A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Wed Oct 24, 2018 3:53 pm

25 is the absolute max on this frame unfortunately, crazy considering my TT bike can take a 28 on the rear. I've got a nice looking DBR Criterium off roadside collection sitting in the shed, if it can take 28s I'll build it up. For a cheap ally frame the Vivente rides really nicely though.
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby singlespeedscott » Wed Oct 24, 2018 8:02 pm

My old DBR criterium could only fit 24mm tyres. Plus it was an uninspiring dog on the climbs.
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Thu Oct 25, 2018 12:24 pm

Quickly checked it this morning, will take 28 on the back. The forks are ugly aluminium ones, so I'll see if I've got some carbon to swap. I'll take it for a spin first before putting any time/money into it, learnt that lesson way too many times :)
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby 10speedsemiracer » Thu Oct 25, 2018 3:07 pm

ldrcycles wrote:Quickly checked it this morning, will take 28 on the back. The forks are ugly aluminium ones, so I'll see if I've got some carbon to swap. I'll take it for a spin first before putting any time/money into it, learnt that lesson way too many times :)
I refurbished a Vivente Como roadie for someone a little while ago. Surprisingly decent bike but 25mm was the most I could squeeze in at front. 28mm Vittoria rubbed radially on brake caliper...which was a shame as 28s would have looked awesome and given a bit more comfort. Rider though was light and compact so 25's didn't really pose an issue. Not sure if the Como is similar to your Vivente but was very similar to the only other Vivente roadie I've seen, a Rosa.
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Sat Oct 27, 2018 1:50 pm

It's surprising just how complete the absence of information on those bikes is, no mention whatsoever on Vivente's website. It's a basic off the shelf aluminium frame, but it's reasonably light and has a good turn of speed. And hey it was free! :D

I was flat out yesterday, so only had time to go up Gyndier once on the DBR, but that was enough to confirm that it's a good bike. It has a particularly tight/stiff feel to it, but not to the point of being lifeless. Needs narrower bars, a shorter stem, fatter tyres, a new chain and a VERY good dose of elbow grease, but I'm keen to get her shipshape.


I woke up this morning feeling quite out of sorts, and it took a few hours to realise that it wasn't gastro or somesuch, just my subconcious having a panic about the prospect of my back giving trouble tomorrow. Once I worked that out, things settled just fine. I had another massage yesterday, I've been doing plenty of stretching, so it's out of my hands now and when things are out of my hands I don't worry about them (generally speaking). I'm excited for this ride, sure there are a MILLION opportunities for trouble, but if all goes according to plan it should be a great ride.

The schedule-

Leave Gympie 1am
Cooroy 2:34
Nambour 3:39
Landsborough 4:45
Caboolture 5:51
Petrie 6:42
Brisbane GPO 7:40

The current record for Gympie-Brisbane is 9:05:45, and Landsborough-Brisbane is 3:02:41. As well as popping gels and such along the way I'll be stopping at the Landsborough Post Office for a good feed before starting the last leg.
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby foo on patrol » Sun Oct 28, 2018 4:14 pm

The youngin has taken it! 8)

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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Thu Nov 01, 2018 6:24 pm

Apparently it is summer NOW and work has exploded overnight, hence no proper write up yet. I will get there, in the meantime how about the entire sports page of the Gympie Times :shock: I did not expect that!



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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby 10speedsemiracer » Thu Nov 01, 2018 6:35 pm

ldrcycles wrote:Apparently it is summer NOW and work has exploded overnight, hence no proper write up yet. I will get there, in the meantime how about the entire sports page of the Gympie Times :shock: I did not expect that!



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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby marty_one » Mon Nov 05, 2018 1:51 pm

ldrcycles wrote:Apparently it is summer NOW and work has exploded overnight, hence no proper write up yet.
Im guessing the work load is still kinda insane at the moment.
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Wed Nov 07, 2018 12:48 pm

And then some! Hopefully I'll find time to bash away at the keyboard this evening.

As an example of the busyness-


I need a slasher, but I can't afford one so took a mower off roadside collection, plus some scrap pieces of steel and a few bolts


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Before-

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After-


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And using the wee Getz in place of a tractor- https://www.facebook.com/lachlanpinto.d ... 351689738/
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby piledhigher » Wed Nov 07, 2018 1:38 pm

ldrcycles wrote:And then some! Hopefully I'll find time to bash away at the keyboard this evening.

