M3 BAPTISM OF FIRE - THINK WE'LL RENAME IT THE M3 OFFROAD CLASSIC

Well actually it was so cold today that a fire would have been nice, we even thought about building one in the back of the church trailer. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Firstly, on behalf of all the M3 team I want to say a HUGE thanks to everyone who came to see us off at church this morning.  That send off was incredibly touching and many of the boys commented on it once we got underway.

Back to the day’s events.  Things started well as we made fairly good time down the Hume Highway to Mittagong averaging 22km/h despite a strong head wind.

Then we reached the Southern Highlands and things changed.  The winds increased and the temperate dropped dramatically.  After a 30min stop at Moss Vale for lunch we set off en route to Goulburn with about half our journey remaining.  And that’s where things got interesting.  Not sure if you’ve noticed but Google Maps doesn’t tell us about dirt roads.  Our route took us over onto Canyonleigh Rd. 35km of dirt road complete with cattle fences and cattle grids!  Wow that was a windy and lonely 2 ½ hours as we spread out up the hills.

Regrouping on the Hume 10km from Goulburn we set sail for our motel. As dark approached we arrived at 8pm for Pizza and a long shower.

Looking forward to a much more comfortable 103km into Canberra tomorrow – hopefully it will be a bit warmer too.  Chat some more then.

Rohan's M3 Weather Forecast

Just in case your interested this is an email I sent to the M3 team on Saturday morning 16th with my weather prediction's for the week.  When you're rinding a bike wind and rain takes on a whole new dimension...

Morning  gents,


I've just been checking out the weather and thought I'd bring you Rohan's forecast for the next week.  My Year 10 Geography and Year 10 work experience at the Bureau of Meteorology did pay off, I can read a weather map!

• Ian texted me earlier this morning to say Charles has informed him on his way back that it is snowing in Cooma.  The 7.30 observation at Cooma airport showed 0.3 degrees with apparent temp of -7.7 degrees, sounds worse than our Saturday morning rides in June / July.
• It appears that it will be cold across much of NSW and Victoria today in the wake of a low pressure system and resultant cold front that passed through last night but today should be the coldest we'll see for the next week.  It should warm back up to low to mid 20s for most of the trip.
• I think that we'll miss most of the rain. We may encounter the odd shower or two but don't think we'll need to negotiate any significantly rainy days en route.
• The bad news is that as a High Pressure system moves into the bight it will bring with it predominantly south westerly through to south easterly winds so we should expect to be riding largely into the wind at least until we get to Cooma.  I don't think they'll be as strong as today though around 15-25 km/hr. Although they may  not be excessively strong but when you are riding uphill any headwind is an inconvenience.  The gale force northerlies that we experienced yesterday ahead of the cold front would have been nice (they would have blown us up the hills without pedaling). Unfortunately they have now subsided and I wouldn't expect to see them again.
• The good thing about the early starts and hopefully knocking of the majority of the ride by lunch time is that winds tend to increase in the afternoons and be calmer in the mornings.
• The back half of next week is a little harder to predict (I'm certainly not a qualified meteorologist and so it's hard to predict this far out) but depending how fast the high pressure system moves through South Australia and Victoria we may end up riding the last day or two into a westerly headwind as well. At least most of that part of the journey is flat. Once again I can't imagine that they will be that strong. (High pressure systems tend to move slower than cold pressure systems and generally have lower accompanying wind speeds.  The good news is that it is likely to be mainly fine weather once we enter Victoria. The high pressure system is peaking at about 1030 hectopascals  which is quite high meaning that the weather should be quite pleasant as it passes directly over us mid-week. I expect a very pleasant lunch break at the picturesque Lakes Entrance on Thursday. 

OUR ITINERARY

Only 2 Weeks to Go

On Saturday we rode from Mt Annan to Glenbrook (Blue Mountains) and the weather was threatening all morning. We finally made it to Mash and sat down to coffee and banana bread; the best banana bread in the world. I know, a BIG call, but you have to try it for yourself. Anyway, as we sat down to enjoy our coffeee and (best in the world) banana bread, the heavens opened up. The rain eventually stopped and we left on our way, but that didn't stop us getting absolutely drenched on the way back along the Northern Road.


Breakfast in the Rain at Glenbrook from M3-Riders on Vimeo.

We were joined by Charles of OCF and Finny from Scotland.

Charlse is the Sales & Marketing Director at OCF and a seasoned cyclist. He just got back from the UK where he rode in an event from the top of Scotland to the bottom of England.

Finny is visiting from Scotland to meet his newborn grandson. He is one tough Scotsman. 3 years ago he visited Australia for the first time and while here decided to ride from Sydney to Perth, alone. On Saturday he had a crash and came off pretty bad. He rode all the way home, with the comment "I think I've broken my wrist". Sure enough, after getting it examined, he did crack his wrist.

