I”m one of these people who doesn”t like to stay put in one place too long. And so it is time for my next adventure. In about 5 weeks Jane and I will be moving to KL to experience everything that living in SE Asia has to offer.

In 2006 I returned to Perth after living in Texas for a few years and started cycling with Rob as part of my triathlon training. After a few months I convinced Rob we should start riding with a group to mix it up and keep cycling interesting, so we started cycling with “pre-SPR” in the summer of 2006/2007. This was before SPR even existed, when the only ride was a Saturday morning ride from Bike Force in South Perth. There was no such thing as a fast, main or transitional group – it was one group of 20-30 riders and you tried to hang on from the start and see how long you could stick with them.

Of course since then the formation of SPR has occurred and grown at an amazing rate. I know there has been a lot of people involved over the past few years to online slots help build this club into what it is today, but this has mostly been from the drive and dedication of Pete and Kate. I want to thank you both personally for all the hard work you have put in to allow me to ride, race, socialise and make many good friends through the SPR family.

I also want to thank everyone that I have riden and raced with over the past 5-6 years, I”ve had a fantastic time and have lots of great memories. I”ve especially enjoyed racing and I think it is amazing to see how many people are now racing with the SPR kit.

I don”t know how much cycling I”m going to be able to do in KL, from what I”ve seen and read it is not the safest city to cycle in but hopefully I”ll be able to get out on my bike out of the city from time to time. Maybe it”s time to take up running again. I”ll also be back in Perth every 1-2 months and will try to get out with the group whenever I can.

Once again I want to thank everyone for making cycling and SPR such an enjoyable part of my life 🙂

C”est la vie!

Paul…aka Dropped In Dalkeith (D.I.D)

I”ve been with this club since it”s inception and one thing we pride ourselves on is being safe and obeying road rules. So I was disappointed to see 75% of the fast group this morning run a red light at Port Beach…it was red before the first rider even got to the lights. If motorists see us run red lights it only gives them online casino more reason to bitch about us. It doesn”t matter whether there are any cars around or not – safety is a habit and if you get out of the habit of being safe you will get hurt.

Annual General Meeting
Date: Saturday 12 March, 2011
Time: 9:00am
Venue: The Esplanade River Suites, Como

Agenda

1. Open Meeting & Apologies
2. Minutes from Previous Meeting
3. President”s Address
4. Membership List
5. Financial Update
6. General Business

a. Change online casino to the Club Constitution – Financial Year

b. Appoint Club Office and Committee positions for 2011

Position                  Current Office Bearer

President:                 Peter Mah
Vice President:         Julian Johnson
Secretary:                Paul Owen
Treasurer:                 Daniel Harvey
Committee Member:  Lisa Wood
Committee Member:  Lorraine Hartland
Committee Member:  Michael Bonner
Committee Member:  Darryl Cartner
Committee Member:  Scott Littlefair
Committee Member:  Toby Brown
Committee Member:  Heiko Potzeldt

c. SPR Crit Series

d. SPR Easter Camp

e. RMC Business

f. Racing Grading System

g. Club 200km Challenge

7. Close

All SPR Members,

This is the notice for the upcoming SPR Annual General Meeting. Details are as follows:

When: Saturday 12th of March
Time: ~9am after the Saturday morning ride
Where: Esplanade River Suites – 112 Melville Parade, Como (old Pagoda Ballroom)
http://www.esplanaderiversuites.com.au

This will also be a club breakfast and the new kit will be distributed.

Cost will be $10 to cover the catered breakfast, which is subsidised through the generous sponsorship casino online of The Esplanade River Suites.

For catering purposes please indicate if you are going to attend in the comments section below.

Nominations for all SPR committee positions and any agenda items should be emailed to the Club Secretary (Paul Owen) at paulowen13@gmail.com

The final agenda will be posted prior to the AGM.

Looking forward to seeing everyone there.

Check out this video taken of Patrick Seabase climbing switchbacks up (and down) the Stevio Pass in the Italian Alps…on a fixie with no brakes!

