The Cycling Adventurer
Randonneuring
You'd Have to be Crazy 600 — 2006
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The Cycling Adventurer |
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Randonneuring |
You'd Have to be Crazy 600 — 2006 |
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Yes, you would be certifiable to ride this!
Dates: 13 May 2006 A ride title such as "You Would Have To Be Crazy" seems to have connotations that a randonneur can easily overlook when innocently planning their annual program. And so it was back in January when I perused the Audax Australia calendar searching for BMB qualifying rides. Two significant factors were at play -- 600km rides are rare enough animals; and I have transport issues to consider.
Anyway, the "Crazy Ride" on Saturday and Sunday, 13-14 May, stood out as having a 600 option among a full range of distances starting a 50km for nouveau randonneurs. And it was based at Lancefield, which was close enough to the north of metropolitan Melbourne that train services would get me quite close by.
What I didn't appreciate in the spiel in the Audax Australia calendar booklet was the small statement, "lots of hills", neatly tucked in with other interesting tidbits such as "lots of flat country" and "glorious scenery all the time".
To my surprise, seven entered the 600 event that comprised a number of out-and-back legs or loops from Lancefield. The town also is the home of organiser Andy Moore, and is popular as a hub for randonnee routes of varying difficulty.
I cobbled together my transport options (lift in a car to catch a bus to catch a train to catch another train to ride 25km from Riddells Creek) to the home of Andy and his wife, Glo, who had kindly offered me a bed for the Friday night.
Joining me at delightful Hotel de Moore (an adobe brick and timber home the couple built some years ago on 20 acres of open eucalypt bushland) were Kevin Ware whom I had met on the Dancing with Dinosaurs 300 on 1 April, and Chris Rogers who is organising my final Australian randonnee for 2006, the Stone the Crows 400 in Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, early in June.
After a brief chin-wag (Australian for chat) about various things randonnee, we headed for sleep.
The 600 started at the relatively late hour of 8.00am on the Saturday. At the minimum average speed of 15km/h, the finish time was midnight on Sunday. That put a bit of pressure on me personally as I wanted to retrace my transport steps and be back home and ready for work on Monday morning.
I planned scenarios of 20km/h, 17km/h and 15km/h. The 17km/h seemed the most likely to work. I had traversed sections of the route while touring last July and judging from my memory of the terrain, I felt reasonably confident I could make the deadlines.
The first half of the first out-and-back leg to the west and north reinforced my perception as I racked up an average around 23km/h. Had I looked more carefully at the maps, however, I would have seen that Lancefield is in a valley between two mountain ranges, and in particular the Macedon Ranges to the west.
The 600 start was combined with the 200, 300 and 400 starts, so there were plenty of riders who set off from the Lancefield Tennis Club. I dropped off the back almost immediately and rode for a while with a fellow Tasmanian working in Victoria, Dave Killick. I then went ahead when Dave said he would reduce his workrate a little, but we rejoined again shortly afterwards when a tiny error in the route instructions led me astray by a couple of kilometres. We seemed to float along through Kyneton (pronounced Kite-on) and the tiny township of Metcalfe towards Bendigo. I was buoyed by the thought that this could be a quite fast 600. The weather was cool, and occasionally the sun poked through the cloud.
The turnaround checkpoint was a 24-hour shop on the outskirts of Bendigo, and I gorged on various sweet things to restore my energy. This was a major mistake. Back on the bike, I struggled for three-quarters of the return to Lancefield; the cold headwind and the slight but constant increase in elevation made it seem like so much hard work. My body's energy processing system finally came on-stream as I passed through Carlsruhe and turned back eastward for the reasonably flat 20km to Lancefield.
As I pulled into the tennis club, I felt the first 200km was OK and I was optimistic. There was nothing to panic about as I looked at my average that still hung around 20+ km/h. But my earlier lack of energy seemed was a worry. I had experienced a similar feeling at the start of the Murray and Bacc 1000 at Easter. All I could do was hope to repeat what I did then -- ride myself into the event.
