I've been too busy to blog last week, I'm sure everyone's shattered!  Go on, you can tell me ... :)

What's been going on?  Firstly, we have round 2 of the Trek Summer Sprint Series this coming Sunday.  We're hoping we have more riders and nice weather again.  Bev's done a great job rounding up volunteers to help out again, thankyou Bev! The week after is the aboc Climbing Camp up at Hotham.  Busy?  heh ... sorta ...

This morning Vanders and I did another blat up the 1:20, I managed to do it about 30s faster than last week, still dog-slow (24:02) and I have a long way to go before being anywhere near my best (sub 19 mins was my best, at 86kg, when I was an almost-decent B grade flatland roady in '04 and '05).   With a focus on sprint power for the next 6 months I don't think I'll ever get below 18 mins, but I'd like to be sub 20 again by the end of this summer.  Vanders is finding some legs which is good. If we keep doing it every Monday morning and I get some of these kilos off, it should happen.

Last Saturday at Blackburn I wasn't quite as stupid as I was the week before (Don't do flying 200's in the morning and expect to race in the afternoon.  Dumb? Very!), but still I was flat and never in the running for anything.  Alan Doran had a great day, winning the B grade scratch and progressive points races, and 4th in the div 1 handicap, Dino rode well, Rob M isn't far off promotion to B grade either, if he keeps riding off the front of C grade anyway.  Nath had a last minute call to work so he missed the day's racing.

I found out from Mick Thomas that he won the B grade scratch race at DISC on Thursday, which is awesome!  He only just made the jump up from C grade a few weeks back, and to have a win is just brilliant. He'll be A grade at Blackburn, I hope! the rest of us need a chance. Young Will rode well at Blackburn as well, as did Emily Apolito.  Now if we can just get them wearing aboc warmup uniforms all will be well.

Some great news from the Warny, Cam Woolcock finished and so did Les Tokolyi.  It was a hot day for them, and as usual, water would have been an issue - this year the gap between the first and second feed zones was 130km.  Yep ... 130km between refills with no other options for water.  Not surprisingly the attrition rate was high, and finishing the Warny is one of the hardest things a cyclist can do, with stuff-all water and high 20's/low 30's with a dry northerly blowing ... urgh.  So Cam and Les, top effort! Tom Leaper managed 15th as well as winning the King of the Mountain and second in the sprints. Tom, winning sprint points?! Look out Jamie, Tom's maybe out to avenge last summer's points race loss at the Blackburn club champs?

Not much in the way of surprizes at the World Masters track champs up in Sydney, John Lewis had an off ride for his flying 200 and had to sprint against Keith Oliver, which meant a quick exit for John, but the V-Train (Stuart Vaughan) won his target event and is now a masters world champion pursuiter.  Andy White (fyxomatosis) is slowly on the mend and he dropped in to Blackburn last weekend for a look, and yes, he can sleep in a halo brace, but someone might sneak in and swap Campag for Shimano, and see if it changes his dreams.  Andy, we're all looking forward to seeing you racing again soon, and maybe you'll be right for later rounds of the Sprint Series?

Anything else?  Not a lot, I haven't yet made it to Glenvale this summer, but hopefully in the next few weeks I'll have racing legs on a Sunday morning.  I might have a new MTB soon too - maybe in time for our next ride up Hurt Hill in late November ... I'm making as much of an effort as I can to ride everywhere, and encourage everyone I know to do the same. Our spineless governments won't even consider discouraging people from driving cars and wasting electricity, belching carbon into the air and destroying their children's futures, but if we ride more than we drive, we can make a little difference, and that's about all any of us can do.  So have a think, every time you plan on going somewhere, ask yourself if you could walk or ride, rather than drive?

Ride on! It's good for everyone.