All posts by elPrez

ride routes 30th & 31st jan

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did i miss something???  oh yeah.  january.  after this weekend it will be well and truly gone and next thing you know we will be buying christmas presents again.  but enough about me letting my life slide by before i know it.

last weekend was a fairly successful splitting of the groups and as such, we will continue along these lines.  the advanced group will head off first as they have the most ground to cover followed by the novice ride.  again the transitional group will follow the intermediate group, but this time the route has been shortened somewhat. 

tips for everyone.  KNOW YOUR RIDE ROUTE.  don’t just leave it up to the leader, or the guy with a gps.  if you get dropped you may need to know how to get home.  at least have an idea so you can call someone to come and pick you up if needed.  this is especially important for the advanced group as the saturday route is not a common one so make sure you know where to turn.

there may be a transitional ride on sunday, but i have not been informed at this time.  stay tuned as will update below once the ride is know.  also, i would to start both sunday rides at 7am if possible.  this will then give people an opportunity to do either ride.  i will let you know.

saturday

novice – spr novice saturday ride 01 – 41.28km max.  may be shortened depending on the group

transitional – spr transitional saturday ride 04 (canning vale) – 39.11km

intermediate – spr intermediate saturday ride 04 (canning vale) – 46.23km

advanced – spr advanced saturday ride 16 (sth lake) – 51.36km

sunday

transitional – tba

advanced – south perth rouleurs sunday ride 01 (carradine & peet) – 92.56km

spr team kit – orders are open

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we are now taking orders for the latest run of spr team kit.  have a look at the team kit page and see what we have to offer.

orders will be taken till the 15th feb, so this give you three weeks.

remember, we do not order extra kit and will not be doing another order for about 6 months, so don’t wait till it’s too late.

also, this order will cover all the kit for winter as well, so even though it is mid-high thirties and hasn’t rained for 67 days, it will get cold and things like vests, armwarmers and jackets will be essential.

minimum order for all items is 20 garments, so if we don’t reach this number, then those items may be charged at a higher rate.  prices in general have gone up this year, but only by a small amount.

to place your order, send and e-mail to sprkit@perthcycling.com.au and we will add it to the list.  once the order has been sent, payment is then required before the garments arrive.

sunday january 24 (part 2)

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ride report by peter.

while julian and a few others turned left to head back towards kalamunda, the rest of us headed to the right to tackle the “easy” side of the observatory.  with still a decent size group and a narrow road to start with it was going to be interesting to see what would happen.

young adrian shot up the road as soon as the hill started and managed to get a good gap.  with quite a lot of hill to go and him not figuring in the points earlier in the day, the main players let him go with the aim to drag him back later.  i hadn’t figured in the points in the previous two climbs and was lucky to actually be still going. 

a gap formed once the hill climbers made there way to the front and after a moments hesitation, i decided to jump across to them.  by the time i reached them, i was well into the 180+ bpm and knew that i would not be holding it for too long.  i sat on the back as long as i could before having to drop off and let my heart recover.  a couple of other smaller groups passed me with some words of encouragement but my bpm was still too high.  “recovering” to around 165bpm, i made my next effort and pushed past the last group that had overtaken me.  this time i maxed out at about 190bpm and was seriously buggered.  most of them came past me again.

you can’t get any better if you don’t push your limits.  if i just sat at a nice even pace at a nice even heart rate, then my body would adapt to that and never be able to get any faster.  like those guys that you see commuting every day.  they just do the same pace and the same distance so even though they have a large km count for the week, they aren’t strong and can’t surge.

meanwhile, a long way up the road at the front of the group, there was a tussle for the line with the following result.

kom 3. 1 – mike, 2 – chris, 3 – stu, 4 – nick, 5 – jarrad.

with one more climb to go, the day was beginning to heat up.  this last climb is always a bit of a bastard as it kicks up almost straight away at close to 15%.  after such a nice downhill you loose all your momentum straight away and are down in your lowest gear.  my legs were pretty much stuffed by now so i couldn’t even work on pushing my heart rate up.  just survive to the end as best i could.  as i wasn’t there and got the final results at the coffee shop, there may be a bit of contention for line honours.  i am just going off what i was told and chris claimed that he beat mike to the traffic sign.  please leave any challenges in the comments.

kom 4. 1 – chris, 2 – mike, 3 – nick, 4 – stu, 5 – brother jules.

well we took over the coffee shop and they were excellent in their efficient service.  probably just trying to get rid of us, but it is good not to have to wait to long.  one gripe from me was the fact that they have changed suppliers and have moved from coke to pepsi.  it just doesn’t seem right to me, but i endured it for the caffine and sugar hit.