The second leg took us into the evening, and was another out-and-back with a little loop, but this time to the east... and that other mountain range. Again, a tiny glitch in the route instructions led me over 2km down the wrong road less than 1km after setting off. When I did get on the correct road, I started to appreciate that little phrase "lots of hills". Sadly, the onset of darkness and a heavy cloud cover that shut out the full moon, meant the other phrase, "glorious scenery" lost all its meaning. I stopped half way up the first hill to strip off some extra gloves and a headband to stop overheating. I didn't need any of that stuff again for the rest of the night. A trio of 300km riders passed me while I fiddled and we sort of leap-frogged each other for the rest of the evening. Our first destination was Kilmore, then we turned south to Wallan to start a circuit back to Kilmore via Wandong and Broadford.
Peter Moore, who runs the Victorian randonneur's favourite shop, Abbottsford Cycles in Richmond, organised the Great Southern 1200 in 2004, and did London-Edinburgh-London last year, was a welcome sight with his wife as a checkpoint at Wandong.
Broadford provided the only annoyance for the ride. A car pulled out ahead of me, did a U-turn and as it went past in the darkness, something flew past my left arm and landed with an egg-like splat on the road behind me. It unnerved me enough to be cautious of the first four or five cars that subsequently went passed me from behind. The last one was a police car, and by that time I was well beyond the town boundary, and the three lights of my fellow riders slowly came into view.
I casually mentioned the incident to Andy Moore after the event, but couldn't remember the town's name. He said Broadford, then went on to relate how two other riders had been assailed, one with a water bomb, the other with an apple that hit him on the right knee and caused enough of an injury to make him limp when walking. Andy said he intended to report the incident to police, as it similar ones had happened on previous rides.
Anyway, our little group made it back to Lancefield, having retraced the hills, and enjoyed the very fast final descent into the town. That was 300km down -- the halfway point. By this time, my plans for finishing early enough to make the train connections home were starting to slip away. The way Andy had planned the event, the 600 riders were meant to take a sleep break after 350km, and restart at 8.00am on Sunday. I knew that all things considered, I would have to be on the road well before then to have any hope of catching the train.
I considered my options as I set of for a "short and easy" 50km out-and-back leg with an early morning turnaround at Riddells Creek. It was a bit of a slog despite some flat, straight roads; a very cold headwind picked up slightly. After a road junction at Monegeeta, I saw a group of four other 600 riders heading back to Lancefield. I was a little surprised they were not so that ahead of me -- only about 12km. Unknown to me, but shortly afterwards, one of the group, Hans Dusink, the president of both Audax Australia and Les Randonneurs Mondiaux, suffered a puncture caused by broken glass that also slashed a tyre. This incident delayed the group for quite a while, and they were just settling down to sleep when I arrived back at Lancefield.
I decided then that I could afford about an hour's sleep, so I could be back on the road between 6.00 and 7.00am. When the alarm went off, I slept on for another 15 minutes, then slowly prepared to set off in the misty dawn for Woodend and Trentham (I had grabbed a half-hour nap at the end of 300km).
This is when I discovered how the title of this event was about to take hold. Unlike other departures from Lancefield, this one started almost immediately to ascend. My legs were leaden, and I wasn't overly enthusiastic about 10 minutes into it. My enthusiasm all but disappeared when I was confronted with a "wall" as I came around a corner. A wall... you know, an uphill that might only be 150 to 200 metres in length, but a crest that looms high above you. A wall that I estimate must have a threshold grade of 10%. I at least could be definite about 10% grades by now -- at Kilmore, the previous night, we rode down and up a hill that was signposted as such.
Well, things went from steep to steeper and more common. It hit me that I must indeed be crazy doing something like this when I passed a sign that mentioned Macedon Ranges. Up and down the route went, past the Pig and Whistle Hotel on a crossroads in the middle of nowhere, and onwards to Trentham, and a nice little cafe. This was the turnaround point. I had visited Trentham back in July -- the memory was readily restored when I spied the burnt-out shell of one of the pubs in the town. But I couldn't remember the hills so graphically.
I passed a small group of 100km riders as they headed into town while I headed out. Then came the 600 riders. The weather had taken a turn for the worse earlier as I climbed towards Trentham; the headwind remained cold and became stronger, and the mist turned to drizzle. Still, as I headed back to the Pig and Whistle and a turn to Kyneton, I could take advantage of a tailwind, and that definitely made climbing the backsides of the walls a little bit easier.
