The John Lieswyn Diary 2000Index to previous entries Herald-Sun Tour 2000Victoria, Australia, October 5-15, 2000 Pre race Dawn and I left Worcester at 1pm Sunday for the drive to Boston. United upgraded me to 1st class for the domestic portion of my trip to Melbourne. Three movies: Field of Dreams (I dozed halfway through but caught the ending) Gone in 60 Seconds with Nicholas Cage (saw about 20 minutes of it, looked like I didn't miss much) and a weird movie wherein a cop whose firefighter father died when the cop was 7. When the cop is 30 he talks to his dad on a shortwave radio across a time warp, and saves his dad's life. The movie continues with the time paradox to a fairly predictable Hollywood conclusion, but I'm always fascinated with this subject so I stayed awake for this one. I also read more of Dune and tried to sleep, but couldn't. On arrival the guy in front of me in the passport line was telling someone on his cell about how his flight from Boston to London had a seagull precipitated engine failure on takeoff. The 4 engine Boeing 747 could have flown to London on 3 engines, but (with 38,000 feet to climb to cruising altitude) it would have consumed more fuel to do it than was onboard. It was too heavy to turn around and land immediately, so they had to go out to sea and jettison 20,000 gallons of jet fuel to lighten the plane for a safe landing. During the jettisoning process the flight attendants distributed plenty of free alcoholic drinks to the worried passengers. The organizers were there to collect the Irish, Malaysians, and myself. It felt like it had been yesterday that I was here instead of 12 months. The truck and minibus were even parked in the same space of the carpark. I was delivered to the Cosmo, the (2 star) St. Kilda hotel where we stayed in '98. Apparently the organizer's long standing relationship with the ancient downtown (1 star) Duke of Wellington Hotel had soured last year. Good thing. That place was scary with broken windows, roach infestation, and the discovery of a dead tenant in one of the rooms during our stay for the '99 race. I went for a 2 hour bike ride down the coast road with Aidan of the Irish team and we marveled as I always do at the variety and beauty of the $500K and up coastal homes. Laster I met up with my teammates Dave and Graeme. We hung out in a coffee shop for a couple hours trying to stay awake so we could sleep through the night tonight and try to get our bodies on local time ASAP. The skies are dark and the temperatures cool. Our Shaklee team of Dave, Graeme, Eric Wohlberg, and myself will be joined by top domestic Australian amateur Robert Tighello. Tommorrow we have a day with our Australia Post sponsors. We have to be at their headquarters downtown at 10am for clothing distribution and meetings, then lunch, and afternoon media interviews. Then we start racing with a downtown criterium on Thursday. Graeme sounds sick but he protests that it's just hayfever. I hope he's right. I just got well myself, it wouldn't do to catch a cold even before the race begins. Team Australia Post 2000 consists of Shaklee riders Graeme Miller, Dave McCook, Eric Wohlberg, myself, and Aussie Robert Tighello. We once again have the best staff on tour: Maya Lerner (sponsor liason) Lenny Hammond (manager) Joy Kelly (soigneur) Leon Melvin (the do it everything man) and Lance de Luca (mechanic). Our competition includes the Belgians, Czechs, Polish, and team Jayco/VIS (Mercury). I hope to turn the tables on Bart Heirweigh, the man who won 2 stages and blew me away in a two up sprint last year. There are 16 Sydney Olympians in the race. Henk Vogels is looking to become the first Australian overall winner since Neil Stephens (1986). His teammate Scott Moninger won in '96, and looks fitter than ever. Last year's 2nd overall Tomas Konecny (Czech) is back as well. The Malaysian Airlines team has 3 tough Malaysian climbers. 