Monday, June 2, 2008

Broga Pondan?

Yeah rite.

On Saturday, early morning wake-up at 530am : my eyes just wouldnt let me have an extra few minutes of sleep. After dawn prayers - i had oats with low fat milk, 2 bananas and coffee for breakfast. Left the house around 640am with everything ready in the car.

I reached Pekan Bt 18 around 715am and there's no one around. Roll-out time was supposed to be around 730. Later, Shazly came and said that everybody was waiting at the bridge. I'm late..!!

The crowd was a mixture of seasoned riders, Ironmans, triathletes and newbies. The plan was to ride for about 70km max with an introduction to the earlier part of the evil Broga route. However, looking at the those coming with us, i had my doubts.

We started spinning at a casual pace and picked it up nearby the Langat Simpang Tiga. I think that was the last time we were in a group until the nasi lemak stall. I had never been to Tekala and i must say the surrounding was very scenic and and has its own character with plenty of lushes greenery and wonderful tropical forest fabric. The Semenyih dam gave a cooling feeling to your eyes with a majestic backdrop of the Titiwangsa mountain range. I was on an easy pace until Shazly pushed me to crank up the speed. He taught me how to spin at a bigger crank and to take advantage of the momentum while climbing the gradual terrain and i felt really good about it. Before this, i would always drop the gear whenever i see a slight elevation and prepare for a painful mash.

At Tekala, a beautiful reacreational park, I was really looking forward to the much touted best-in-the world nasi lemak but to our dismay, the stall had ran out of supply at 845am..!! This nasi lemak must be really good, i thought.

In search for carbo, we stopped at another stall and same story, no more nasi lemak!! Aper nih..? Sedap sangat ker?

So, the group had decided to head towards Semenyih town. On the way there, OP AJ cranked-up the speed and IM Shazly asked everyone to stick behind him. He pulled us quite fast and the meter breached 40km/h. After that i dare not look at my meter again. Traffic were heavy so i better make sure i stayed focus and avoid all the potholes. Safety first.

One by one dropped behind the pack. I maintained my cadence with the heaviest gear and stayed behind Azly of Malakoff to take advantage of the slipstream effect. It worked. I had good 12-15 mins following the train until a damn bloody crazy nuthead lorry came near me and almost hit me. It's too dangerous and i backed off. Potong stim betul.

Anyway, we reached Semenyih town and again, no nasi lemak..!! Aiyaaa...

From Semenyih town, the leading pack decided to go to Broga town and truth be told, by now the 70km plan was a history.

On the way to Broga town, yeah baby Broga town (i cant believe im saying this!!), there were lotsa road constuction work and the sun was shining on our backs. The heat was on. We passed Broga town and still no nasi lemak..!!

About 1km after Broga town, there was another massive road construction work. Massive. Except for Chief Kutu, Mervyn, Jason and AJ - the rest decided to dismount their bikes and walked on the heavily gravelled and uncompacted road. Some of the riders started to feel tired already and the thought of nasi lemak was not fun anymore. We walked almost 1km and could not see the end of the construction. At 51km (on the meter), the rest of us decided to turn back and rest at Broga town. We really need to refuel, badly. The construction strecth was a really turned off for an otherwise an enjoyable and challenging ride.

Refuelled at Broga town - only one nasi lemak pack left and yours truly was the first to grab it. Haha.. the rest went for roti telur, roti canai and nasi campur. I had a quarter of the Powerbar too. After a table full of 100-plus cans and 30 mins of rest, we rode back.

On the way back, the faster riders decided to go fast and left us behind. At Tekala, i waited for DBC and a few mins later joined by Chief Kutu, Mervyn and Jason. We rest for awhile and had iced coconut drink to refresh before the nasty Semenyih Dam hill climb.

We continued riding and got the bottom of the hill climb. As I was mashing and grinding the climb, my heart rate was touching 90%, suddenly i had double muscle twitch on both thighs 3/4 of the climb. I almost fell unclipped but managed to stabilise my stance. I had to drop and walk to the top. I downed the 100-plus drink and a Powergel. It worked.

The rest of the ride practically went without any incident.

We reached Pekan 18 at around 1330hrs and i clocked appox 4 hours of riding time, 101km, burning 7897 calories along the way. Handsome sum.

We took a dip in the cool Sg Congkak, a much needed after ride recovery theraphy.

For me, that's another 100 in the bag.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Well done bro.

.. u must try nasi lemak kat sg congkak (2km kot from bt 18) ... OUT OF ZIS WORLD!!!


Eraser