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• cycling - 43
• football - 4
• general - 22
• results - 2

Tue, 30 Nov 2004

Hartley Challenge - Photos - 20:12
I've added some Hartley Challenge photos

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Tour de France LIVE om SBS - 20:09
SBS Sport announced today on World Sports at 7pm that have the rights to show the The Tour de France LIVE and EVERYDAY for the next FIVE years. Now, of course this should make me very happy, and it did. But it also brought tears to my eyes. All at once it seems the minority sports in this country are finally getting a fair go. I remember the times when all the coverage I could get of the Tour was Winning magazines, months out of date. Of course they had fabulous photos by Graham Watson and the extensive stories of the chess game on wheels. I still look through some of the old mage from the 1980's I suppose Johnny Warren's fight for football still gets me all emotional. I wonder have I am going to survive the Tour de France and the World Cup when they virtually coincide in 2006.

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Hartley Challenge - 13:50
This weekend I rode the 2004 Hartley Challenge from Canberra to Charlotte's Pass and return, staying in Jindabyne. I rode with the Paxus/Vikings bunch organised by Bill Frost, John Thorn and Phil Lejsek. The other riders were Patrick McNamara, Ashley Sked, Bobby Dungca, Bill Neate, Graeme Cameron and Paul Burbidge-Smith. All the riders are experienced racer types, mostly past or current members of ACT Vets Cycling Club. Phil was the ride captain and the early relentless, but fast and steady pace was too much for me on Friday. At Bredbo I dropped back to another group for the run into Cooma. From there I took over from Graeme, driving Bill's Hi-Lux into the Sport and Rec centre at the top of the hill in Jindabyne. Saturday saw the ride to Charlotte's Pass, Ashley who had been troubled with cramps the day before decided to set out with me, slightly ahead of the big guns from our group. Fortunately I was on a good day as over 20km of climbing was ahead. I rode half the climb with Ashley, before continuing on with Judy Scott and Richard Bourne, other friends from the Vets Club. The whole weekend saw copious amounts of eating, drinking and jokes all around. I finally got to see the legendary appetite of Bobby. John and Phil were in good form with the bottle and a good story for every occasion. Trivia questions abounded from every corner and Bill made provisions for almost everything imaginable in his big red truck. Patrick, Paul and Wes always looked immaculate on the bike and I was sad to see Wes jump in the truck coming back into Canberra, as he seemed quite determined to make the whole ride on the bike. I'm full of admiration for Thorny and Phil for their "hard men" status. They made the whole ride, with Thorny riding to the top of Kosciusko with Paul on Saturday. On Sunday with the words ringing in my ears from Phil "Today the ride does not even start till Bredbo" and the temperature climbing to the mid thirties I knew it was going to be a demanding day. The head/cross winds were a constant menace. My legs felt fine, but my feet succumbed to that old "hot foot syndrome". Maybe I will not suffer from that in the future with new shoes I got last week. It will take a little while to break em in though. I was very glad to see Fyshwick Fruit Markets at the end of the day. I rode home to a most refreshing shower was very glad to get the salt, sweat, sunburn cream and road grit out of my skin. I was feeling decidely ordinary by the end of the ride.

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Sat, 20 Nov 2004

Return of the Bacon Ride - 14:46
A bunch of us had a bit of Fun at Sparrow Hill this morning. First to arrive was Terry, then Mike and I. Jamyz was there along with Richard, Steve and Ian. Lots of single track and many jokes, mostly for a mature audience. No crashes or mishaps to report, just some tired legs and reports of "feeling good and smooth on that section of single track". We retired to the Central Cafe for lashings of bacon, me with the seafood basket and Richard with the only veggie dish on the menu apart from the huge slices of cake. Seems to me the ride was hungry work as the only bit of food left was one slice of toast from our "basket of toast". Anytime I hear the words "Sparrow Hill" I'll be keen to ride there. I just wish it could be moved closer to my house. Bring back Stromlo! Soon!

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Tue, 16 Nov 2004

Australian team to dedicate Australia v Norway match to Johnny Warren - 10:41
Soccerhut has reported that the match between Australian and Norway will be dedicated to Johnny Warren. The local band of the Australian Team fan club the Green and Gold Army will be watching the game at a cafe in Garema Place.