16 five man teams for 80 riders total. The race will be decided in 3 ways: the crosswinds, the Stage 6 climb up Mt. Hotham on Sunday, and the Stage 11 25km time trial. Our Canadian Eric Wohlberg has the best chance of all of us, but I'm not writing myself off either! Stage 1 - October 5: Melbourne criterium, 30 laps, 31 km (20 mi) While warming up I was riding along minding my own business when the strong winds blew one of the metal fences out in a fraction of a second straight into my right side. I swerved and skidded sideways, and got clocked pretty well on my right shoe, but received no real injury. Scared me half to death and convinced me that caution would be my main thought today. We lined up by teams and then waited for a few minutes until the paralympic torch bearer came by to thunderous applause. On the start I went straight to the front to stay out of trouble. The swirling winds were making it difficult to maintain a steady speed, and the peloton would come nearly to a crawl around the tight second corner. Tighello and I covered several early breakaways but Eric was the man today. Eric kept the hammer down from about 25 to go until 20 to go, when he got away with only Vogels. Four Aussie Post and four Jayco/Mercury riders went to the front and shut the pace down at the front, and the break built up to a 50 second lead. I began to wonder if they would lap us, but Eric later told me that the two of them really didn't ride flat out. With 3 to go the peloton gained momentum, but it was still 30sec at the finish. Vogels took it from Eric by a tire width in a hard fought sprint. I was just pleased that the peloton took it easy in the difficult corners. After tangling with metal barricades in Chicago, (with horrendous results) I was absolutely terrified of the ones that lined the course today. I'm really looking forward to getting out on the open road! Stage 2 - October 6: Frankston criterium, 30 km Last night I definitely didn't live up to my nickname, Sleepy. When I managed to sleep I had bike racing nightmares. This morning I felt like I had a hangover, but after Graeme hooked a brother up with Italian Blend and a latte, I was half human. During the warmup I felt pretty awesome and went around giving the schoolkids my palm at 30 kph. I was determined to give it a shot with about 5 laps to go since the course did not favor an early break. Wow. These guys are super strong, or else I'm jet lagged. I had a hard time keeping up. There were a few small breaks but nothing stuck. Eric threw in a few attacks right when I was planning to try, but I was hanging on for dear life. Moninger (Mercury) had Eric marked well. Jayco/Mercury went for it at the end and delivered with Victorian Baden Cooke 1st and Vogels 2nd. We're starting to wonder how long they can keep this domination up before the rest of the field just refuses to ride any break with them or chase any move they miss.
Stage 3 - October 6: Frankston - Wonthaggi, 107.3 km After lunch and coffee, we started with 9 km neutralized pace. I went up and followed the bumper of the official car, which took us up to 60kph on a descent. Mike Sayers (Jayco/Mercury) came up screaming to the driver that if they were to have a neutralized start we ought not be going 60kph at any time. Mike then accused me of convincing the driver to go fast. Yeah, Mike, whatever. Like I would seek an artificial advantage before the race start. After the official start the race was animated and we got our first taste of gutter groveling. No team wanted to throw down a maximal effort on the first stage, however, so the wind did not split the group. Nevertheless a breakaway of 9 or so escaped with no Post riders and two Jaycos (Baden Cooke and Mike Sayers). We tried to pretend we hadn't missed it. Gerolsteiner rode the front at 40kph. The break got up to 2 minutes and the only reason it wasn't 5 was because the Jayco guys weren't helping (their leaders Vogels and Moninger were still in the pack). Finally we put four of us Postmen at the front and a Francaise de Jeux rider helped for a few km as well. On a climb we got the break in sight and then Cooke crashed out of the break and was just remounting as we came past. Jamie Drew (Jayco) started taking turns with Graeme and Tiggs while I ran out of fuel and had to sit back. We caught all the escapees except Bart Heirweigh, who managed to hold off the field and win by a few seconds. The lead motors misdirected the peloton with 3 turns to go. Vogels and Josh Collingwood got a 5 second gap for 3rd and 2nd on the stage respectively. While everything worked out as far as staying in overall contention, we really blew it by missing that big break and having to expend extra energy to get it back.
