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Today was the longest day of the tour. 235kms from Margaret River to Mandurah. After an early start that again required getting up in what seemed like the dead of the night, we set off into another pleasantly cool morning.

Things were fairly uneventful for the first part of the ride until we encountered some seriously shoddy roads - think cyclocross-style gravel and loose dirt/dust, but minus the mud this time. This required some serious concentration to get through, and I think I nearly shouted myself hoarse with calls of “HOLE!”, as is the convention in the RFY peloton when one spots even an inkling of an indent in the road.

The ‘V8s’ were increased today to be ‘V10s’, and Brett and I did our fair share at the pointy end of the peloton. It was good to get out the midst of the bunch as it helped to break up the rather plain flat sections heading towards Bunbury. We had two school stops today (and goodness knows how many ‘pit-stops’) along the way. These were at MacKillop College in Busselton and Grace Christian School in Bunbury. The students at both schools were very well behaved and interested, asking us many questions. Brett did well under pressure when he spoke at the latter in Bunbury, although he may have been a bit glib.

Upon leaving Grace Christian, it was truly starting to warm up and even I was beginning to feel the sting in the sun. At the end of the day even I had something approaching a little sunburn. Luckily the wind wasn’t too bad for the most part, although I was a little worried as we crossed the Mandurah traffic bridge that some of our lighter riders might need some protection to avoid being blown away.

When we finally arrived in Mandurah I was pretty happy to get into the shower and eventually get some food in me. Sleep was also high on my list, however the nights essential fines proceedings took precendence. I was not fined for long socks for a change, however I can’t for the life of me remember what I was fined for. I’m fairly certain I was fined for something Brett did(?!). When all the fining was over and we had been thoroughly kicked out of the pool/bbq area by the hotel management, I made a quick exit - I was way over-tired and grumpy at that.

Stats for the day:
07:40:46 ride time
236.2kms (ave 30.76km/hr)
ave HR 130bpm (max 173bpm)
negligeble ascending.

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