JRA – Just Resting Along

Wow! It’s been two years. I really couldn’t have imagined after my last post that I would be gone for so long. In fact a mere 4 months after being run over I got back to riding and was so happy. However mere weeks after that I was so close to being squished by a bus that didn’t give way at a roundabout that slowly riding slipped away from me. And this was compounded by ongoing issues with my back.
Anyway, I am not here to dwell on the past, but to share with any of you who might still be interested after all this time that I’m back on my bikes and I love them so much. However this being back on the bikes a very very recent thing and getting back into writing about it is part of my plan for ensuring the addiction takes hold again.

Today I did something I wasn’t sure was possible. I rode up Rapaki. Now riding up a great big hill when you are unfit after being fit is very different from doing it when you are unfit and only just starting out riding. In some ways it’s easier and in others harder. For example when you start out it’s actually pretty intimidating and scary and you’re not even sure you can do it at all. My first ride up Rapaki included at least 2 lying down crying tantrums. However once you’ve been fit you know that all you have to do is just ride slow and keep going. However the other side of the coin is that there’s a voice in the back of your mind that likes to remind you that you used to be so much faster, it didn’t use to hurt, walkers didn’t use to pass you (runners yes) and the litany goes on.

Luckily for me (I guess) I’ve been so injured and through so much in the last couple of years that that voice didn’t really have a chance over the voice of complete and utter joy at being in the hills in the sun on my beloved bike. Joyous voice had a lot to say.

“Oh my god I’m riding, up a hill!”
“Wow, it is beautiful today”
“Hmmmmmm long fingered gloves are hot”
“I wish my bike computer was working”
“This bit in the trees seems longer”
“My legs are doing well”
“My sit-bones hate me”
“My *censored* hates me more, flippin ow”
“Don’t think about the pain, you’re riding”
“Hmmmmm my back aches”
“Wow my lungs don’t ache”
“Gosh it’s peaceful”
“My front rotor is rubbing a tiny bit”
“These gloves are really hot”
“Shut up thigh and keep pedalling this is awesome”

You get the idea.  A litany of thoughts tumbling over each other in the excitement of being on my bike. And over them all “You should write in your blog again”, which is how this is happening. Out of that incomplete list of brain babble there were a couple of thoughts that I did need to pay attention to, my back and my lungs. This can be difficult when you have sit-bones screaming that you are an evil witch, but they are the two things I need to really look after now that I’m a battered old woman. So while the cacophony of thoughts raged I quietly monitored my back, which ached a little by the end, and my lungs which were really good all things considered. Of course if my bike computer had been working then this whole head noise situation wouldn’t have occurred as I would have been pleasantly preoccupied with speed/time/distance maths. Off to get a battery tomorrow.

And finally I would like to share that I have at last been able to achieve Just Resting Along. This is when you reach a portion of the ride that is a little easier than the rest (or ideally a lot easier) and instead of pushing your speed up you relax. Just spin along slowly, not worrying what anyone else thinks. Relaxing, dropping your heart rate, cruising. Just Relaxing Along is freeing. Sure others may blast past as if you are standing still, but hey, you’re not. You are still moving and your Just Relaxing Along means you can ride longer than you would have been able to if you slammed yourself. JRA allows you to achieve things you didn’t think possible. Like riding to the top of a bloody big hill after no riding at all for a year.

So I’m back. Hi! I can’t wait to see where my wheels take me. I’m like a child in a candy store, but at the moment I don’t have much fitness currency.

Tragedy – unexpected breakages

When I got the Anthem one of the first things I did was replace the seat, and not just with any old seat. With a beautiful colour co-ordinated and light Specialized Ariel. I loved this seat. It looked amazing and felt great to ride. Every time I got my bike out of the garage it would greet me and make me smile, inviting me to get on and ride and ride. Then I went for a little superman over my bars onto the road and split my chin open. I thought the damage was solely to my fast healing body, I was wrong. Riding into the bike shop to pick up new, bloodless gloves I noticed a pronounced lean to the right. I had a sinking feeling in my stomach, and hoped desperately that my wonderful seat was not stuffed. Alas, it was. Rails terribly bent.

