204.39km / 10:44:17 / 3568m / 21.0°C
My annual mostly unprepared assault upon the Alpine Classic course, yet again I hadn’t put in enough training. After getting prepared for the 300 km Around the Bay I took a few weeks off with a sore knee, then Christmas snuck up on me and before I knew it here I was in Bright with once again, not enough hills in my legs. Must have been enough though, I made it through in about my normal sort of time and didn’t feel like chucking it in and turning around at any point
The landslide at Falls Creek made for a different route this year, Mount Hotham instead of Falls Creek and missing out on Tawonga gap in both directions – the second climb being the bane of my life in past years. I think I enjoyed Hotham more than Falls, even there were some strong crosswinds at the top to contend with
I chose the early start and was up at for breakfast, then down to Howitt park for the start, a wise choice given my speed as it gives me much better time out on the circuit and less chance of being hounded by the sag wagons
Something wasn’t quite right with my tyres or pressure, the first descent on Mount Buffalo had me riding the brakes far more than usual and feeling that the bike wasn’t handling well. It wasn’t until I’d ridden back through Bright and made it all the way up to Dinner Plain that I checked the pressure and found it quite low – I suspect that I’d not sealed the valve properly when checking over the bike yesterday. Pumping them up made for a far better descent of Hotham but I still took it easy, not being able to get into a good frame of mind for descending
Great weather too, not too cold early on, although I was wishing for arm warmers up by Lake Catani, and not too hot all except for the last stretch from Harrietville back to Bright
All up an enjoyable day out, now I’ll have to work out if I want to do that route again next year, or tackle the traditional one up Falls Creek
Clear sky, 15°C, Feels like 14°C, Humidity 57%, Wind 1m/s from ESE - by Klimat.app
My 1130th day in a row riding a bike; the last 6 days of 2019, my and all of 2021, 2022 and 2023 so far…
Garmin / Strava / ridewithgps