As an example of the busyness-


I need a slasher, but I can't afford one so took a mower off roadside collection, plus some scrap pieces of steel and a few bolts


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That somewhere between awesome and horrific!

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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby find_bruce » Wed Nov 07, 2018 3:57 pm

Not a good day to wear the safety thongs. Ironically its probably safer than most farm machinery, because it just screams "DANGER"

We used to cut firewood on the hobby farm with a PTO driven table saw that looked a lot like this

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No danger of complacency - it was absolutely terrifying

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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby RobertL » Wed Nov 07, 2018 4:05 pm

piledhigher wrote: That somewhere between awesome and horrific!
So's the video of the Getz! :shock: :shock: :shock:

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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Thu Nov 08, 2018 11:02 am

find_bruce wrote:Not a good day to wear the safety thongs. Ironically its probably safer than most farm machinery, because it just screams "DANGER"
Oh yea PPE galore for this job! Number one is a dust mask, it generates a huge amount of dry, dusty, dead grass fibres which are very unpleasant to breathe in.



Still no post on Gympie-Brisbane, after doing 4 hill repeats at Tinbeerwah last night (which went very well) I drove off with my Garmin on the roof :oops: . Half an hour of searching the roadside yielded no result, so I'll have to get my hands on a new GPS today :cry:
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby foo on patrol » Fri Nov 09, 2018 10:16 am

find_bruce wrote:Not a good day to wear the safety thongs. Ironically its probably safer than most farm machinery, because it just screams "DANGER"

We used to cut firewood on the hobby farm with a PTO driven table saw that looked a lot like this

Image

No danger of complacency - it was absolutely terrifying
Pfffft. We used to cut wood on a blade that big, with a 186 Holden motor and 3sp box still connected and ya think that baby didn't whistle. :lol: :lol: :lol:

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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby 10speedsemiracer » Fri Nov 09, 2018 10:44 am

foo on patrol wrote:...

Pfffft. We used to cut wood on a blade that big, with a 186 Holden motor and 3sp box still connected and ya think that baby didn't whistle. :lol: :lol: :lol:

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I'm guessing that 186/3sp only worked on redgum... :lol:
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Fri Nov 09, 2018 1:20 pm

OK I'll have to tap this out quickly on my lunch break otherwise I won't get a chance before the Toogoolawah ride tomorrow.

I was up at 11:45 as planned, my dad's alarm didn't go off though so we got to Gympie a little later than scheduled. As I got things ready there were a few people wandering home from the night time establishments, and as one group came past a somewhat less than sober bloke said "What are you doing on your bike at 1 in the morning?!" Breaking the record to Brisbane, says I, which got a somewhat stunned "woah. Oh yea socks man!" It turned out we were both wearing the red and white McDonalds fundraiser socks :lol:

So at 1:07am we set off, and as I headed down Mary Street the chain overshifted the big ring and came off :? . I've never had an issue with the Vivente before, and it took me a good few hours (and a few more chain drops) to realise it was down to the very small amount of material removed from the BB shell when it was faced. Just enough to have the indexing slightly out, but with a more careful shift it worked fine.

The forecast tailwind never appeared, but I still ticked along nicely with dead still air. The moon was so bright I turned all my headlights off through Kybong, and just enjoyed the peace and quiet. After passing through Cooroy I gently spun my way up the first significant hills, and happily flew down to Eumundi at ~60kmh.

The slightly lumpy road through to Yandina took a bit of effort, and as I headed towards Nambour some dark creatures started muttering negative things. I've certainly had niggling thoughts of failure on rides before (as I'm sure all riders have), but this is the first time I can remember those thoughts taking a physical form, and I wasn't happy to see them. A sharp yell made them quiet, but they still sat around watching me.

While the temperature was nice and cool, the sky high humidity had me sweating torrents, so I made a quick stop on the outskirts of Nambour to grab another water bottle and start eating a Clif bar. I kept my careful pace on the hills, using the triple cranks to full effect. I can only take on food while descending, and as I came down into Palmwoods I tried to finish off the Clif bar and struggled with a gag reflex, as though my throat muscles were cramping. I've not experienced that before, but managed to finish eating as I turned towards Eudlo.