The lovely mechanic at the Hub did his best to straighten them and the seat was rideable. My hopes soared and I headed up the hills for my planned 2.5 hrs. By the top of Rapaki I knew all was not well and had severe pain in places no one ever wants pain. By the time I made it home things were grim and I knew I had to get a new seat. Not good news given my destitute financial state.

There was only one thing for it. Time to sell my possessions! Used my gift for silliness I whipped up an ad for my spare couch and threw it on trademe. In no time I had hundreds of page views and loads of watchers. Unfortunately that didn’t turn into loads of bidders, but I got enough money to cover the cost of a new seat and some race entry fees. Yay.


The lovely Andrew at the Hub tracked me down a new seat (not as fabulous looking as my old seat) and had it ready for me to pick up in time for a ride on the dry tracks at the weekend. My butt (and other regions) were happy again and I spent a rather blusterous 3hrs riding up Kennedy’s (only got blown off three times), up Marleys, down Flying Nun (sketchy in the wind), up to the Traverse and across it (only blown off twice) and then for the first time up Mt Vernon. Mt Vernon was great, expect for the walkers who couldn’t hear me calling over the wind and then informed me that’d like to see me fall off cause that would be funny. I personally didn’t find this very amusing.

The wind took its toll on my and I headed down Rapaki, ruing the fact Old Bownevale wasn’t open and Rapaki was sooooo boring. Luckily I had the wind behind me and the way home and helped my tired legs over the Cashmere Downs. I was completely smashed and happy with it. I’m pretty stoked to be able to do long rides this early in the year. I’ll be sending my entry off to the McLeans 6hr this week. Yay!

Channelling Julie Andrews

Sky larks and soldiers and walkers with big dogs
Blusterous winds and zephyrs of sea fog
Sweat from my brow that makes my eyes sting
These are a few of Rapaki’s things

Dust clouds and dry grass and stones under feet
Magpies circle and unrelenting heat
Gates held open by blue plastic string
These are a few of Rapaki’s things

Sore legs and tussocks and passing smiles
Deserted benches and blue skies for miles
Sheep that are munching on nettles that sting
These are a few of Rapaki’s things

Ok, that was a teensey bit sad, but yesterday on the hills that’s what I had going through my head. Luckily for me my fitness is now so rubbish that I didn’t have enough breath to be singing it aloud. And why do I have so little fitness now? Well at the risk of making false assumptions, like Julie Andrews, I just don’t have any biking mojo at the moment. Since the fateful Moa race I’ve been out an various bikes a few times. I’ve been singlespeeding at McLeans, shuttling Vic Park on my bouncier bike and doing a bit of XC riding and pretty much all these rides have left me feeling a bit meh.

What has happened???

I think the weather is playing a part. Gloomy overcast days that even Mary Poppins herself couldn’t whisk away with a cheery song. It is meant to be summer and the hills should be alive with the sound of music. That music being the crunch of gravel under wheels, the click of gear changes, the squeal of poorly aligned brakes and the rasp of ragged breathing. Instead sheep graze undisturbed and puddles form on the sweet singletrack. *insert immature raspberry blowing noise here*

I did have a great deal of fun watching the crazy downhillers throwing themselves down the side of Vic Park on Sunday. It was great watching people riding stuff that scares the whiskers on kittens out of me. And excitingly Gravity Canterbury is having a novice race on the 20th of December. I think I might have to have a go and if you’re a chick who’s interested in giving it a go on nice easy, flowing tracks I’d encourage you to give it a go too!

Yesterday’s ride up Rapaki was hot with a nor’ wester blasting the hills, and at one point I did almost get blown off the Traverse by a particularly strong gust. It was hard work, but it was really good to be out on the bike again. The grey skies today are a little disconcerting, but I know it’s going to be a sunny weekend and it’s time to put the grins back into my riding. Hmmmm, what fun shall I get up too? While I ponder that, here’s a little treat for you, my favourite ever Julie Andrews song, with the Muppets of course!

Fitness gains are good

Once upon a time there was a lovely princess who was passionate about cycling. She wasn’t very fit though, and she was carrying a lot of extra weight. Luckily for her, the fabulous thing about cycling is the more you do it, the better you get. The princess was blessed to live in an enchanted land full of hills and valleys and trails aplenty for riding her bicycle on. Initially the princess was quite intimidated by these enchanting tracks, but with the help of her handsome prince and some neighbouring princesses she overcame her fears and began to acquire magical biking powers. To her delight she became strong and a lot of her cuddly layers disappeared.

