EC NZ '10 Day 4 Matamata - Turangi

EC NZ ’10 Day 5 – Matamata – Turangi

The day of the Roleur and the Growing Grupetto

I must’ve missed the memo about the Grupetto generously accepting all broken and battered campers but as I readied myself after breakfast it was easy to see the last group is shrinking fast. Today the Grupetto had grown to include more than ½ the camp.
We still managed a very leisurely first hour which was great as I really needed to digest my breakfast today. Often the tempo or the hills are pretty severed right after breakfast and those days always end up being a sufferfest the end of the day and any calorie deficit is an even more severe penalty the following day.

We had some really nice roads to ride today. Lots of quiet country roads and even the main highways we rode today were nice and not too busy.
At around the 75km point soon after the first drink stop Steve the “Roleur” Lord took over and kept the pace on all the way to lunch at around 130km.
There was a lot of very long, gradual uphills with a tail wind and he kept it steady at 40kph on those segments and a nice 50-65kph on the downhills. No shit!.
When you sit on the wheel for that long you get a good sense of the depth of the guys fitness. He didn’t even use the aero bars so it would be esier for those following to sit on.
We had about a 10-15-minute deficit to the grupetto after the drinks stop at 65km and he ate that up in about 40km.
When you’re ripping along like you’re in the TGV train its tough sometimes to pull the pin and cruise as you know that for every 3-4 minutes you hang on you are saving yourself another minute of riding. For every hill you suffer through you get a free ride at the speed of light on the next descent.
After lunch Steve gave the group about an easy 20 minutes before seeing that there was only 5 of us holding on at his leiruely pace so no sense in cruising any longer nd once again assumed his steady tempo right to the end.
There was about a dozen points during the ride today both before and after lunch that I was wavering but glad at the end to have held on as we got that 182km done damn quick.

The ride around Lake Taupo is hilly but beautiful and interesting. Too bad the IM Here doesn’t use this route……….

After a snack a swim and run were on the menu. Some people ran to the lake and most ran back to get their 10km or more.
Richard Blanco did a total of 25km of running to get an extra 2 points. There was a little discussion among the committee because it was broken by a swim …..
We do need to stick to the rules and ignorance is no excuse (except this time………)
Gordo is even more of a stickler for the rules than John is and he dearly wants to hack 5 points from my total for crossing the center line when I was playing around and jumped behind a sheep truck.

The lake was choppy but the troupers got it done.
The run back was a crummy one along the highway but they got that done too.
But that venue doesn’t lend itself well to a aquathon at all so we’ve ditched that idea for tomorrow morning and will just go for a swim in the lake and hope its calmer in the morning.

Dinner was a buffet at a restaurant and was OK, perhaps just saved with a nice pavlova and ice cream at the end. David Craig sure can eat. Just goes to show that if you want to have 3% bodyfat you need a fast metabolism above all else.

I skipped both the swim and run today with self preservation in mind and washed the road grime and aches and pains away and took a little nap in the sun to get rid of those unsightly cycling tan lines…………