SUVelo Women's Come And Try Criterium Racing

So recently,

"The Cycling NSW Women’s Commission is urging women who haven’t raced before or who are new to racing, to sign up for its new Come and Try Race Series.

 The series, being held for the first time, will comprise of four criterium (short closed circuit) events in November and February - three in Sydney and one in Newcastle."

Full details from Cycling NSW here.

Yesterday was the Sydney University Velo Club (SUVelo) session:

It was fun.

I like participating in these activities because it's a safe environment and you can learn heaps.

Also, it's great to support activities that provide opportunities for women, to encourage more of these opportunities.

I woke up early as usual in the morning.

As I live pretty close to the venue, I had decided to do a 30 minute roll earlier, to get a bit of a warm up, and also eat my Clif Bar for breakfast.  (I find it hard to eat breakfast at home so soon after waking up, so for me, eating on the bike is easier).

By the time I got to the park, I didn't feel warmed up, I felt sort of tired and weary.

My friends were laughing at my face - which was probably a cross between cold race face and nervous face.

I sort of go into lock down because I'm afraid if I express any emotion - positive or negative - the nerves may take over!

Anyway, the SUVelo girls took us around the track to show us the path.

Then we started.

They split us up into 2 groups (about 10 in each group) and we started riding around the track.

We rode in 2 lines and the SUVelo girls surrounded us, giving us tips and checking if the pace was ok.

After 1 lap (I think), the group started a rolling pace line.

This was my first time in doing a rolling pace line.

So that was cool.

The race was 20 minutes + 2 laps.

The SUVelo girls ramped up the speed slowly.

I was struggling to stay on - it became difficult for me to roll around the front, I had trouble speeding up enough to get around the front.

I didn't know what to do, so I just pushed harder to get there.

(My husband later on suggested that I could have rolled off the group towards the right - rather than the left, but I didn't know what at the time and I was worried about and didn't want to cause unnecessary danger to other riders by doing something weird.)

So by the time the whistle blew for the 2 race laps, I was pretty tired.

Apparently my husband saw my face on one of the middle laps and thought "ooh, she's going to crack soon".

During the first race lap, as the group accelerated to race pace, I struggled to stay on.

One of the SUVelo girls tried to keep me on her wheel.

I was really struggling and was starting to wheeze / hyperventilate slightly.

I tried to calm myself and slow my breathing down but it wasn't really happening.

I also made the mistake of not drinking, so my mouth was very very dry by this point.
(I will need to work on taking a drink in between strong pedals - I tend to soft pedal / stop pedalling when I grab the water bottle, so something to work on).

On the tricky uphill bit (where most people attack on this course), she shouted "stay on my wheel!"

Inside my head, I said "I can't" and dropped off the group completely.

I tried to keep pedalling but I was still struggling to slow my breathing down.

I was quite disappointed in myself (and started to cry) as I knew it was a little bit mental weakness that I had succumbed to the "I can't" dialog in my head.

As I was pretty far off the group now, I slow pedalled to the finish line (where everyone was).

I was still wheezing and chose to pull off the course (1 lap early).
(Once you've lost the group in a crit race, there can be not much point doing another lap by yourself.)

My friendly supporters were encouraging me to keep going but I just had nothing left.

I hid behind a bush and cried for a little bit whilst I tried to get my breathing back to normal.

Despite being probably a not as strong / experienced rider than most of the others, and being upset at myself at that point, I was really proud that I had pushed as hard as I could - I could feel that I had nothing left.

It was a really great feeling to have pushed my body harder than I thought was possible.

I should be easier on myself.  By the time I said "I can't", I had probably pushed further than I should have, so it wasn't like I necessarily had much more energy left.

There can be a lot of fear around crit racing - the speed and closeness of the bunch riders - means that there can be some quite ugly crashes.  But it felt very safe and encouraging as a Come & Try experience.

It was a great opportunity and I was thankful to Cycling NSW and SUVelo for organising the session and supporting women's cycling, and am very happy to have done it.

I'm probably not going to make crit racing a regular priority for myself, but it will be a good activity for me to do to mix things up and be pushed a little further than I would push myself.

A few of my friends got on the podium, so that was an awesome bonus!

2014 Sum Up

[oops, never posted this, posting now!]

So it's 31 December 2014.

It's been a funny year, so many achievements, but such a long way to go at the same time.

It's interesting, I have been feeling like the last few months, I have been going backwards in my cycling.

I've stopped attending group rides.  My cycling has gotten slower.