At the start of this blog I was larger and not very confident, now things are different!

Ok, I think everyone gets the point of this story now, it’s not a fairytale, but it does have all the joy a fairytale can bring (a Disney one, not the cool menacing old school ones where all the children get eaten alive). As you can see from the photo’s above I’ve definitely lost a fair amount of flab since starting this blog, but more importantly I’ve really improved my fitness a lot. This year I’ve been using my roadbike in a more structured way to try and improve my cadence, rather than just heading out on longish rides and not paying any attention to the quality of the ride. I’ve been doing a couple of lunchtime rides out to Sumner during the week, which is a nice 30km spin and each ride my average rpm has improved. On Saturday I headed out for a 2.5hr mtb ride with DirtDiva which tootled to Rapaki and then up it (much like last weekend), then across the Traverse and up the road to Kennedy’s Bush and down to home. A nice 37km trip in the sun. The reason I’m writing about this ride is a couple of amazing things happened on the ride.

As we headed up Rapaki we were going at a fairly good pace, but not really pushing it, until DirtDiva zoomed off ahead of me on the steeper final section. I looked at my speedo and realised that if I dug in I could probably get to the top in under 30 minutes, for the first time ever. So I took off after her and really pushed it. It hurt, but all those roadie rides paid off and I got to the top in 28mins 51 secs! I was over the moon. I was also a little light headed, but I recovered really quickly and we headed up the road to the Traverse. Amazingly my legs felt fantastic and as we cruised round the road they felt better and better. By the time we hit the Traverse I was ready to tackle it at speed, which I did. Happy sigh. It was fantastic and with my front fork set up properly, thanks lovely husband, I was faster than a speeding bullet (well, not really, but really fast).

Then over to Kennedy’s and down. With my suspension set up properly it was great, which was good because my back brakes aren’t really working well at the moment. We then headed up the little bit of singletrack on Kennedy’s and to my surprise my legs still felt strong. Then down the front and down the Crocodile. Trail pixies had been hard at work, Thank You!, and the track was flowing well. My cornering was really good, despite the lack of rear braking power and then we were done.

Last year this ride, even when I was fit, was hard work and left me feeling broken for days. This year I’m fit enough that this ride left me tired, but not broken and amazingly I am really enjoying climbing now. So much so that I’m going to take my bike up Rapaki again on Tuesday and see if I can knock a bit more time off my pb! In fact I’m hungry for bigger, harder rides this summer, the Poulter, Double Fenceline, Wharfdale, and Craigieburn have all been riders that I’ve read about and known I wasn’t strong enough to tackle them, but this summer will be different. Wahoo! I can’t wait.

Girls go Wild on the Singletrack

It’s been another fantastic week of riding, with a strong roadie ride over the “Pyrenees” , then a fantastic night ride up the Port Hills and topped off with a brilliant road trip to Hanmer Springs.

Thursday night saw a group of 4 of us head up Rapaki in the dark and immediately my legs suggested that yoga and hill climbs should not be done in the same day. Further up the hill they suggested that perhaps I’ve been doing just a leettle bit too much riding lately and not quite enough recovering. Rapaki was a nasty slog that night and the 2 whippets we were with raced off ahead of us. I was looking forward to hitting the Traverse though, so this slight sufferfest was worth it. As we cruised round the road the fog rolled in and gave the ride a wonderful spooky atmosphere, but by the time we hit the singletrack it was gone. Zooming across the Traverse in the dark was fantastic. Again the Anthem was super responsive and if my legs hadn’t been such weak pieces of over-cooked spaghetti I would have been shredding the whole time. As it was I really flew along the second half and particularly enjoyed the new berms towards the end. And then I rode Brake-Free for the first time since the accident, and while I didn’t do any big jumps, I did a couple of small ones and it was fun. It felt good to conquer my fear. Then we headed down Sesame St and it was fabulous, but I did discover my brakes weren’t working too good. In fact by the bottom of Vic Park they weren’t really working much at all.

