Seven Hills on Sunday

I went out for a bit of a post-accident shakedown ride on Sunday morning. My rib and my wrist were still sore, so I wasn't sure how far I'd get. I was pretty keen to at least try Saddle Hill Road up in the Belair National Park. After doing Sheoak Road three weeks ago, I posted a comment on Adelaide Cyclists and another member suggested that Saddle Hill Road is a good alternative route up that way. It's still steep but doesn't have that ridiculous bit at the start.

I also felt the need to get back out on the road to try and get my cycling mojo back. Riding on quiet roads in the hills is obviously different to doing an urban commute in busy traffic but I nonetheless had a strong need to get out there and get amongst it. I've been a bit of a nervous wreck commuting in traffic especially in the few days after the accident. I've always considered myself to be a reasonably safe and defensive rider but I'm more cautious now. Having experienced someone doing something completely unpredictable and reckless, I keep expecting everyone to do the same. Every time I have someone on my right when approaching a left hand corner I find myself braking in anticipation of them swinging in front of me. I'm sure I'll stop being so paranoid in the weeks to come but maybe just a bit of paranoia and extra vigilence is a good thing. I don't want it to diminish my cyling experience and take the fun away, but equally, I don't want to end up on the deck again.

Sunday's ride ended up becoming somewhat of an epic. I read a write up recently of the 'Dirty Dozen' ride in Adelaide last year (here, nicely written by Adam Willis with great pics) which involved a bunch of riders doing 12 of Adelaide's steepest climbs - a total of around 3000m of climbing - in one day. It's given me some ideas for future climbs. Anyway, Sunday's ride ended up being my scaled down version - 'Seven Hills' perhaps. I did 1512m of ascending over 84km which is more climbing than I've ever done in one ride. Here's a list of the the main parts of each climb, with stats from Strava segments:

Shepherds Hill Road (bottom end)      2.3km @ 6.3%
Cherry Plantation Road, BNP             0.9km @ 11.2%
Saddle Hill Road, BNP                      1.5km @ 8.0%
Sheoak Road (east end)                    1.0km @ 8.7%
Mt Lofty Summit Road                       2.3km @ 5.1%
Germantown Hill                                1.6km @ 6.1%
Old Mt Barker Rd (from Kain Ave)       1.2km @ 7.4%

As you can see, it's mostly short, sharp and shiney climbs. Not suprisingly, the hardest was Cherry Plantation Road in Belair National Park, which was actually a mistake. I missed the turn-off to Saddle Hill Road and kept riding thinking I was on it. I should have twigged when I came upon a 'no through road' sign, then a boom gate across the road. I persisted and the road turned steep very quickly and was littered with twigs and bark due to the fact that vehicles hardly ever go up (or down) there. It took some serious zig zagging and dodging of the debris, but I made it to the top. The road flattened out and I followed it to it's logical conclusion, which should have found me on Sheoak Road. However, when I reached the junction it looked suspiciously like Upper Sturt Road. I contemplated following it to Crafers but I was determined to do Saddle Hill Road, so I re-traced my steps and finally found the turn off. It turned out to be a particularly nice road to ride on with bugger all traffic - it was still steep and challenging but not as severe and demoralising as Sheoak Road.

The Valley Road - very pretty

The start of the Cherry Plantation Road climb

The start of the Saddle Hill Road climb

and further along

I've had another minor acheivement this week. I finally made it to the top of a Strava leaderboard for my age bracket. It's on one of those countless short urban segements which really are a bit naff. It's the diagonal path running through the south parklands linking Morphett Road/South Tce with Goodwood/Greenhill Roads. It was quite accidental - I was just enjoying having a tailwind on my commute home (for a change) and thought I'd give my legs a bit of a blast. Anyway, I'm number one out of 23 in the old buggers' age bracket (45 - 54). Happy happy, joy joy.....

A little pleasure, lots of pain

It's been a fairly eventful week, cycling wise. It was pretty warm on the weekend so I thought I'd do a flat ride down to Semaphore rather than hit the hills. In the absence of hills I decided to ride hard and try to get my average speed up a bit. It worked out pretty well - I averaged 27km/h for the 54 km journey, which is the fastest longer ride I've done by a mile.

