2012 Highland "Full" Fling

I've been training pretty hard in the last few months for this and I've actually already doubled my 2011 total kilometres in 2012 so I've really been at it all year.

This was the my last marathon for 2012 so I was keen to finish off strong and I'm pretty happy how it went today.

Even though I stayed down there (at Berrima) I was up at 4:30am to give me plenty of time to drop my esky at the Wingello transition, get to Bundanoon ready for a warm up. During the warm up I had a base layer and jersey but quickly decided to drop the base layer and just go with arm warmers as they're easy to remove at the first stop. It might have also had something to do with GAZZA telling me its a race and I needed to man up .

I get to the start and Steve, Dave, Michael and me are 2 rows back behind the barrier. That was before people then started lining up in front, doh. Riders briefing and then the gun goes. We didn't even get 10 metres and we're all on the brakes with riders down. Everyone's just scrambling around then and we hit the roads. The pace is quick from the start but seemed comfortable. Then I look down at my garmin and my HR is reading mid 170's and I'm thinking there's no way I can maintain this for the whole race but we keep pushing.

The first section went pretty quick and we're in at the first stop, a quick bottle change, lose the arm warmers . I only had one issue in the first section where I had to stop to remove a stick.

On to the Wingello loop. I managed to hook up with a group of about 8 for the first bit of road. I was sitting second from the back getting some food in then going up the fire trail where there is a sharp left and the red loop single track starts good and proper they all nearly missed the turn jumping on the brakes. As I've been down there a bit lately I was expecting it so managed to go past hitting the single track first so no traffic for me

I rode the wall which was good and gained about 5 spots with people walking up. Coming close to the 50 mark I really started to struggle. Took on a heap of food, hooked up with a rider here and there and got through half way hill and the kick. The outer limits was bypassed this year due to grading so we took a whole new route to get back to the roads and the normal course. I didn't manage to get anyone to work with back to transition so I think this was the last big effort before I started to really struggle.

Back at transition, swap my bottles, have a toilet stop and then I was off. A couple of twinges on the road and when I hit the single track bang, massive cramp so it was back to granny to spin it out. By now my guts felt like crap so I was just forcing a little bit of food here and there. I had over taken GAZZA towards the end on the first section and he finally got the upper hand just before your call. I tried to push but had nothing.

In the end I crossed the line and my official time was 05:11:56 for for 110kms I'm pretty stoked. I also cracked the 20km/h average for a full marathon.

A big thanks to the guys I've been training with. I think we've been pushing each other pretty hard. Thanks to Anthony for all the advice leading up to this and thanks to Jet Cycles for getting my bike back on the road so quickly after the Scott.

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