Gold Coast via Tamborine

One night this week Jenny asked me what ride the Southbank Bunch was doing. “Redcliffe”, I replied, suspicion in my voice.

“Oh”, she said. “You don’t really like that ride, do you?”

“Well actually I was looking forward to a long flat ride with my friends after the hills of Tour de Dave”

“I just thought that Saturday might be a nice day for the family to go to the coast, maybe you could ride down and meet us.”

And so a plan was formulated. I am keen to keep working on improving my form on the bike and so I wanted to clock up some km’s. I weighed up riding straight down and then later riding home, but eventually decided on a longer ride down. There are various alternatives to straight down the V1 to Southport. I elected to go via Mt Tamborine. It has a 7km climb that is steady and achievable (for me) on the road up from Tamborine Village. So even though the 91km route is significantly shorter than a “ride in-Redcliffe-ride home” SBB ride I thought I should get a pretty good workout.

This is the route from my place to Southport. it can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/62ujf2g

I left home at 6:00am, lights on and wearing arm warmers as the morning was fresh. The forecast was for a fine day with light to moderate southerly breezes in the morning. I was a little surprised at how low my average speed was for the first couple of hours on the bike (about 23km/h) as I would have thought that TdD should have given me some extra horsepower. I am often slow at the start of a ride with a hill in it, I seem to psyche myself out a bit and overdo the conserving of energy.

Between Tamborine Village and the start of the climb I had an unusual incident. I was rolling down a small hill at about 35km/h, in a world of my own, probably solving the world’s problems, when my left peripheral sensed movement. I turned my head and saw a medium sized wallaby eyeball to eyeball coming flat out straight at me. It saw me just as it was pushing off on another tremendous bound out onto the road, and it was able to adjust its trajectory enough to sail past behind me. The incident took less than a second but for me and skippy there was a whole lot of our life crammed into that instant. I was still a bit shaky 2 minutes later when a bunch of 4 fit looking cyclists called out to me as they whizzed past. I almost jumped out of my skin.

The arm warmers came off at the bottom of the climb and my heart and head did battle for the 1^st km of the climb. To me it seems that the gradient gets easier once you hit the long sweeping bends about 3km up. I settled into more of a rhythm and was able to change up a couple of gears in the second half of the climb. I was conscious of the 10.00am rendezvous with the family and so kept going once I had finished the climb. There are a couple of nasty steep bits on the Tamborine plateau, but once through them it was onto a fantastic 3 stage descent. I had a vague plan that today I would pass my personal 15 year old fastest speed on a bike (83km/h). I did this on an aluminium framed Trek hybrid riding this same descent back when my parents lived at Tamborine and I used to frequent the district more often.

I achieved speeds in the 70’s for the first 2 downhills, but cars held me up a bit. For the really big descent I checked that I had some clear road in front of me, then tucked in on the steep, rough (no holes, just heavily textured) road and hung on for grim death. I found visibility a problem as my eyes were watering. About halfway down I moved my hands to the hoods and glanced at the speedo. 84km/h. The corner was approaching and through my tears I could see brake lights. Give it a couple more seconds and then trust in the Campag Record brakes to do their thing. It is like a base jumper knowing when to pull the ‘chute.  I was behind a car for the rest of the roll down the mountain. I check of the stats showed 85km/h max. A real thrill for me but as Margie tweeted to me later it was a good job the roo didn’t jump out during that descent! No doubt more experienced downhillers could get a lot more out of that descent but on the day it was good enough for me.

From the bottom of the hill to Oxenford are some rolling hills and one mongrel 12% hillock that I had to stop on for a breather. After Oxenford it was a flat 22km around Hope Island and onto the tourist strip. Once on the flat I felt my legs come back a bit, although my backside had decided that the ride should already be over. A piece of metal through the back tyre 5km out from the finish held me up for 8 minutes and then I was at Southport, rolling around the foreshore and looking for my beloved.

Ride stats: 91km, 21.5km/h average, 6:00am start 10:30am finish. Top speed 85km/h. Tamborine climb 38 minutes.

What a beautiful day it was. The smaller kids and I had a swim, they played on the wonderful facilities in the park across from Australia Fair, we had Red Rooster for lunch at Main Beach, we went  into SeaWorld for a few hours looking at the penguins and the seal show, and also Renee and I tried out one of the new rides. Jenny did the drive home and we had a good chance to catch up with each other. All in all a top day. And at night Nick O’Donnell showed me how to make a profile chart from a google map, no Garmin or anything!

