Yesterday’s AUDAX 300km had it all. 25 registered riders, 41 Celcius heat, 25km of eyeball busting rain and wind and punctures. In the end it was great and I believe everybody finished! At KM 140, just 20 kilometers from lunch we had a number of people bonking after the monster post-Petronas hills. They stuck it out and survived to lunch, ate, revitalized and all finished strong.
The Lundy Worker Award definitely goes to Mat Lock. If he were shorter, and American versus Australian, I would have sworn it was Lundy in person. Mat probably did 270km of front time yesterday for the majority of the group. Mat fixed punctures, donated tubes and cracked jokes along the way.
Liuyang Wan easily won the Silk Smile Award. He was smiling so much we actually thought there was something wrong with him. Despite smiling the entire 300km of riding, he actually beamed an even bigger smile when his double burger was placed in front of him at Brewerkz.
The JFT Audax Spirit Award is for Christopher Broughton. While all the other riders continued to power on through the torrential rains, Christopher pulled over in a hut, relaxed for a bit and then sensibly jumped back in the saddle to finish the final 80km on his own. More importantly he showed up for a beer at Brewerkz.
Congrats to all the winners….you win a pair of AUDAX socks. (Mat you also ‘win’ a tube)
On a rather sad note it was the last ride of Mat and Neridah Lock (the Aussies) who are moving to Australia. They will come up a bit we hope but it will likely be a while.
Finally, special thanks to Patrick Williams who once again designed a new route to keep rider interest up and also to cut the actual distance to 304km from Starbucks to Brewerkz. Thanks Patrick!