2010 Endeavour Challenge 110km Charity Ride

Its a little hard to find bike races around the place so when this opportunity came up I jumped at the chance! Now I know its a charity ride, and they say its not a race, but I planned on racing and I was sure that others would too!

The morning of the event myself and dean set out very early to make it there on time. It was overcast and raining a little by the time we arrived. What an awesome start to the day

When we arrived we found an open subway so I could fuel up and then I got into my gear ready for the start of the ride. Unfortunately I discovered I left my arm warmers at home, so it could be interesting as no other rider did not have arm warmers on.

The rain for the moment had subsided and I position myself in the front of the pack for the slow start as we departed Toowoomba. It was pretty clear from the start there were going to be a few to race as we quickly lost the majority of the riders forming a pack of around 20 riders.

The pace was hot from the start and before I knew it we had gone through the 45km mark in around 37km an hour. I was sitting at the back of the pack conserving myself not really sure of what the ride would be like.

It was spitting gently as we ride through rolling hills that would continue for the entire 110kms. It was a great experience to ride with a pack and race like cyclists would and it was interesting to note the pack mentality and trying to resist the temptation to attack. We slowly dropped riders until only 8 of us remained. At around 60kms a rider made a break away and I decided to chase it down.

Another rider took off before me and cleared out away from the pack. Coming from the back I built my speed up quickly and shot around the peloton. Unfortunately I did this with quite a lot of pace and before I knew it was I was shooting past the breakaway riders and forming my own.

I decided I was committed so continued the pace for around a Km before hitting a long hill where the pack quickly caught me. And this was the end of my excitement for the day.

By around the 75km mark I was dropped, the rolling hills finally took their toll and I just couldn't maintain the pace of the pack. We were still sitting on around 35kph for the 75km but I was slowing rapidly.

Dean pulled up along side of me in the car for the remainder of the ride, and it really was a struggle. Along the flats I was fine and managed to hit around 36kph but the hills were killing me and dropping my speed significantly.

The pack had stretch to single riders apart from three lead riders. I caught one and another was in my sights over the last 10km but I couldn't catch them.

In the end I was the 5th rider across the line in a time of 3:27:10 a great time and a very fast average speed for me to hold through rolling hills. All in all it was a great training rider and a massive learning curve for me!