelling.
We were rolling nicely and we all seemed happy with the speed. (Although Cookie always looks like he’s on a leisurely stroll) We overtook a lot of groups and even a Navara towing a horse float, was that a double white 
line on the crest of a hill? Go Go Go. Apart from that manoeuvre our overtaking was fairly smooth. Usually forming a single file and regrouping quickly after the pass. We were overtaken by a few teams but one idiot nearly took out Blinder’s front wheel. The back marker from that team was very apologetic after the abuse hurled at the offending rider from Blinder.
After the fourth lap I looked down to see an average of 35.1kph. The instruction came to conserve on the difficult bit and go for it after the slight hills. Let’s start to wind it up with a few k’s to go. Spunker yells something… shit, are we losing our formation in our attempt to get to the finish line. Regroup and push hard. Cookie has his hand on Blinder’s back and we are all breathing hard. Spunker takes the lead and is looking strong, as is Gaz. We finally form a single file… with 500m to go I notice a slight split. Should I wait? Spunker is at the front and Blinder’s at the back. No instructions. Blinder yells go, so we all push for the line and finish not too far apart.
I look down at my speedo and see the average of 34.7kph…we lost time on that last lap? It must have been the “difficult bit”. Will wait to see the official Sportif time. We all shake hands and agree it was the tidiest roll we’ve ridden so far. We get back to Stuey’s car and before we know it the Due team is right there. Had we maintained our one minute per lap? I doubt it, but lets wait and see. A gentle ride back to the Dome followed by a great lunch.
I get to the oval in time to watch the second half of my son’s footy match. Home to find a roast lamb in the oven. Park myself in front of the TV and sink a few bitterly cold Tooheys Old stubbies. Life’s good.
Thanks to my long-departed grandfather, I took one small step away from O’Dirty dependency this week. My single-speed commuter, a brushed aluminium 2007 Specialized Langster, needed a new chain and freewheel. I’d successfully replaced the old stretched chain without bleating for O’Dirty’s help, but the old freewheel, wound tight on the axle by daily Mount Street ascents, wouldn’t budge. The worn sprocket teeth made an ugly grinding noise against the new chain. I needed more leverage to undo that freewheel; I needed a vice, so I could clamp the freewheel removal tool and use the wheel as a spanner. At last I had found a use for the vice that had belonged to my grandfather, and that my father had passed on to me with Grandpa’s workbench. I bought some nuts, bolts, and washers, and fixed the vice to the bench through the existing holes in the wood top. With the removal tool clamped in the vice, the old freewheel came off easily.
The Langster is now running smoothly again; I’m wearing new 2010 Specialized S-Works shoes (no velcro, just two BOA dials) connected to Speedplay Zero pedals, and an Ay Up system lights the way ahead. This is the sweetest commuting setup I’ve ever had.
So, my ride is tuned; the weather is fine; my nearly-two-year-old son has begun to sleep through the night and has learned to say “bikyll”; and yesterday his mother got up early to go riding on her new road bike. The rain will come, as it must; but for now, life is good.
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