i nice trip home and i managed to keep to the front on descent where we didn’t really clock much faster than 80km/hr.  i kind of lost it in the legs on the flat and got caught at the lights.  the temperature was a good 5 deg hotter off the hill and you could really feel it now.  a good quick run home though and better for it at the end of the day.

australia day public holiday ride on tuesday, but don’t forget that the start location has changed due to road closures.  the corner of coode and angelo st is where we will meet, with parking near the senior citizens centre behind the bank.

saturday 23rd – transitional group

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ride report by peter.

third time on the bike since before christmas and gee my butt is sore.  to be more specific, my sit bones are sore.  it is amazing how much resistance you can build up to that sort of abuse if you just persist with it.  i was having trouble backing up rides and had to ride the first few kms standing up.  i guess i am just lucky that the rest of the muscle groups seem to be firing ok.  cardio is a different story.

i turned up relatively early (well for me anyway) as my kids are still not quite over running on melbourne time.  the first morning we got back and they were up at 3:30am ready for action.  at least now they are closer to 6:00am but still not quite there yet.  anyway, i turned up to a sea of unfamiliar faces and this both excited and worried me.  excited as it was great to see that the group is steadily growing, but worried me because i like to know everyone’s name.  i am going to have to work on the names thing so don’t get to upset if i apologise for not remembering we have met.

as per the blog, we proceeded to split into 4 groups.  i sent the advanced group on their way as they had the longest to travel.  then i split the novice group out and left them in the hands of mark and carol.  the intermediate group was next with the transitional group to follow the same path.

dr ronny has volunteered to look after the transitional group and i came along today to make sure everything went well.  we took off and i sat on the front with mandy as we set an easy pace along mill point to great eastern.  the idea was to just leave a couple of people on the front and then have them peel off when they got tired.  nice easy pace and no roll through or anything. 

we made it to ascot with me playing sheepdog and constantly moving from front to back to give directions and make sure we hadn’t lost anyone.  there was the occasional person falling off the back and we had to slow the group down a bit to keep everyone together.  we were heading out guilford rd into a decent headwind and it is important to know where to sit to keep out of the wind.  these are skills that you pick up along the way and it is generally trial and error that will see you through.

a bit of confusion at the turn at guilford saw half the group going straight instead of turning to get onto west swan rd.  by the time we got together, we were already on benara rd.  once the group formed up we tried to roll through, but it didn’t go too well and we dropped a couple of riders.  also there were people that hadn’t rolled through before and didn’t know what to do.  my fault really, as i thought that everyone had been through this sort of thing with the previous novice group.  it is something that we will work on but it will not be the focus of the transitional group.

i dropped back a few times for riders that were struggling and once for a dropped chain, but we were back together for the route through the northern suburbs.  the roads were tighter and the traffic heavier so we were down to single file for quite a while, but eventually got formed back up.  the rolling hills heading into bayswater took their toll on a few and the group split a bit with me off the back lending a hand.  on the last small hill, lynda stopped as she dropped her chain.  or so we thought.  turns out she snapped it totally.  too much power i expect.  she was within rolling distance of the train station so she headed for a ticket machine.  with the remaining three riders, we made our way home along whatley crescent and to the belltower.

the rest of the group were waiting there and the other groups had already taken over the majority of the coffee shop.  we stood around and had a quick chat about the ride and how we thought it went.  there are some changes that i think that we will make to it, but basically there are a few things that we need to work on.

  • two leaders are needed.  one to control the group and one to help those that are struggling.
  • know the ride route.  not just the leaders, everyone that is riding.
  • know where to position your bike to get a good draft.
  • know how to safely move off the front.
  • the ride route needs to be shorter.  some people were struggling towards the end.
  • how to roll through.  we will discuss this before the ride starts next week.
  • correct gear selection at traffic lights and climbs.

all up though, i thought it was a good ride today for the new group and definitely something we will continue to do.

ride routes 23rd, 24th & 26th jan

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home at last.  after a month over east doing the family christmas thing and visiting family, we are finally back in our own beds and not living out of a suitcase.  as you may have seen on the blog, i managed to catch a few bike races while i was over there, but didn’t manage to “saddle up” at all.  as such, my fitness level is somewhere off the back of the intermediate group.

