Take 2: Cape2Cape 2019

Ed.

Premier Member
#23
Thanks guys. Unfortunately I've called it and won't be finishing the ride. Just too fried and not helped by not being able to sleep when I got in last night (went to sleep just fine in full gear 30km out of town!). I was a mess when I rolled in and couldn't back it up again today on less than 3hrs.
Ridingthe last 300km of the Plenty hwy in the dark broke me, it was just brutal - completely unpredictable surface conditions and cattle everywhere.
Planning to more or less follow the route through to visit family but just of the clock. (Will leave spot on). Will probably pick up border run on way home.
 

Ed.

Premier Member
#29
It is a tough one - the ride itself is tough but it also has very little flexibility with logistics around opening times for fuel. Add to that the massive increase in risk and difficulty riding the plenty and great central rd at night and the timing becomes really restricted and very hard to recover if it slips. I still think it is doable but not by me today. Would be more than happy to share what we have learnt in the past two attempts with anyone wanting a go at it.
 

Ed.

Premier Member
#32
Put quite a bit of thought into this as I was going along today. I realised that even after the light day yesterday, it was still theoretically possible (from a time/distance perspective) to complete the ride in under 100hrs. Without going too far down the coulda/shoulda route, I think if I had played my cards very slightly differently i would still be in the game. Some good lessons for both this ride specifically and for my multi day rides generally I think. As i said above, this is still very doable, just needs the right plan and approach. Might have to do a bit of a debrief, lessons learnt thing maybe.
 

Rusjel

Premier Member
#40
It was the hardest thing I've ever done on a long ride to leave Thommo at Coen, but Ed and I knew the last thing he'd want would be to stop us having a go. Funny how you remember things. I left Tiger Bill to limp in after one FarRide in QLD many years ago and I was remembering how bad that felt as well. However, it was an easy call to go get Thommo once the ride wasn't on for me. Big thanks to Tack and Rhys for the lend of the ute.

Since my cancer treatment I've been functioning on reduced sleep. I've managed it o.k, but it is not ideal for multi day rides. I really want to have a go at a few of these, so I'm going to get a referral to a sleep clinic and see what can be done.

I'd like to have another go at this one but it might be a while before I can put all the pieces on the board for a proper attempt. The good things are what we've learned about this ride. Its definately doable, we just have to get the pieces aligned and run with the right plan.