Larus dominicanus

First up, an update of sorts from Sunday's ride.
Here's the route, Doris's Day of Destiny . I've taken it from the Lincoln Road, Universal Drive intersection in Horrenderson and finished it at the end of the new motorway at Maioro St in New Windsor.
Here is the profile, it is from Balmoral, back to Balmoral, so includes the NW Bikepath, etc.
I have also discovered today, that one of the riders on Sunday is a scavenger, like a seagull. On arriving in Titirangi, said rider raced over to the Hardware Cafe where Warren and Serge sat,
and grabbed the portion of brioche that Serge was yet to consume. They then, in their own words "Scarfed it". Interesting behaviour, I do hope that they don't adopt other seagull like habits.

I raced tonight, in the bioSport Crit. I rode B grade. It was great fun, and I had a blast. Thanks to Greg and co for organising these races. A good size field, fifty eight riders, reasonable pace, and thoroughly enjoyable. Unfortunately, I also proved to be inadequate for a member of the female sex.

I had mentioned to Gael, from Solo, that I could lead her out for the final sprint. Gael is a damn good rider, and had won the previous week in the face of some stiff competition. So, tonight I rolled around the race mid field, comfortable and happy. With two laps to go, I made the move through a lap to get much closer to the pointy end of the race. As I passed Gael around the start of the final lap, I told her to jump on board. All good, so far. Turned into the finish straight, position, not bad. Gael yells "Go, Go, Go" and I mentally respond, my body doesn't. I was completely tapped out, and going a speed that wouldn't be out of place at a Senior Citizen's Zimmer Frame Race. It was appalling.
Faced with that handicap, Gael did very well to get around from behind the lumbering behemoth that was me, get up to speed and run it very close to finish second.

Well done Gael.

Mental note to self, be gallant with things I can manage - doors, puddles and seating.

Doris's Day of Destiny

Last Sunday, I enjoyed several minutes of being hated by a woman. She told me that she hated me, she even used a very strong modifier to the sentence as she told me that she hated me. It was good.

Mikeal, he of the self imagined donkey punch, and Doris are going to race the Wellington to Auckland next week. As such, Doris wanted a bit of an up tempo hit out to gild the lily. She had asked for a roll around the BCL with Junior and I. I am always happy to oblige these sort of requests, but had added that I wanted to add a couple more hills into the loop.

And this I did, adding in another three climbs of reasonable length and some little pinches to cause pain and suffering in between. All of this tacked onto the tailend of the BCL and giving an Eighty kilometre loop with Eleven hundred metres of climbing.

Then I spread the invitation wide. Come the day, we had a group of ten, perfect weather and a morning of fun ahead of us.

Unfortunately our group was thinned to nine on the first climb with the quiet drift off the back of Mr Parker, the result of some slightly up tempo pace which did stretch the group a little. Up the next climb, again the pace was strong, and three of the males were adrift at the top, but Doris, who is made of stern stuff and has great form at the moment, was still attached.

Over the next couple of climbs the pace was sensible, with a couple of stragglers. The group lost another member, after the Glengarry Road pinch, who had to head home to complete domestic duties. That left eight of us.

On Konini Road Wayne Hudson started the fireworks, Mikeal (who was definitely not Sid Too that day) then attacked. That sparked Junior and The Crocodile to warm their engines a little and leave us mortals alone and battling it out for the minor placings. Doris was firmly attached to my rear wheel and may have muttered a few epithets at Wayne for his insolence on the slope.

Serge and Warren opted out of the final and opted for the coffee stop at Titirangi, before the final plunge and the last two climbs. That left six of us. Some fresh and some less fresh. As we pulled up Victory Road, with it's 1.7 kilometres at an average of 7.5%, the group was split by Mikeal, Junior and The Croc going ahead to do battle. Me riding tempo, because I didn't have any other option, Wayne altering pace a little, and Doris attached firmly to my wheel.

It was here that Doris started to tell me how much she truly didn't care for me, and that she wasn't feeling kindly at all to me. There were several sentences with the F word and hate in them. It was good.

The final climb was just tempo, as I suspect that a few of us were a little broken. We made Titirangi to see a smiling Serge and Warren, who were promptly told by Doris how much she hated me.

This was a gratifying result.

In the afterglow, all was smiles and forgiveness.

I'll post the directions and profile for the loop shortly.

Well worth doing, and even better if there's some emotion shown on the road.