Again, more climbs, and again I carefully measured out my effort. The infamous Wall just south of Eudlo (signposted at 17% and maxing in the 20% range) saw me down to just 5kmh, with the sweat flowing like it was the middle of the day. The descent on the other side is a great reward though, and I narrowly dodged an owl as the first pale light started to appear on the horizon.

Through to Landsborough I started to fade just a little, the pace on the flat dropping to around 29kmh. I reached the Post Office in 3hr47 and hopped off the bike for a rest and more food. Unfortunately that gagging stopped me from having more than a very small amount of solid food, but I had easily enough gels on hand that I could keep the calories up. I'd matched the last Kin Kin rider's effort in reaching Landsborough (Gilbert McAndrew in 1939), now it was time to go one better.

Down Steve Irwin Way again, and it was immediately clear the extended rest stop had worked wonders, I was humming along beautifully. I was going so well it wasn't until I passed through Beerwah that I suddenly realised the "night creatures" were gone, and I actually cried with relief. The happy mood I started with was back in force, and I made great time through Elimbah to Caboolture. The miles started to tell on the few short climbs, as my legs were getting a little sore and the speed was easing back a little, but on the flats and downhills I was still getting along very well.

Nothing is ever perfect though, and disaster struck in Bald Hills. The street sign was missing on an intersection where I had to turn to keep on Gympie Road, and I didn't realise until we were past the last intersection before the highway. I could just hop over the median strip to turn around, but dad in the observer car had no choice but to continue onto the motorway and make a long circle back. In all, that detour cost a whopping 34 minutes, and completely destroyed my tilt at the Landsborough-Brisbane record. If the street sign had been in place, I would have broken that record by about a quarter of an hour, so it was a bitter pill to swallow.

I still had plenty of time in hand for the big prize though, and we got back on track and focused our sights on the GPO. Even though it was only 7:30 on a Sunday morning, the traffic on Gympie Arterial Road was quite heavy, and even with the observer car shepherding me through it wasn't particularly pleasant. Especially as one section required me to ride in the middle of 5 lanes, and I had to wind up to 46kmh to get through as quickly as possible. Traffic aside, there were no other issues, and as I came across Turbot Street the downhill along Edward Street looked like the holy grail and I let rip. If the local constabulary is reading this, I'm quite certain the GPS was confused by the skyscrapers, and I wasn't really doing 23kmh over the speed limit...

I swung around the corner onto Queen Street, and pulled up at the GPO with a time of 7h22m27s, an hour and 43 minutes ahead of the old record of 9:05:45! As usual, there was no welcoming party, just a quick photo with the bike over my head as a few people walked past, barely noticing. Not exactly the glamorous fame and fortune of the 1930s!

Like I said in the newspaper article, it's easily the best ride I've ever done over that sort of distance, and the number one reason is pacing myself perfectly. No heroics (like the Goat Track hey Scott!), no wasted energy, just a consistent, carefully measured effort. The solid food issue forced me to have gels on a regular basis, and that definitely played a part, as normally I have larger amounts of food less frequently.

I'm incredibly happy with how I rode, but the disappointment at the time lost in Bald Hills still burns a fortnight later, and I'm determined to avenge it as soon as possible.



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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby singlespeedscott » Fri Nov 09, 2018 3:13 pm

An awesome effort mate and a great write up. It's good to see you improving your pacing these days :)

With all these minutes lost on missed turns I really think you need to undertake a recce in the car before your attempts. Either that or get a GPS with some turn based indicators.
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Fri Nov 09, 2018 3:32 pm

So just to keep you up to date, I'm heading down to Brisneyland after work this evening, leaving the GPO at 4:30 tomorrow morning. I want to lower my records for Bris-Toogoolawah, Ipswich-Esk, and Ipswich-Toogoolawah, but the main goal is breaking the Brisbane-Esk. It was set at 3h56m back in February 1948 by a Kevin Cassidy, and if it hadn't been for the wrong turn in Sherwood last time, I would have beaten it by about 2 minutes. I'm aiming for an average of at least 28kmh, which is not insubstantial with the number of hills and rough surfaces involved, and that would give me the record by only 2.5 minutes, so not much breathing room over 109kms.