I always find it interesting to hear the views of ‘outsiders’ towards us cyclists. There now seems to be an acronym out there for a certain sub-group of us – MAMIL…Middle Aged Men In Lycra.

Check out the link 🙂

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-10965608

As always in cycling there are sceptics and knockers who attempt to tarnish the reputation of the best riders in the business when they achieve great results. Take a look at the latest shot at Fabian Cancellara and make up your own mind.

Bike with engine and Cancellara

Paul O

UPDATE – there have been further revelations as to how Boonen gets to go so fast.

Peter

Just a reminder for those of you who are thinking of racing in Sunday’s Renae’s Race that nominations close tonight. There is a requirement of a minimum of 10 riders for each grade, and currently there is NOT the minimum of 10 riders for some grades. So if you are considering participating please nominate today. Below is a link to a flyer for the event.

I have nominated for Senior B grade. I’m not sure who else from SPR has nominated.

http://www.wa.cycling.org.au/site/cycling/wa/downloads/2010/Events/RENAE2010v2.pdf

Paul O.

by Paul Owen

On Sunday the City of Perth triathlon is on along Riverside Drive between the Bell Tower and Victoria Av. This is an Olympic distance triathlon (1500m swim – 40km cycle – 10km run) and are the WA state championships.

It is also a qualifying event for the Age Group for the Australian Team for the World Championships to be held in Budapest in September.

A few SPR regulars will be competing casino online so if you are riding the hills, ATTA, criterium or any other ride then come on down and see some very fit people put themselves through some pain. Kick-off will be around 7:30am with Nico and myself scheduled to take a dip in the river at 8:18am. We will be wearing the recently debuted SPR trisuit, as can be seen here in a couple of photos from the Australia Day triathlon held at Point Walter.

Report by Paul O.

First up apologies for the late write up, just been an unbelievably busy week.

Last Sunday I decided to do the NDCC crit in Wangara instead of slugging it out in the hills and although there was a brief moment where I thought of entering C grade with the rest of the guys, I flew the SPR flag solo in B grade.

B grade was off first with around 50-60 starters, a large field which meant staying near the front and out of trouble was a primary objective. Like most crits the course was a short sharp one with the most exciting part being a downhill section before a sweeping left turn about 300m from the start/finish line. As an added obstacle there was a round-a-bout near the top of the incline on the home straight.

As usual the first few laps were about everyone jostling for position and nobody showing too much of their tactics, although an initial break of 4-5 guys did occur on lap 3 (I think?). They stayed away for a few laps but were reeled back in by the large group. There were two points on the course that were important for positioning – the first being going into the round-a-bout where you wanted to be near the front so you didn’t get squeezed and force backwards into a dangerous situation where you could clip wheels or get dropped through the surge when coming out of the round-a-bout. The second was just before coming into the last the sweeping bend before the start/finish line were the bunch would go wide coming into the corner and hitting it at a very fast pace (~55km/hr every lap).

Everything went pretty well up until the second last lap where after coming out of the sweeping bend into the home straight I was fortunate enough to be positioned in the front 1/3^rd of the group on the outside when all of a sudden out of the corner of my eye I see a wheel fly into the air and I heard pop, crash, scrap, bang. I don’t know how many riders went down but it didn’t sound good (check out the great photo below by Troy Coulthard). A group of about 15-18 of us got through for the final lap and of course immediately the pace went up. We stretched out into single file and unfortunately I was about 15^th wheel coming out of the final bend (doing 58 km/hr) and managed to only make up a few spots in the sprint for the line, finishing in about 11-12^th I think.

B grade was 40 min + 2 laps and looking back at the info on the garmin we ended up doing 19 laps for approx. 31km at an average of 41km/hr.

NDCC run a good event and there is another crit on this weekend in Osborne Park. I encourage anyone who wants to try a crit to check it out.

Congrats to the guys in C grade who had some great results with some high places in the top 10…I reckon a few of you could come help out in B grade 🙂 Matt and Nico also competed strongly in A grade but couldn’t match it with Graeme Brown…but no one else could either.