Cyclists tour Canberra covering 250km
Report by Kymbal Dunne
Cycling club Member
The Tattersalls Club cycling tour at Canberra on the weekend (3-5 April) was a great sucess with riders enjoying a 3 day cycling adventure covering about 250kms of Canberra’s hills, flat roads and specialist criterium course allowing riders to climb, ride in a 24 person peloton and race a team time trial.
One off jerseys designed by Simon Forsyth and sponsored by Jax Tyres, Avanti Supreme Cycles, Sophos and m2 Office Leasing gave the group a strong identity. Prizes were provided by Tattersalls Club and Cranks Bikestore and were presented at the end of the tour, water bottles provided by Equigroup.
Medina Classic Canberra at Kingston was our base and offered great value, comfortable accommodation conveniently located to Kingston’s Cafes, Bars and restaurants. Whether it was Silo, Durham, Kingston Grind, Art Express, Chang Rai Thai or others they all delivered up great variety. We were blessed with great weather and warm conditions ranging from 18-27 degrees.
We took in the flatter north and north west on Day 1 touring to Poacher’s Pantry where we lunched with one of our crew - Allison's mum and apart from a final 1 km dirt road which transformed into a high performance mountain bike track leading to our luncheon the ride was magnificently surfaced and kept the ten riders together as a compact Peloton.
Day 2 was an epic ride through rolling hills where it was tough to keep the riders together. At the rear seasoned riders like Tattersalls Member Paul Khoury and Melissa Neumaier looked after any rider at the back like seasoned ski patrol mountain sweepers. A mistaken turn saw the group, but notably four riders in Mark Stoneham, Scott Davies, Murray King and Ian Hurrell storm uphill on an unsealed dirt road to Tumut. It would take the support car driver in a Sebastian Loeb rally manner to reel them in and return them to the group. The whole group then returned to Canberra, either directly or towards Tharwa covering either 85 or 120kms. Peter Hewett looked after the tail as sweeper. The ride took a lot out of all riders and there was no need for a Saturday afternoon at the Go Karts.
Day 3 was out to Stromlo Forest Park. It offered up an exceptional criterium cycling facility in a peanut shaped 1.2km course on an immaculate bitumen surface. Five teams of between four and five riders contested an eight lap event. The teams had a range of abilities and strategising was important. Despite the range of abilities the teams finished with times ranging from 15 minutes, 58 seconds to 18 minutes, 38 seconds. Four teams finished within 50 seconds of each other making split lap times interesting for the crowd. Cooperation was required to keep the teams together as it was the last rider across the line which determined the team time.
In the end Captain and Tattersalls Committee Member Peter Hedge and his team were victorious averaging 36km per hour whilst the other averages at 34 & 35 per hour.
It was unanimously agreed that this tour known as The Showgirl’s Cycling Tour of Canberra was a success.
This Sunday we’ll ride north and see if we can get as many of the Tour riders together again. Next on the agenda is a celebratory dinner at Tattersalls Club and to view the photo book by Simon Forsyth, come up with new nicknames and plan for the next tour.