I'll be on the Vivente this time as I think it will be a better fit for the route than the Shiv. The big help this time round is NO HEADWIND!! (fingers, toes, and every other appendage firmly crossed, touch wood &c!) Current forecast is for south to south easterly winds, which should be perfect. PLEASE PLEASE let it be a tailwind!


@Scott, at least I'm in good company there, Oppy took wrong turns too :) . That's supposed to be the point of having someone in the following car with a turn by turn route description, but obviously that hasn't done the trick yet. I did actually drive the entire Bris-Toogoolawah course before I rode it, but things look different from the bike in the early morning. Both myself and dad are just going to obsessively study the route beforehand, as my GPS is only a basic one.

On that note, I picked up a replacement for the lost Garmin yesterday. Unfortunately, time and money constraints meant I ended up with a Bryton :? I've tested it in the car and it does track and upload etc without issue, but the interface is very poor. It took half an hour of stuffing around with an app on Mrs LDR's phone (mine has one app on it and that's all it can handle) to get the thing to display average speed, and it can't be manually paused like the Garmin 200 could (which was ideal for red lights, so I didn't have to dredge through the data later on to work out the correct record time). Still it will have to do.
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby RobertL » Fri Nov 09, 2018 3:35 pm

singlespeedscott wrote:An awesome effort mate and a great write up. It's good to see you improving your pacing these days :)

With all these minutes lost on missed turns I really think you need to undertake a recce in the car before your attempts. Either that or get a GPS with some turn based indicators.
Maybe just a good look at the intersections in Google streetview.

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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Wed Nov 14, 2018 10:26 pm

No rundown on Toogoolawah yet, as I've been wearing myself out with the nightmare machine again. Gets good results though :)



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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby Lukeyboy » Wed Nov 14, 2018 11:17 pm

singlespeedscott wrote:Your long ride looks pretty good mate. Nobody uses 23mm tyres anymore mate. See if you can squeeze some 28mm ones in the frame. That way you won’t careless about the road turning to dirt.
Lots still do. Sold 6 of them alone today. And bikes with wider rims are helping this. For example a 23c on some rims now measure close to a 25c. Downside is that if you puncture you better slow quickly to prevent the rim from striking the ground.

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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby marty_one » Thu Nov 15, 2018 9:41 am

ldrcycles wrote:I've been wearing myself out with the nightmare machine again. Gets good results though :)

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Think we need to see a video of this toe murdering machine in action to truly grasp the monstrosity you have created!

:D
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Thu Nov 15, 2018 8:46 pm

marty_one wrote: Think we need to see a video of this toe murdering machine in action to truly grasp the monstrosity you have created!

:D
Will do :lol:
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Re: A year in the life of a wannabe racer- Part 4- The Comeback!

Postby ldrcycles » Fri Nov 16, 2018 7:01 pm

After an uneventful trip down to Brisbane I settled in to a comfy hotel bed in Kangaroo Point, only to wake up an hour later. And then another hour after that, and so on, until it was 3:15am :cry: On the plus side, that meant we were at the GPO with plenty of time to spare after I sent us the wrong way on Elizabeth Street (in my defence, I had been studying the record route, not how to get to the start line! :lol: ). The forecast southeasterly was blowing and was mighty cold, but once on the bike the temperature was quite pleasant.



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With the Gympie-Brisbane success in mind, I took a very relaxed attitude to the first few hills, and being on the Vivente rather than the Shiv made the first large climb out of Oxley station much more pleasant than last time. Through to Ipswich the wind was coming across me from the front, but it was mild enough not to hinder the speed much. I took one break from the softly softly approach to race a truck on a downhill stretch around Dinmore, and had a big grin on my face as I held him up to about 55kmh :) . Not too much of that sort of lark though!

I reached the Ipswich Post Office in about 1:34, for context, the Brisbane-Ipswich record is 1:06, set by Les Cecil on his way to Toowoomba and back! :shock: I turned more northerly towards Fernvale and with the breeze at my back the speed ticked up a little. I kept plenty in reserve though, fearing the big climb on the western side of Wivenhoe Dam.

