Graperide

Another race done and dusted with another PB in the bag!! This has been a stunning season of racing so far!!

Well I had a pretty simple race plan for Graperide - go hard from the start and just go for it, ie leave it all out on the road!!

Last year was the first time I did this ride and I wasn't sure how hard it would be, to be fair I had also never ridden 100kms at the time so I took it pretty easy at the start so I would be able to make it.

This year my fitness and ability has improved outta sight so I knew that even if I thrashed myself at the start I would still be able to make it over those hills and to the finish line.

I was at the start line with one of Geoff's friends so that was cool to have someone to chat to at the start, I was planning to try and hang on to Nathan for as long as I could as I knew he was considerably stronger than I am, he had a bad crash a few weeks ago tho so wasn't near as fast as he could have been.

As the bunch turned onto the main road after leaving the vineyard they took off so I had to put in a fair bit of effort straight away so that I could stay with them but figured that a bit of effort now would pay off if I could stay with a decent bunch. The effort was well worth it as the bunch was working really well and communicating well when they slowed up etc so I was feeling pretty safe and happy in there which was good. I was a bit nervous about the bunches as I haven't done a lot of bunch riding lately and it was the first time I had ridden the Wilier in a cycle race. The bunch was huge until we got just past Blenheim and then it split in half and Nathan was in the front half and up the road while I was in the back half of the bunch, still there were lots of big strong guys around who seemed to be more than happy to share the bulk of the work between them. I started eating about now, we were about 30mins into the race and I knew that if I didn't eat then things would go bad esp as we were getting along the road at a really good pace, pace was feeling good tho, not too hard but certainly hard enough that I knew I was working, I checked my HR a couple of times and it was generally in the 150's while we were cycling along the flats. The first hill hits you just before Picton and that certainly seemed to sort a few people out on the way up although the bunch re-grouped after the descent into Picton. Got to Picton in an hour and 6mins which is pretty good as it just on 40kms to Picton. Then you really get into the hills and they were fun!! Really they were!! Last year I wasn't fond of hills and my climbing ability was rather limited in hindsight!! This year, I was literally dancing on my pedals and cruising past heaps of people on the climbs, wow that is an awesome feeling passing people on the climbs!! Yay!! To be fair a number of people caught me again on the descents as I don't descend uber-fast as I would rather get to the bottom of the hill a few seconds slower and get there in one piece!! The challenge was getting in with a good bunch again for the next flat section. One guy had the right idea trying to get everyone working together for short stints at the front. it was just a bugger that when he got to the front he was too strong for the rest of us and the bunch of about 20 became a bunch of about 5 with me desperately clinging on to the back of the 5!! Hmmmm, life got hard at that point as we had a nasty headwind now that stayed with us for the rest of the ride!! Last year we had a tailwind at the same point which was much much nicer!! One last wee hill thru Havelock and then you can just about smell the finish!! The 10km to go sign was a welcome thing, 5kms rocked up pretty quick. At the last wee climb just up from there I took off in my big chain ring and got in front of the bunch and managed to catch a girl up the road and sat in on her until the last km where I dug deep and took off for the finish line. I think I must have dragged everyone with me as a couple of the guys commended me on my ride to the end! Oh well, they helped me out enough during the race so fair's fair!! I did go up and shake one guys hand and thank him as he was regularly a very convenient windbreak when I needed one!

So total time was: 03:14:23 and I am stoked with that as last year I did: 03:34:28. A 20min improvement on what everyone reckons was a much harder ride than last year with that wind is pretty blimmin fantastic in my book! Woohoo, on to Brunner this weekend now!!