A nice little Monday ride.....

After a weekend of no riding due to hot weather and laziness, today I needed to get out on the bike. Too windy for an enjoyable road ride, so it was a quick text to Freemo for a Glenrock MTB mission. His reply sat well with my designs on the ride, "Raced yesterday, need an easy one. Real easy." Now as Freemo is a 7 foot tall A grader (he won the HMBA A Grade Club Chamionship yesterday, well done), his easy is usually my fairly hard. So I thought 'real easy' would be good for me.
Freemo takes a short cut through the scrub trying to catch up to 'the old guy'


Waiting at the Burwood Rd carpark, another rider pulled up and asked if I had a shock pump, which of course I didn't. I mean who carries a fuckin shock pump? This guy looked kinda pretty serious, kitted out in full Australian National Team gear, nice bike and shaved legs. We got chatting and introductions were made. "Brett". "Shaun". "Shaun? Last name?" "Lewis".... "Ahh huh!, thought so" Former National Junior and Under 23 XC champion. 2nd in National XC Champs as a first year senior. World Cup experience.
Lewis at the Worlds 05, training for his Glenrock encounter with 'the old guy'...


Turns out he was here on a short holiday from Adelaide. Suddenly the ride wasn't looking so 'easy'. Freemo turned up and of course the guys knew each other, and off we went to meet up with Crewsy as well (after Freemo had driven my car back to his place to get a pump). The rest of the ride was spent hanging off the back, riding my own pace rather than try to keep up with those lads. They were probably taking it easy by their standards! Shaun's fork stayed inflated for about a km but having about 1 inch of travel didn't seem to affect him too much. If I was 20 years younger, fit and talented, I reckon I would've stomped those guys....