The next day I was so tired I could hardly move, so did the sensible and thing and planned a roadie ride in the afternoon. Luckily, I guess, my work interfered and I didn’t get to go on it. This meant I was very keen for some riding on Saturday and what could be better than a girls day trip to Hanmer? Well it turns out, not very much at all actually. Yesterday was one of the best days riding I’ve ever had. After a great trip to Hanmer, and the all important ingestion of delicious pies, we headed to Krank to get the skinny on the tracks from Neil. We all (well not Neil, he wasn’t involved in the conversation) decided that we were keen for fun and shiftiness. Unfortunately for me, this meant we were heading for Red Rocks (YAY!!!), via Timberlands (BOOOOO!). Timberlands quickly taught me that my legs were still toasted and that a spin around the carpark is not enough of a warm up for a steep hill climb. The hill climb continued, after a brief pause for important discussions, up Red Rocks, which I remembered well and then we were finally at the top. From there it was a fantastic fast, slippy descent down the old track, which then flowed into swoopy new bermed goodness and then went up a rocky pinch into a great fall-line rock berm. My excitement to be on my bouncy bike had me keen to ride it and a very nice local gave us a quick demo. After watching him I decided to take a completely different line and set off up the track to get a run in. Not far enough up the track because I didn’t have enough speed when I got to the crest so bailed and headed back up the track for a second go. This time I got the speed just right and nailed it. Brrrrraaaaaapp! It was brilliant and I was buzzing as you can tell from the corny grin.




Red Rocks was over too quickly and we pootled up Dog Stream and then up Detox. Anna and I made it look easy (hah!) and almost like we were enjoying ourselves (HAH!), climbing the 4wd track.

Both of us were not loving the climbs. It was worth it again though as Detox was sweet flowing goodness and I was stoked to nail the rock drop without having to scope it first. We sessioned it a bit and Michelle showed us both how to really ride it properly. Unfortunately I’d gotten a bit over excited with the fun riding and further down Detox I got a bit tangled up in a rut. I managed to bear the brunt of my crash on my well padded hip, but I did end up in the middle of the track with my bike on top of me. I yelled back to Anna so she wouldn’t get too much of a shock to see me there, unfortunately she was distracted by my ladylike, spread-eagled, beneath bike pose and tipped herself gracefully into a gorse bush. So then I was lying under my bike yelling “Are you alright?”, while she was lying in a bush yelling “Are you alright?”. We both were and giggling uncontrollably, it was soo funny. Not having learnt my lesson at all I continued bombing down the slippery track at highspeed only to stick my front wheel into a rut and go flying over my handbars. This was my worst nightmare as I landed right on my bung arm, and my dodgey knee. Good news!! My arm is mended and strong, and now I don’t have to worry anymore. Even after being a complete muppet on that bit of track I was still grinning at the bottom.



We were all pretty tired and zoomed down Camp Track and back to the car to take photo’s of alien baby that was now growing out of my knee.



Off to the pub for some mulled wine and sunshine before a well earned soak in the hot pools. But the thrills weren’t over and we braved the freezing evening air to take on the “Blackhole”, the pitch black hydro slide at the hot pools. Insane fun. After three runs I decided that I didn’t want to bash my already bruised knees and elbows any further and so we soaked in the octagonal pools and scared the other pool dwellers by all touching our noses with our toes! I tell you, the fun never stops on our road trip. After a feed of traditional kiwi kai we were on the road and singing hits of the 90s the whole way home.

Today I’ve been completely shattered. My whole body hurts, apparently hitting the ground hard a couple times isn’t something my body likes, even my left ear which may have hit a rock or a bee? But I do love road tripping and riding with the girls and I do love learning new skills, like tipping my bike into berms, and realising I still need to get my knees wider when descending. I love riding my bikes, but this week I’m going to rest for a few days and get my strength back. In other exciting news, I’ve managed to lose a whooping 6kgs in the past 6 weeks so all the riding seems to be paying off. I can’t wait to get out again next weekend, bring on the sun and the singletrack.

