Fixed Audax

Meets Melbourne
21

Saturday was a fun day out for all on our first (LW&B excluded) fixed Audax experience. Minimal traffic, great weather and a friendly bunch of riders. Almost a polar opposite from riding in Brisbane.

Participants included Rhino and special guest Rhino Snr on his geared Ciocc, Rogaine, Inane, LittleWheelsandBig and myself.

Freezing start from Gatton at 8am, but I decided to stick with a SS jersey and cutoff gloves in the hope that the temps would rise quickly. My fingers weren’t happy about that choice.

~51km to the bakery at Lowood for baked goods and a short rest before turning around and heading back to Gatton. After informing rogaine that our average speed was ~27km/hr for the (overall downhill) first part he decided that was too fast and we would slow it up a bit. Then he proceeded to try and drop us at every rise and the return leg flew past.

My speedo read 102.58km in 3:40 for an average of 27.95km/hr. Departed ~8am and arrived back at 12:05pm. Both my longest and longest fixed ride so far and I’m none the worse for wear, so I’m quite happy.

Rhino and James are already making noises about the 200km S & W of Toowoomba on July 1st, and there are 100/150/200km rides coming up around Ipswich on Jul22/Aug5/Aug26… Fixed Audax, the new hottness?

22

hey awesome guys - I love long rides.

I WAS planning on doing a 35km out-and-back to the Mt Stromlo observatory (on top of a big F’ing hill) but instead decided to keep going because of the gorgeous weather - to the Tidbinbilla deep space tracing station up in the Brindabella ranges:

http://www.stillhq.com/events/pictures/20051015-cotter/tidbinbilla_deep_space_network_tracking_nasa_canberra-IMG_3743.JPG

those things are really impressive up close. Anyway, I ended up doing 103km in about 4 hours including my 15min coffee at “The Dish”. Really hilly. I went in and out of the the gorge formed by the Molongolo river about 5 times - didn’t dismount once. Half the ride in 42/15 and the second half 42/16.

I’ve done ~165km fixed twice now - next is 200, then …the rest of the super Audax series…then PBP '07 !

  • Joel
23

Total agreement with Blakey, the event was fantastic and even better was the chance to ride around in an new area away from the cars. My father thinks we are all crazy, BUT…last night he had plans in his head to get his second moulton bike turned into a fixed (for getting the morning paper)…now, I wonder where he got that great idea :roll: