I got outside last Saturday to enjoy the beautiful sunny spring day. I wandered around the local Plympton area, and also headed down to Henley beach which is only about a 10 min drive from us. It was nice to finally have some inspirational settings to take some photos again.
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Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Finally...the Dirty Dozen!
The 2014 Adelaide Dirty Dozen was an amazing event! I was looking forward to it for so long, and thankfully Adelaide graced us with beautiful weather for the Sept 6th "social" ride.
The Dirty Dozen has been running for a few years, however this was my first opportunity to take part. In summary the event is a socially organised ride that tackles 13 of Adelaides steepest climbs. This covers about 3km of vert and 115kms of road. Funnily enough I had done next to no hill training for this. Since moving to Plympton I have been doing a lot more long flat riding, so needless to say I was slightly concerned seeming in the past 3 months I think I had a total vert count of maybe the total vert of this one event.
Anyways I'm always down for a challenge so I was at Red Berry Espresso 6:45 am sharp for the rider briefing, and then by 7:30ish we hit it. First up, Mt Osmond. See the full hill list below.
Mt Osmond (Hayward Dve) - 2.3km @ 9.7% Gill Tce - 0.6km @ 14.7% Kensington Rd - 1.3km @ 11.5% Coach Rd - 2.4km @ 9.8% Coach House Dve / Woodlands Way - 2.7km @10.1% Cleland Wildlife Park access road - 1.2km @ 10.6% Whitewood Dve - 1.1km @ 10.3% Heather Rd - 0.6km @ 12.4% Ridge Rd - 1.3km @ 9.5% Morgan Rd - 1km @ 10.4% Pole Rd - 1km @ 9.9% Lynton (Caroline) Bike Path - 0.7km @ 11.1% Sheoak Rd - 5.2km @ 4.7% (incl sections of 0.5km @ 15.2% and 1km @ 8.7%)
Anyways, the day went so well. The organisers were rad and had bananas and drinks at the top of a few of the big climbs which was totally unnecessary, but so appreciated. The total bitch of a climb went to Sheoak Rd, as expected. Final climb and what a son of a bitch. Talk about nail in the coffin. Some people were struggling big time up there!
Obviously I didn't take a map, or even really look at the route before hand and thus was totally relying on other people for directions. This led to me doing an extra hill climb that wasn't on the route and adding probably an extra 10kms. So my dirty dozen was actually 14 hills and ~130kms including ride from home to the event. This didn't bother me too much, however one of the guys that took the wrong turn with me was super unstoked when he realised. I thought he was about to throw the towel in!
This ride took some amazing roads through parts of Adelaide that I am ashamed to say I have never been too before. It was so beautiful and I'll have to get back out there now that I know where all the roads go. There are also some damn steep hills in Adelaide so no excuses to not get those hill muscles going.
Overall it was an amazing day and I'll definitely be hitting it again next year.
The Dirty Dozen has been running for a few years, however this was my first opportunity to take part. In summary the event is a socially organised ride that tackles 13 of Adelaides steepest climbs. This covers about 3km of vert and 115kms of road. Funnily enough I had done next to no hill training for this. Since moving to Plympton I have been doing a lot more long flat riding, so needless to say I was slightly concerned seeming in the past 3 months I think I had a total vert count of maybe the total vert of this one event.
Anyways I'm always down for a challenge so I was at Red Berry Espresso 6:45 am sharp for the rider briefing, and then by 7:30ish we hit it. First up, Mt Osmond. See the full hill list below.
Mt Osmond (Hayward Dve) - 2.3km @ 9.7% Gill Tce - 0.6km @ 14.7% Kensington Rd - 1.3km @ 11.5% Coach Rd - 2.4km @ 9.8% Coach House Dve / Woodlands Way - 2.7km @10.1% Cleland Wildlife Park access road - 1.2km @ 10.6% Whitewood Dve - 1.1km @ 10.3% Heather Rd - 0.6km @ 12.4% Ridge Rd - 1.3km @ 9.5% Morgan Rd - 1km @ 10.4% Pole Rd - 1km @ 9.9% Lynton (Caroline) Bike Path - 0.7km @ 11.1% Sheoak Rd - 5.2km @ 4.7% (incl sections of 0.5km @ 15.2% and 1km @ 8.7%)
Anyways, the day went so well. The organisers were rad and had bananas and drinks at the top of a few of the big climbs which was totally unnecessary, but so appreciated. The total bitch of a climb went to Sheoak Rd, as expected. Final climb and what a son of a bitch. Talk about nail in the coffin. Some people were struggling big time up there!
