Stage 1 was a one hour crit on Friday afternoon. The purpose built crit circuit at Stromlo Forest park has no real corners and is much like Nundah (my least favourite place) back home. With 115 starters there was potential for the race to blow up completely. However, with relatively no wind this was not the case and the majority of the field was given the same time. The last 3 lsps were extremely fast and there were about 5 crashes on the final lap. Thankfully I was not near any of those. The goal was to stay out of trouble and not lose time, job done. 47km/hr average speed.

Stage 2 was a 109km road stage on Saturday morning. By the finish my computer said 115km. When the team came down last year we did this same stage. I also rode the course on Friday so knew exactly what to expect, a very hilly, fast and hard course. It started at the crit circuit and was out and back, then repeat that again. As usual the start was caotic with 115 riders all trying to get near the front. The intelligence of the bunch was highlighted for the first 20km with constant disregard by many to the double white lines we had been told to stay left of. It’s not a full road closure down here like most other NRS events. Like last year and at virtually the same spot the police stopped the race to address this issue again. After being told to stay left for the 27th time most people understood. During that 20km I flatted and despite leaving wheels in the designated area for neutral spares prior to the start Idiscovered there was no neutral spares car. My wheels were exactly where I left them 3 hours later. Big thanks to the BikeBug team car which gave me a wheel. It was shimano but it worked ok and I still had most gears. I was back to the convoy when the race was stopped.

From there not much happened until about 10km after the first turn around. At that point, roughly 40km in a large group just rolled off the front. I was boxed in and could not get out in time to get on this (without crossing a double white line in front of the police moto – not a fine I wanted). I thought the group was too big and would come straight back, not so. After a few more k’s I rode away from the main bunch hoping a few riders would join. That didn’t happen, only one rider joined me. At the halfway mark we were 1km behind the front group and 1km ahead of the main bunch. The next 60km were not much fun as we rode a two man TT to the finish. With only two we were not going to catch the leaders on our own and still thought others might come accross. We did have company for the last 1km but this was far too late! All things considered, after having missed the split this was a reasonable outcome and better than doing nothing back in the bunch for 60km. I haven’t seen the results yet but I’m told we were closer to the front group of 20 or so than the bunch was to us.

Stage 3 was a 20km TT starting 2 hours later. With the tough road stage just discussed already in the legs and a 32 spoke training wheel on the back of my road bike the outcome wasn’t going to be good. I only averaged 37.5km/hr and lost a fair chunk of time. Time to recover for tomorrows final stage. There are no flat roads here and it will be a tough 130km on Sunday.

Bobo. Out.