ECNZ 2010 – Day 8 – Masterton to Wellington

ECNZ 2010 – Day 8 – Masterton to Wellington

Good old windy Wellington delivered again. I think every time I have been to the capital in my life it has been miserable and I’d estimate I’ve been here about 15 times.

I changed today’s plan, which was to swim first, to being straight on the bike and try to avoid the gale force winds that were forecast. This worked well for a couple of hours but by the time we reached the Rimutaka climb we’d been looking forward to the wind was in full cry. The climb was a good one and I guess around 6-7km with a mix of steep and moderate grades. What made it tricky was the wind. Poor old Jordon and Jo who weigh a fraction of some of the big guys literately got blown to a standstill and had to clip out. Whilst I didn’t quite get to that I did have one incident when I was trying to surge to the front and attack, I got stopped in my dead in my tracks and had to regroup.

The climb was fun. Molina was the first to show his cards followed by Pete O’Brien, next Lee Wingate went off the front and almost got whiplash from the number of times he looked back to see what was going on behind. As the grade steepened Molina made the decisive move that split the bunch - Gordo, Clas, myself and Scott were away. We traded blows for a while before Clas surged with Gordo. Scott put in a great turn to slowly but surely pull us back up to them. Nearing the top Clas surged again and Gordo popped. Not wanting him to get himself together I went away as well to take 2^nd with Scott and Gordo following in. Everyone had a few stories from the climb so a fitting way to finish up the North Island.

A quick run to the pool and 3km swim and we’re done.

So one Island down and one to go. I seem to be getting stronger on the bike which make sense as my fitness coming into the camp was low. My energy levels remain good. The body is holding up well, just a slight tweak in my Achilles. The undercarriage is good but a little sore on the flatter days.

Overall I was impressed with the riding in the North Island. I had much lower expectations and the traffic was nowhere near as bad as I though. When we got off the main state highways it was right up there with the best riding I’ve done in NZ.

Tomorrow is a re-group day. We have the ferry across the Cook Straight then just a 28km bike the Blenheim. The committee have decided to make it a mandatory re-group day so everyone can regroup and not feel any pressure to train

Summary

Swim 3km

Bike 135km

Run 4km