The Anthem is a good thing

As I write this I’m struggling to stay awake and my legs are aching in quite a pleasing fashion. Tonight was a more extensive test of the lovely Anthem. Up Rapaki with Michelle and she evilly put the pressure on and I couldn’t help but chase her. This in itself is an unusual occurrence, not Michelle being speedy, but me even trying to keep up at all. However tonight I felt like I could push more, and chase her. I couldn’t catch her, but she didn’t get away either. Well, up the first climb. Unfortunately I’d slightly toasted my legs doing this and on the second, steeper climb I was pretty slow. But my very cunning ploy of lulling Michelle into a false sense of security by pootling up the hill while she raced ahead worked perfectly, as not only did she kindly come back to ride with me, I was then able to sneakily change up a gear and put in a sprint to the finish gate and take the win! I’m such a good friend! Well, I’m a devious wench, but hey, I’ve never ever had the energy for that sort of carry on at the top of Rapaki before. The Anthem really climbs amazingly.

After a brief and chilly respite at the top to take in the sunset we headed up the road and round to the Traverse. Michelle got rewengay (revenge for those not familiar with classic British comedy) on me up the road, by really making me push harder than I wanted too and in no time we when at the Traverse. I was feeling nervous about this. Only my second ride on the Traverse since I’ve returned to riding and on a new bike with strange new geometry; this was going to be interesting. I decided there was nothing for it but dive right in and I was immediately rewarded. Not only is the Anthem a rocket up the hills, it is a laser guided missile on the singletrack (compared to the XLT that I’m used to anyway). I couldn’t believe how incredibly responsive the handling was. While having less suspension made it less forgiving over the rocks, its nimbleness meant I could ride cleaner lines and move about the track like I was hovering. I was blow away by how good it was and by the end of the Traverse I was riding faster than I’ve ever gone before on that track. Oh yes, this bike is fantastic.

Unfortunately all good things come to an end and I soon discovered that there are some drawbacks to all this climbing goodness and defined handling. It doesn’t like the downhills. This is exacerbated by the seat clamp not being a quick release so I didn’t drop my seat before we headed into Sesame St. Dropping down the steep rocky entrance off the cattlestop I could feel things were very sketchy. The back end was twitchy as and seemed to want to float off the ground with the slightest bump. Even through the sweet bermed corners it felt out of its depth, well I felt out of my depth, and by the bottom I wasn’t really grinning, just glad I’d made it down in one piece. Of course, this is the first time I’ve tried to ride it down anything vaguely technical so it’s to be expected that I haven’t wrapped my head around the very different handling. I will get the hang of it, but I do know it will never be the same fun going down as the XLT.

So, to sum up, this is a XC machine and behaves like one. It makes climbing something I want to do more of, rather than a means to an end. It handles like a dream on the singletrack and inspires confidence. It sticks to the track well and makes me want to go faster and faster. It descends like an XC bike, slightly skittery and a bit scary for me, but I know as I get used to it this will lessen. This bike is fantastic and if you’re looking for a well priced race bike I think it’s fantastic. I still prefer my bigger bike for silly, jumpy, downhilly stuff, but right now all I can think is bring on race season. I want to test this beautiful Anthem and my new found legs.

When it's good it's very very good!

Ahhh, what a wonderful week of riding it has been here in sunny, yes that's right sunny, Christchurch. And it seems the addition of the beautiful new stead to the stable has fired my enthusiasm significantly. I'm into training mode now and am planning upcoming events, all working towards the goal of taking an hour off my Molesworth time from last year. It seems like a big ask, but I've learnt a lot of lessons and I think I know how to prepare better and how to ride on the day to minimise the necessity for stops.

This past week I've managed 3 roadie rides, one of which is the longest I've ever done on the roadie and it felt good and another of which was great fun with Michelle. I've never really roadied with anyone before and I can now see the attraction of cranking out the k's, all the while gas bagging and laughing. Fun. I also managed to head out on the new bike for a lunchtime ride up Rapaki. Rapaki has been completely resurfaced and is now riding quite a lot like a road. It certainly was on the day I went up as I had to contend with 3 huge Fulton Hogan trucks, a big roller and a digger. Even with the comical in ditch dismounts to let the trucks by I managed to hoof it up the hill in 33 minutes. Oh yes, that is fast for me. And shockingly, it makes me want to climb more. Yes, I've turned that corner in my riding where I actually want to ride up hills. What's happening to me?!

The new stead in it's element, at the top of a hill after a fast climb.

