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• cycling - 43
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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 I remember the times when all the coverage I could get of the Tour was Winning magazines, months out of date.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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