However, when I think about it.  After the Rapha 100km mid year, I decided that for this Spring / Summer, I would focus on getting others into cycling.

So, if that was my goal, I think I achieved it.

Now, to confirm this goal or think up a new one for 2015!

Happy New Year everyone!

Bonus moment: Pushing others

We were on a ride this week and I said to Marc I was going to try and cycle and touch his back at the same time.

Marc then said to try and give him a push.

I did, and almost lost control of the bike and gave myself a heart attack.

I love everything about this photo. ‪

Everyone makes it look so easy!!

(via Liv Cycling)

My First Mountain Bike Ride

So, long time no post.

I guess it's been a little average - nothing exciting I felt like was worth posting.

I wish I had kept blogging all the way through, but I guess no major breakthroughs, just little realisations.  Which probably would have been good to record, but oh well.

Also, I always find the months of October / November such a struggle, waiting, wanting a new start to the year.  Everything feels so tiresome.  Also, I got sick and between that and feeling tired, have sort of dropped off for the last month.

BUT, last weekend I accomplished my first mountain bike ride.

It was pretty cool.

Not "the most fun ever" as other people have said, but I guess it's hard to have "the most fun ever" doing something that you've never done before and involving skill and experience.

I think our bike shop friends were a bit surprised that I wasn't like IT WAS THE BEST FUN EVER.

We went down the Loftus with a bunch of friends for a roll.

I wore my least worn jersey (I don't wear this one - even though it's pink - because it's so baggy and especially around the arms, which sort of made it perfect for mountain biking).

I put on lycra knicks / pants - as padded pants are the bomb.  

And I don't have any padded shorts yet.  Although, I'm already eyeing off Dharco clothing..

I put on long socks as people talk about the scratching etc from the twigs and branches and I thought that might help.  Plus, I like cycling in long socks. 

I packed my camelbak and patch kit.

On greeting the group, one of my friends said, "oh.. you're going to clip in..."

My husband had said this to me yesterday.

When 2 people do something, I interpret that as EVERYBODY.
2 people = everyone.

To which I started to get paranoid and freak out about why EVERYONE kept exclaiming that - perhaps I was being an idiot and I had made things harder for myself.

Then I realised I had forgotten to put a Garmin mount on the bike so had to try and fit it in my camelbak without pressing any of the buttons..
Husband said there should be a screen lock function.

I couldn't find it.

I could feel my nerves and emotions rising.

So, I told my husband, "I'm freaking out".

And then I proceeded to shout frustratedly some blaming statements at my husband about how he didn't prepare me for mountain biking at all.

To which he didn't respond and just stayed very very quiet until I moved my focus onto something else.
(Which was quite nice of him as I was entirely being unreasonable and irrational).

So we started to roll.

It was fine.

My friend said that sometimes it's good to have a foot ready to put down, but it's not all the time.

I clipped out when I felt like I might need to stop.  Mostly the narrow and curvy bits.

I had borrowed the Liv Lust Advanced 2 demo bike, which is AMAZING.  

It has these huge fat wheels (so much rolling over everything and anything) and it's made out of carbon (oh so light).

It's "dual suspension" (like, on the front and back).  As opposed to a "hard tail".

I keep calling it a "soft bottom" which sounds not quite as refined...  :)

I had received a lot of tips for cycling and it was interesting to apply them in the context of mountain biking:

1.  Look where you want to go and the bike will follow.

This became much more obvious in mountain biking than road cycling.

There's a bit in Blair Witch that turns right really abruptly and both times we did it, I ended up too wide and had to stop.

I realised it was because I kept getting to that point and missing the right turn so ended up looking at the front "oh look, that's where I don't want to go" and would just ride straight into the corner.

There was a lot of space in that corner, so I'm guessing I wasn't the only person who did that!

2.  Lean, don't steer.

I seem to have forgotten this one the whole time.

Probably because the trees felt so narrow, how could I possibly lean!

But the tread on the mountain bike tyres are made for leaning - they have tread all the way up the sides.

I think there was a third point but I can't remember it any more.

Anyway, so there was a lot of rest breaks where we stood and talked, which was:

a) quite fun

b) a good rest because there's a such an energy output - very different to road cycling.

So it was pretty cool and different and interesting.

I fell towards the end, through a very technical bit (very narrow and twisty).

The trees in that section had been burnt, so they were blacked and sticking upwards.

I named it The Blackened Shards of Hell.

I probably fell because fear took over.

