Terra Australis 2011 - Day One

No more training to be done, Sunday 20th March dawned and we were on the start line for Terra Australis 2011, at Windy Corner, Falls Creek. The next seven days held the epitome of mountain bike stage racing in Australia.

A tour of the Falls Creek village took us along the aqueduct, on a climb out to Mt Mckay then descending to the bitumen for a roll toward the first feed station. What stood before us throughout the 65km stage was about to get a whole lot tougher with a climb toward Mt Nelse. Holding a rhythm across the rough access tracks was a challenge with the course peppered with various sized rocks and sections of the vehicle track rutts deep enough to interfere with the pedal downstroke.

We soon crested the highest point of the Terra course that pointed us down the rarely used and minimally maintained track covered in tree debris, rocks of all sizes and all concealed by grasses and bracken. It was a switchbacked road with straights between the bends that were long enough to let the brakes go while the eyes scanned for any rocks, potholes or branches as the speeds crept to the 40km/h mark. We reached the fast flowing Big River with bikes in tact and fore arms burning from the rough, fast descent. A short climb to a clearing used as a helipad preceded the second step of the gnarly road down to Bogong Creek. Sections allowed some faster speeds but the terrain became a lot more loose and commanded a greater respect. At one spot we stopped to check on the well being of a fellow entrant that had succumbed to the obstacles littering the trail. The creek was lined with rounded river rocks, as was the following 50 metres of road, the rocks wet from the overflowing creek throwing a slippery mix into the bag.

It was not much further to descend to the welcomed second feed station before another 8 or 9 km of BIg River Fire Trail taking us to the Bogong High Plains Road. We were able to hold a good pace and rhythm along the bitumen picking up another team then leading them into the second last single track section for the day. Using the single track to our advantage we opened a bigger gap to cross the bitumen one last time and hit the single track that would take us to the stage finish line in 3 hours 35 minutes.