Wellington - Auckland

Stage 3 Masterton - Pahiatua



A slightly overcast day greeted us at the start line. Rob joined an early break so I sat in for a while, joining any attempts to bridge across. A sudden attempt from Tour leader Tom Francis to bring the break back broke a group of us free from the peloton. We caught Rob and the rest of his group and the pace eased. There were a few additional attacks and I joined one just after the mid stage sprint but it was soon shut down. There were a few undulations which split up the group with a final climb before a steep descent into a tight right hander to the finish line. I struggled to get through the climb, avoiding riders who were coming back at the speed that we were going up. I eased slightly on the descent as it was still wet from a passing shower. I finished just off the back of the front group which was just enough to get me a time split which was a shame.






Stage 4 Pahiatua - Palmerston North


After lunch and some further showers we started the course to Palmerston North. As we have mass starts with all riders combined I find this part quite stressful as a large number of riders who have no realistic chance of being near the front all try to move up during the neutral zone and just become obsticals as soon as the race starts. With my less than perfect eyesight this is a real concentration effort on my part. I took every opportunity to move up and was near the front when we started the hill. I wasn't really feeling that flash having used too much energy in the previous stage. So at the start of the climb I was struggling just off the back of the group. The pace slowed slightly as the gradient increased and I started to feel better and soon caught up and was with the main leaders going over the top of the hill. Tom and 2 others had escaped down the other side and as I had no idea what the roads were like I eased just slightly off the back of the group descending to give me a better opportinity to see where we were going. Rob had done the same thing and was just ahead of me coming into a tight left hand corner Rob struggled to reduce his speed and crossed over into the incoming lane and on the edge of the road. I started to scrub as much speed as possible to avoid any chance of runnng into him as he crossed back over into a tight right hander and ended up running into a road sign. He had lost a lot of speed by this point so the impact didnt seem that bad and I carried on to try and rejoin the group we had been with. As the road straightened I could see them just up ahead but faced with a strong headwind I struggled to catch them. With about 10km to go it was a bit of a time trial time for me. A group containing Rob joined me at about the 5km mark but they were not working very well so Rob and I carried on to try and catch up. We ended up losing about 2 minutes and so slipped down the GC rating.






Stage 5 Palmerston North - Hunterville


It was a cold and windy start to stage 5 which suited me fine - well the cold anyway. The usual story of being too far back and on the inside (which although safe is not that useful when the pressure goes on) continued to plague me. An organised attack from 2 teams right from the gun. I eventually managed to get out and took off in pursuit. The whole group was spread out in a single line with gaps forming everywhere and people just pinging off the back. I blew down the side to get past and was steaming along at 52kph with out making any significant inroads. Rob had been further up at the start and I could see that he was still with the group. I found myself with a small group of chasers although most of them seemed to have no idea how to work in a cross wind and refused to be told. For a long time it was just two of us trying to bring the break back which were still in view. A small incident at a round-a-bout didnt really help but it was going to be a losing battle with this group. As the ground got slightly more undulating there was less and less help and found myself riding at the front on my own. Eventually I rode away from the group and off on my own. I caught a couple of other riders and continued to ride at the front to the end where they all sprinted me for 20th or some other ridiculously useless placing. I had lost buckets of time - in fact I havent checked what it was as I would be well out of the running for anything. Still with Rob staying in to the end It could end up being useful for him.






Stage6 - Hunterville - Wanganui


It was pretty hot by now. There were a number of serious road works at the start of the stage so the race was neutralised for 15km. I tried to move up closer to the front for when we were finally racing. When we did start it was a mad dash around some undulating tight narrow roads. I found myself just off the front group but with a small group of chasers we managed to pull them back and caught them before the main climb of the day. I rode from the back of the group through the other riders to join the main leaders on the climb. Rob was hanging just on the back of them so I moved forward to enable me to fall back and help him if required. There was a bit of a cross wind in the run in to Wanganui and I just stayed out of the way and out of trouble. We turned off the highway and down a narrow descent to the finish line. There were some tight corners and it was on one very tight left hander that I saw Rob run wide again. I slowed and saw him run off the road and into a fence. I stopped and along with one of the motorbike support riders picked him up and found his glasses. I paced him back to the finish line and sat him down. He was convinced that he had injured his collar bone so we got an ambulance and he went to hospital. The diagnosis was broken collar bone, cracked ribs and a punctured lung - not a good combination and he will be in hospital for 2 - 3 days. Eileen is going to pull out which is a shame given that she is in the lead by about 12 minutes. So the Nelson Alarms team is unlikely to get a very high placing - but Robs injuries could have been worse!