there have been a lot of things happening while i was away, but the most significant one for spr would be the growth of the novice group.  from the 4 or 5 hardcore mainstays over the winter, the group now regularly boasts around 20 riders.  also, i am hearing that the intermediate and advanced (note name change) groups have also swelled such that there are around 80 riders fronting up on a saturday morning.  while this is great for both the club and cycling in general, it does call into play a few safety concerns.  with more riders in the novice group there needs to be more leaders as these are the riders that need the most attention.  with more riders in the intermediate and advanced groups, we take up a lot more road, meaning more splits at lights, more difficult to change lanes and generally more chance to piss off the motorists.

as such, starting this week, we will make a small change to the way we format the rides.

the intermediate and advanced rides will now split at the beginning with both groups heading out on totally different courses.  although, this does diminish the social aspect of the ride, safety is a higher priority and you can always catch up at the coffeeshop.  for the intermediate group there should be no real change.  just get yourself warmed up and then start a moderate pace roll through.  this does not need to be a race and should be about developing skills in a safe environment. 

for the advanced group, this will mean that you will set off a couple of minutes earlier and you must know the ride routes.  you also have to make your choice of which group you are riding with before the start as there will be no second peloton to sweep you up.  it will not be flat out from the gun, but rather you should spend the first 10 kms warming up and socialising before the pace goes on.  generally this ride is around the 50km mark, so there will be plenty of time for seemingly endless suffering.

the novices.  once an after thought because i didn’t want to turn people away, has now become a draw card with three (or four) rides scheduled each week.  the majority of emails that i receive during the week of new people wanting to come out riding with us are asking about the novice group.  i am really happy with the way that it has grown and really proud of the people that have stepped up to take on the task of getting them organised.  cycling with a group can be very daunting and back a year ago, any newbie would have been both scared shitless and dropped within 5 kms from the start of the spr ride.  we are one of the few clubs that organise so many training rides and one of the few places that offer a wide variety at no cost.  however, it does come at a price as the more novices we have, the less one-on-one time the leaders can spend with them.  also, there is a much wider spread of abilities within the novice group and as such we will be looking at splitting the novices into 2 groups.

the original intent of the novice group will remain as such.  a standard ride with a smaller group and keeping out of high traffic areas so they can concentrate on developing riding skills.  these should include, how to hold a wheel, where to position your bike, how to move positions within a group safely and how to roll through.  riders should be comfortable with these skills before they move up into a more advanced group.  confidence in your own skills and those around you is the most important thing when it comes to safety in the group.

the second novice group will be called the transitional group.  this group contains those riders that have mastered the basic skill set and need to put it in practice in a smaller and more controlled environment.  this will also include the development of skills of bunch riding on busier roads and a general increase of fitness.  as such the transitional group will follow the same course as the intermediate group.  this allows a more varied weekly route to develop navigational skills and encountering different terrain.  it also allows any of the transitional riders a chance to try out the intermediate group, but if they get dropped, can be picked up by the sweepers. i will be looking for some leaders to take care of this group.  someone from the intermediate group would be more than adequate.  for this first week, however, i will be looking after it.

so, there we have it.  we have now developed into 4 separate training groups with 11 different rides during the week.  not bad for less than 2 years in existence.  all i need to do is work out how to make money off of it and i can move into semi-retirement.

peter

the ride routes are as follows and where there are 2 routes in the link, the intermediate will do the shorter one while the advanced will do the longer one.

saturday

novice – south perth rouleurs saturday novice ride (41.28km)

intermediate/transitional – south perth rouleurs saturday ride 08 (benara rd) (route “a” 42.35km)

advanced – south perth rouleurs saturday ride 18 (canning vale & welshpool) (route “b” 54.03km)

sunday

novice – south perth rouleurs sunday novice ride – freo via cannington (79.48km)

advanced – south perth rouleurs sunday ride 07 (canning mills & peet & patterson) (90.54km)

tuesday (australia day – be aware of road closures if driving to the start)

intermediate – south perth rouleurs public holiday ride (59.35km)

national road championships – men’s road race part 03

along with steve hedley, there were a few other stars of cycling at the national road championships.  here are a few pics that i managed to get. 

for those that are heading over to the tour down under, get in contact with me to get blog access so you can upload your pics.

peter

resolution of the cycling wa clubs – important

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some of you may be aware of the dysfunctional nature of cycling wa at the present time.  in the past few months the chairman and two other board members have resigned along with the ceo and other staff members from the office. 

most of this came about from a definite challenge to the identified direction that cycling in wa needed to go and a want to head back to the old school ways of racing being the be all and end all of cycling.  there has also been a recommendation from certain clubs to change the constitution to not allow clubs like ours to have any voting rights within cycling wa as we do not currently hold any race events. 