The style of cornering was a little like the yellow bollards on Anzac Pde / Allison Rd (my nemesis) that I feel fear every time I come up to it.

So I fell and my friends checked to see if I was ok.

Which I was.

Although, my thumb was in a bit of pain from being jammed between the bike and a tree, so I screamed silently for a bit..

Got back on the bike.

Then I fell again.

This time my bike was up the slope and I was down the slope and I couldn't unclip.

I just lay there laughing hysterically (like a turtle that can't flip over - although they probably don't laugh) until my friends could undo my shoe.

After that I thought I was pretty tired so we went for a little longer and then went back to the cars.

Will I be buying a mountain bike?
Probably not soon.  Maybe in the future.

If I did though, I would totally buy the Liv Lust - my friend said it's pretty good value.

The dual suspension and huge fat tires, made me feel really confident (even as a beginner) that I would be fine just rolling over everything (as long as I kept pedalling).

My other friend also had great advice in that, there's no point buying a stiff bottom hard tail bike to learn skills.  You might as well get the dual suspension / dualie and make it fun as you learn.

My husband and the bike shop agreed.
A while back, the dualies didn't have sophisticated suspension and you lost a lot of power, but nowadays, you can maintain the power whilst still having the comfort and benefits of the dual suspension.

I also got previous advice from the bike shop in that a mountain bike is an investment and you should be prepared to drive a while to go mountain biking, which is very different from road cycling where you just hop on your bike and go.

So, probably not a new avenue for me right now.  

To be honest, I'm at a stagnant point of my cycling and I feel like introducing another genre wouldn't be a great idea while I'm feeling so lethargic.  

Also, I'm not a HUGE fan of nature and the bush..  City girl at heart.

November really tired me out with work and I was off the road bike for about a month and a half and I feel like I've lost a lot of fitness.

Over this Christmas period, I'm planning to cycle as much as I can to get back into the routine, ready for 2015!

I will see if I remember other things that happened to me recently to write up.

Rollerfit (Wheels of a different kind)

So, it's the near the end of the year..  

I've been cycling for a year..  (And come such a long way!)

I have a gold racing license but I currently have no clear goals or events to look towards.

(I intended to do a few more CX races but the one I was intending to do got cancelled and then I felt too overwhelmed by the Rapha Supercross - although had it not been the day before my first MS Gong, I should have given it a crack.)

Anyway, I was internet surfing (do people still say that?) and I came across RollerFit.

(so random: bike valet -> newtown festival -> rollerfit promotions -> rollerfit classes)

(via facebook)

"RollerFit Members. 

Join us tomorrow Morning 7.30am-8.15am for a $5 drop in class. All Levels, plus skate hire. Perfect way to start you day!"

I thought, wow.

And then there was another post further down the page:

"We often hear from newbie RollerFitters that it took them 3-6months to build up there confidence to join our classes! Read why you should stop putting off your first visit from one of our instructors Amy, who started out just like you!
http://www.rollerfit.com.au/uncategorized/why-you-should-stop-putting-off-coming-to-rollerfit/"

My previous memories of rollerskating involved shuffling around, clutching the barriers..

 After some reading, it seemed like the classes were very friendly for beginners.

I decided to head down and give it a go.

I figured my fitness from cycling would put me in good stead and I was looking for something interesting to do.

(via http://www.schmutzie.com)

The night before, as usual, I was bouncing between "OMG I can't believe I am doing this, this is excitingly amazing" and "OMG I can't believe I am doing this, it's going to hurt and I'm going to be so crap".

I spoke to my sister and she seemed to have a different memory to me - "you were good, I was the one clutching the barrier, you were so good you won a hat!"

Sometimes I wonder what my memories are actually made of.  They seem to not necessarily be based in reality.  Who knows!

My husband laughed at me, about clearly only remembering the traumatic moments, and wiping out any memory of being competent and enjoying myself..

I actually wasn't sure what to wear, but I had an urge to wear long socks this week so I did that.

Also, I had started googling skates and found that rollerskaters are also into #sockdoping (not just a cycling thing!).

(via http://shop.rollergirlpromotions.com.au/)

Too cool..  I'm into long socks, I could do this.  :)

(It's all about getting into making it look cool - hehe)

I wear a lot of dresses and my 1 pair of active shorts that fit me was not washed from boxing class, and I didn't necessarily want to wear my denim shorts for activewear.

