A cracking Saturday morning down here in Tassie so I planned to make up for last week’s disaster of a ride. With the sun still sleeping below the horizon as I unloaded the bike out of the car, I could tell today was going to be another perfect day for cycling and to bang out Ride 1 of the 2018 Cycle Life Challenge.

The Herd weren’t meeting till 8am so I had time to rack up a few bonus solo kilometres. I clipped in and pedalled silently into the morning darkness. Circling the airport and along the coastline I was treated to a spectacular purple haze sunrise to accompany the morning birdsong and hum of my S-Works tyres caressing the blacktop. There’s nothing quite like greeting the daybreak on two wheels.

Rolling into the carpark 40km later with a minute to spare, I met up with six of The Herd and we headed south along Seven Mile Beach, down through Acton and Sandford. There’s only one little “climb” en-route so I gave it a good crack, good enough for 2nd place and six seconds off the KOM for the Strava segment. It was a speedy trip down and the legs were feeling great, so as thanks I sat on the front and towed the bunch into Crenmore.

The wind wasn’t too harsh and kept us cool as the sun’s rays intensified. The miles flew by in a perfect whirr of seven cycles all in sync. Good weather, great company.

On the final 10km few of the group wound up the pace, obviously eager for a coffee! I sat in the draft before taking the front about 8km out. I had Trish, Donna and Roggo on my wheel. A few more watts and it was just Roggo, a few more as I was feeling sharp and I soon realised it was just me! Was it to be a solo break to the cafe today?  Well, kind of. Nearing the cafe I noticed I was on 95km! A rapid lap of the estate to bring up my metric century gave the rest of the bunch time to pull in, grab a table and order coffee. I rolled in soon after with 101km on the clock, all before 10:30am. Happy days!

A great “ride debrief” in the sunshine!

I had a fantastically tasty fruit muesli slice and cappuccino from Red Square as my support for local small business. I would have taken a photo, but I was super hungry and wolfed it down before I even thought about it!