Tour of SouthLand,Stage 1

Daniel Carruthers is keeping us posted from New Zealand, during his racing days down under.

Credit for the photos goes to envious photography.

Stage 2 update

Deep in the Deep South of New Zealand, the Tour of Southland battle is on;  it is a race where all of the top Kiwi riders turn out and a handful of Australians taking on the challenge. The race has a reputation for having plenty of bad weather to dish out at the riders, like crosswinds you’ve never experienced before - ones that would blow you along if you had sails mounted on your bike. Combined with the cold and rain, racing over rough chip seal New Zealand roads makes for a challenging race. Even more challenging when you are riding with some of the most talented riders in the country who know how to ride in the crosswinds.

True to typical Southland weather, the whole stage was buffeted with powerful head and cross-winds. This combined with the aggression of the riders made for a super tense day with riders constantly jockeying for position. You could never stay on the front of the peloton for very long as the pace would speed up and slow down, thus allowing riders from behind to swarm up on the sides and pushing you back. It was a mission in itself to stay up in the top 20-30 positions; which I was doing pretty good with and staying out of trouble. I was going well in the bunch till about the 100km mark, we had just completed the official KOM for the day and it was the calm before the storm that would erupt within the peloton. I was caught out completely. The Avanti team really drilled it once we crested the climb and it was full gas to the right hand corner.  After that turn, it was another crosswind fest but felt 10 times stronger because I was riding in the gutter in full force of the wind. I found myself slowly exploding and no longer able to hold the wheel in front of me. Moreover, it was downhill also! It was my first time getting dropped on a downhill and with riders barreling past me on the left. Even one tried to ram me into the ditch as he flew by. I chased hard, but could not recover enough to keep up the power. Eventually I found myself in a group of 10-riders and we ended up taking the wrong turn after battling block head-wind at 28-30km/h. Fortunately the officials gave us an official finish time as we eventually rolled across the finish in Gore under icy cold rain. It was a wake up call for me. Racing in cross-winds requires good positioning and knowledge of what is to come.  

Presently I am way down the GC in 93rd position from 108 riders as a result of today’s stage, but there are seven more stages to come so plenty of chances to try to salvage something at the 2014 Tour de Southland. If you are a strong elite rider and never raced before in New Zealand, this is the race to do. It won’t be an easy race thats for sure, but it would be an experience of a lifetime as you take in the stunning beauty of New Zealand’s Southland.

Tour of Southland opening 4.2km TTT prologue

Today's guest writer is a profound Saddledrunker. His names is Daniel Carruthers.Daniel is in New Zealand racing at the moment for Adair Craik Chartered Accountants Team.Daniel will be keeping us posted everyday this week during the 2014 SBS Tour of Southland. We wish him and his team good luck.We are sorry for the delay but we are -13 hours from them, therefore he will be reporting after he has finish competing.

This is the second time at Tour of Southland, the first time was back in 2006 when I was still new to racing and now this time I hope I can be competitive and be active in the race instead of clinging on for dear life like I did in the 2006 edition. This is my 2014 season goal and have been steadily building towards starting in New Zealand’s biggest and hardest race; it has a reputation for being a very tough race especially when you factor in the arctic conditions riders often face. I recall in the 2006 edition, we had hail as thick as your thumb belt down on us, gusty wind that wreaked havoc in the peloton and snow falling for some of the stages. Tour of Southland is one tough race, but it does traverse through some stunning scenery New Zealand has to offer. 

Day one of the Tour, riders were greeted with steady cold rain that fell throughout the afternoon which made the 4.2km 4-corner lap around the Queens Park quite challenging. I was riding for the Adair Craik team, a team mostly comprised of young talented under 23 riders with myself and one other in the Masters category. With most of the other teams being pro and prepared, they were warming up under tents on rollers and trainers while we had to contend with sitting in the van to keep warm. I decided I was not going to do that so did a lap around the Queens Park to get the heart rate going and some blood flow to the legs. We rolled up to our start time of 4.32pm and I was slotted into 5th position in the pace-line.  The first lead out rider went nice and quick as expected at the beginning but the 4th rider dropped wheels so he had to close a gap and yelling at the front three to slow down a little. Going through the first corner, the same rider could not hold the wheels through the corner and was struggling to regain contact. I came passed him to close the gap and they slotted in quickly behind me as I went. The front three revved properly back into gear when I yelled GO and the pace line became smooth’n’fast. The corners were a little tricky due to the wet conditions, and we managed to negotiate them intact. On the back straight about 300m from the final corner one of the riders was unable to hold the power and this caused 2nd placed rider to hesitate and this made us bunch up going into the last corner. Fortunately, we made it through and it was a sprint to finish the fast opening TTT. I came through in 3rd place and we posted a respectable time of 5:24 with an average speed of 47.3km/h. The winning team, Avanti Cycling from Australia, posted a super fast time of 4:57 to be the top team on the day and lead the tour.   I am sitting 2nd overall in the Master category and 63rd overall on GC from 108 riders. 

