MAD ride, Woodend Vic , 65km MTB route:

I couldn’t face another day of seeing my poor Specialized Epic in the shed covered in a layer on the wrong sort of dust, so in the absence of any other MTB riding for the whole of 2012, I pumped up the tyres & took it out to Woodend for the annual MAD ride. I’ve done this ride before & recall it being a good shakedown from the Wombat 100 (which I have also entered, but for the 50km distance due to my lack of, well riding really in 2012).


Signed up on the day & rolled out about an hour after the first start time (being a non-competitive event, you can start anytime between 8am & 9:30am) pretty much on my own, but that’s OK as I was planning on some quality zen time out on the MTB. Very nice morning for it, the breeze at the start died out at the first single track. Very well signed course but some trail sections had lots of leaf cover in places which made looking a grippy line awkward. Cool vibe from everyone I happened across. The rest stops had fruit which is always a good thing. 2x tricky descents of the course had me clip-out & dabble (is that the right word?) the last 10mts, but at least I got a chockie at the base of the 2nd for my efforts.

My joy in not bailing to my granny or walking a climb for most of the course as I left the Lunch stop was comprehensively quashed on the last 15kms home. Ouch, not nice on tied legs. The roll back to Woodend was nice as it was mostly down than up, although a developing rear tyre flat was dulling my ride down Old Calder Rd to the Woodend Township.

Tied, dirty & a stinging chainwheel bite on my right calf muscle (result of a poor line choice traversing a boggy two-track ditch), was accompanied by a warm contented glow of a good day out on the bike.

Ride stat for the day. (Endomondo)