Whisperer's blog

Decided on Saturday night to go out and do the 4 hour. There were a bunch of the gang going, so I thought it would be good to go out and get some 'corner carving' and 'race pace' training in ahead of the Jet Black 24 in Feb.

Seems like sleep was a problem all round on Saturday night, plenty of comments around the traps, and I was the same, got about 5 hrs in before a 5.30 wakeup to get out there and register. Not to worry - a seriously strong coffee and I was ready to go

It's time to join the off road single speed crowd, so decided to do a conversion of the Turner 5 Spot.

With the cheap flights available, and holidays starting before Christmas, I thought I'd do a 4 day blast down the Great Ocean Rd.
It's going to be a lightweight tour, on the roadie with a minimum of gear to slow me down. I considered the single speed for this one - having done it twice before on the roadie's over the last 10 years, but there are a few pretty serious climbs along the way, and carrying my gear too would mean I'd have to add a tooth or two to the back, and that'd just slow me down too much on the flats.

We had a great race but suffered from 2 slashed tyres. Steve01 on the second lap, and myself (Whisperer) on my first night lap.

The mixed nuts team of Gazza and Martine, Steve01 and myself decided some time back, to do the 12 hr, as kind of a warm up to the Scott24 later in the year. So after much preparation, we headed out to Yarramundee on Friday night to set up camp with Carl Groover & Gavin and Vanina. Groover had gone down to the track on Thursday night and marked out a good area for the NobMob crew, so we had a perfect trackside position to transition from, and watch the race go by. I set up my tarp & light set, and it was all very civilised!

The Scummer's been an absolute joy since the rebuild, and I've been out getting in some long hard k's while the tracks have been drying out after the rain. But, disaster struck last week, a 'slam' gearchange, going onto the big ring at the front while shifting to one of the bigger cogs at the back with too much load (I should've known better), and the rear derailleur twisted out of the hanger, stripping what was left of some very tired thread after nine years of use. With a road bike, the hangar is usually permanently attached, and in my case, bonded into the carbon frame.

After deliberating buying a new road bike, what with the exchange rate and having already updated my mtb race bike this year I decided to rebuild my trek scummer.

What an excellent weekend away. Christine organised the old church again for us to stay in, and have use of excellent facilities - a kitchen, toilets and real hot showers, well, until the water ran out after about the 12th shower after the race... Gaz was heard shouting from the shower stall for 'assistance' when he had lathered up and the water actually ran out. Given his previous reputation, it was a matter of drawing straws to see who would go in with a pressure washer to rinse him down.... anyway, onto the report...

What a weekend, and in my opinion the best 24hr race ever, on the best course of flowing fast tacky singletrack. Our team, Mixed Nuts was ade up of Steve01, Gazza, Martine and myself (Whisperer), and contested the mixed 40+ fours.

It was great to be in amongst a huge NobMob contingent, with the spirits running high.

Kinda weird, but in spite of the conditions it was a great weekend, everyone was in 'disturbingly' good spirits.
Can't say I've done a night lap before where it is teeming rain, the mud is inches deep in places, the downhill is treacherous, the creek single track section a case of join the dots of traction, and the brake pads last between 1 and 3 laps.
But then, getting out at 7.30 this morning when the track had a chance to stabilise overnight, it was good again.