Stage 4 - October 7: Wonthaggi - Korumburra, 48.8 km One Penny becomes Ten It rained all night last night and it was still drizzling this morning as we drove to the start. Our rather rustic accomodations last night (I'm not complaining: we've had great places to stay for every other night so far) didn't have a phone so 20 minutes before the start I was to be found in an internet shop checking my mail! We didn't even get 2km into the race before someone lit it up and the attacks were incessent from then on. My stomach was pretty torched for some reason and every time I tried to go hard I would get a stomach cramp, but I was determined to save Eric's legs as much as possible by covering all major break attempts. Dave showed us how tough he is by overcoming his sickness and lack of form in covering a few moves, and of course we could count on Tiggs and Graeme to do the same. I was the lucky one in that it was my turn to go when Jeremy Hunt took off like a rocket on a 800m hill. I buried myself to stay close to him, and he eased off enough to let me get on just over the top. We worked well together for 10 minutes or so. Jeremy looked back and saw the Mercury led peloton breathing down our backs just 15 seconds behind, so he gave up. Thinking that it would be better to give my teammates a little longer breather from covering moves, I kept going. Irishman David McCann shot out of the field and re-energized Jeremy, and I waited up for the two of them. Going over the sole climb of the day I didn't take any turns at the front, preferring to watch these two guys whose strengths were unknown to me. We got a maximum lead of 1:15 but the Mercury led pack was mowing us down in the final 10km. I planned on attacking at 3km to go if we were still ahead, but with the field just :15 behind at 3km I decided to feather my energy and use these guys as much as possible. My turns were just a bit shorter and slower than theirs, and McCann was obviously figuring that he'd better pull hard and get 3rd than get caught and get nothing. With the banner in sight and the pack just :03 behind, I jumped past McCann and drove for the line. Hunt was challenging on my right but I just thought about my Dawn asking me to go win for her and I held him off to win by half a wheel. As I warmed down I spotted a dime glinting on the wet road. Remembering how I found a penny heads up on the ground after Bart Heirweigh beat me on the penultimate stage last year, I pulled a U-turn to pick it up. I'm not normally superstitious but that dime will now travel with me everywhere.
Stage 5 - October 7: Korumburra - Traralgon, 90.5 km After going through drug testing during the 2 hour lunch break, we suited up again for another rainy stage. We didn't have time to be cold as the attacks were furious from the start. Two men got away after about 20km. Jayco/Mercury set tempo for a few km and then four Southern Grampians riders shot to the front to help them out. Phew, after this morning's exertions I was happy we were going a steady speed. Us Australia Post riders generally succeeded in riding together just sheltered behind the Mercury boys. The peloton was very twitchy and there were a number of fights breaking out. We haven't even gotten to the crosswind stages yet! The race came back together going in the last 6km and the pace quickened. Eric, Tiggs and I stayed out of trouble while Graeme and Dave fought positioning battles into the last 500m. Dave dove into the decreasing radius penultimate turn way too fast and had to abort his race and jump the median. In his younger days he'd have tried to make it and ended up on his arse. Baden Cooke (Jayco/Mercury) won his second stage in a photo finish. Thank the Lord our really nice motel was just 100m from the finish line. It's been a long wet day.
Stage 6 - October 8: Bairnsdale - Mt Hotham, 174 km Moninger made me laugh today when he said 50km into the stage that he'd learnt something new. He had weather controlling arm warmers: pull them up to full arm coverage and the sun came out, put them down to the wrists and the clouds would obscure the sun and it would become chilly. Graeme said that he wished that there was a way to bottle up the pain we felt today so that when someone asks us next year if we want to go to the Sun Tour he could just unscrew the top and relive Mt.Hotham; then he could answer easily and emphatically "no!" Our angry little man Eric Wohlberg said he wanted to show Vogels some love today after Vogels was quoted in the papers about the contenders, and us Australia Post riders weren't included. I definitely felt like I haven't done enough long stage races this season: my legs are so sore I'm going to suffer like a dog today. I didn't even check the General Classification before the stage. Later I found out that by virtue of my stage win yesterday I was up to fourth. Jayco allowed all attacks early on and only chased when a contender made a move or the break got too large. Finally two men got away including David McCann (Latrobe/Ireland). Jayco and Southern Grampians set tempo until the town of Omeo at 100km into the race, whereupon we hit a major climb and the peloton shattered. I hung on around fifth wheel on a steep pitch, all of us riding in the gravel gutter trying to get a little shelter from the crosswind. 