This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
and after the last nervous pee we are running to the kayaks. It has been emphasised by starter Struan Little (a carnivore) that this is a highly competitive and thoroughly serious event, and that no humour, disorderly conduct, disrespect for officials, or vegetarianism will be tolerated. There’s trouble with my spray skirt, so a whole bunch of paddlers are on the water ahead of us. Never mind, “Titan” Wasmuth is in our rear driving seat (double kayaks, unlike tandems, are commanded from the back). We power through the field leaving others bobbing in our wake. Maybe digging that snowcave at Christmas strengthened my paddling muscles? The Days Bay wharf has diagonal braces underneath, and you have to pick the right entry to get through. Paddle left! says Alan. Trouble Is Alan, this paddle isn’t designed to handle twelve by twelve jarrah coated with mussels. After five kilometres of increasingly sore arms, we beach in a handy fifth position. Alan hauls me bodily out of the boat and I totter up the beach, less certain now that this will be the day I complete my first triathion. Meanwhile Janet has tagged Alan and is running off along Marine Parade. Along to the bus sheds, getting slowly into the rhythm of this strange running thing. Here is Phil Kendon, directing runners. I haven’t seen him for a while, and he stops me so he can shake my hand. Now there’s an English gentleman for you! Up the hill. My honey drink is beginning to take effect and I catch Janet, (suffering from a sore throat) and two others. Down to Butterfly Creek and up the valley. An overtaking runner takes fourth place from me near
1 2 March 2000. A 9am start at 9.25am sharp,
~-the-top-of the-hill-above Eastbourne Over the “crest; I and the track divides three ways. This must be it. Free fall through the bush to streets and houses. Hit the flat, legs feel tired. Go left then right, should be nearly back at Bishop Park. What’s this? Oh s..t, I’ve come down the wrong ridge! I jog tiredly through unfamiliar streets looking for Bishop Park. Here comes Alan, steaming along Marine Parade on his huge bike with a brisk nor-wester behind him. Janet must have finished already. When I get to the park, lots of runners who are supposed to be behind me are already in. Why didn’t they follow my route? More honey drink, on with a layer of polyprop, and away on the bike. Not much chance of catching Alan now. At the end of the public road, car club vehicles are lined up for a trip to Pencarrow. This wasn’t in the script. People chatting beside their cars scatter as speeding cyclists descend on them. A couple of hundred yards further and I grind to a halt. My back wheel bearings have seized. End of your triathlon, John. I slacken the quick release so the whole axle can tum in the frame, and start the long walk back. dust past the gate on the Pencarrow road is a kiosk. The kiosk is open. A man is in it. He has ice creams for sale. Beside the kiosk are bikes. They are mountain bikes. The mountain bikes are for hire. The price is $7 an hour. What is $7 when the glory of SWTC and the realisation of a personal goal are at stake (or as Struan would have it, steak)? Kiosk man chooses me a steed and pumps the back tyre. Another honey drink and I’m away, overtaking Austin Sevens and Morris Minors and huge Chryslers and open-topped sports cars. This is good for morale! Then a girl in pink shorts speeds past me. Very cheeky of her — doesn’t she know I’m going fast? Round the corner past Lake Kohangasomethingorother, and up the track into the teeth of the gale, which was only a stiff breeze when it was behind me. I’m closing on Pink Shorts. I pass her at the lighthouse — and wonder of wonders, she doesn’t overtake on the slow, tricky descent. Then all I have to do is select middle chain ring and punch into the gale. Going round a headland, I look back and Pink Shorts is nowhere in sight. I even overtake cocky a kilometre from the finish, a young male comes past me, travelling unnaturally fast. I suspect he’s high on one of those drugs we had when I was young, testosterone or something. It shouldn't be allowed. A sprint for the line, Ann Kempster thrusts a choccy bar into my hand, and back to kiosk man in Janet’s car. He only charges me for an hour. Brilliant bike, I tell him, probably better than wine even when both wheels rotate. Two ice creams, please. cont on page 9 bs Seer = Me HERE eS from page 8 Alan has come in fifth — maybe he and Janet were the first mixed team? However, three of us making two teams confused the organisers (who can blame them — we were confused too!) so we scored third. Not had for a little club whose name is rarely heard in the big bad world west of the Rimutakas. At the prize giving, Struan is looking drawn and exhausted as a result of his morning’s MC work. Maybe he missed out on his steak for morning tea. Meanwhile Lisa, who completed the Reverse Perverse last weekend, the Tararua Mountain Race yesterday, and the Tongue and Meat Challenge today — any of which should put any normally insane person in bed for a week — looks as fresh as a daisy. MC Struan, in awarding SWTC its trophy, comments on Wairarapa technology: wheels have been invented there, he says, but not yet ones that go round. That may be true Struan, but at least we can say S-0-U-T-H W-A-I-R-A-R-A-P-A T-R-A-M-P-I-N-G C-L-U-B, and we’re going to work on you till you can say it too! Team: Alan Wasmuth, Janet Rhodes, John Rhodes
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John Rhodes
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