Busso or bust!

This week has been interesting. I’ve helped out at the Bikeforce Southern River shop in Perth Western Australia for a couple of days. The owner’s name is Paul McCartney…..seriously! On Saturday, I did their shop bike ride for the usual 60kms and helped ‘Irish John’ around. He was getting ready for the cyclosportif ride at Chidlow the following day. Gave him some advice on carbo supplements and drinks.

My wife and I ended up at Declan and Monica’s for dinner  on Sat PM with some beautiful curries and salads, some nice Noble (De Bortoli) dessert wine, a bit of Galway pipe for me. I brought some red wine called ‘3 drops’ shiraz from the Mt Barker region (seems a bit stingy bringing just 3 drops though!) A bit of lemon sorbet to wake up the taste buds and the evening was complete. Delcan has a bulging disc…….ok, stop smiling….I can almost sense what you’re going to say!! Just stop it!!!

Dee managed a 21km training run on Sat AM and was well-pleased that her body stood up to this. She came in at around 2hrs and would be happy to get a result like this for the Busselton Half Ironman team.

On Sunday morning, I travelled to Chidlow for the 87 km ‘Sfida di Chidlow’. This was a very hilly 29km course that we did 3 laps of. Our team consisted of 5 people (nb the teams can have up to a maximum of 9) so the going was tough. We averaged around 31.5kph but its early days. I daresay our next ride at Toodyay will have more on board and be a little quicker. Our thanks to Force Equipment Hire at Maddington (Jason John) for being one of our main sponsors. Pure Fitness Gym in Canning Vale also on board as sponsors.

There was a record number of participants (around 550 I think). Didn’t hear of any major incidents and I couldn’t believe how many first-timers were there. It’s a great team cycling activity and gets good corporate support too. My thanks to Trevor Edwards from Cyclosportif in helping me get my team registrations and payments sorted.

Dee and I had wanted to do the 12hr Darkan rogaining event but sometimes events just clash. In any event, to be competitive, we would have had to get in around 40 to 45kms of coverage.

To cap off my day, the mighty Carlton Football Club had a good win over Melbourne. Took the scarf into work today and waved it around a bit. When all the West Coast Eagle and Freo Docker supporters are silenced due to their teams’ losses on the weekend, it makes the Carlton victory that much sweeter. It may now be appropriate to buy some Melbourne supporters a tank top or two. Our acid test comes with Adelaide next week at the MCG.

If you see me cycling in to work , give me a ‘gidday christo’. I wear orange socks and orange bike gloves which, combined with my orange bike, make me a bit hard to miss cycling along the Kwinana Freeway path into the city.

I hope to emulate my effort two years ago in the Busselton Half Ironman with a 5hr 30min time. I’m not a strong swimmer so a 40min time for the 1.9km would be good, followed up with something better than 3hrs on the 90km bike and better than 1hr 50min for the run. I should finish close to my wife’s team time so hopefully we’ll cross paths on the run. I hope for a good day on May 3^rd at Busselton. Loads of people I know have put in late entries. Should be a massive turnout. Best of luck to all the ‘first timers’.

I just bought a pack of lime carboshotz tablets and a pair of ¾ skins for my wife from Runner’s World. Bob and Jan have always been good to me and they were a good $15 cheaper with these skins than the next cheapest price from other sports stores in the city.

I haven’t got the Darlington Half Marathon results yet but I’m sure my effort was around the 5min/km mark.

I’ll have ‘Christo’ written on my arm and leg for the Busso Half Ironman. Touch wood that the ‘puncture’ gremlins stay away. But, as they say in the classics, ‘Stercus Accidit’!!

I’d like to wish the Man United supporters good luck…….but I can’t bring myself to do it. As much as I hate to say it, if Arsenal now cannot win, I would love Chelsea to steal the premier title from Man Utd.

Reservoir amoebas!

CHRISTO