I signed up to do the 'Feb-fifteen Challenge" on Strava where you basically try and do 15 hours on the bike for the week (25/2 - 3/3). To get some hours up I thought I'd do some meandering on the way home from work. Tuesday's meander was a trip up to Crafers. Given how much I've improved up Willunga Hill last weekend, I was keen to see if I could improve my time from the Tollgate to the Crafers bollards (probably my most frequent climb). I gave it a good solid effort and ended up doing it just under 38 minutes, smashing my previous best by 4:30 which I was pretty excited about. The last time I did the descent from there I gave it a good old crack and did it in a bit over 10 minutes, but I don't think I'll be doing that again soon. The on-road part is okay but it really is too risky to fang it on the narrow bike path bits at the start and finish of the run. So this time I thought I'd try and do the downhill run without pedaling at all. It still only took just over fifteen minutes and I had plenty of time to enjoy the scenery, which was an entirely pleasant experience on a balmy summer evening.

It's not all beer, skittles and nice scenery though because yesterday morning I had an accident on the way to work. With the closure of the Noarlunga train line for most of this year, I've been riding every day. It's normally only a short 8km commute because I drop Ruby at school, drive to the nearest tram stop and ride from there, usually taking the bike route that runs adjacent to the tramway. It's a fairly cruisy ride which I've been doing on my flat bar roadie (a Giant CRX2). I don't do the Lycra thing and take it fairly easy because I don't want to get too hot and sweaty before work. I've been really enjoying the commute with the exception of the run along Morphett Street. The worst part is traversing Whitmore and Light Squares where cars and buses constantly cut the corners into the bike lane.

Anyway, yesterday I was cruising along Morphett Street heading north. As I entered the left hand bend at the south-west corner of Light Square, a black SUV (it's always seems to be a black SUV...) went past me. Inexplicably, they decided they needed to suddenly turn left down Waymouth Street and lurched straight across my path. I just avoided a collision, but skidded and came off hitting the deck fairly hard. I ended up with some abrasions and sprains, the worst injury being a bruised rib (I think my rib slammed into one of my bar ends when I hit the deck). By the time I picked myself up, the car had disappeared down the road. I suspect they were completely oblivious to what happened. They clearly didn't see me, despite having my lights on and wearing a flouro jersey. I have trouble fathoming it, but sometimes it doesn't matter how visible you are or how defensibly you ride, some drivers just have a permanent blind spot when it comes to bikes and bike lanes. And the accident could have been far, far worse if the car behind me hadn't stopped so quickly.

There's more accidents in the CBD than anywhere else in Adelaide - I suspect many of them occur because drivers are looking for parks or trying to find streets etc, and are prone to making rash decisions such as turning across the bike lanes without looking. I don't think you can change that behaviour - the solution is to improve the cyling infrastucture by having separated, dedicated bike lanes, reducing the amount of cars in the CBD and limiting right turns at intersections (especially at peak times). I'm sure that there's many other things that could be done but these three would be a damn good start. Anyway I might write to the Adelaide City Council and give them my two cents worth on this subject.

The accident has shaken me up a bit and I've been feeling a bit anxious in traffic since it happened. I'm sure I'll get my cycling mojo back but, for the moment, being in traffic is just a little stressful. The really annoying thing is that I was planning a long hard ride in the hills for this Saturday in preparation for the Velo Adelaide ride in a few weeks, but I think my ribs will still be too sore. Bugger.

Hot, bothered, happy

I hadn't been up Willunga Hill since I went down to Encounter Bay in early January so I thought I'd give it a another bash this morning. I took off just after 7am and headed up the Veloway. It was getting warm even then so it was pretty clear it was going to develop into a bit of a stinker of a day.

After a quick refreshment stop at Willunga and I headed up the hill. My best time is 21:08 up there and I was confident I could take a minute or so off it. When I reached the 1st km mark in around 7:30 I thought I was onto a good thing (considering the first km is the hardest). In the end I did it in 17:37 taking a huge 3 1/2 minutes off my best, which is far and away the biggest improvement I've ever had on a climb. I reckon I could have pushed a bit harder over the final third so I think I could get into the 16's. I'm pretty damn happy about that.