1 kph faster and I would have been spat out the back. Vogels was dropped. We had a group of about 20 riders but now that the gap was established there wasn't anyone willing to keep the pace up. Here we may have erred: Eric felt that if we didn't work that Vogels might make it back on. In hindsight we now realize that even if he had he probably would have been dropped on the next climb. So Eric and I burned a few matches pulling this big group along. On the next big climb Moninger attacked and only 3 men went with him. Eric and I hung in there and we watched as Moninger went it alone and the other 3 pulled away from our group, now around 10 or 12 riders. After the summit Eric and I once again did the majority of the work to try and keep the four riders ahead within sight and Eric in contention. Tony Cruz was pulling really hard on the hills and we got some help from Ciaran Power (Ireland) and Steve Williams (Caravello, Australia). I felt my tank going empty AGAIN and told Eric that if I kept pulling I wasn't going to finish in this group. I'd exhausted my supply of food and our team car wasn't in the caravan yet. The attacks were coming fast and furious in the gusting winds and I was afraid that in my depleted state if I went back to the caravan to search out some energy gels that I wouldn't get back on. We were close to the summit of yet another climb and I was hopeful that I could make it and refuel on the descent. It wasn't to be as I couldn't match yet another acceleration. There was one more chance: the group slowed and I had grabbed a few gels from the team car, but I overdid it and swallowed about six of them and the time taken to do so was crucial. We went over the top and now I was too far behind the caravan to gain any shelter from a blistering headwind, with 15km remaining to the finish. Ultimately Moninger was caught in the last 2km and dropped, while Williams won the stage from 2nd placed Cruz and 3rd placed Wohlberg. I came in around 3min behind in a group of ten. So while I dropped a top 3 position down to about 16th and we lost the team classification, Eric moved into a tie for the yellow leader's jersey with Williams. Graeme's philosophy is that "he won it, he can look after it" (the yellow jersey). Of course he's just kidding. Stay tuned! Stage 7 - October 9: Bright Kermesse 4 laps 12km circuit A day in the sun, with two races and our work cut out for us... With Eric tied for first, the jersey was given to Williams by virtue of Williams' stage win yesterday. That's really good for us because we won't be expected to defend the jersey by riding on the front. Better to take the jersey later on in the tour. Riders yelled "piano, piano" indicating their desire to have a slow start. Graeme flatted on the first lap and it took him ages to get back in the caravan and back to the field, which was charging with attack after attack. Dave McCook said his legs were coming around and that he might have something for the finish if it was a field sprint. It wasn't to be as four guys got away at the end of the third lap. Olympic gold medalist Brad McGee dumped the other three with 2km to go to solo in for the win, while the rest of us nearly caught the trio at the line. We had lunch in the sunshine and I had a chance to call home. Stage 8 - October 9: Bright-Beechworth 91km road race With a full stomach I was hoping that we'd roll out easy but nah, someone attacked straight away. Graeme and I ended up in a group of 12. Initially we figured that there weren't any overall contenders with us, but DeSmet bridged up. We quit taking turns at the front as soon as we realized there was a danger man in the break. We were up to nearly 2 minutes. The group slowed to a crawl and the attacks started coming, so our pace was off-on-off-on. Eventually Aidan Duff (Ireland) took advantage of our efforts to neutralize DeSmet and the group's average speed by attacking hard and alone. He built a huge lead to win solo. Over the 1st major climb the eleven of us were down to just 1 minute over Eric and the field, and I was considering dropping back to help the chase effort. We weren't in contention for the