All posts by Toby

Wednesday Night Night Ride

This week the Wednesday night night ride is on again.  The weather forecast looks good with Wednesday looking like one of the only dry ones for the week.

Details

Meet: Dome Westralia Plaza

When: Wednesday 7:00pm

The more lights the better!  Dinner and beer after.

 

SPR Night Ride – Wednesday the 18th

The first SPR Night Ride will be rolling out from Dome Westralia Plaza at 7pm next Wednesday night. This is a once month per month affair, so if you miss it this week you will have to wait for a whole month to get amongst the nocturnal shenanigans.

The route has been tested this week and, with a few small adjustments should be right to go.

The traffic was minimal and despite a couple of wrong turns everyone who came out this week for the test run had a good time.

The route is here:

SPR Night Ride

Good lights are essential, and I would recommend anybody coming to also look into buying a Bikeglow kit like Peter and I have.  They cost about $30 and make the bike incredibly visable.  Check them out at the link below:

Bikeglow

So the details.

Where: Dome Westralia Plaza

When: 7pm – third Wednesday of each month

Duration: about 38km or 1.25 hours.

Dinner? Yes – the cafe will be open after for a munch.

SPR Chalk Support 2012

Last year a group of about 10 SPR ninjas met under the cover of darkenss with a mission to add some colour to the UCI event.  Armed with a few kilograms of chalk the masked bandits attacked Spring Street turning it into a huge canvass full of support messages for the SPR riders competing.

This year we will be launching another full blown chalk support campaign.  With a few differences:

1) CWA has been notified that we will be doing it and they have informed the event organisers and City of Perth.  This means that CoP shouldnt panic this year and paint over the chalk within 24 hours.  So it’s a little less dangerous this year – but I think it will still be a thrill.

2) The chalking will happen a little later in the evening this year so there are less cars around interrupting our efforts.

With a few of our ninjas from last year out of action due to racing themselves and having children etc. (pffhh?) we need some more recruits.  Ideally we need about 20 people to get the job done in an hour.

So here is the instructions:

Meet at the corner of Spring Street and Mounts Bay Road at 11pm Saturday night.

Bring chalk – lots of it – and in big sticks.  I got mine from Toys ‘R’ Us.  I have 100 sticks for the cause.

Someone also needs to bring a list of the riders names.

The Wong Way 2011
Chalking is not a crime

Night Ride – Expression of Interest

I’ve been talking about starting a night ride for a while now.  After chatting with a number of different people the consensus seems to be that Thursday evening would be the way to go.

I’ve mapped a route which I would like to do.  We would basically go up Beaufort Street for a bit of exhibitionism then turn left onto Morely Drive for a fast section.  I would propose a quick regroup when we hit the coast, and then proceed to cruise down the coast and back into town.

I’m proposing a 7pm depart from Dome, which would mean a 8:30pm finish.

Dome Westralia Night Ride Route

So – is anyone keen? Glowsticks?

 

A Simple Roll Through

After our little bingle on the transition ride this weekend while attempting a roll through, I though it might be a good idea to post this video for new riders to explain what a roll through is and how it should work.

Although I’m putting this up for the newer riders in the club there are certainly people riding in other groups that could also do with a refresher.

After riding main 1.5 yesterday there was some issues with the way in which people were rolling that need to be addressed. First and foremost – when pulling your turn on the front make sure you keep in formation and don’t wonder out into the middle of the road. A number of times I saw riders get to the front and drift out to the centre line before realising and then zigging back to the left to finish their turn. Of course the issue here is that the next rider, and the next rider, and the next rider have all just been moved out to the centre line too.

Here is a simple video to show how a roll through should work. Note the proximity of the two moving lines to each other. Maintain a safe distance apart, but keep it as tight as possible.  Of course in a cross wind this changes a bit as you may need to echolon accross the road – but lets get this right first 🙂

The GMF Health Goldfields Cyclassic

UPDATE

Toby has been doing a bit of calling around looking at some of the options for getting a number of club riders up to Kalgoorlie for the weekend. Obviously the EGCC has organised a deal with flights and bike transport, but that can make for an expensive weekend. Toby has found a 12 seater mini-van rental, that accounting for petrol and trailer hire (for the bikes), could get the cost down to considerably less than the flying option. Plus, you’d get to have an SPR ROAD TRIP!

However, we’d need some firm commitments from people before we get started on organising all of this. So, I’ve bumped this article to the top of the list again to see if we can get a show of hands of people who are keen. Remember, there’s $40,000 up for grabs, so it could be a very lucrative weekend’s ride if you’re on form.

Let us know if you’re keen in the comments.

– Jordan

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The Menzies Classic is coming up early June (4th -5th).  CWA has been in touch and asked if we could help promote the event.  And for good reason!!  The Eastern Goldfields Cycling Club has put in a tremendous amount of effort to retool the traditional event and make it into a 2 event sensation!  This two day event is now called the GMF Health Goldfields Cyclassic.

To peak you interest and lure you into reading on consider this point alone – over the 2 day event there is over $40,000 prize money on offer!

The Goldfields Cyclassic will be a two stage handicap race across the Goldfields from Kalgoorlie-Boulder to Menzies and on to Leonora taking you across the historic landscapes of the Western Australian Goldfields.
Each component of the event will be run as an individual race. Each rider will be assigned a finish time as the time after the lead rider crosses the line and the time the rider crosses the line for each race. The times for each race are added together to give a total time behind the race leader for a final Cyclassic position.
Ladies will race in the appropriate handicap grade and are eligible for the main line honours in each race as well as designated ladies prizes.
Although each stage is too far for a junior race, we wish to include juniors in this historic race and hence we have laid on a relay race to cover the complete distance. U17 will be able to complete a 2 person relay with stages of approximately 65km each for the Menzies Classic and 51km each for the Leonora Golden Wheels. The U15 race will be a 4 person relay dividing the distance into 35km for the Menzies Classic and 25km for the Leonora Golden Wheels. Teams can be girls or boys.
The Weekend Enthusiasts who do not whish to race, but wish to be included in this exciting event, may enter the Community Challenge Ride and enjoy the achievement of completing the course.
To make the logistics for the rider very simple there is a package weekend which will include flights from Perth and return, two races, overnight accommodation with race dinner and awards night, entertainment in Menzies on Saturday and transport as necessary.  The prices are reasonable as the flights organized are only around $250 return with additional costs for accommodation and meals etc.

I for one applaud EGCC for the effort they have put into organizing this event and for being brave enough to try something new.  Good luck to them and I hope as many SPR people as possible make the effort to support the event.

Event Information: here

Register: here