Sub 5...almost...

Team Hyper Gila - After race kit collection


Ipoh taugeh chicken rice loading



With Mr. 'Merida' Yeap from KSH shop and Frank


Yip, me, Frank, Lynn, Chin Chin




Bkt Kinding Resort - start/finish for Century Ride 2009

As soon as the riders hit the main road, turbos set in and off they went. I was just warming up and went rather slow for the first 5km.

Riders zooming past me and very soon a 30 rider peloton went by so I joined in. More and more riders were 'picked up' and soon the peloton grew to about 50 riders. Average speed then hovered around 35-40kmh. Not before long, we caught up with leading pack, building the peloton size to at least 70 riders. Impressive! Especially since Tour de France was halfway through and we get to...well...imagine we are in France la. :P

I was enjoying the peloton but the speed crept upwards till we were doing above 40kmh and at certain stretches we even hit 50kmh+

I have no idea which downhill stretch recorded a 71kmh on my meter as the fastest. Wow!

When we hit the 70km+ mark, I failed to keep up when they attacked the hills. I lost it...bye bye peloton. Immediately speed dropped and I hovered around 30kmh till water station. From then on, together with 5-6 riders, we cruised in single file drafting each other. Very soon another peloton of around 20 riders came by...alright! But scattered to bits at water station no.3
From then on, I was more or less alone for the remaining 40km. Quads were feeling the stress and began twitching. Already 2 PowerGels and bites of PowerBar in my tummy and they surely kept me going...rolling... I'm the 'belakang mari' guy

Somewhere around km 130km thereabout I had to dismount my bike and do some stretching and had a couple minutes rest by the roadside. Legs were crying!
But I must say the short rest did wonders. Legs felt much much better.
30km...20km...10km...I kept the pace decently as I didn't want to be below 30kmh this time.

The last 10km... hot hot hot. Sun finally showed itself after a pleasant cool morning. Resort guardhouse was a view longed by all riders. I cruised to finish line slowly, enjoying the final moments of this great Century Ride. Last year, I took 6:13 and this time, I stopped in front of the race clock which showed 5:00! Yahoo!!! 5hr flat!

I'm the one wearing Powered by Jesus jersey. Praise the Lord!

But my cert was printed 5:01...no official 5hr flat...oh well, next year then...