SOUTHERN ALPS HRS

By EAT MORE LARD

November 18^th, 2017

WHERE NEXT?

It's been interesting watching Hells 500 develop over the years under the master stewardship of Andy van Bergen. From the original ride that spawned the name through a number of annual "epics" to Everesting. The obvious question for Andy after the Everesting phenomenon was what was next? How to avoid just turning it into longer, higher, steeper... the proverbial arms race.

Step forward the High Rouleurs Society, or HRS for short. It's a ride of few rules. Ride 400km or more, climb 10 000m or more, and do it in under 36 hours sleep. Do you like to sleep in a hotel or a bus shelter? Sure, go for it. Swap bikes. Get a train and ride somewhere else. It's up to you. Just remember the clock never stops.

GOLD IN THEM HILLS

So it was, I found myself standing deep in the valley that is home to Walhalla at 6am one Sunday morning. I was riding for 4 other fellows, captained by Joel, who I had know for years. Our ultimate destination was Mt Buller with an overnight stop at Marysville on the way.

Joel and I had been talking about a ride that linked all the major Victorian alpine climbs for years and here we were finally knocking off at least the southern half of that. Our ride would take us over the 10 000m high water mark with a barely a meter to spare. I was sceptical that the various routing websites were accurate. We were seeing anything from around 9 000m to 11 000m so we would be somewhere in between. In the back of my mind I wanted to make sure we had a time buffer in case some repeats were required on Buller at the end.

Joining Joel and myself were Stuart, Brodie and Dan. Along with Joel, they were all part of the crew that liked to ride hard on weekday laps of the Boulie in Melbourne and I was a little worried that I was going to be shelled out the back of the bunch early. AB had kindly offered to drive the support car over the weekend, taking the opportunity to run his own tour of mountain bike parks in between pandering to our needs.

My form was ok, legs were in reasonable shape but it would be naive of me to think that I was anywhere near approaching top form. Still, I had previous with this kind of ride and I knew how to just "get it done". I was, of course, hoping to enjoy it at the same time!

SLOW BOATING

Start the clock. Day 1 from Walhalla to Marysville was the biggest day at 260km and 6300m of climbing. We tossed back opinions on how long it would take us, with the estimates anywhere between 12 and 17 hours. It took us over 5 hours to get to Noojee (and nearly an hour for lunch there... a theme to be continued day 2). On the way we had scaled Baw Baw and the rolling terrain in between.

Our route from Walhalla had us dropping in chilly shade down the valley from Walhalla before climbing back up to Rawson. We were all apprehensive about the South Face Rd to Baw Baw. It was unsealed but we were all confident to be riding the road bikes on gravel. We just didn't really know what state it would be in. Brodie had reccied a short section and found it to be very rough so we were pleasantly surprised with the early sections of the road as it trended upwards in a series of rolling ramps. The forest here was truely beautiful, punctuated by Tolkien-esque creeks and waterfalls. Soon the bulk of Baw Baw was loitering in the background.

We were approaching the end of the gravel when Dan hit a dinner plate sized rock as he drifted through a corner, clipping it with his rear wheel. "That was lucky", I thought to myself as he rolled on. Two more corners and there was the sealed road again. Less than 50 metres shy of the black top, Dan's rear tyre went pop. He had sustained a nasty gash in the tyre and it was time to crack out the five dollar note and stuff it in the tyre until we could meet up with AB and change it for a spare.

Once on the black top, it was handbrake off time and everyone was in their own world of pain on Baw Baw's 21% slopes to the summit. A terrifying descent was punctuated by Dan's rear tyre going again and this time requiring the use of plan B, the gel wrapper (and no, I hadn't planned on skulling a gel before 10 o'clock in the morning!). With one more puncture to deal with along with the constant rollers and the Climb That Shall Not Be Mentioned (Vespers Hill), it was time for an early lunch at Noojee. Fortunately, we had all day (and night) and we had already knocked off 3 500m of climbing!

Hot & COLD

By now, it had warmed up and we were all shedding layers and running out of pockets to stuff gear. The climb out of Noojee was a highlight, even with full bellies. It was a lovely surface at a consistent and never hard gradient. It reminded me of Humevale. The reward for the climb was a super fast non-technical descent back to the valley floor. Daryn ran into us on the road to Warbie - he was one of the original crew who had had to pull out due to illness - and he had a spare tyre so we sorted out Dan's rear and ripped down the valley, over Little Joe and down to the Warbie bakery. This was a psychologically important stop for us. We had Donna Buang to knock off as an out and back straight out of Warbie but from there on it was a b-line to Marysville with little distraction. We dumped clothes into the car with AB and headed upwards.

The climb of Donna was straight forward enough. Brodie rolled on ahead but I engaged the diesel engine and set a tempo on the 17km climb to the top. My only concern was how cold I was feeling. I was zipping back up as we were climbing inside the last 3km. We had started the climb at 4pm and it was now well after 5pm and the temperature was dropping significantly already. I shivered all the way down and tried to find a patch of sun - somewhere, anywhere - to warm up while I waited for the others. What is it about descending Donna? I've lost count of the number of freezing descents I have experienced! We rode up the valley at a good tempo, all trying to get some warmth back into the core.

As we passed the Reefton hotel in MacMahons creek, Brodie asked if he minded if we stopped for a coke. Cracking idea! Soon 5 cokes and 5 bags of chips were sitting on the table. We had been on the road for 12 hours and were feeling a little weary and a salt and sugar hit were just what we needed. By the time he hit the base of Reefton (after the 4th puncture of the day), it was getting gloomy. Lights were flicked on and we all agreed to stay together on Reefton Spur and Lake Mountain to come.