What goes up must, naturally enough, come down, so I decided to do the Penney's Hill Road descent for the first time in ages. It's a magnificent bit of road and I managed to do it in a tick over four minutes, which is my best effort there too.

The pines on the way to MV - always a haven on a hot day

Now all those personal bests are all well and good but by the time I'd worked my way back to the south end of the Veloway and stopped for a break in the tunnel, it was getting pretty damn hot and I was starting to feel pretty damn bothered. Up to that point I'd set a reasonably brisk pace but the trip home from there was fairly slow. The last half hour was particularly hard work and it became a struggle to go the distance. I clearly wasn't the only one feeling the heat - I passed a couple of groups stopped in the shade on the Veloway with a few people looking distinctly worse for wear. It was around 35 degrees at this stage (late morning) and quite humid with north winds so it was no surprise that my core temperature went up a bit. I jumped straight into a long cold shower with my gear on when I got home but it was still a good half hour before I stopped sweating.

The ride was 92km with 1200m of climbing and I was out for a bit under five hours which, in those conditions, is about my limit. Overall though, it seems that all the extra km's I've been doing over the past two or three months are starting to pay off. I feel stronger on the bike, I spend a lot more time on the big chainring (albeit a 50 tooth compact), I can push for longer out of the saddle on a climb and haven't cramped up for ages.

Sheoak Road - Satan's driveway!

I've just had a fairly big weekend on the bike - lots of climbing (just over 2000m) and I tackled a few new hills.

I've had a bit of a spring to my step since making it up Corkscrew last weekend. With this new found confidence I thought I'd tackle the Belair Road and Sheoak Road route through to Crafers on Saturday. I've heard that Sheoak Road is long and tough but felt up for the challenge. Before that however was Belair Road. I've been down it before but I've never done the up track. I've been up there countless times on mototbikes and in cars when I was younger, so I know the road pretty well. Overall it was a magnificent climb - great views to the city and challenging but not too long (it's 3.6 km at 5.6%). From the top I headed across to Sheoak Road.

It was nice enough at the start, exchanging pleasantries with the residents out raking leaves and watering their gardens. Perhaps it was a touch of paranoia, but they seemed to giving me a knowing "I know something about this road that you don't" look. Then, soon enough, it appeared. The yellow 20% gradient sign heralded the appearance of a very, very nasty hill. I stopped for a quick snap of the sign and the hill (well, you don't often see a 20% sign), and thought 'here goes nothing'. It was bloody hard and I made it about two-thirds the way up before I conceded defeat.

It doesn't look very steep in the photos - I guess you just had to be there.
Zoom in, the sign really does say 20%, honest!

This is the top of the nasty hill

After a 2 or 3 minute break and a 20 metre walk up the hill to a flatish driveway (so I could safely take off and clip in, which is always a challenge for me on a steep hill), I was on my way again and completed the last bit of the climb. I might have faired a bit better if I had more of a run up and didn't stop at the base of the climb for a photo opportunity but, realistically, I still don't think I could have made it up that hill. I'm quite happy grinding away up a long 8% climb but I just don't have the power in my legs for those short but severe gradients. I suspect I'll probably get up there eventually, but I doubt if it will be any time in the near future.

Thankfully there was no more climbs of that severity. The rest of the road was more of a constant rollercoaster of climbs which I found pretty demanding but I got through it without stopping. When I reached this particularly long and nasty hill pictured below, I really wasn't sure how far along the road I'd come. I thought I was about three quarters done, so after trudging up this long straight climb I was pretty happy to hear the traffic from Upper Sturt Road. From there it was a short ride to Crafers. After that I just turned around and came home back via Sheoak, Blackwood and down Shephards Hill Road.

