Bludged my way up to the front group (you get put into lots according to estimated finishing time) and kapow! Off we went from the gun, straight uphill into a howling crosswind, the bunch all over the road, fighting for wheels, legs on fire, heart rate going through the roof thinking... 4 plus hours of this torture? No way!
Things settled down a bit, but couldn't relax one bit as it was a constant fight to stay near the front. Every time I had a lapse in concentration I drifted back and had to start all over again, it was moving all over the place.
The course has changed to the same as the elite race with lots more rolling big hills through Kinlock but the real 'fun' started at Kuratau (no one warned me!) where a gap appeared on a series of nasty rises and the pressure went on, I wasn't in the right place, thought a decent descent was coming and wasn't and nek minnut, the bunch split more or less into two, me in the wrong half.
We chased like mad, on two occasions on my own to bridge across, a couple of times we were about 100 metres from making it, but the wind wouldn't let us, so everyone pulled the pin and resigned ourselves to working with the group we had and hoping the next group didn't get up to us. Fark I was cross...
The crosswinds before Turangi nearly blew me right off my bike a couple of times but finally, after about 100K we turned out of the wind and hit nearly 70K on the flat from Turangi to the edge of the lake and to the foot of the dreaded Hatepe incline where I forced the pace and got away with 4 others who turned out to be good companions to the finish.
So, 4.25, 40th place, 10th in my age group and about 10 minutes off the winner which all things considered, could have been better, could have been worse.
So thats Taupo?
Mmmmm, can see what all the fuss is about, its pretty awesome really, huge event and to get that high up out of 7,000 competitors is pretty good I guess so can't complain.
