I love this race. I do it every year, had to miss out last year because I was 5 months pregnant! I seeded myself correctly in the 30-35 kmhr group, but was annoyed at all the slower people who we're seeded further back but moved up into our group at the start of the race. There were people on mountain bikes and even on fixed gear bikes. Please! All that ends up happening is you have to spend the first 5k overtaking everyone. Anyway, once that was over, I was off! I totally hammered the first half of the ride, got to the bridge across the river in Fremantle within 45 mins at was at the half way point by 50 mins. Along the way I chatted to a guy wearing a Polish cycling jersey (I want one!) and a guy from Sef's work, I recognised his Ausenco knicks. Anyway after I got to the half way point I really started to feel knackered. Probably because I've only been doing 25-30k rides for the past few months. It was also super humid out there under heavy, thunderstormy skies. I ate a muesli bar and focused on drinking more and felt a bit better. I'd managed to average 30k/hr until that point and didn't think I could hold it, but I must have because I finished with a 30k/hr average. It was a lot harder though after that half way mark! I concentrated on finding people to draft off to help me along. A lot of people would beat me on the uphill, but I would beat them on the downhill & flat. I used aero position where I could. Towards the end I realised I may beat my time from 2008 so I pushed as hard as I could. As I got onto Riverside Drive about 500m from the finish, a guy I'd been playing cat & mouse with since the half way point said to me "lets race to the end" so I totally hammered it and left him in the dust! Then I apologised, I had aero and he didn't so I had an unfair advantage ;-)

Not a lot. Train more? How much faster can I get? :)

Didn't hang around as needed to get home to the hubby & son. Gentle cycle to the train station, caught the train home, gentle cycle home from our local station.


PB time! I get better every time I do this. 2006 2:18, 2007 2:05, 2008 1:49, 2009 didn't do it, was pregnant LOL. I haven't been doing a whole amount of training so I'm super happy. I could always train more of course. I'm doing what I can considering I have an 8 month old baby!!!

Some hill training and weight loss would probably both make a big difference. Hills are my weakness.


Like the terminator, I'LL BE BACK!!! ;-)