stage win and the overall was much more important anyway. At 12km to go the gap back to the field was still 1:09 and on hearing this from the chief official's car, I pulled a u-turn and went back for Eric. Jumping into the field I dropped the hammer with Williams' teammates and Josh Collingwood's teammates. We had six or seven guys riding flat out and I was giving it all the stick I could. At 3km to go we came into the bottom of a Cat.3 climb, and Mercury pulled their move. Vogels, Drew, and Cooke led Moninger by in a full out sprint on the right, and straight to the left gutter (there was a good crosswind out of the right). Eric missed the move. I went straight to the back and the group detonated, but I gave it everything and caught the main bunch over the top. Unfortunately it was just 1.9 km to the finish and with a 20 sec deficit behind Moninger and two other top 10 contenders, there wasn't much time to do anything. It was still about 20 sec at the line. So Eric lost some of his cushion on 3 contenders, but he should still be tied for first. I won't be leaving Eric again this tour. I'm pretty tired so my writing is degenerating into a simple account of what happened but hopefully I'll get some more interesting color into tommorrow's report. Stage 9 - October 10: Shepparton Kermesse (circuit race), 80km The conditions were overcast, cool and very windy. 400 schoolkids turned out to cheer, many of them dressed in the team's colors. We started at the front but didn't last long up there. The attacks were so fast and uninterrupted that I began to doubt myself. I can't go this damn fast! After a couple laps it became evident it wasn't just me. Most attackers came back fast and struggled to get back in the single file line. A break containing top 10 contender Peter Wrolich (Austria, City of Melbourne team) was up to over a minute before I went to the front with a Caravello rider. Together we held the gap steady for four laps until Gman and Tigs came up to help. We weren't getting regular time splits so we weren't able to properly gauge our chase. Ideally the chasing team wants to bring the break back in the final 3km to preclude another flurry of dangerous attacks. We got too close too quickly and Vogels made a big move to bridge the gap. Once he went, it was too likely his additional power could make bringing back the break much more difficult. We had to go ahead and finish the job off with 11 laps to go. Then I went to the front to try and settle everyone down. I pulled by myself until 7 to go. Southern Grampians took over (for those of you paying attention to their riding the past week, I wonder why...) and the field stretched out single file nearly to the breaking point at 52kph average. Mercury jammed through at 3 to go at 55+ kph and the field split in half. 25 riders made the first split, including Eric and both our sprinters, Dave and Gman. My job was done, and I watched from the middle of the second group as Tony Cruz was the last man to make it across the widening gap to the leaders. Williams, in the the last few minutes of holding the yellow jersey, tried to go with Cruz but couldn't hold the wheel and stayed in the 2nd group, which lost 48 seconds by the finish. Baden Cooke (Jayco/Mercury) won his 3rd stage convincingly in front of his family and friends. AMAZING. While Eric donned the yellow jersey on the podium, we downed recovery drinks and prepared to ride to the hotel under darkening skies. I'm sitting on the bed watching Seinfeld on TV and Eric putting together his Millenium Falcon (his time trial bike). It will take him hours. I don't know what he does with it, my TT bike takes about 10 minutes to assemble and adjust. For you gearheads, his bike has a 60x11 top gear! I'm contemplating tommorrow's 189km death march wherein we must defend Eric's yellow leader's jersey. Then Eric gets to do his stuff in the following day's time trial and we get a figurative day off. That's because anyone not in contention for the top ten generally takes the time trial easy, unless you think you can win the TT stage itself. THEN it's just four days to go, and we ought to be able to do it considering how well Tighello, Miller and I are going. Even McCook is recovering and riding stronger every day. Stage 10 - October 11: Euroa to Moama 189km Another beautiful day greeted the Australia Post Team. We were all smiles and jokes as we prepared to face a long ride defending Eric. Leon cooked up a huge pot of scrambled eggs, ham, and toast in addition to the usual cereal, yogurt, and fruit. Lance had our bikes shining. Joy loosened up the muscles and applied warmup crème. At 11am we were off for 10 laps of a 700m circuit in Euroa, featuring time bonus sprints every