how this is meant to encourage more people to ride is quite unknown to most of us and looks to pigeonhole cycle racing to an even more elitist sport.  i think our club offers more than just racing and even though that aspect has been growing, there are riders that we have that would not have ever got a licence if we didn’t become a club.  there are many people out there riding every weekend that do not have any cycling licence and are just part of a coffeeshop/bike shop ride. 

a report commissioned by the dsr found that cycling wa has about 1,500 members but on a daily basis there are about 65,000 people in perth that ride a bike.  even more so there are about 250,000 people over the age of 15 that ride at least once a year.  there is a huge untapped market out there and we should be doing everything to try to encourage these people to find a home amongst the clubs around perth and country wa.  part of the direction that has been recommended for cycling wa and cycling australia as a whole is to combine the road/track cycling with mtb and bmx bringing all the sports under one umbrella.  the direction that the board wants to take cycling in this state would certainly not include those aspect of bicycling.  at the agm, one delegate even challenged the perth mtb clubs eligibility to vote as he said that “it is not real cycling”.  i really hope he told cadel evans that when he was over here in perth recently.

so were does that bring us now. 

the constitution of cycling wa allows for the removal of any or all board members if 75% of the affiliated clubs sign a resolution to do so.  with 19 clubs in wa this meant that 15 clubs needed to sign in order for this to take affect.  this was not an easy task as some of the board members have very, very close ties with certain clubs and therefore would not sign the resolution.  other clubs were reluctant to sign as there was no clear direction as to what would happen to cycling in wa afterwards.  this is a fair point and some work was done to make sure a fair and honest approach to re-electing a board was put into place.  unfortunately there is nothing in the current constitution to allow for this as it assumes that there would only be a few vacancies at any time.  as such a special meeting needs to be held to change the constitution to permit both the dsr and cycling australia to appoint a new board.  this board would be made up of people not directly involved in the day to day running of clubs but rather people that would want to work to see cycling as a whole grow in wa.

so on christmas eve, the required 15 signatures were acquired and the resolution was passed onto the appropriate bodies.  i did sign on behalf of spcc after discussion with the committee and what options we and cycling in general really had.  the recent agm was further proof of the deterioration of relationships across the entire state affiliation.  our right to vote was also challenged based on a payment of affiliation fees which were waived by the board based on the fact that there were not may months left in the finacial year.  this is not the first time that our rights have been challenged but really all it shows is that certain people are jealous of what we have achieved and scared of losing their members to a club like ours.

as expected the three remaining board members did not accept the resolution and dismissed it as invalid.  they took a further step to try to keep things going and called meetings to change the constitution (as previously mentioned) and hold meetings to appoint new board members.  for those that do not know the process, the clubs vote on who becomes a board member but only after the current board receives the nominations and recommends the candidates.  even if the clubs reject a candidate they can still get in on appeal and one of the remaining three board members did get on via that process.  so what this really means is that the board can effectively fill the vacant positions with like minded individuals rather than providing a cross-section of experience.

with a challenge on and cycling australia powerless to intervene, it asked the dsr to check the validity of the resolution.  there was some speculation that the resolution was signed by people that didn’t have the correct authorisation.  the board claimed that some clubs were mislead into signing and others have withdrawn their signature.  this was circulated to all the clubs and had the effect of causing confusion as to what was actually going on.  there were meetings planned by the board and meetings planned by those attempting to remove the board as well as the race management meetings to elect new board members.  a letter was sent out from the ceo of cycling australia that reiterated the fact that they are constitutionally powerless to rule on these matters.  they were however willing to help if requested by the membership to assist in working through the current situation.

while i was watching the national crit race in ballarat, i received a phone call from the dsr asking if i was the president of the south perth club, did i sign the resolution and did i still support that resolution.  yes, yes and yes. 

tonight i received a further letter from the ceo of cycling australia in reference to the current resolution.  this time it stated that the dsr had checked with all 15 clubs and was satisfied that the resolution was valid and therefore the current board members have been dismissed.  it also supported the special general meeting to be held which would make changes to the constitution to allow the dsr and cycling australia to appoint a new board.

the general meeting is to be held this saturday and as i am still on holidays, brendan will be going as vice-president holding the proxy vote.  hopefully this will mean that cycling wa can move ahead and be progressive in how it views cycling in this state.

i know that this may be all new to some of you, and you may not think that any of this would affect you.  quite possibly this may be true, but what i may have meant is that cycling as a whole would not actually grow and that massive untapped market out there would stay untapped.

