CoT well represented at Lang Lang!?

Hey there. I turned up to Lang Lang and entered B grade at 1pm (so did Guy Green and over 60 other people). I decided that was soft so I changed to A grade at 1:15pm. Other A grade riders included Pat Shaw, Robert Crowe, Murray Spink, Vaughan Bowman, Wayne Evans, Justin Davis, etc. etc. I did about an 8km warm up then started the race in pole position. The first 5kms was under control and coz I'm so strong and not weak I sat on the front for the first 3km (also to complete my warm up). I then slotted into the peleton and got serious about the race. I stayed near the front up the hill to Poowong (sat second wheel on Bring Sing I think his name is). After Poowong an attack went with a few riders but we caught them after around 8 or 9 kms. Another attack went (including Murray and Crowe) and we caught them too. Bring Sing nearly came down after being chopped into the gutter by Pat Shaw and some guy wearing a pink jersey (they were really pissed off at him as was the whole bunch coz he was blocking for Murray and wouldn't roll through).

We hit Heath Hill and I rolled past the strugglers (including VB and Wevans) and stayed with the front of the race (6 of us away). VB was next on the road in "no man's land". I tried to wait for him to catch up (by not pulling hard turns) but we were going too quick. He dropped back to form a chase group with Wevans and about 5 others. They chased for around 5 kms before catching us then Matt Chessum and I rolled off the front of the bunch (at around the 60km mark). We saw that we had a gap on the peleton so we started working together. We got 100+ metres then Robert Crowe tt'd across on his own. With 3 of us working well together we pulled away until we got out of sight. We were still out of sight when we got to the final ascent of the race (Heath Hill) which is about 20kms from the finish.

Chessum got dropped as soon as the hill started, leaving just me and Crowe. I felt absolutely great apart from starting to feel my legs on the verge of cramping so I backed it off a bit and paced myself gently up the climb. Pat Shaw and Bring Sing were flying up the climb behind me (everyone else was still out of sight). I jumped on Brian's wheel and was following these 2 guys back up to Crowe. Brian dropped Pat's wheel and apologised to me so I jumped around him and set off after Pat. I was third on the road and feeling great apart from cramps starting. I eased up and decided to work with Brian to get back to the 2 leaders (I did not see him as a threat in a sprint). We got over the top of Heath Hill with Pat only about 25 metres in front and Crowe about 20 metres in front of him. I was confident I'd get back on them easily. This was about the best I've ever done in a 100km A grade Combine Road Race. I started thinking that if I don't cramp I'm a certainty for a top 3. I was so hungry for the win and feeling great....apart from that bloody friging cramp!!!

At the 81.5km mark it happened (just 16 flat kms from the finish). My left hamstring cramped up and there was nothing I could do about it. Gone were my goals of a top 3 A grade finish for Le Tour. Gone were my goals of a top 3 finish for the CoT. I couldn't pedal. I had to pull over and was stopped for about 7 minutes. I watched Murray chase the 3 leaders (he only caught and passed Brian, the other 2 were gone, Crowe taking first and Pat taking 2nd). Then there was a gap back to a chasing Justin Davis then a massive gap back to a very small bunch including VB and Wevans. I just watched them all go past from the side of the road.