other lap. We're so confident of Eric's time trialing ability that we haven't been concerned about 3 second bonus sprints. The ultimate situation was to have a 3 man break (2 men would leave 3rd place open for some yahoo in the bunch to sprint past us every time a white flag was waved, more than 3 men may be able to roll up too large of a lead on us). We got lucky and had 3 lowly placed (overall) riders escape on the 8th lap. As we left Euroa and turned onto a narrow country road Tigs and I did all we could to shut the peloton's speed down and allow the break to get some time on us. If we got too close to them then everyone and their brother would want to try and bridge the gap. The highest placed guy in the break was 30min behind Eric on the GC so we figured we could give them as much rope as possible. Young Kristin Lewis (AH Plant, Aus) is still learning the tactics of bike racing and attacked, sat 30 seconds in front of us, but without any chance of catching the leaders, for nearly 45min before realizing the futility of it. With Eric safely ensconced in our draft the four of us rode the front at a 40kph average for the 189km. Mercury, Gerolsteiner, and the Belgians all tried to put us in the gutter numerous times. I don't know what they were thinking. Perhaps that we were a bunch of 19 year old amateurs. Whatever they were thinking, we certainly weren't going to crack on our first serious day of defending Eric. The wind wasn't strong enough for a split today. Henk Vogels threw in a few soft ones that actually hurt a bit. Gman rode up to him on 3 separate attacks and said "Cmon, is that all you've got?" Gman said that the third time Vogels had steam coming out of his ears and he had to put in a big grin to let Henk know he was just kidding around. The leaders got up to 9:20 before the attempts to crack us and the windup for the finish reeled it back to just over 2min at the line. The final 10km were unbelievably fast considering we were only going for 4th place. This evening's TV coverage made no mention of our defense, and the only time the peloton was shown was the .0005% of the race when a Mercury guy was on the front. 2nd place on the stage Nick Gates (Southern Grampians) was interviewed on the bike, and he was saying something like "I'm out here to put pressure on Wohlberg, by the end of the stage he'll be smashed" (tired). I'm still laughing about that. Nick, it'll take someone higher on GC to smash Eric, don't you think? It certainly won't be easy defending Eric on the last two road stages. Stage 11 - October 12: Rochester Time Trial 25 km Swirling winds, warm and sunny
Last night we shared our hotel with an antique car rally. For you motorheads, the carpark was crowded with beautiful classics: a Series 1 1/2 Jaguar XKE 4.2 coupe, 2 Alfa 1750's, a '64 Jensen 541R, a Volvo P1800S, a 1920's Riley, and a pristine '28 Bentley open 4 seater. My time trial strategy? On the one hand, if I took it easy and just rolled a 40th placing, I'd save energy to help defend Eric's lead the next two days. On the other hand, I really wanted to see what I could do and practice my time trialling. A fast time would move me up to 14th, a slow one down to 21st. Not much money difference, and I wasn't deluding myself into thinking I was going to be top 3 against the likes of Wohlberg and Wacker. The latter rider was 17th at the Olympics and 11th in the Worlds last year. I ended up choosing the middle ground, a 90% effort. My Marin TT bike felt comfortable and fast, and after 10 minutes I kinda wished I'd given it a 100% from the start. I clocked around 35:20. This is once again within 10sec of Gman's time. For the two years we've been teammates we seem to TT the same pace. Last year at the Sun Tour our times were only 1 second apart! Eric went under 32 minutes, smoking everyone except Wacker (at 0:06) and Moninger (about 0:35 behind). That puts Wacker unofficially at 0:22 behind Eric on the GC. Our work is really cut out for us now, considering that Eric isn't a sprinter and there are lots of time bonus sprints left. We drove 80km under increasingly cloudy skies. Going through the city of Bendigo was interesting: the houses have ornate ironworks supporting the front porches, the buildings have that "Gold Rush" architecture, and the cathedral was absolutely impressive. The cathedral wouldn't have looked out of place in Paris. A one hour tourist trolley car has tracks up and down the main street. Dusty Holdens pull up next to sparkling BMW 328's. Rain is forecast for tonight's super short 21km Bendigo Criterium. That'll take less than 30 minutes! 2 years ago we did a dirt horse track crit in Bendigo. I was one of the few riders who had fun on that course - it was different!