I dragged myself into Lancefield at the end of 450km. I was first in of the 600 riders! That was amazing for me, and internally I was quite thrilled. I hopefully asked Andy about the status of the hills for the remainder of the ride. Andy was not very optimistic. "More of the same, I'm afraid". Hmmm... I settled on the facts that (a) challenges like those on this ride were what randonnees were meant to be about and (b) I wasn't going to make the train connection nor make it to work on Monday morning. Oh well... I was enjoying myself too much to worry about dropping a day's pay.
The toughest set of hills were reserved for the last 100km out-and-back stage. A final 50km stage would come later, but that would be along that flat section between Lancefield and Carlsruhe. In our discussion on the status of the hills, Andy said Lancefield was around 400 metres above sea level; the maximum altitude in the Macedon Ranges we had topped was 750 metres; and Tallarook, the turnaround point on this next leg, was at 100 metres. "You are going up and down all the time, but dropping all the time on the way out to Tallarook, and then you have to climb all the way back up again," he said quietly and matter-of-factly.
And yes, it was tough. There was a big downhill of around 5km towards Tallarook that took out a big chunk of the altitude loss. There were more walls. And as darkness heralded Sunday evening, there was more cold wind and quite heavy rain.
I and the quartet of remaining 600 riders crossed just as I left Tallarook. Me still in the "lead"? Yes, remarkable as it might seem, I was. But I think the others took their full share of sleep time back at Lancefield early on Sunday morning and departed the checkpoint at 8.00am. Nevertheless, I was quite happy that I was doing well despite regular roadside stops to allow my legs to revitalise themselves. And I was thankful for my low granny gear as each consecutive wall appeared. Actually, the thought crossed my mind on several occasions that except for a clean and polish, I had done nothing to the bike since the 1000 at Easter -- not even lubricated the chain -- and that it had served me well again on this event.
I kept myself occupied listening to various radio programs, ranging from Australian Rules football matches to politics to religion, and towards the end of this section, counted down the kilometres of remaining hills. I was thankful when the final long and very fast downhill on a slick road surface was finished, and I could make my way into Lancefield... into driving rain. Right then, I thought "Hooray for my brand new booties".
The final stage was only 34km. That was 17km out and back on the Carlsruhe road. It wasn't a fast run, but I was exhilarated by two things -- I was close to finishing, and I crossed the other 600 riders with around a 50-minute buffer!
I crawled into the tennis club and almost fell off the bike as I stopped. Idiot! What a way that would have been to finish a significant ride.
I handed over my brevet card as Andy tended to revitalising food and drink. I then curled up in my sleeping bag on a sofa and dozed as I waited for the others to finish. Hans commented that I had NOT finished last. Yay! I've handed over my lantern rouge mantle! My fitness and overall speed must be improving. My elapsed time was 38 hours 13 minutes. Less than two hours may not be a generous period within the 40-hour maximum, but I think reflects the difficulty of the event. Certainly, all the other finishers rated it as difficult. I was asked to rate it, and gave it 8 out of 10. I thought of how English randonnees have been described to me, and this Crazy Ride seemed very similar.
Technically, I think I have now qualified for BMB with 200, 300 and 600 rides, and the Murray and Bacc 1000 substituting for the 400. That remains to be confirmed by the BMB organiser, Jennifer Wise. Irrespective, I would like to do Chris' Stone the Crows 400 for several reasons on 3 June -- it would give me my second Super Randonnee award; cover roads and areas new to me; give me a full qualifying set of randonnees for BMB; and despite the cost, allow me to ride the XPT fast train between Melbourne and Wagga Wagga (I like travelling on trains).
As far as the 600 is concerned, I am glad now I did it (even though I had serious doubts about my sanity during it). It was a great training ride for BMB at the very least, and best of all enabled me to get to know a few more Australian randonneurs. Oh, and not finishing last (in fact, finishing FIRST!) was a pleasure that warmed me no end :-)
Finally, a thanks to Andy and his helpers, including his brothers Barry and Peter and Peter's wife, Maria Plumer, and others who attended to the riders' every whim on food and drinks at the Lancefield checkpoints. Maria's husband, Scott, did the 300 option after recovering from a knee injury sustained on the Murray and Bacc 1000 when he came off crossing wet railway lines. He's a strong, young rider and streaked away from the other 300 riders right from the start.
Anyway, the Crazy Ride is thoroughly recommended.
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