how that may affect our club moving forward is unclear at this time.  the general running of training rides should not be affected so for most it will be business as usual.  there may be some issues with the running of races, as one of the outgoing board members has very, very close ties with the commisaires that officiate the open road races we enter.  the finalisation of the race calendar and the general running of events may the biggest issues that we face.  as such, there will be a number of races that we need to support in order to keep the sport going and to show that our club is here to stay.  so over the next few months, keep an eye on the website and we will actively promote the events that we feel will be important to the growth of cycling in wa.

the more important thing that you can do is encourage some of those 50,000 other people (commuters, triathletes, mtb, etc) out there that are riding to come along and see what we can offer them as a club.  remember when you used to ride by yourself and how much more enjoyable the experience is now you ride with a group.  we need to do what we can to grow the sport so that it can find a stable and successful place in perth.

thanks

peter – president south perth cycle club

national road championships – men’s road race part 01

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report by peter.

as i previously mentioned steve hedley was fronting up to the national road race today.  it was good as it gave me someone to look out for rather than just go euro-star spotting.  i turned up early and caught up with chevaun as she was looking for the support van for steve’s spare wheels.  turns out that he had not ridden the hill yet but had driven it twice the previous night.  sure, that will do.  chevaun and her family were setting up in the feedzone to support steve as the 160+ kms meant that he was going to need some food and the close to 40 degree day meant he would need lots of bottles.

i hung around the sign in area and did some star spotting with a older couple also from perth.  pam used to race in victoria about 35 years ago but now lived in mandurah.  i told her about the club and said she should look us up as she mentioned that she wanted to start riding and racing again.  they were off to the tour down under after this and knew all the pro riders.  steve was almost last to sign in but made it to the line on time.  pretty soon they were off on 16 laps of the 10.2km circuit.

i wandered up the first hill to the feedzone and hung out with chevaun, her parents and sister for a while, before making the trek to the top of the king of the mountain climb.  i sat with some guys from the sunbury club for a few laps and watched the peloton swing past.  there was a breakaway from lap 2 and it was increasing each lap till it got to about a 7 min advantage.  with each lap only taking 15 min, it was hanging out there for quite a while.  the main peloton didn’t seem to want to chase down at all as i think they thought it wouldn’t last with the conditions the way they were. 

steve was sitting pretty in the main peloton along with all the euro-stars (rodgers, davis a, davis s, goss, meyer c, bobridge, cooke, wilson, lowe) and looked very comfortable on the climbs.  for the majority he was sitting at the front quarter of the the pack staying out of trouble. 

it was a long way from the top of the mountain to the finishline and i didn’t want to miss the finish so i left with about 5 laps to go.  on the way down, i watched the peloton go past again and didn’t see steve.  not to worry, it is easy to miss someone when there are that many riders in a group.  as the support cars went past, i saw him just off the back of the main pack and chasing to get on.  i didn’t know what had happened so made my way back to the feed zone.  there i found out that he had a mishap with a bottle and feedbag which caused him to crash on the previous lap.  it was pretty low speed so not much damage, but enough to knock the wind out of him and make it hard to catch back on to the pack.

chevaun was pretty upset about it as she thought that she caused the crash, but i think it was just one of those things.  steve came past another couple of times and managed to get aboard with a few other guys, but the peleton started to make stronger accelerations.  they were getting desperate as the break had not been pulled back in and it looked like the winner would be coming from the original 8 man which was now whittled down to 4. 

steve lasted till about 3 laps to go before deciding to call it a day.  he was riding strong but was not sure if he could have stayed with the likes of rodgers etc when the move went.  a sub-group had formed with the davis boys in and he thought that he may have been able to stick with them till the end.  however, it was not to be but it showed a very promising start to 2010 especially after his back surgery last year.

we made our way down to the finishline where steve got his injuries tended to at the medical tent.  the loudspeaker announced that the breakaway had indeed stayed away and the younger of the meyer boys, travis, had attacked the others and was now clear of the field.  with steve patched up we made our way to the line to see travis cross as the new australian road champion, to match his brothers tt championship on wednesday.

national road championships – road race

the women’s road race was damn hot today.  predicted max of 35 degrees was seen and past on the way to closer to 40 deg.  it took it’s toll early with about a 1/3 of the field pulling out after about 3 laps.  we had a few south perth girls taking part so here are the pics. 

tomorrow is men’s road race and steve hedley is having a crack against the likes of michael rodgers and co.  will get a few pics up tomorrow night.

peter