Pedal Cure 4 FightMND – 2020
8th March, 2020
Today was the day when I would officially start Pedal Cure 4 FightMND. I’ve never cycled with a large group of people before, so this was going to be different. After breakfast and being checked off, I threw most of my stuff in one of the support vehicles and lined up. There were two groups. A faster group and a ‘slower’ group. I was in the slower group, which set off first. At 08:54, it was time to roll! As we rolled out of turn, there were a few cheers from wellwishers. We were soon on the open road, opening up the throttle. Suffice to say, the pace was quite fast (as far as I was concerned). It didn’t take too long for the fast group to catch up and overtake. It wasn’t until West Wyalong, about 40 km non-stop down the road, that we stopped for a morning break. Very glad I wasn’t carrying my usual load.
Twenty minutes later, it was time to set off again. Pushing another 35 km down the road to a place called Barmedman. Thankfully, the ride so far was relatively flat. I was able to keep up a decent pace. Fast by my standards, but not fast compared to the ‘fast’ group. 🙂 We arrived at Barmedman and had lunch in one of the parks.
After about twenty minutes, I joined a couple of others who decided to move along early. This allowed us to cycle along at a more sedate pace. Which was nice, as there was a steady ascent for the next 10 km. This resulted in being overtaken by both groups fairly quickly. But the last 15 km had a downward trend. After six hours (and certainly my fastest day cycling), we arrived at Ariah Park – our stop for the night.
After a shower, at the local footy club, we all popped over to the Ariah Park Hotel, where we were all entertained by Hawthorn footballers Luke Breust & Isaac Smith, and former Essendon footballer Chris Daniher. An entertaining evening, with food and drink all around! Tomorrow, it’s over 130 km – this will be my longest distance yet!
Header photo grabbed from a photo on Pedal Cure's Facebook page.