Stage 12 - October 12: Bendigo Criterium, 21km 7:30pm, DRY! I'm not sure how riders make it through a 3 week tour like the Giro, Vuelta, or Tour de France. Not physically, because I can see that. Mentally! Tensions are running high. Eric is holding up amazingly well under the pressure, and our staff is still doing the same awesome job in this marathon. But we're up against a powerful three team combine: 15 against 5. As our team's theme song goes, "he (Eric) says all the right things, at all the right times..he's such a nice guy". Eric is fully deserving of this win if he gets it, and deserving of the respect of the peloton. His demeanor has to be making friends. But as this night's criterium went to show, it takes more than that. Eric suggested that he would follow Wacker while Tigs and I covered the front. Dave and Graeme were to pip Wacker for sprints if necessary and go for the stage win. We got double strength lattes and sat at a café until 7pm and then did a few hard warmup laps. My achilles tendon is popping a bit and will definitely require a good icing tonight. A huge crowd turned out. Police stood in the first and second turns holding smoking and flaming torches. The lights came on as we nervously crept forward in anticipation of the start. Dave did his trademark "first to the first corner" start and I was right behind him. From 30 to go until 20 to go I was all over the front, covering everything for Eric. 2nd placed overall rider Wacker was nowhere to be seen in the time bonus sprints awarded every other lap. At the midpoint of the race I was a bit winded and I drifted part way back in the bunch. I saw Wacker going forward with Eric tagging his rear wheel. At 12 to go I made another charge to the front, and passed Graeme on the way. Gman was screaming "get to the front, Wacker!". By the time I made it up there, the race was still all together but I gathered from Eric that he had been required to chase a solo Wacker for 3 laps. Wacker had picked up 6 seconds while Eric had scored 3, for a 3 second net advantage to the Krygystan rider. I stayed at the front until 2 to go, when violent bumping scared me enough to back off. Dave was in the top ten as Mercury wound it out at the front. In the last lap I did all I could to hang on the wheel in front of me. All I could think of was "don't open a gap that will lose Eric more time on any possible contenders ahead of me". Dave won the race with brilliant bike handling and speed. Unfortunately that wasn't part of the plan according to Gman, who was stunned that we couldn't control just one rider in the field, Wacker. As I see it, on a 700 meter night-time course there is only so much a small team can do to control anyone. I'm proud of Dave and ready to lay it down for Eric in the coming three days. I know that despite the tensions everyone will do the same. The score is: Australia Post, 3 stage wins and the leader's jersey for another day. Stage 13 - October 13: Eaglehawk - Ballarat, 148.2 km The 9 day numbness has set in. While my legs aren't sore, they don't produce high speeds. The wind was blowing hard at the start and EVERYONE chucked in attacks. We were trying to let a smaller (less than 10 man) break go, but it wasn't happening. Jayco/Mercury and Southern Grampians massed themselves ahead and dropped the hammer in the crosswinds. Both Tigs and McCook (he woke up with full on head cold) got spat out the back and I was doing all I could to drag Eric around. I finally blew and offered my hand to Eric for a handsling up to the group ahead. By the time I'd recovered my breath and elbowed my way into the 50kph single file line of riders that had been passing me on the road's edge, I was about 50 guys back. It split with Eric and Gman in a group of 25 ahead, and my group was also about 25. For the next 45 minutes my group tried to close a 30sec gap to the front, and this situation sealed the fate of Tigs and McCook (they eventually finished in a "gruppetto; laughing group" of 10, 30min back). Finally the two main bunches regrouped, and I went straight to the front to see what I could do for Eric. I was so knackered that all I could do was ride a single speed, about 42kph, and listen to Eric's "good, let that guy go - bad, chase". We finally had a 9 man break established ahead of us, with only Andy De Smet being an overall contender up there. Gman came up, and after he and I rode tempo for 10 minutes, we decided to roll the dice and bluff. We quit working and waited to see if we could draw the Czechs, Poles, or Mercury into chasing. Everyone else stood to lose a placing to De Smet if he stayed away, but nobody was going to help us out. We weren't about to pay anyone for assistance either. There was still about 90km remaining with numerous steep climbs. While DeSmet powered the break to nearly 4 minute advantage over us, the peloton slowed to a crawl. Then we hit the climbs, and it felt