It was getting cold though and we were all a little wary of Lake Mountain and the 20km descent. I had been up to Lake Mountain 4 or 5 times before and every time it had been freezing cold. We called AB and asked him to meet us on the road. As we crested Reefton, there was AB. He had not only bought clothes but take-out pizza. Legend! Hot pizza in the headlights was the order of the (now) night. It may not have been gourmet but right then it felt like the perfect meal!

Suitably refuelled, we headed to Lake Mountain, sliding up the second Climb That Shall Not Be Mentioned of the day. It was 10km from the gatehouse to Lake Mountain and it passed quickly. I was feeling fantastic. Nothing hurt and the legs were good. No sleepiness had set in and I was happy with the world. A full moon flirted in and out of the clouds as we turns tail at the summit and plunged down to Marysville and our bed for the night. I was briefly rolling with the crew but a wombat decided to dive out in front on me. At that point I was spooked and dropped off to a more conservative pace.

It was 11pm and day one was done. A beer and a little food and off to bed.

Backing it up

We had agreed a 7am departure, although I had wanted to get going at 6am. Remember that clocked we talked about? It had been ticking all night and we had until 6pm (actually 6.12pm and those 12 minutes would matter later on) to crash through 10 000m. A 7am departure gave us 11 hours for 190km and 3700m of climbing. It should be enough.

It didn't start well when we found one of the bikes with a flat tyre overnight and after a bit of faffing it was 7.40am before we were off. Fortunately, the first 50km were on easy rolling terrain and we were at Eildon in a little over an hour and a half. From Eildon it was 60 lumpy kilometres to Jamieson, taking in the infamous Mt Terrible. The route through to Jamieson is spectacular with the winding contours of Mt Terrible particularly spectacular, both up and down. We got a surprise visit from AB and took the opportunity to dump clothes and re-fuel. A stiff wind had developed overnight but it wasn't causing us any problems. We all rode our own tempo over Mt Terrible and rolled into Jamieson for lunch.

Spirits were high and nobody seem to be struggling. Dan had had a hard last few hours yesterday but he seemed to be coping well. I felt very comfortable. I had really enjoyed yesterday and, to be honest, had expected it to be alot harder. I'm not sure if it was the affect of longer more constant climbs ridden at a more conservative pace or just the adrenaline of the "event", but I felt far more at ease on a 260km, 6 300m day than I had on 3MAWs lesser distance and lesser metres a few weeks earlier.

Don't mention the wind

Or the third Climb That Shall Not Be Mentioned of the ride, come to think of it....

On a bike, the wind is either your friend or your enemy. There's no middle ground. No-one is apathetic about the wind on a bike. In a car, unless it is really howling, you don't teally notice.

We blasted out of Jamieson after an hour and a half lunch (tick, tick, tick) on rolling terrain heading north. Once we had cleared the rollers and the aforementioned Climb, we were flying along at 40km/h. Traffic was significantly heavier but we hardly even noticed - pretty much every driver was well behaved.

Then we turned towards Buller as we approached Mansfield. The wind was no longer our friend. In fact, it was now a nasty crosswind. You'd think a headwind would be the worst for a cyclist and, on your own, that's probably true. In a group you can work together against the invisible enemy but with a crosswind, there is no where to hide on a public road. It was a slog towards Buller. Our speed had gone from 40km/h to a little over 20km/h. The clock was still ticking. Tick. Tick. Tick. On the Bendigo 600, the number that obsessed me was kilometres. On day 2, it was time. with over 400km in the legs, it had suddenly become hard.

Just outside Merrijig, Joel took off at a furious pace. There was a pub in Merrijig and we had planned to re-enact the coke and chips strategy. Had Joel rang ahead and found out that they only had one coke left or did he just need to find a friendly toilet for a sit down? Of course, Joel being Joel, he had raced ahead to order and buy the rest of us the emergency supplies. By the time we rolled in, he had laid out the revival kit for us!

The only way is up

It was now 3.30pm. We had a little over 2.5 hours and 35km to go, most of it uphill. By my reckoning, we were likely to be a few hundred metres short and would need a few repeats in the remaining time we had.

After Merrijig, the amount of traffic drops and the road is substantially more interesting, rolling through the narrowing valley and constantly changing in gradient. Buller was now very evident on the skyline and the clouds were massing overhead.

We were through the gatehouse and on the climb. Fat drops of rain started to bounce off the warm tarmac and it was soon raining enough for us to stop and don gilets. I set a tempo on the front that was easy enough to keep everyone together but hard enough that we could keep ahead of that never stopping clock. It's been years since I've been to Buller and every time I wonder why it's been so long. It's a majestic climb, different to most other Victorian alpine climbs. It has European style switchbacks that wind up the mountain. The gradient is pretty consistent and not too taxing until the final kilometre or so when it kicks up.

We rode together up through the carpark and around Hell Corner until the steepening gradient spread us a little over the mountain. I crested into the village needing another 350m. We had 25 minutes including the reserve 12 mins! It would be enough. From there we all rolled up and down the vicious slopes to the Alberg and down to the carpark and back up, seeking out the most efficient elevation gain. Our legs were heavy and we were weary in all sorts of ways from the two days but we weren't going to give up now.

I cracked through the 10 000m on my third visit to the Arlberg, pulled into the bus shelter, stopped the GPS and saved the ride. I didn't leap in the air or find someone to hug. I didn't even cry. I just noticed how cold it was. Really, really cold. 4C plus a stinging windchill. I took a few photos and rolled down the hill. After a quick chat with AB it was off to our lodge for a beer in front of the fire as the rest of the crew rolled in.