KoroJ's Blog

Counting down the last two weeks to the TT and this week I went on the Uly Ride to Apiti, combining it with my last prep’ ride. My plan was to ride with the group to the Pilgrims Rest , on Pohangina Valley East Rd, but then continue riding instead of stopping for lunch, focusing on maintaining a good average pace, whilst generally riding economically and within the prescribed tolerances, so as not top get pinged.

I did the usual ride prep of tyres, clean (& polish for a change), prepared a route for Betty, and mowed the lawns (because I know what’s good for me), then Sunday it was scrub up, stow the gear and hit the road for a fill at Shell Mana. I opted for Shell because I didn’t want the BP 98 to extend my range for pace, so the ride would be more realistic in keeping with the TT conditions.

After topping up, I went to the Plimmerton Weigh Station to talk while we waited for the crowd to arrive…..all six of them, that is apart from Ken (RIC) and myself (TEC), there were six riders that departed, but one pulled off at Waikanae and another at Levin…just leaving six of us. We trundled along SH1 in the usual boring fashion, with the weather threatening to let loose and I was thinking I might need to get the wets out at Shannon, but once we were skirting past Levin I could see that the weather was clear ahead. About that time, I also lost my music and Betty stopped talking to me.

Once we stopped in Shannon, I could hear that the MP3 and Nav voice functions were still working but had defaulted to the unit speaker and weren’t coming through the stand pick-up and wiring, so that was a concern but fortunately, switching the MP3 function off then on again fixed the fault and it didn’t repeat….what a relief.

OnOn and now Ken assumed TEC whilst Jim went lead to take us to the Pilgrim’s Rest, leaving me to putter along as we cruised to Ashhurst and up the Pohangina Valley. We got to the lunch stop at 1215, at which time I paused until the others had all turned off (so as not to confuse anyone) then kicked into GC mode and stepped the pace up, continuing around to Apiti, then via Rangiwahia and Mangaweka to SH1.

My plans had been thwarted slightly, because the group pace to this point had me on 19.5K/Ltr for the first 150Km, which is unlikely to happen on a TT2000 ride and being a backroad with little chance of meeting a revenue collector, meant I could up the pace somewhat, but as usual, catch 22 situation….On a road like this, although one can maintain a good pace, it is unwise to push the limits, because there’s little room for error and the likelihood of stock or grit on the tight road is high.

I was a bit like a dog let off the leash, or a freshly shawn sheep though and enjoyed the freedom to ride at my own pace and on a mission to maintain a good average, so in keeping with the economical thing, I would let the pace get up on occasions, then let it wash off leading to the corners so I still only required minimal braking. During this period, the weather had cleared, with the temp jumping to 25º+, so I found at times I was having to drop the screen to get a bit of airflow going and at one of these moments I found myself staring at a large stone as it bounded up from a car and honed in on my face, bouncing off the visor that was ¾ shut…..that was one big wheeeww! The stone was about the size of a 20cent piece, or somewhere between a standard marble and a tombola, with a probable closing speed in the vicinity of 140-150kph and afterwards I considered the luck that I had the visor down enough because otherwise I would have lost a bit of blood and surely broken something, be it nose, cheek, tooth or even two tooths…like I said…Wheeeww!!

Over my first hour on the loose, I managed 91Km and was just north of Mangaweka, making good time with the temp heading towards 28 º. The next hour was spent scooting up SH1, across SH49 (through Ohakune) and started down SH4. Betty did throw me a curve ball though when I passed through Ohakune and she told me to turn left on Burns St. Most odd I thought because I’d already passed Raetihi – Ohakune Rd so I checked it out anyway. As it turned out, the Bloody Bitch was trying to turn me to the dark Side and onto gravel…..hmmm….preferences need to be checked (but they were OK – Avoid Gravel) and a later check on MapSource revealed a dead end???....Go figure! This 2nd hour had me just entering the Parapara proper with another 99Km on the clock.

Hour 3 and a the lovely Para’s in my sights…..woohoo! This road is great….except in the wet….and except on a still, 28º day! Much of the road has been improved over recent years, but many of the older parts have tar snakes…big, wide, long, strips…..well nah!...much of the road had a narrow clean hump in the middle of the lane! I still had a ball, flitting along at a nice easy, but brisk’ish pace, taking real care on the lines because the slightest hint of touching the tar did not feel oozy at all, but more like cold wet tar…real loose and greasy! Over this hour I managed 81Km, but that included a fuel stop and my average to that point was 93kph.

I now had 190Km to go across SH3 and down SH1and started with a good average, between 96 & 105kph but as I got closer to Wellington the average kept deteriorating until I got home at 85kph for the last 2¼ hours. This wasn’t helped when I passed the turnoff to Waitarere Beach and I heard/perceived an odd pop and instinctively lunged my left hand for my right eye. I didn’t know what had happened, but luckily my subconscious did and sure enough, my glove came away from my eye with a lens and I couldn’t see…until I closed my right eye. Oh bother! That meant I’d have to stop and disrupt the average. I carried on until I got into Levin before pulling over, swapping glasses and barely lost a minute.

All in all I had a great day, doing nearly 650Km, with the 611Km from Plimmerton at an average of 83kph with stops, managing 18.6K/Ltr to the fuel stop in Whanganui and 18.7k/Ltr to home (thanks to the traffic). All in all a good result considering the slow start on the group ride and the fact that I was generally keeping the speed at 105-109kph to keep ‘under the radar’.

I don’t have any more rides planned apart from a squirt over to Masterton and back, before the 108,000Km service, a new front tyre and then it’s off to the TT and hopefully a Gold Flyer achievement with a 1500+Km Saturday and 1300+Km Sunday. I just hope for good weather and good behavior from Betty.