The highlight of the week has to be Flying Nunn. I finished work early on Thursday and managed to convince my lovely husband to do the same and we loaded up the trusty Starlet and headed up the hill for a couple of runs of the Nunn before it got dark. Oh, it was running so sweet on Thursday. Dry, but not dusty and flowing like warm maple syrup over fresh blueberry pancakes (I hope everyone's had a satisfying breakfast this morning). I was feeling determined to ride the whole thing without having to walk. Something I've yet to achieve. I had excellent flow and none of the nerves I felt last time I was here. Everything was going brilliantly and I was riding faster and better than ever before on this track. I nailed the first part I've never ridden and then attacked the nasty rocky corner that psychs me out every time. Bugger. wrong line, oops, falling fast. OW! Knee straight into big rock. Of course if I'd been wearing my trusty knee pads I would have been completely unscathed, but I wasn't. Fool.

Don't worry Mum, this graze isn't as bad as it looks, really!

After limping for a while and then walking it off I was riding again. Pretty tentatively at first, but by the time I got back to the car I wanted to go again. But the blood flowing down my leg and filling up my sock made my caring husband suggest that I shouldn't be pushing my luck. I so wanted to go again, but it wasn't to be. It turns out he was probably right as I managed to give myself a nasty pumpkin soup burn later in the evening so it seems mupperty was my lot for that night.

Sunday dawned sunny, the tracks on the Port Hills were open and a group of 5 chicks and 2 brave men were ready for Nunn repeats. I was interested to see how my legs would go after the 50km roadie of the previous day. Last year a 45km roadie took me about the same amount of time as the 50km ride, but I was broken for a least a whole day afterwards. My legs still felt good on Sunday and although the heavy bike was heavy, not as heavy as Rita's crazy cool downhill bike, I went up the hill pretty well. We did three runs and not once did I manage to get that troublesome corner. Seems some corner sessioning is in order. The rest of the track was brilliant and I got to experience some sideways action for the first time in the last berm as it was a bit wet.

Don't worry Mum, this rock garden isn't as bad as it looks, really!

For your extra entertainment I’ve included this unflattering video (unflattering for me) of what happens when you get a bunch of chicks together for some excellent riding, roadie heckling! Remember kids, white lycra is never right, especially if it’s a bit old.

It was the best week of riding I've had since my broken elbow and I just want more and more and more. I can't wait to get out on the bike tomorrow. What to do? What to do?

Hi, my name is Oscar and I’ll be your grouch today

It’s 8am on Saturday morning and I’m still asleep. Mmmmmm sleep, how I love you at the moment, I wish I could have more of you all the time. The significance of me being asleep at 8am is the previous night I’d agreed that 9:30am would be a good time to go riding up Rapaki and had asked my lovely hubby to wake me at 8am to ensure I had plenty of time to wake up and get ready. Unfortunately he was unable to keep track of the time once he got up and the next thing I know I’m being abruptly awakened by my phone announcing it has a text for me. Sometimes I truly regret my Invader Zim ringtones.

Through bleary eyes and with fog filled headed I eventually regain control of my limbs enough to press the necessary buttons to read the text and discover, to my disgust, that it’s a beautiful sunny day and 9:30am is the kick off for the ride, as I foolishly proposed the night before. I hate it when I’m the author of my own downfall. I flop out of bed and into the kitchen to remind my lovely husband to wake me at 8am. He is surprised and amused at his oversight, I am not. I am grumpy. Breakfast is quickly eaten and biking clothes are gathered in front of the heater. The many layers are donned and the search for a clean and dry headband commenced, in vain it turns out. No clean headbands, and sun glasses are MIA. I am grumpy.

My lovely husband attaches my bike to my car as penance for not waking me up while I fill my camel back with clean water, gather helmet, gloves, and shoes and then pile into the car. The call of my warm bed is still strong but I start the car and head off. I feel ever so slightly sorry for my riding companions, but it passes quickly because I’m grumpy. The spin round the road from scatter’s house is ok, but I’m feeling a little light-headed and am pining for my sunglasses. Up the seal on Rapaki Rd I manage to go quite woosey (the medical term) and ride into the gutter and almost fall off. Hmmmmm I am grumpy and a muppet. Guess which one!