The final hill that seemed to go forever (at the eastern end of Sheoak Road)

I'd mapped out Sunday morning's ride ages ago but never got around to doing it. I started off climbing up Flagstaff Road then headed to Clarendon, Kangarilla, Meadows, Echunga, Hahndorf, Bridgewater, Crafers then home. It was 90km with around 1300m of climbing, which puts it up there with my most challenging rides. It was challenging too because most of the first 40km or so were into a reasonably brisk headwind. The first major challenge was Chandlers Hill. I'd been about two-thirds the way up a couple of years ago but I haven't been back since, so it was nice to get up the thing. It's 2.5km at 6.7%, so it's not to be sneezed at. From there it was a nice downhill run into Clarendon then some more gentle climbs heading toward Kangarilla and Meadows. Here's a couple of snaps on the way to Meadows:

It started to drizzle on the way into Meadows but there wasn't too much in it. I stopped at the sausage sizzle at the market in Meadows, then turned up to the long straight road towards Echunga. I was amazed at how many vintage cars were going past me and thought there must have been some sort of event on. Sure enough, just out of Echunga I came across the 'All British' vehicle gathering. There was so many magnificent cars - here's a few pics:

A Healey, I believe

Love the Morry convertible

 

Not sure what this is, but it has some beautifully sculptured, elegant curves.

The road through to Hahndorf was paricularly nice. It was fairly busy on this particular morning but it was a nice smooth ride nonetheless. Another break at Hahndorf and I headed towards the familiar climbs of Germantown Hill and the Old Mt Barker Road climb up Mt George. I was pretty happy with these two - I managed to do my best time up both climbs, then topped it of with my fastest run down from Crafers to the Tollgate (10:31), which was significantly good fun.

It was a bit of a 'four seasons in one day' sort of morning - dark and cloudy, then drizzly, then bright and sunny towards the end. This was perfect conditions to try out my new Shimano photochromatic glasses (ie. they change depending on the brightness). The lenses performed brilliantly, they were really comfortable and seemed to repell the rain quite well too. Very impressed.

Overall, it was a great ride - good distance, plenty of work for the legs, nice roads, not too hot etc. I'm certainly racking up the km's. I'm up to around 870 so far this year, which is only 6 weeks old. I did around 2000 for the whole of last year so I reckon I can at least double that this year.

Conquering Corksrew

I think I'm finally making a little bit of progress. Leading up to the Mt Lofty Challenge in March, I'm focusing more on the hills. To that end, today's ride was pretty intense (for me at least) - 1150m of elevation gained over 56km.

I dropped Ruby at the Gilles Street market, parked the car in the CBD and headed up to Norton Summit. My legs felt pretty good and I managed to knock over a minute off my best time. From there I thought I might try the Lobethal Road, not having been down there before. It's a really nice road but I only made it as far as Basket Range before turning back, partly because I was running out of time and partly because there was a few too many motor bikes on the road for my liking. Bikes don't normally bother me at all but there seemed to be constant steam of boy racers around this afternoon. I'm all for sharing the road but when I'm plodding away up a hill on the edge of the road and a bike flys by doing 70 or 80km/h, 2 - 3 feet from my right shoulder I start to get a little un-nerved. I'm not normally riding in the hills at that time of day - it's less of an issue in the early mornings.

So I headed back up the long hill to Ashton then headed towards Montacute Road and my date with the Corkscrew, keen to have another bash at it. I rolled down the hill, admiring all the signwriting on the road from the TDU a week and a half ago. Just past the bridge I turned around and steeled myself for the climb.

The first stage is deceptively hard. It doesn't look as severe as the hairpin section - it starts off okay but pretty soon becomes a hard grind. I went past a couple of guys on the first part of the climb who were both clearly struggling on this section and they both ended up stopping. I have to say that overtaking someone on a climb always gives my ego a boost because it doesn't happen very often. I reckon the hardest bit is the 300m or so before the first hairpin. I struggled through it - I got down to walking pace but I was determined to keep grinding away. The hairpins, well .... they're also the hardest bit. As I approached the first one, my determination was strong but I was concerned that my legs would blow up.

The Ride for a Reason signs (ie. the "think this climb is tough ... imagine fighting cancer" ones) on the first few hairpins helped to strengthen my resolve. It was timely, especially with Sandra back in hospital last week and still having a tough time. The latest thing she's had to endure is surgery to have a pick line thing installed in her chest, so that chemo and other drugs can be administered. She's had quite a bit of trouble with the one in her arm and decided to pay to have the chest one done because it's much better in many ways. Unfortunately the surgeon snipped her lung (apparently a one in five hundred occurrence) so she's had to spend a week in hospital recovering. It's put her treatment back a bit but I think she'll be starting chemo again over the next few weeks.