3 Weeks to Go

Thanks to all the riders, support crew, family and friends who attended our dinner night at The Macarthur on Monday night. We had about 40+ people there on the night and it was great opportunity for the families of the riders and support crew to catch up and enjoy some food and drink together.

Thanks to The Macarthur for putting on a 2-for-1 meal deal which was supurb and for donating $500 towards our charities.

FIVE WEEKS TO GO!

Well, it's fast approaching. Not fast enough though, I can't wait.  I feel as though I'm fit enough and up for the journey but there remains this niggling thought... "Seven days at an average of 150km per day... And the most you've done so far is 120km!"

I guess time will tell.  It's going to take very long days of riding no doubt, most days we'll be spending 7-8 hours seated on the bike excluding breaks. But when I consider that two weeks ago it was looking as though our route would take us up and over the top of the country and down the other side I feel more comfortable about the route we've finally settled on.

Our path will keep us off the dreaded Hume Highway for most of the journey and may just save us from an unexpected encounter with a runaway b-double semi trailer.  The other upside is that I'm sure it will be a lot more scenic than mile after mile of highway.  The downside? We'll it's certainly more hilly than the 'carved out' path straight down the Hume.  Our biggest threat now will probably be magpies - but then again they can do some damage too, just ask Mario!


Please consider making a generous donation to our charities on the right of screen.  Our goal is to raise at lest $25,000 towards CAP and OCF.  That would make the arduous journey and long hours on seemingly endless roads worthwhile.

Thanks so much for your support.

Rohan Bell

M3 Power push through the pain and the rain in pursuit of the Century

The four successful centurians celebrate at the end of the ride

If Saturday’s ride were compared to a cricket match it certainly contained enough drama to keep everyone guessing as to the final outcome right down to the wire of the final kilometre. The battle was on for the 6 starters to break the hitherto elusive barrier of a 100Km ride. The drama began to unfold at 4.30am when frantic phone calls and text messages were passing back and forth amongst the team to see if the team were up to the challenge of riding in the worst storms to batter Sydney in a whole week. The team were spurred on into action by the Scottish iron man Kenny, who claims that when riding in his youth in Scotland in the perpetual rain that he never took water with him and only drank the spray from his front mudguard if absolutely necessary.

The ride up on the M7 bike track proved top be the calm before the storm and after customary refuelling refreshments were taken it was time for a mystery tour around the belle-aire of western Sydney in order to boost the kilometres when the scribe decided to take a dive right in front of the referees nose of a nearby footy game to reacquaint himself with tarmac once again and squashing his banana in the process. By the time of the return leg the rain had set in again in earnest aided and abetted by some strong winds, deciding that the bike track was too tame the team opted for the greater challenge of the M7 proper to go with the force 9 winds, horizontal rain, punctures, glass, debris and general abuse of passing trucks who delight in making their presence known with a 129Db truck siren right in the ear holes of the beleaguered riders as they tried to mend the gathering momentum of punctures that were coming their way.

By the 70Km mark it was clear that two riders were going to be in doubt of making the century but the four intrepid heroes pictured above opted to add on another 12Kms just to make sure that the century mark was passed which is a bit like climbing up both sides of Mount Everest to say that it was well and truly conquered, and as the Irish would say, to be sure to be sure. Well done to these intrepid 2 wheel travellers.

CHART SUMMARY OF ALL THE CRUCIAL ACTION

RIDERS	PUNCTURES	THRILLS	SPILLS	RETIRED HURT	RAIN	CENTURIES
6	3	none	3	2	lots	4

GADGET OF THE WEEK
This award has to go to Kenny who is a self confessed gadget geek and has had endless trouble transporting his bananas around on his back without turning to mush before he can benefit from the nutritious energy boost that they give whilst out on a ride. “An hour in the saddle and my banana turns to mush”, he said. So to combat this predicament he has come up with an ingenious invention to circumvent this eventuality or to be completely accurate his wife bought him this subtle contraption that has made mushy bananas a thing of the past. Here he is pictured enjoying his new acquisition.

RIDING TIPS
This one passed on by our very own Tachis. “It’s a good idea to sometimes check to see if your wheel is on upside down or not”, he said. Here he is pictured below doing this very thing just before our Easter Monday ride when he realised just in time that his front wheel would do better if it was installed the other way up. After he carried out this fine tuning adjustment to his machine it meant that he was able to go even faster on our ride which was bad news for the rest of us left trailing in his slipstream. He has also just superseded the 2,000Km mark in his training regime so our hearty congratulations go to him.

Here he is pictured getting some fine tuning to that front wheel from Sebastian the unofficial team mechanic.

Well that just about wraps it up for this edition but in the next publication we look forward to hearing some of “Hendo’s Handy Hints”, where we will learn about some useful tips to help make our riding more bearable and pain free.

Best wishes for now
from the scribe