So I found my Adidas onesie and wore that.  :)  

It was a bit cool in the morning so I wore arm warmers (the best - keep your arms warm without trapping sweat in your underarms)

Packed my work clothes for the day and cycled off to the class.

It was amazing!

It was sooo much fun!!  

My husband is involved in teaching about computer games and they always say to the students that saying something is "fun" is a cop out because the word "fun" isn't very descriptive and doesn't mean much.

I totally understood what that meant when I tried to explain how fun it was!

It was nervous and exciting and enjoyable to learn and inspiring to watch the other skaters do their more advanced moves!

(Yeah.. I'm not even sure how that works..  I can't even get into that position stationary and barefoot...)

So the class involved some drills and exercises.  

I started off just walking (in a marching sort of action) and the instructor Stacey said soon I would just start rolling.  

I thought, yeah whatever, maybe next class, and of course 30 seconds later, I was rolling along!

The drills were tailored to our level, so when the others were doing advanced drills, I was practicing scissors.

I realised there's a lot of leg and core strength required.  I was lucky that I had this from cycling and boxing.

It was also interesting the different leg muscles involved - I felt it most on the outside sides of my thighs the following days.

I didn't know whether they wear protective gear, but when I got there no one was.
I guess it's more a roller derby being full contact sport thing.

I did borrow some wrist guards though.  My husband warned if I break my wrist, that's 6 weeks off the bike!! :(
He said from his experience in mountain biking, there is a twisting arm / rolling weight falling technique.  (Where you roll on the curve of your arm, rather than putting your arms straight out and having the impact and weight go straight up your wrists into your collarbone).
But as I was a newbie, my instinct would probably be just to put my arms straight out.

But falling wasn't really an issue.
I watched some youtube videos the night before and the tip was pretty much: if you lose your balance, get into crouch so you're closer to the ground (less distance to fall).
I did fall a few times but I wouldn't call them stacks or anything, just losing balance and touching the ground. It didn't really hurt.

I'm really so grateful and happy that I'm at such a great point in my life I can try new things and give it a good crack!  Life is so good!

So of course on burst of excitement about rollerskating, next week my husband and I are going to watch the Sydney Roller Derby League Presents the 2014 Home Season Grand Finals!

I've never seen Roller Derby live, only in a Drew Barrymore / Ellen Page movie, so I think it'll be interesting!

Eek!  So good.

Cyclocross (CX)!

(A very belated post)

So a while back in August, Sydney Cyclocross Collective posted about a free workshop with Lindsay Gorrell, NSW State Champion.

(via australiancxmagazine)

And I thought, I can't turn down this opportunity!

I used to think Cyclocross was odd.

I mean, who creates a bike race where you pick up the bike and run up stairs?

Anyway, after watching my husband and his friends do a race, I just thought it was a very fun thing!

Lots of pain faces very early on, but everyone laps everyone, so you never know who's winning or last.

My kind of race!

I even wanted to buy a CX bike!

Liv Giant 2014 Brava SLR 2

It is pink..

Anyway, so I did this workshop - I didn't want to do it and when I arrived I didn't want to do it even more because everyone had Cyclocross bikes or mountain bikes and I had my road bike.

As usual, I decided to have a goal so that I could try and have a sense of achievement at the end.

My goal was to try everything at least once.  Even if it was slow or a walkthrough.  (A pretty basic goal as I was expecting to be challenged.  This would be the first entrance to off-road cycling that I'd ever had.)

Our first lesson was suitcase carrys over a barrier.

(via onespeedblog.blogspot.com.au)

Which meant unclipping, and moving 1 leg over the back of the bike while still rolling, before unclipping the other foot and picking up the bike and running over the barrier.

I had trouble unclipping.

I am still not 100% confident with my clipping in / unclipping.

I felt like crying!

Thank goodness I always cycle with glasses, so hopefully when I'm crying, it's mostly hidden!

The first exercise and I already couldn't do it!

I thought to myself, this is just going to be a horrid day!

But, I thought about my goal - "try everything at least once".

So I sucked it up and gave it a go.

Not me.

It was pretty shit.

Lindsay was super nice though and tried to loosen my pedals (already at max looseness) and then gave me some exercises for practicing clipping in and out.

I talked myself into continuing - as I'm sort of used to cycling without being clipped in.

So I decided to practice by unclipping super early.

That was much better.

And I also did my first down hill slope.

It freaked me out watching the other girls, and I had a mental block of thinking of road bike would slip out.

Finally, I agreed to borrow someone else's bike (see how friendly everyone is!) and I did it!