She's now been on the latest cancer roller coaster for nine months or so. She had bowel cancer about three years ago and had a fair bit of her bowel removed. This time she's been treated for two spots on opposite sides of her liver and two on her lung. The prognosis did not look good in the early days as there was considerable doubt about whether the liver would be operable. Thankfully, there was a surgeon who was pretty confident that surgery could be done, so in September she had 40% of her liver removed. This was followed up with several weeks of chemo. They've recently discovered another spot on her lung so she's about to get back on the chemo treadmill.

I am so much in awe of how she has handled herself over the last nine months or so. It's been such a emotional roller coaster but she still manages to just get on with things. It's obviously been pretty tough for her but, to me, she seems remarkably positive and she steadfastly refuses to let cancer define her life. I guess you don't really know how you'd handle something like this until it actually happens to you, but Sandra has revealed remarkable strength, courage and resilience to us all, which is quite inspiring.

Back on the road, I counted down the hairpins out loud ....one down....painful....two down....really painful...three down....agony.......but at that point I knew I was home. I took the high line in the middle of the road and almost cruised around the fourth and final hairpin.

From there to the top it's still steep, but I knew it was manageable. The last third of the climb was the best feeling - I was so happy I did a bit whooping and shouting (I can't actually remember what I said), which is not normally my style. I even had enough left in my legs to get out of the saddle a couple of times. Then I started to feel a bit overwhelmed. I guess it was partly that thing of driving yourself pretty much to the edge physically which overwhelms you emotionally as well. I also think I may well be turning into one of the blokes who cries more often when they get older. Anyway, I reached the top and felt so elated I had to ring Karolle and tell her. Then I got choked up when I tried to tell her that thinking about what Sandra's been going through helped me to hang in there. Of course, I'm just riding a bike up a hill - no one's forcing me to do it. Like Belinda, Sandra doesn't have a choice with her pain. But it doesn't stop me admiring her and being inspired by her.

The Corkscrew Road climb is 2.4km at 9.4% average gradient which is definitely the steepest hill I've done. It took me just under 19 minutes - I think the pros did it in 7 or 8 minutes on Stage 2 of the TDU last month. I suspect there's been many thousands of cyclists over the years who've been up there faster but, for me, it was all about getting to the top without stopping. I'm pretty damn chuffed about it.

Bupa Challenge

Well, the Bupa Challenge has been and gone. The ride went pretty well - it was relatively cruisey with a tail wind for the majority of the ride. Mind you the day got off to a fairly ordinary start because I had terrible trouble sleeping the night before. I reckon I had no more than two hours sleep. I wasn't nervous or anything but I did go to bed quite a bit earlier than I normally do and it was a stinking hot night. I just got into that horrible insomnia cycle and couldn't seem to get myself out of it. I finally nodded off at 3.30 but the alarm was set for 5am so I'd make it to Kersbrook for the start.

Anyway, I was a bit concerned about how I'd go on the ride with such minimal sleep. I felt pretty tired at the start but I managed to get myself going and felt okay for most of the ride. I was feeling pretty buggered towards the end, especially the bit just out of Angaston which was uphill and into the wind (the picture below was taken there), but overall I'm glad it was a relatively easy route. It was only about 800m of climbing which is not that much compared to most of the rides I've been doing for the past few months. It took me a touch over four hours and I averaged 25.6km/h which, all things considered, I'm reasonably happy with.

Troy did the 46km ride from Mt Pleasant and went really well. I think he was surprised that they (he and Bevan) made it to Tanunda so quickly - a bit over an hour and a half, I think he said. I met up with them (ie. Alison, Charlotte and Troy) at the finish and took them up on their offer of a lift back to Kersbrook. I was a little disappointed about not riding back to my car, as was the original plan, but I would have had a headwind and there was nothing much left in the tank after that crappy night.

