septo de mayo

Al collected me and we rode to Steves for 9am start. hubby, andrew tony and steve were already in attendance, and pete turned up shortly thereafter. we headed up rapaki. good pace all the way up. i was a little ahead of the group when i turned and saw a guy passing them, so i took off at a slightly faster pace, just to keep him on his toes, he eventually caught me and overtook, but i stayed on him the rest of the way up. i was feeling a bit overhung, tired, from two shortnights sleep. cold and windy up top, overcast day, from the south. rode left along the summit trail, donned my jacket on the road section. bombed it down the castle rock section. interestingly greasy down through there, with just slightly damp dirt, which carried from tire to rock so's to make for a more technical ride. good pace along road to Britten Reserve, new section in there needs a wee bit work, it just doesnt quite flow yet. then breezed down road onto Richmond hill singletrack... fun. greasy. quite a few dabs, one near shoulder barge with a rockface when the rocks i was skittering on got too skittery, then most of the way down, i feel like i've bent my brake lever, but no, slowly my handlebars are twisting back (the other day when i tried out my mary bars i obviously didnt quite torque the clamp up enough and now i'm paying for it...) riding got harder and harder as my handlbars became more and more swayed back. levers getting more and more horizontal. we stopped in the Macrocarpa at Evans for foodsnacks and pete's twisted chain link removal and my handlebar reallignment (i got to test out my new multi tool multi5 received as gift for subscribing to Spoke magazine last month).

then off out godley trail. after first climb pete's chain pin had started to poke out so we stopped again and they used a proper pin. then it was fantastic downhill, trail drier out there. next climb and then down to breeze col. decided just to drop it down to taylors.

Anaconda... wickeeeed. couple of other riders had taken off ahead, we'd given them a bit of a head start, but me in the lead soon caught one of them, and on the first right hand sweeper i caught him after a jump and juuuuust about lost the front wheel, washed out a bit, and i found myself heading off the track, so i just held on and cut out a big corner, taking my place ahead of him, and just let it go, screamed down popping excellent air on every jump. caught the next guy on the big long sweeper that i crashed on another time, sat on his tail a bit but he wasnt moving over, so i paused to watch pete and the others behind catch up a bit, then i hammered on and caught that guy again before the bottom. sweeeeeeet spin. then the grind out of taylors. nichelson park, coffee at .com and the long slog home...