Tomorrow’s stage is 167km starting in Invercargill and promises to be one full of attacking action. Depending on how severe the cross winds are, the peloton could be in pieces by the end. The Tour of Southland goes for six days and takes in the best scenery Southland has to offer.  Visit www.tourofsouthland.com for live updates and results if you wish to follow the day to day action. 

361°Cup Cycling Open, China

This week SaddleDrunk guest writer is Alex telling us is amazing experience in China last weekend.Happy reading.Credits for the photos to Jennifer Carruthers.

The Police

The Police

Sweet surprises....

It isn’t often that a spur of the moment decision, made with very little knowledge of the logistical details or potential outcomes, works out to such utter perfection. Such was the case when I was surprised by an invitation from Daniel Carruthers to travel to compete in couple of bike races in China - the

361°Cup Cycling Open in Jinjiang and the Tour de Qiandao Lake near Hangzhou.  I’d been to China for work once before, but I’d never heard of either of these places, let alone the events. I’d also never traveled outside the country for a race. In fact, it was only through a mutual friend that we made contact via email and Facebook. Other than that, I hadn’t even met Daniel in person!  So going into this, I really had no idea what to expect. And that’s what was so attractive about the proposition. It smacked of ambiguity and adventure and it was something that I just could not resist.

Due to the distance and location, travelling to Jinjiang from Austin, TX is guaranteed to be an arduous task. It doesn’t make it any easier when you show up at the airport with an expired passport! Luckily, I’d arrived a little earlier than usual and was assisted by a delayed flight arrival. This just barely gave enough time for my lovely girlfriend Katie to make the hour-plus round trip to retrieve my valid passport. That self-induced fiasco soon passed and then it was just a matter of negotiation the next three flights to

The 2014 361°Cup Cycling Open

The organizers of the 361°Cup did an absolutely superb job attending to every detail of the race.  On arrival, I was greeted at the airport by a couple of college co-eds who took  my bags and escorted me to the hotel shuttle. These volunteers, who spoke very good English, were a delight to be with. They were excited and helpful. Couldn’t have been a better way to arrive after almost 30 hrs of travel.  An hour later, I was at the hotel being greeted by several more volunteers who checked me in, took my bags and even  sat down to have lunch with me.  If I asked for anything, they sprang into action. They truly made me feel welcome.

 The following day, Friday, was scheduled to be a recon of the race course for all the teams that were competing. It was here that I began to realize the magnitude of this event. I can’t name all the countries that were there, but here’s a representative list – Uzbekistan, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Germany, Malaysia, Serbia and many more. I had no idea there would be so many international riders competing! In fact, the CCN Team Daniel had assembled was also very cosmopolitan –Daniel is a Kiwi, Matt Boys and Trent Morey are Aussies and Gary Loafman is an Okie (In Texas, we consider Oklahomans as foreigners). This was turning out to be a big deal!

The team 3rd position

The team 3rd position

Race day, Saturday, arrived and it was more of the same. Race start was on the open grounds of a convention center that was absolutely packed with volunteers, organizers, staff, visitors and even a bike racer or two. There were television crews, a giant sign-on board, a full on opening ceremony and what seemed like half the residents of Jinjiang in attendance. Spectators were asking for autographs and taking selfies with us.  And what made it really special was that these people were truly joyful about it!  They were very happy and very gracious, all of them!

 So how did the race unfold…. Without getting too deep into the details, our team did very well.  Matt and Trent got into the winning move on the second lap. I missed out on making the break, my mishap may have been just enough disruption to allow the break to escape. I managed to quickly remount and rejoin the peloton. Where I stayed out of trouble and finished in about 11th place out of the bunch sprint. Team leader Daniel had a very strong sprint, finishing 2 places ahead of me after having moved up some 30-40 places in the final 1km, while Gary also finished safely with our group. Impressively, Matt and Trent snagged 7th and 10th places, respectively.  With all those placings, our team claimed Third overall in the Team Classification.  Now, I’ve seen a podium or two in my day, but they were nothing like this awards ceremony. It was spectacular!  There was a processional, music, plaques, trophy, bouquets and even magnum bottles of champagne!  Like I said, it was a veritable Pro Tour level celebration.  Never in my life have I been sprayed with Champagne on a huge stage!  I'm still shaking my head at how amazing the entire day was! 

Thank you Alex.

Have a good weekend you all.

Be safe out there.

SD.