Tour de Dave 2011, riding in heaven

I had a ride this long weekend worthy of an attempted story. Le Tour de Dave is a 4 day spin for road cycling enthusiasts who are in some way connected to Dave Clarke. My own contact with Dave is through the Southbank Bunch who ride every Saturday morning, but Dave is now in the bike shop business and has a wide and diverse congregation of friends and associates. Fund raising is involved for the Endeavour Foundation and the spirit of the ride seems to be that participants enjoy great company, scenery, food, laughs and a significant physical challenge.

I loved the nervous excitement as a petri of personalities, riders from previous years and first timers mingled and began to get to know each other at Dave’s shop. We rolled out into a persistent southerly breeze. It was to be in our face for the next two days. Groups worked with varying success at gelling and riding together. Navigation and group cohesion gave many of us opportunity for personal growth on the first day. I finished at 5:20pm after 138km, the last rider into Beaudesert. I was very tired and had been battling cramps for the last 50 kilometres. As I sat in front of my T bone at the RSL that evening I put my head in my hands and wondered how I could possibly ride tomorrow, over the range at the Mt Lindsay border down to NSW. I opened my eyes and my friend Les was smiling at me, shaking his head. It clicked to me that tomorrow didn’t matter. I was out with people who are the best.

I really struggled the next morning.  I was hiding on the back of group 3, wiggling around in my seat trying to find a less painful spot for my chaffed bottom. At 50km the start of the climb was actually a relief as I could stand up a bit. Magnesium tablets supplied by the Barley’s seemed to keep the cramps at bay. I crawled over the top of the range and rolled down to Grevillia to take over driving duties. I felt happy with my performance for the day. The groups showed much better discipline and enjoyed tight bunch riding down the scenic valley of the Richmond River to Casino for our second night. The Hong Kong Chinese Restaurant provided a bargain banquet for a happy and noisy bunch that had conquered 150km for the day.

Keen to see whether the couple of days riding had done my legs any good, I jumped on the front with Dave for the 1^st 10km out of Casino. I climbed over Naughton’s Gap not last and feeling like it would be a good day. The ride north towards Nimbin is probably the prettiest leg of the whole tour. The extended wet season that we have experienced has given the countryside a magnificent green plumage. I don’t like Nimbin, where we had a stop for coffee; I feel a pretence about the place. The climb over Blue Knob saw me last up the hill again, but some judicial wheel sucking saw me finish the day with energy still in my legs. Murwillumbah. Yay! To celebrate I went for a walk down town and found a massage therapist. My legs were a bit tender however they enjoyed some hot rock massage technique and a lymphatic drainage treatment that I had never had before. It was the final night together for the tourists and a hefty meal of pizza at the Flamingo Restaurant probably undid the health benefits of the sublime 100km leg.

Many of the riders had been sweating about the Natural Arch climb on the last day’s stint to Nerang. I had dealt with my own concerns by pretending the Tuesday would never come. It was a pleasant surprise for me to find that a driver was needed for the 1^st half of the day and I gladly accepted the role. It was good that I did. The steep incline at the end of the climb looked menacing from my position behind the last rider. You get to know something of the character of a person when you watch them push themselves to their ultimate physical capacity. My hat is off to Richard Baker who was the last of the brave riders to breach the gap. Great determination.

I was on the bike for the next 40km down to Nerang via a seemingly never ending series of short sharp climbs. My legs received a final flogging. The sandwich stop 5km out of Nerang was blissful. I watched a group of still enthusiastic riders set off for the full circuit all the way back to Graceville Bike Hub and then I joined the more mortal riders on a rapid train journey back to the city.

My friends know and love me for who I am. This is nice and I try to reciprocate. But I am not happy with a few things. I cannot blame my poor form on simple lack of training or having too full a life. I was the heftiest participant on the ride by some margin and it doesn’t have to be that way. I don’t want my mates to have to wait for me at the top of hills or pace themselves to accommodate the big happy guy. I feel ready to change a few things in my life and would like to set a goal of doing this ride next year in the first group. What is disappointing is that I have worked hard in the past and found that kind of form but for various reasons I have let it slip away. I need to find a way of maintaining the appropriate lifestyle. I guess having a goal is a good start.

Andrew is a wonderful roommate for me and I think long exposure has given him some immunity to my more banal characteristics. I look forward to being a more compatible riding partner for him in our escapades to come. I also met some new friends on this ride and got to know some old friends much better.

In winding up this reflection I would like to thank Dave for his vision and leadership. The Tour de Dave is a wonderful concept and he shows great maturity and aplomb in managing the event. He has a way of relating with everybody that is warm and genuine, and he shows a generous spirit. Les Hewett plotted a seamless event. We were always in the right place at the right time with the right resources. God put creation on show for us and Les was the tour guide. People with the ability to plan, stay organised, disciplined and serve others with a smile on their dial are the people I admire and want to hang with.