I wonder who stenciled this on the road??

Last Saturday was the first Saturday in a long time that I didn't get up at the crack of dawn to head out on a group ride. With the ATB on Sunday and all the events in the city as part of the Melbourne Cycling Festival (because Melbourne just doesn’t have quite enough festivals…), no one was doing a group ride this weekend so we figured we would have an easy day as well and just head into watch the races and meet up with some of the BVers.

After the drama of PDL’s new bike breaking, she got it back but Shimano had forgotten to send back the spacer for the brifter. Good one! BSC didn’t have any of the shims in stock and said they would get some in, however it seemed they didn’t know of any part to fit the Shimano 105 brifter after all and they suggested we take it back to their city store (where it was fitted in the first place) as they didn't know what they had done. Now, why-O-why they couldn’t just call the city store themselves I don’t know but that’s Brunswick St BSC workshop for you. *sigh*

On the way to the race, we rode over to BSC in Elizabeth St and picked up the shim and fitted it ourselves (after getting the extra little lug cut off to fit right). Now if I could figure out the deal with the shim and fit it while standing in Elizabeth St, why couldn't the Brunswick St BSC workshop guys do it? Anyway, on the way down I MADE PDL ride in front as she seems to ride more confidently when she leads and low and behold, she rode confidently and without fear.

Once at the cycling course, we rode a lap of the botanical gardens on the closed roads, which was really nice. As we rode up Anderson St, we stopped to take a photo of the HTFU stencil spray painted on the road. Hmm… I wonder who did that?? After stopping on Anderson St, PDL and I ended up racing each other to the top and as usual, PDL beat me but not by as big an amount and she used to. I’m getting there!

While wandering around the start finish area, checking out all the riders and their oh so trick bikes, PDL decided to enter a race and she won in a mass sprint finish! Ah… comedy gold!
Next we bumped into Richard and Meggles from the BV forum and then as we returned to Anderson St for the TT we met Freckle and her partner. We also saw Weg across the road and waved from a distance (well, actually I didn't see her but PDL did). We caught up with Kathy and Dave on Anderson St and then saw Kenneth and a cast of many other BV’ers. It's nice to be able to go to a big event like this and randomly meet up with so many people we know.

It was fun watching the TT riders fly down the hill for a while but it was watching them punish themselves going back up that was the fun bit. We all shouted encouragement to them and Stuart O'Grady got the biggest cheer. I just wish there was a big crowd with cow bells, air horns, flags waving and devils- just like they do on the Alp d’Huez”!

After the race we all rolled over to the bar for a drink and chat with more BVers and then left to go do the Kew Bouli, this time starting from the Richmond end.

To get to the Kew Bouli we had to ride down Swan St which was jam packed with cars. PDL rode through the mayhem with ease and zero stress. She was riding like a champ.

The start of Kew Bouli was riding up the big uphill climb and I was hurting. On the downhill I flew past PDL but she just caught back up to me on the next uphill which we repeated several times until PDL rode out of range (I think she picked up her downhill speed a bit).

I’m not sure but the Bouli seemed that much harder in this direction. Eventually we turned off at the track that goes down to the Fairfield Boathouse to avoid the Chandler Hwy bridge and boy that trail was interesting! Not only was is steep but it also had a series of narrow switchbacks, one after another!

By the time we made it across the bridge, PDL was feeling good about herself and her riding that day. She rode confidently in traffic; she rode the hills well and even picked up a bit of speed without feeling out of control. The smile on her face was unwipeable. Good stuff.

The following day we had planned to attempt the 1:20 ride up Mt Dandenong. I am expecting to be very slow but I think it’s doable *fingers crossed*.

I wonder who stenciled this on the road??