After a great deal of stuffing around with the Bryton, I had managed to get it to display average speed, as I find it easier to track my progress with that than time checks. The target was 28kmh, leaving Fernvale I was beaming as the display ticked over to 29.6, a kilometre later it was 29.7, then just before the climb to the dam it briefly touched 29.8 :mrgreen: .




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The view at the dam is incredible, which is lucky as it takes the mind off the diabolical surface on the shoulder, especially directly over the spillway. There wasn't too much traffic though, so I was able to ride to the right of the fog line to avoid the worst of it. It was time for the big climb, and it took me a moment to realise I was floating up it. "Dancing on the pedals" would definitely be a stretch, but I was doing a reasonable pace without any struggle, and as I neared the top I happened to look down and saw I was still in the big ring!
Obviously headwind+TT bike+poor pacing is going to be a big difference to tailwind+roady+careful pace but I wasn't expecting it to be that good.

Unfortunately from there on the road deteriorates quite a bit, with "reverse potholes" on the fog line that look like miniature mountain ranges. The traffic was getting up a little too, and while there were no dangerous passes (as one should hope when there's an observer car with flashing lights and a CYCLIST AHEAD sign), there were more than a few that I would call inconsiderate.

Up the final rise before Esk I started to struggle a bit, but the quick descent into town perked me up again, and I shook my fist as I went past the post office. I was aiming to take 2.5 minutes off the Brisbane-Esk record of 3:56:00, I ended up with a time of 3:41:13, nearly 15 minutes faster! The buzz from that helped as my legs (and in turn, lower back) started to tighten up towards Toogoolawah. I swept over the last downhill towards town, into Cressbrook Street (dodging the mongrel magpie), and a last burst up Fulham Street had me at the finish.



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I was hoping to get my previous time of 5:08:28 down to 4:45:00, I actually managed 4:19:47, nearly 50 minutes better! :mrgreen:
Ipswich-Esk came down nearly 17 minutes to 2:10:33, and Ipswich-Toogoolawah down nearly 40 minutes to 2:48:07 (which illustrates just how slowly I crawled from Esk to Toogoolawah on the last ride).

I'm absolutely delighted with that result, with the limited amount of training I can squeeze in that's about as good as it gets.

The first stop afterwards was the showgrounds, where Google said there were showers for campers. I wasn't a camper, but after hadning a few dollars to the caretaker I had a fantastic shower and we headed back into town for a chinwag with the locals at the markets, then over to the pub for a magnificent chicken schnitzel.



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Two of those (complete with little pitcher of warm gravy!) and two drinks for about $33 all up :mrgreen:


We then headed over to the art gallery (housed in the last remaining building from the condensed milk factory that brought Toogoolawah into being) for the opening of their Armistice Centenary exhibition. The president of the local historical society had told me to come along after my last record ride, and she's not the sort of lady you say no to! The exhibition was excellent, and there was a great turnout.


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The highlight for me though, was a couple of WW1 era bikes! The owner was there and a good hour flew past talking about all things 2 wheeled. The first bike is a 1917 Harley-Davidson, and what I first thought was a CO2 inflator under the top tube turned out to be a Harley-Davidson FIRE EXTINGUISHER! :shock: That alone would be worth a small fortune, the bike being in amazing condition complete with H-D chain ring, saddle, frame bag and said extinguisher is priceless.


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So a wonderful day all told!

This Sunday is the last record attempt for the year, I wanted to have another go at Gympie-Brisbane, but the wind is in the wrong direction for that, and Brisbane-Gympie didn't appeal for some reason. My next thought was Lismore-Brisbane, but navigating on non-motorways from Coolangatta to the Brisbane GPO is not the work of a moment, and I shifted my attention to Toowoomba-Dalby. That looked like a fine ride, but getting there would be a bit of a bother, and then I came across Gympie-Maryborough.

It goes in the right direction to have a following breeze, the start is only half an hour from home, and there's a beautiful Post Office at the finish. Tick, tick, tick! The current record is 3:53:00, I should have no trouble getting 20-30 minutes on that and perhaps down towards the 3hr mark. There's a fair bit of climbing early on, then a 15km long straight through Boonooroo Plains to the finish. Best of all, only about 8 intersections for the whole thing! :lol:
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