After some emergency shoe-stuck-in-pedal-repairs for one of our small group at the gate and some bike swapping we’re off. I have no power at all. I will be riding slooooow. The sun is out, but we are completely shaded in the valley, but we’re also sheltered from the wind. Up we go and I go slow. But I go. It’s weird. I get in a zone where my legs just go round and round and while my heart isn’t racing, I can’t really talk, that may have more to done with grumpiness than exertion, and I am determined to just keep pedalling till I get to the top. We pop out of the shade at the track temporarily levels off and BAM! the wind kicks in. Typical.

The grind up the final section is unpleasant with a mixture of gusty cross winds and nasty head winds. I’m slightly less grumpy as the wind gives me something to think about other than how feeble my legs feel. I’m also glad for my heavy bike and frame as I’m not so susceptible to buffeting by the evil wind. At the top the wind is howling and freezing and another layer is quickly added before we set off up the road. The road ride is yucky and by the start of the traverse I’m very grumpy. We go straight into the Traverse and I’m nervous. This is my first ride back here since my break and this is the track I’ve crashed on the most, usually through the rocky section. My nerves block out the grumpiness and I flow along the track and smile. It’s good to be back. I completely stuff up the rocky section and have to walk it, but I don’t care. Along I go and it gets better and better. The surface is dry almost everywhere, and I’m loving it. The second half is even better and I’m grinning through the new bermed corners towards the end and we are at Vic Park.

Dun dun DUN!!!!

My first visit to the scene of the accident and I feel a bit sick looking at where I crashed. I do not ride Brake Free, but we make our way to the start of Sesame St and as I drop off the cattlestop I ask aloud “What am I doing?” I’m really nervous and completely nana it along the track and through the sweet corners. I stop and admire the wall ride and I long to ride it, but not when I’m this nervous. I get to the bottom full of adrenaline and stoked. Down Dazzas and my bung arm sort of collapses and I almost endo, I am grumpy and berate myself but make it down in one piece and happy. The 4wd track is rutty and wet and the drainage ditches are not fun. We come past Double Drop and I stop and look back at it and cannot believe I ever rode down it. Insane. On down the 4wd track and I get some air over the speed humps and I’m loving it and I know I want to shuttle again. Nothing else makes me feel this good when I’m this grumpy.I’m bloody tired when the ride is over and I’m still grumpy, but overlaid on top of that grumpiness is a thick juicy layer of happy. I love riding my bike, I love pushing my limits, I even like scaring myself trying hard stuff and I love riding with mates. They all seemed to survive relatively unscathed from their encounter with Oscar.

A stock-take for Easter

For many many years Easter has been a bit of a non-event for me in the traditional scoffing of stupid amounts of chocolate bunnies and eggs way. This is because of an initial traumatic Easter experience when I was about 6 and then a conclusively horrific Cadbury’s factory incident in 5th Form (when I was 15 for those of you who don’t understand old school). This Incident involved a bus load of 15 year olds let loose in the reject egg room and told we could eat as much as we liked, but couldn’t take any chocolate out of the room with us. Add to this a 3 hour bus ride on very windy roads and I think you can guess the result. This one Incident scarred my tastebuds and stomach so comprehensively that to this very day I can’t eat Cadbury’s chocolate. In fact until last year I didn’t eat chocolate very often at all. Say once or twice a year! “My god, that’s unnatural!” I hear you say. Well maybe. But since marrying my beloved husband that has changed. He is a lolly monster and is capable of ingesting amounts of sweets and chocolates that would make mere mortals vomit. Copiously. Because of this there are often chocolates in the house. Early on in the relationship this was fine. I didn’t like chocolate after all. And then came the fateful day when the block of Whittakers Dark Chococlate with Orange came into the house. It even smelt good. It all came crumbling down. Over fifteen years of freedom from the tyranny of chocolate undone by that delicious dark goodness. Still I tried to tell myself that I still didn’t like chocolate, but there is no going back. So this Easter has been the first in many years when I have enjoyed the ample supply of chocolate eggs and bunnies that I’ve been missing out on. With this high calorie chocolate diet I decided it was important to do some biking and to really try and work out where I’m at now, both confidence and fitness wise.

