A trip to Canberra

18/7/12

A couple of weeks back now I loaded the car (AKA Jen’s ice-cream van), with both mtb and roadie, and drove the 7hrs or so up the Hume to Canberra.  I had several aims of my week long stay, including catching up with a few of my Anytime / Trek teammates, checking out the Trek headquarters and of course riding some of the awesome trails Canberra has to offer.

On my way up, I couldn’t resist a stop off in Holbrook, the ‘submarine’ town.  Admittedly, the stop wasn’t entirely motivated by the iconic submarine, but more so by the quality bakery in town!  It was winter after all…plenty of time to shed the extra kg’s and a little extra load makes for some good strength training anyway.  I was excited when the overall drive time was cut by almost an hour as I turned into the newly opened section of freeway.  I didn’t however judge the distance b/w petrol stations too well when the petrol sign started glowing red and then started flashing for a good 10km before finally finding a place to refuel.  Nothing like living on the edge.

The Henderson’s kindly gave me a bed and opened their house to me for the first few nights of my stay.  Generally a busy household, with up to 7 or 8 people staying at one time, the place was a little more peaceful during my visit with just 6 of us.  It was great to get to know each of the Hendo’s a little better and in particular spend some time with Ben, who unfortunately, due to sickness, hasn’t been able to show his face at any of the race events for some time.  While sickness has forced him off the race track at this point in time, Ben has been able to use the down-time wisely and has started up a business of importing Rubena Tyres.  In recent months I have been lucky to get hold of a set or 2 and have been mighty impressed with the combination of fast flowing, traction around corners and they are also one of the lightest tyres on the market.  I will not think twice about using the Rubena tyres in any of the upcoming races that’s for sure!

Team owner / manager Rich Peil, had the week scheduled out for me.  First thing on the list was a coffee out his side of town followed by a team ride in Majura.  Ben kindly guided me across town and joined us for coffee in Gungahlin.  Pete, our team mechanic, and young up and comer Harry Hearne also joined us.  By the time we had consumed a caffeine hit or 2, and made our way over to the Majura trails, the sun was shining and we were in for a couple of fun hours.  I’m not sure if “fun” really crossed my mind though, as Rich turned us up a fire-road once inside the gates of Majura.  The road just seemed to keep climbing, with several “kicks” of extra gradient.  I’m not sure if Rich had wanted to test me out and see if I had been joking about by lack of fitness, but I think my comments were confirmed to him about halfway up the climb!  It was probably good to get the hard climbing out of the way early on, as the rest of the ride was awesome fun with some cool descents and some undulating, twisty sections. All up a great ride was had, although after day 1 I was already quite knackered!

The trip to Canberra would not have been the same without experiencing the full effects of sub zero temperatures first thing in the morning.  I opted to go back inside, and put just one more layer on before departing the Hendo’s for a road ride with Jamie Bailey the next morning.  Jamie is a fellow Anytime Fitness team member and also works for Trek.  It was quite embarrassing to meet him for the first time and then just 5min later have to steel one of his road tubes after double flatting.  We finally made our way out to the base of Stromlo where we were to meet with Rich, for a few hours road ride in the hills.  Our plans changed a little though as we got further out and couldn’t see more than 2metres ahead due to the mist.  If I’d been in full training, I would have insisted on carrying on out into the hills, but as this was just my first week back on the bike we opted for an easier stroll around the lake.  Lucky I chose the easier route as my legs still hadn’t recovered from the previous day.  On the way home Jamie assured me that he was taking me the ‘scenic’ way and taking in more of the sights of Canberra.  I actually think he was a little lost as we seemed to be going around in circles a fair bit and got to practice our cyclocross skills with a little off-road thrown in!

After thawing out in the shower, I made my way across town again to Fyshwick where Trek headquarters are.  Jamie once again met me there and kindly gave me the grand tour of the place.  Quite an impressive building with lots of space for the workers all busily typing away on computers, in meetings and madly putting together the latest Trek bikes for the upcoming “trek World” event.  I felt quite privileged to be shown the fancy new Trek bikes, yet to be released in Australia.  It’s a mystery to me how the engineers can continue to produce bikes that are lighter, stronger and more aerodynamic year after year. I am the first to admit that I am a little “technically-challenged” and opted to not make too many comments about the fancy looking machines in case I sounded silly!

It was great to meet many of the Trek staff, including National Marketing Manager Simon Thompson.  Simon was one of Australia’s most successful triathletes, having competed at Commonwealth and Olympic Games and a winner of World Cup events.  He knows first-hand what it is like to train and compete at the highest level and can relate well to the athletes.

The following day provided me with my greatest challenge yet.  I was to meet up with Rich’s wife, Jess, for a kickboxing session. Little did I know what I was in for!  For such a wide-smiling, loveable character, Jess can also be one tough chic when given a pair of boxing gloves!  While the hour work-out was pretty hard-core, I thoroughly enjoyed it and reckon boxing could very well add another dimension to the training program.

The following couple of nights I spent out at Rich’s farm.  The Peil’s residence is situated just out of town amongst some beautiful rolling hills.  It’s an awesome place for the kids to run around, kick the football and care for the animals.  Jess made some yummy pizzas for dinner and I opted for an early night.  The next morning I was treated to some great entertainment out at the kid’s soccer matches.  It was quite impressive to see the high skill level at such an early age!

Next on Rich’s checklist was a ride out at Sparrow hill.  Pete once again joined us for the spin, which was quite a peaceful one as each of us rode our own pace.  I was quite tired at this late stage in the week, with little training done of late, so was quite happy Rich didn’t throw in any unexpected hill climbs and I was able to let the Superfly do most of the work along the flowy trails out at Sparrow hill.

To cap off a great week in Canberra, Rich and Jess had organised a bon-fire out at their place on the Saturday night.  The Henderson’s, Pete, Harry and the family all came along for a great feed and laugh around the fire.  Much to the delight of the kids, Rich kept the fire ablaze with several splashes of diesel.  Luckily none of the nearby trees were set alight and the fire brigade didn’t have to be brought in.

Driving home from Canberra, I had a good 7hrs to summarize my week long stay.  I have concluded that I really must knuckle down and set myself a training program if I’m to be in any sort of form for the start of Summer, also that I am lucky enough to be part of an awesome mtb team alongside some great people and lastly that I lack the hand-eye co-ordination to become a reasonable boxer and will for now will stick to pedaling circles 🙂