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Mon, 15 Nov 2004

Cycling on the Weekend - 16:10
Well, there was not much of it. The threat of all day rain prompted Terry to call me and cancel the Sparrow Hill excursion. Mike told me on Sunday it was quite a good day, with almost too much single track. Can anybody really believe there was too much single track? So, Rachel and I decided to go walking instead, we did walk and did manage to get rained on quite a bit. Rachel bough some nice plants from the Yarralumla Nursery I actually woke up before my 5:55am alarm on Sunday. Could this mean I was keen and more importantly better? I had arranged to meet Chris Nolan, who I had met the day before at Bunnings. I wonder if he got to paint his carport. Anyhow, we rode off to Sutton Driver Training Centre with a howling wind at our backs. We both entered A grade, my biggest ambition of the day was not the be the first one dropped. With Ken and Chris both dropped I was able to slip out the back as Nick Boylan put in the 25th attack in 6 laps of racing. Oh, boy. Even Neil was struggling with the pace, complaining about a lack of fire power after a hard week at work. Pictures of the crit with Crash featuring regularly

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Invites to G-Mail - 15:15
I still have 4 more invites to Google's G-Mail If you want a brand new e-mail account with 1000mb of storage send me an email at allan.bontjer@gmail.com

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Crash Comments - Da Blog - 15:10
Crash: Nice work on the blog. Not sure about the Hanley-esque colour scheme though.What's this about the All You Can Eat Vets licence? Pay for ten races and get the rest free?
Allan: I already had the blue on some of my other pages.
As for the Vets, yes excellent value especially if one factors in $20 for the Guning Two Day Tour. Print out the new membership form, it has all the details. I sent my 2005 membership in today.

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Fri, 12 Nov 2004

It's all about the bike - 13:54
Well, today it is. This is my first entry, reflecting on the crit last night in Kingston. It was good to see Crash hold his own in a huge C grade bunch as one of my team mates Ricco came in second behind the steam train like Bill. Photos can be found on Nick Payne's site He also has a bunch of other photos of ACT Bike racing I had a nasty moment in the final turn of the final lap of my race. Clipped a pedal and did a shoulder to shoulder rub with John Thorn to stay upright. Lucky John did not panic or I could have been writing all this with less skin than yesterday. Many moments of forgetfulness on the fixed wheel this winter helped in regard to my pedal incident. Handling the bike was similar.Canberra Cycling Club results can be found here.
Much Thanks must go to Steve Hanley who set all this up for me on the domain svana.org

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UEFA has approved artificial pitches - 13:40
BBC Sport - Football has reported that UEFA has approved artificial pitches. I find it quite interesting as here in Australia we are blessed with wonderful grass pitches almost everywhere. Even in France, Spain and Italy many lower division matches are played on sand. I wonder how expensive these new pitches will be? I reckon they will certainly help in the colder climates where keeping grass growing is a real pain. I also wonder about the future sustainability of grass for sports in in Canberra. Certainly drinking water used to water sports fields is not the long-term answer

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I'm getting into this blog thing - 10:18
Well, Steve got the calender working. He also gave me some hints and tips on the world of blogs. I'm also doing my html in a basic text editor rather than using nancy boy frontpage. Today I'm busy at work moving a bunch of servers around and then a divisional meeting in the arvo. Not too much time for blogging.

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Thu, 11 Nov 2004

ACT Vets Cycling Club Membership offer - 21:22
All ACT Vets, I reckon the deal where you pay the $110 for membership and get entry to ALL races is 2005 is good value. No more fishing for change and a huge incentive to get out to more races. That could be a hint to Richard, Morgs and others as the AVCC are considering bring the Vets age to 30 and it is with AVCC females and all under the UCI rules. Of course one can choose to ride elite (open) if one wants to. Information abou the local club can be found at ACT Vets also the national body has a web site at Australian Veteran Cycling Council

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Johnny Warren - an inspiration to all those wog ball kids - 14:00
I just want to mention that Johhny Warren was one of the major reasons why I choose football over the other codes. Ron Tilsed, Harry Willims and Johhny visited North Curtin Primary when I was a very young lad. I was so impressed with them at the time I decided that goalkeeping and football were going to be my sport. Not only me, because the kids organised a lunchtime soccer game every day from 2nd grade through to 6th grade between the trees.

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