I cannot think of a more fitting title to this blog. From the side lines, it may have looked like I was drowning, hell, there were many many times where I felt like I was drowning but I managed to go into the deep dark recesses of the vault and drag the head out of the water just enough to keep the nose above the water line and with that, stay in the race that little bit longer.

Oh sh!t bi-atches, that was THE SINGLE HARDEST THING i have done on 2 wheels, I kid you not. Fast, 51.5km covered in the 1h + 3 laps, open racing, all 17 teams on track together all starting at the same time of which some were VIS, Drapac Porsche, Degani Team and that all equals one thing = PHUKING FAST with the likes of David Pell riding (12th Aust Road Racing Champs). This was by no means a Sunday saunter.

It's is somewhat difficult to sum up how fast and intense the ride was today. I'll start by saying it was the hardest 1h and 10min I have spent on a bike. I decided to leave the HR strap at home as I figured

1) No time to look at it with 100+ other bikes around me, needed to be ALERT
2) The heart was always going to be AWOL which could mentally crack me
3) Not knowing is a good thing.

So with that in mind I would hazard a guess to say mid to high 170's for 90% of the race and low 180's to ??? for the other 10%, pretty much all out maximal effort. And that was how the race was for me, it was close to an all out effort for over an hour.

Speaking with Xav before hand, I mentioned, "Do you think it will roll around for a lap or two?". He said, "No, it will be hot from the get go". How right Xav was. It was just BANG from the start, luckily we warmed up well pre-race riding laps of the Calder Park circuit - about a nice 20+km warm-up. It was very windy.

I must thank the X-Man for talking me into this, I don't know how on earth he did it but did it he did and I am so glad for that now.

After the start, I thought to myself, oh 5hit b!tches, this is going to get very ugly very quickly as I found myself at the rear end of the bunch. After a few laps I worked out where I needed to be in certain corners to make life somewhat easier (still HARD) for myself from a positioning perspective. What is hard to explain is the constant accelerations that take place, then the slowing then the accelerations all over again. This is vastly different to Ironman racing where you generally hold the same effort and intensity for 180kms.

The first 20min or so were raced at a very fast tempo and after a small break away formed, the pace settled back down for the next 20min or so. I was happily riding towards the back of the bunch and would occasionally make my way towards mid pack for a lap and did find it easier there. In hindsight, I should have tried to stay in this position but did not really have the experience to hold it as guys would duck into the smallest of gaps.

At 50min in, I lost the wheel coming around the straight to start another lap and had to go into the vaults vault and extract something else to get back on. Hearing Matty Lewis from the side lines yell out "Go Komo - get back" just gave me that little spur I needed, so, head down, I got back on and managed to last until the sign for the final 3 laps was shown.

Once this sign went up, it was like a turbo boost was applied to the race and the pace went up a notch again. Oh BOY! At this point I'd been riding on the drops for a good 30min to hang on so I managed to fight and scramble my way around for the next 2 laps.

With 1 lap to go as we cornered to start the final lap of the race, the nose dropped below the waterline, I started to drown at this point. The pace went up to 51kph into the head wind, I lost the wheel, got spat out the back and finished the last lap a few hundred metres behind the bunch. That said, guys dropped out throughout the 1hr so I made it to the end, considering I have only raced one 'C' grade CRIT and one 'Open' now of which I was told was faster than club 'A' grade racing I figure my cycling is on track and in line with my goals (perhaps slightly ahead).

All in all, one hell of an experience, the surging was so so hard to contend with, I have NEVER had to dig as deep into the piggy pig on a bike EVER and I went that deep and then some. At the end of the day, you only have some many of those efforts in you.

You can kiss T1 and T2 goodbye for some time, I am entrenched in this roadie caper now, this was truly the deep end, a baptism of fire and to come out the other end has now given me a huge confidence booster to know I can ride with some fast lads and hang on.

Giddy Up,

Komo