6am i think, what..

Bellie is 37 minutes ahead. Its now daylight.

Feeling kinda strange after not sleeping since some time a few days ago i think.

A Flapping butterfly wind flaps but once to the moon.

?

0300 hours

Bellie, looking good, eating.....

Alex K still in first too.

Everyone is looking forward to sunrise

#4 Coke is calling

1 am

Black Gold number 3 & 4...

Bellie in 27th place overall.

Still smashing away in first.

Its still cold.

Midnight

Bellie still in the lead. In good spirits. About 40mins up.

Wind has died down.

Still dusty out.

Its cold.

........

SO far I've had 2 cans of Coke.

Ryan's being mean to me....

Bellie takes the lead

6 hours in and it was lights on time, bellie had been lapping consistantly all day and with a quick pit to fit lights he was off. Waiting for his next transition we see first place and second place come in with bellie close behind.

In the change from day to night bellie took the lead.

Its now 8 hours ride time, lights are on, we've put more walls on the tent and bellie is cruising around in first.

On a side note, Alex Kiendl, Kona's female solo enduro rider, is also in first and looking comfortable.

Kona going for the double victory??

maybe.....

Bellie just rolled through transition, quote "I'm feeling far too fresh, i'm trying to hold back, I'll just keep riding ok..."

nutter.

4 hours in...

So far so good.... Bellie is looking comfortable sitting in second we think. Hydration and food intake seem to be going well. Robyn and i are getting the hang of a slightly complicated transition area.
2 seperate loops, red and blue, 2 seperate transition areas, one tent.
The wind has picked up again but with minimal clouds in the sky we probably wont see a repeat of last nights flooding!
More updates if we can spare the time.

Here at last

Ben & I left Melbourne last night & drove for a few hours before pulling over next to the highway to sleep with the hum of trucks going past every minute (see pic below). Not a good nights sleep, but it'll do.


Made it to the race site this morning. Very windy. Very cold at night. Just stuffing around now .. but I'm ready to race.

Heading north

Last nights Fatties ride was a bit of a strange one. The warmer weather brought everyone out of the wood work. With this came a ride with more mechanicals than I have ever seen on this ride in over 5 years. I finished by pushing one of the regulars the last km or so (I now know how you felt a few years back thanks Rhino). I wasn’t feeling the best last night, I think it was due to the fact I hadn’t worked all day and I missed out on my normal 8-9hr warm-up. When those boys put the power down, the pace at the front is very hot. Sorry no photos, to busy chewing the bars.

Today I am packing for the dreaded drive north the Canberra for the Scott 24hr this weekend. Tonight myself and Ben Randall will get a few hours under the belt and finish it off by lunch time tomorrow. If you’re heading up for the event pop in to my pit tent and say g’day.

Kona anyone? Still one more on top of this lot.



Done. A fair load indeed. With a camper trailer on the back to boot.

For anyone interested, we are going to do some blog posts during the event to let you know how things are going. We are expecting a close to 0C for Sayurday night, should be fun.

Then there were two

Yesterdays ride home from work had me racing a large black cloud. It was breathing down my neck like you would not believe. Knowing I was heading out for more punishment in the hills in the morning, I didn’t want to push too hard having already been on the bike for nine hours. It was a draw - the rain catching me at the front gate.

The rain came down for most of the night. My alarm rang out at 6am, but I was content to stay under the covers considering it was still raining outside. 6:30 came around and I thought I had better get out of bed and at least check the radar map. All looked pretty clear, so I had to start rushing to get ready to meet at 7. An SMS from Ash Thomas (this months Freewheel superstar) gave me an extra 10 minutes.

As it turned out, only Ash and I fronted up, so we decided to head out towards Kinglake. From there we hit Whittlesea and copped a strong head wind all the way back to Melbourne, so we made a few stops to brake the monotony.

Ash feeding his face at Kinglake bakery. He figured he deserved nothing but the best. Mmm donut.




There are some things you just should not find at sporting grounds. It’s a shame some people think they need to sink this low to get ahead in their chosen sport. Shame, shame, shame.

These little guys were having a ball. We had to stop and have a closer look. Think I’ll be taking Jay along one day.

Selfless Promotion

If you had your head deep in a MTB magazine last month and didn’t get around to reading Alpha, here’s an article that caught my eye.

The contents page is my favorite. Who is that guy at the top?
Click images to enlarge.

Was pretty happy with this one. MTB doesn't often hit the mainstream. Robyn’s persistence paid off. Alpha has a 600,000 circulation.

Good one Randall

I am pleased that fellow tough guy and long time riding buddy, Ben Randall, is joining the Mt Buller Kona Factory Team. After showing everybody how it’s done at the Subaru 12hr last month, he has more than proven he deserves the gig. His first ride on the team will be at the Mont 24hr later this month alongside myself, Cal, and Neil in the Pro Four category.



The team now seems complete, with Ben, Cal, Neil and Russell racing enduros as a team and myself and Alex racing solo. Looking forward to a great summer of racing ... and riding with you in something less retro, buddy!

Nice legs

Legs are still smashed from Saturdays hills. What am I thinking, there is no way I will be ready to race the Scott 24 in two weeks. Yes that's right folks, I'll be racing solo at the Scott. At work today all I could do was turn them over with no intensity. At least the weather was better than Friday.

I was doing some shopping at Anaconda yesterday and who should I bump into. What a nice looking bloke.