Obviously I didn't take a map, or even really look at the route before hand and thus was totally relying on other people for directions. This led to me doing an extra hill climb that wasn't on the route and adding probably an extra 10kms. So my dirty dozen was actually 14 hills and ~130kms including ride from home to the event. This didn't bother me too much, however one of the guys that took the wrong turn with me was super unstoked when he realised. I thought he was about to throw the towel in!
This ride took some amazing roads through parts of Adelaide that I am ashamed to say I have never been too before. It was so beautiful and I'll have to get back out there now that I know where all the roads go. There are also some damn steep hills in Adelaide so no excuses to not get those hill muscles going.
Overall it was an amazing day and I'll definitely be hitting it again next year.
Friday, September 5, 2014
The day my 365 project failed.
So I have been working on a 365 photo project this year, until the other day. I failed to take a photograph last Monday. I didn't take my camera to work, rushed home and then went swimming. Upon returning from swimming we made dinner and were totally thrashed. I thought I gotta take a photo of dinner to do my photo for the day. That's where it ended. I ate, showered and zonked out. I didn't even realise that I had forgotten till later the next day. I had been disliking the project for a while as I didn't have the time to focus on it to do it well. Since I have failed and stopped pursuing the project, I have found that I am already taking more interesting photos, and I only take my camera when I want to. It's way more fun. The rules I set myself for the project were cool, if you had a lot of time to work with them. The first part of the series in Vancouver and while I was unemployed in Adelaide are great. They adhere to the rules more or less, but also the rules at this stage of the project gave me ideas to seek out subjects. Once full time work ramped back up and more intense triathlon training, I just ran out of time and motivation. My goal for next year, and maybe the end of this year is going to be switched to making sure I produce one good photo a week. This gives me time to write about it, and choose a rally nice photo. I hope you enjoyed watching, the project that ended at day 235 took me to some cool places and allowed me to take some great photos. Writing this a few weeks later I am really not regretting that I let it skip. I just think I was trying to do too much and my heart wasn't in it. It has been really nice just taking photos when I've wanted to rather than feeling I have to each day. Everythings fun, until you force yourself to do it :-)
235/365
Torrens, Linear Park with Kate while House Hunting in Klemzig. One of the first "warm" weekend days for a while. It was nice to just sit and chill in the sun for a while, a small moment of peace in our hectic schedule.
234/365
Picking Kate up from The Gilbert St Pub after friday night dinner at the folks. Beautiful bokeh of city lights with my 85mm 1.8.
233/365
I was out wandering around town capturing some reference photos for work and saw this cool piece of public art. Also, it was such a beautiful day, finally after weeks of crappy cold winter weather.
232/365
Surprise present from Kate! I was so stoked with this T2 thermos. I take it everywhere, especially to morning swimming for a hot drink afterwards. No shit, it keeps the tea so hot that two hours later it is still too hot to drink! Amazing.
231/365
On Tuesdays Kate is out for choir rehersal, so I roast up my favourite veggie dish. Roast everything, lots of sweet potato tho, rice, chick peas, tahini, nutritional yeast, avocado! YES!
229/365
That lame achilles again! The woes of running. Now I just gotta get it healed for Murray Man!
228/365
Work in progress tri-bike build. It's really good fun building your own bike from individual components. Keeps me preoccupied in my spare time thats for sure.
227/365
Flower marked, lunchtime, Friday, Rundle Mall. I write this post a few weeks later, and it is still going and really creating a cool vibe in the Mall. It's great to see these kinds of initiatives being implemented.
226/365
Moroccan lamb curry al a Kate :-) Delicious, until we got to all the fat that cooked out of it..kinda reminded me why I like eating vegetarian.
Monday, September 1, 2014
Beautiful day in the hills to end winter
What an amazing Saturday afternoon hanging out at Mt Osmond with Kate. Beautiful views of Adelaide and amazing sunshine.
My new tri bike
This was a lot of fun to build. I bought the groupset separate from the frame. Yes it's a Team Discovery Channel Trek :-) Came with a supply of EPO!
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