Butterfly on a wheel

On Sunday I made people swear at me, and think unholy thoughts of me.
It was the second Race of Six Friends, and the evil triumvirate of my brain, spring weather and the local council came together to cause adventure, misery and satisfaction.
You can read of my course creation thoughts on the R6F blog, this post is more around my day out in the boonies with five other tolerant souls and a crack support person.

Tristan Thomas had flown up from Wellington to be team Ox and super tow for the day. The rest of the team was a mix of old and new, Mikeal had blagged a spot that was vacated by Paul Pendry, and Damien Kearney stepped into the unknown at the last minute as sub for Junior who was unavailable. Rounding the team out were The Worm and The Croc.

The weather looked okay on the radar, with a rain band that would go through, then happy times. That wasn't quite the story as we did get some decent precipitation for a while, then drizzle and rain in the later part. I had forgotten that up here in Auckland we tend to be a bit soft about the weather, and I did scoff when all the softies got excited about the big snowfall of 2011, but I realised that I have grown soft in reading Tristan's post of the weekend, where he described the weather as drizzle. It was a fitting description.

We started with Tristan and The Worm setting a fine pace and example on the flats towards Port Waikato, that Mikeal and I then failed to match. In Mikeal's defense he may have still be suffering from the pre-start nipple gripple I gave him. He did get his revenge later.

Things went in a peachy fashion for the flat, and the climb and descent of Klondyke Road, until The Worm suffered an explosive pinch flat, for the rest of us a small wait and watch, then off again, all was good, then suddenly "What the hell is this?" as the road that was fast and smooth two week prior was now a mudbath with loose metal either side of the ruts from bike tyres. Turns out that the local council had opted to grade and remetal the last couple of kilometres at the end of Klondyke Road. Cue many, many punctures. Tristan was afflicted by two in quick succession, and Mikeal exacted his revenge on me while Tristan effected his repair.

Mikeal's revenge consisted of a quick flick to the end of a delicate part of my person. The sound was meaty and the pain was quite sharp. Much amusement to the assorted crowd and the Jackass road show carried on.

The rest of the ride was a set of movements by various team members to come up along side Tristan for a bit of finding one's place in the scheme of things, while he rode tempo and strong.

When we hit the final flat section, Tristan told us all to hop on, and on the train we scrambled, or in my case dangled. The last little rise, loomed and turned me into a whimpering shell. Finish couldn't come fast enough.

Then the pleasure of dry clothes and shelter. Nothing like clambering out of wet gritty clothes, into dry clothes on a small country town's side street, it bought back a raft of deeply repressed memories.

As a team we did very well, and thanks to my team mates for putting up with me, thanks to Doris for being in the right place at the right time with all the good stuff. Well done team, we (or at least I) will be back for the next one.