Not me.  (That's Lindsay)

So after all of that worry and initial mental anguish, it ended up being a really fun day and great meeting other girls interested in CX.

That's me.

The group.

Big thank you to Rob Parbery who is huge in supporting CX in Sydney and Lindsay Gorrell for taking the time to run the session.

A few weeks later, I ended up doing 1 race at Terrey Hills but I felt like my attempt was a bit lame

I did it on my road bike with my road tyres.

I was too nervous and I didn't really apply anything that I learnt.

My transitions were really awkward and clunky.  Basically, stop, get off bike, walk over obstacle, stop, get back on bike, go.

The technical parts were also really difficult (even for those on mountain bikes).

Something to think about for next year.  ;)

Favourite part of the race - at the beginning - speaking to Lizanne:

Me: My goal is to do 2 laps.

Lizanne: Oh, you'll do more than that, unfortunately..

Yeah.. I did 5 laps.  (The winners did 8).

2 Things I Learnt From Husband Doing The Newcastle Overnight

Last night, my husband participated in the Newcastle Overnight.

via http://newcastleovernight.com/

It was a 170km ride starting at 9pm at Observatory Hill, Sydney to Newcastle Baths.

I initially considered maybe doing it, but it sounded a bit long and tiring..

I was irrationally worried about my husband doing it as I had been affected a few months earlier by the gentleman who was killed by a truck while participating in a long ride.

My husband reassured me that one must not go through life avoiding things that 1 person once died from.

Which is a really valid statement.

Otherwise we'd all either be sitting in the middle of a room not doing anything, although, I'm sure someone must have died from doing that at some point in history..

Anyway, everything went fine and apparently the group stuck together quite effectively (however my husband is a pretty strong beginner rider who can keep up with the more experienced riders if need be).

2 Things I Learnt From Husband Doing The Newcastle Overnight

1.  I don't think I want to do it (right now).

Despite it sounding like a challenging event with a bunch of nice people (I mean, who has the energy to be an arsehole while cycling 170km.. surely you run out of air at about 80km.), my husband's by-line for the ride on Strava was "Everybody hurts . . . sometimes . . . everybody cries . . ." which is the song he sings when he climbs.  

But, his description of the last part of the ride and how at the last stop, everyone's pretty subdued, and it's about making conversation and being easy going and staying positive..  I'm just not sure if my personality would be that conducive.  

My husband even mentioned there was a point on the ride where he thought "if my wife was here, she would be crying right now".

Anyway, not for right now, maybe when I'm old and wise AND A MONSTER CYCLIST.  Teehee..

2.  Using lots of chamois cream is important

I always marvelled at photos of how much chamois cream was used by experienced cyclists - eg.

(via euphoriabeforetotalimplosion.blogspot.com.au)

Without going into too much detail, despite my husband bringing along a ziplock bag of chamois cream to reapply.  It was not enough.

He described parts chafing that I didn't realise even made contact when cycling.

As I have never ridden close to 200km, now I understand why this (formerly considered EXCESSIVE) amount of chamois cream is required.

Yay for chamois cream.

Today I won a game of chicken

Today I won a game of chicken.

But it doesn't feel like I won anything.

I was cycling towards La Perouse (1 lane each way).

A vehicle coming the opposite way, overtook another vehicle and completed this move.

Then he decided to change into my lane and head towards me - ie. going the wrong way in my lane.

I was planning to turn left so I held my lane (to get a good turning line and so no cars could overtake me).  There were also no cars behind me.

I eyeballed him and just before we got close, he changed back to the correct lane.

I feel like I held my lane because
1.  the car was not accelerating
2.  there were heaps of people around as witnesses

I think if those 2 things had been different, I may have made a different decision.

Now, it didn't really affect me because when I'm cycling, I turn into an absolute hardarse.

I have developed this because I found when cycling, I feel like I need to focus on staying calm and making measured decisions without panicking.

But in hindsight, this morning was probably a risky move and I'm lucky I didn't get injured.

I know everyone will be like "be careful" and I wish I didn't have stories like this, but it is what it is.

It's good

Most of the time it's great fun.

I really think things are getting better - I think odd incidents for me have dropped from once a fortnight to probably once a month.

One day..

(via www.keepcalm-o-matic.co.uk)

P.S.  How good is the Sydney weather this week!  :)

I finally worked out how to get my bike to lean against a wall with the back wheel only.  

By "worked out", I mean I did it for the first time and it worked...

Something to do with aiming the front wheel at that particular angle....