My first goal, a hill climb. I haven’t been on a hill since I broke my elbow so I was feeling quite apprehensive. I decided on Rapaki as I knew it was freshly graded and should be a nice smooth start for someone as unfit as me. My goal was to get to the top, and hopefully only stop once or twice. Admittedly we cheated a bit by parking halfway up Rapaki Rd. Still I dropped into my granny ring and spun up and things felt pretty good. OK. This will be doable. I was a little concerned about the burning in my thighs by the first cattlestop, but decided that was just my lazy legs trying to get out of it. The 4wd track was S-M-O-O-T-H, no bumps whatsoever. This did mean there was a new hazard to be avoided. In addition to the usual runners and walkers there were now a large number of tiny dogs. Riding near tiny dogs is always slightly worrying as you never know what they’re going to do, and when you’re crawling up a hill at 4.5kph there’s not much you can do to avoid falling off if they take it into their crazy little heads to run under your wheels. Fortunately there were no small dog acting crazy situations and I spun up to where the climb plateaus out feeling really surprisingly good.

In fact I was feeling so good I re-evaluated of my goals for the ride. Now I wanted to get to the top without stopping and get there in under 45 minutes. My fastest recorded time up there last year was 32min 35sec so that seemed a realistic goal. Also the first few times I’d gone up there it took over 50 mins so it would be good to be better than that. Down the wee descent before the big final climb and I headed to the only rough bits on the track just to see how the bike felt with a bit of speed over the rough stuff. It felt pretty good. A bit weird, but good. Then I was into the last bit of the climb. Bleurgh. I wasn’t really up to chatting with my ever patient husband who had cruised up with me to this point so I told him to go for it and I’d spin up as best I could. And I was very pleasantly surprised with how well it went. In fact with the end in sight I decided I wanted to get to the top in under 42 mins and put a burst of speed on! I made it to the top in 42mins and 4secs (but that included some time on the road) and was stoked. I was definitely puffed, but I felt really good and for a first ride up a hill it couldn’t have gone better. Then came the descent. Oh yes, it was good. I was even popping little hucks of the few rocks in the track. It felt so good to go fast again. I felt balanced on the bike and completely in control. It made me want to head back to Vic Park and play on Sesame St, but common sense will prevail and I will wait till I’m stronger.

Easter goal number one – hill climb. Check

My other goal was endurance. I’m definitely doing the recreational race at Mt Somer’s next weekend. Its 20kms long and the furthest I’ve managed to ride so far is 16km on the road and 13km on the dirt. I wanted to make sure I could actually still ride 20km. So hubby and I headed to the sandpit for 2 laps. Last time I was there I couldn’t even do a full lap of the inner loop so doing over twice that was going to be a challenge. Hubby set off on his singlespeed with the agreement that he’d ride with me when he lapped me. I tried to start more conservatively than my usual all or nothing starts that leave me gasping after one small section. I sort of managed it. I’m definitely getting the hang of my new arm position and felt more balanced on the bike and was able to push the bike through the corners more. Also I did a few more jumps and they all went well.

I feel an aside is important here, just to reassure those of you who are currently reading this and thinking I’m insane to be doing any sort of jump after Christmas. Well, the “jumps” in Bottlelake are very very small, the kind of thing you’d be happy let your small child play on. The ones I broke my elbow on were proper, bigger jumps that required some skill (which I obviously didn’t have) to do well. I will not be trying to do that sort of jumping in the near future, please be reassured.

Where was I? Oh yes, little jumps. The little jumps actually felt better than they had before my crash. I felt really balanced and loose on the bike and seemed to hit them perfectly. This did my confidence the world of good. By the end of the first lap, yes I managed to do a whole lap, I was hurting, particularly in the legs. I decided that I might have to do a reduced length second lap, but I’d see when hubby caught up (which should be soon) before deciding. I was using my gears a lot more in the second lap, but I kept going and even managed to get up the nasty nasty pinch in the middle (just) and just kept going. No short lap for me. I came here to do 2 laps and I would do 2 laps. By the end my legs felt completely spent, but I did it. 26kms and my hubby didn’t lap me. He did manage to do 3 laps in only a little more time than it took me to do 2, but hey, I’ve got a broken arm. Despite feeling physically ill I was stoked to have ridden more than double the distance I managed last time and now feel quite happy that I can at least complete the race next weekend before the prize giving starts.

Easter goal number two – endurance. Check

All in all, a very satisfying regaining of much confidence. Now I’ve just got to get my outfit for the race sewed up and it’ll be all go for next Sunday. I can’t wait.