like my legs were made of lead. I couldn't climb to save my life. Eric was on his own, and I was constantly getting dropped on the hills back to the second half of the group. It would regroup, but then we'd hit another steep hill. It was on one of these that Wacker and Moninger played their cards. Josh Collingwood got Moninger's wheel, and Eric was on Josh. Wacker kept the pressure on and Eric was stuck in a crossover gear 53x23 when Josh couldn't hold on anymore. He opened a gap that Eric couldn't close. Two more guys got across to Moninger and Wacker and these four pulled away steadily. Gman and I watched helplessly (from 20 guys back) as Eric was dropped. Two Gerolsteiner riders tried to bring it back on the next hill, but they went so hard that they blew the remnants of the group to bits. They didn't make it and it took fully ten minutes for Gman and I to recover. By the time we got a chase organized, this time assisted by the Irish (riding for Ciaran Power), Moninger and Wacker's group was 2 minutes up. They would eventually catch the DeSmet group and build up to a 3:07 lead on us. The Czechs didn't get their man into the break and he stood to drop several places on the overall, but they wouldn't help us. The temperature dropped precipitously and the five of us (Eric was pulling now for all he was worth) forced our way into a blistering head/cross wind. Small hail pounded us for ten minutes, and the rain was washing sweat off my forehead and into my eyes. In the final 40km of chasing, Gman and I died slow deaths repeatedly. Every time we were dropped on the slightest rise in the road, we had to fight our way up to the front and rejoin Eric in this desperate pursuit. The final gap to the break was around 2.5 minutes, and Eric has slipped to 3rd or 4th overall. We put in a valiant fight, but our legs weren't quite up to the challenge. At least we won't have to defend the yellow jersey in tomorrow's 188km hilly and cold death march. Eric is one angry man and I'm going to turn my disappointment for him into positive energy tomorrow. Putting him back in yellow is a real long shot, but at least we can make those guys hurt. Stage 14 - October 14: Colac to Apollo Bay, 188km Heavy cold rain and high winds Yuck. This is the worst possible luck. Yesterday everyone wanted to race and everyone attacked Eric in the yellow jersey. Today the weather is atrocious and mostly a straight headwind, so nobody wanted to attack Wacker. His team (UCI trade team Mroz) controlled the pace for the first 60km and managed to get a five man breakaway of lowly placed riders up the road. This neutralized five teams desires to attack. 2nd place Scott Moninger wasn't going to attack until we got to the climbs later in the stage. At about 60km Mroz bought the Vic Roads team and now there were 8 guys rotating on the front. When we hit the climbs Gman and Dave were dropped and Eric (now in 4th overall) was struggling. It was up to Tigs and I to help Eric out. Wacker, Moninger, Josh Collingwood, and 6 others got away on the 6km Great Ocean Rd climb. The three of us Aussie Post riders did all the work to bring them back. Once again, 25 other riders wouldn't help out even though many of them stood to lose overall places. Coming off some of the summits we would round steep downhill bends completely exposed to the wind. It was scary when the wind would catch my aerodynamic wheels and it was all I could do to keep control of the bike. Squalls of rain alternated with blue skies. Several times I caught a view of the clear blue ocean in my peripheral vision. Once off the hilly terrain and with just 35km remaining, I died a thousand deaths as we absolutely buried ourselves. All of a sudden the lead group's follow cars came into our view and the elation of our progress re-energized me. We caught up, but my elation was short lived as we were all together for just 10 minutes before we hit an unexpectedly vicious climb. Josh Collingwood (riding this tour with fitness we've never seen from him in the USA) attacked from the bottom of the climb and it was like throwing a grenade into the pack. Tigs and I were dropped immediately and I could see Eric struggling again. After ten minutes of climbing I found myself in a group of four with no other riders in sight ahead or behind. With dead legs I struggled in to the finish. Joy threw a blanket over me and Leon propped a chair under me before I collapsed. Eric was there and I popped the question: "did you make it?" He recounted how he was dropped over the top of the last climb and it took him ten km of chasing (with Vogels, Cooke, and Sayers of Mercury) to regain the front group. They came into Apollo Bay just 24sec in arrears of 3 men from the original group. Hard man Bart Heirweigh pulled off the stage win. I don't remember the last race that I suffered so much in. One FLAT day to go. Phew.
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