I'm not sure if I'll do the TDU ride again, unless it's a really good route. The logistics were a bit of a pain, it's expensive and the jersey was pretty ordinary (and not optional). The best community ride I've done was the the Mt Lofty Challenge - cheaper, great (and optional) jersey, more interesting and challenging route and a CBD start/finish. It comes up again in March so that's what I'll be preparing for over the next six weeks. The goal I set after the ride last year was to do the 110km circuit in around the same time that I took to do the 80km last year. I'm sticking to that - I'm not 100% confident because it's an awful lot of climbing (around 1800m) but I'll give it a bash. I better get myself up into them thar hills.

Riding, riding and more riding

I've covered a fair bit of ground since I last updated this blog a month ago. I've done just over 600km with around 6000m of climbing, which makes it the most intense period of riding that I've ever done. I've done a bunch a nice longish rides. I rode down to Encounter Bay to see Barrie and Ruth and have been up to Norton Summit and Mt Lofty a few times. I'm slowly starting to show some improvement - my average time is creeping up a bit and I've done my best times on a few climbs (Old Willunga Hill, Mt Lofty specifically)

It's Tour Down Under week and it's a great time to be on a bike. I've encountered a bunch of pro teams in my travels over the past week or so. I went up to Norton Summit last Tuesday night after work and while I stopped and filled my water bottle, the whole BMC team (led by Phillip Gilbert resplendent in his world champs rainbow jersey) came up the road then disappeared down the Old NS Road. Then last Saturday I came across 10 different teams out training around West Lakes and Semaphore. It was great fun to be riding around in amongst all that.

It was a pretty big ride on Saturday - 105km, which is the longest ride I've done. I went up to Mt Lofty, then across the ranges and descended down Montacute Road, which has been partially resurface ahead of tomorrow's TDU stage where they go up Corkscrew Road and down Montacute Road to the finish line. That's going to be a seriously hairy decsent. Unfortunately they've only resurfaced the worst bits so it's has a bit of a patchwork look. Still, the new bits are beautifully smooth and overall it's better than it was.

Anyway, from Monacute I worked my way across the city, down Grange Road and across to Semaphore. By the time a reached Semaphore and stopped for a toasty I'd clocked up 78km. I was surprised at how good I felt - I'm normally starting to feel pretty well spent by then. As I bogged into my toasty, I started to wonder if Karolle had laced my orange juice with EPO that morning! I decided it was a combination of things - paying a bit more attention to carb loading over the 24 hours before the ride, taking a higher potency magnesium powder ('Ultra Muscleze Energy') which seemed to help with my cramp issues, mild weather (27ish) and getting my bike fit sorted.

Heading up Cross Road in the first part of the ride, I kept getting the feeling that, if I raised my seat a bit more, I'd probably sit a bit lighter on my bum. When I first started riding my seat was quite low (only slightly higher than the handlebars) because of my lower back issues left over from my disc injury 12 years ago. As my back has been getting stronger, I feel like I've been able to cope with having the seat higher so I've been incrementally raising it over the past year. Anyway, I stopped just before the Tollgate and raised it by 15-20mm, which is a fairly significant increase. After doing the 40 kilometres or so through the hills it was pretty obvious that I'd got it right because my bum wasn't nearly as sore as I normally would be.

Anyway I felt remarkably good at the end of the ride. I even had enough left in my legs to boogie the night away with Karolle at Peta-Ann's 80's theme birthday party on Saturday night. Mind you, my legs have been pretty sore for the last few days.

The Bupa challenge ride is coming up on Friday. I've decided to do the Kersbrook start (92km), mainly because it fits in better logistically. I can drive to Kerbrook, do the ride, hang out in Tanunda with Troy and Allison (Troy's doing the 46km), watch the pros come through, then ride back down to Kersbrook (35km). That's the theory anyway. I can't wait. The weather forecast is good - 25 degrees with south-westerly winds, which will be a tailwind for the majority of the ride.

I'm also doing the Ride for a Reason cancer fundraising thing. It seemed timely with my sister-in-law Sandra riding the cancer rollercoaster for most of the past year and with my neice Belinda passing away 14 months ago. I'm doing the Bupa ride for my own sense of acheivement but I'm also riding to honour them both. Here's the signs they've put up on Norton Summit Road recently that put it all into perspective.

Today is also the second anniversary of giving up smoking. I'm pretty damn happy about that. My, how life has changed.