Tuesday, September 8, 2009

The 49th Grafton to Inverell & a 49th birthday party

Four more sleeps and I will be lining up for my first A event of the year. How exciting is that? And how scary is that as it will be for one of the toughest races in Australia...

The preparation has been an experience in itself. I chose not to do the 10,000 miles that most people would do and concentrated on a more disciplined approach than previous racing seasons. If it is going to work, who knows? I certainly don't!

This weekend marked the end of week eleven, which, based on Friel's bible, I called Peak. I found hard to plan that week as it is so close to the event and overdoing could put me in a fatigued state and not doing enough could lead to a drop in form as well just before the event.

Anyway, having to work and also helping Sandra with another event on the weekend only gave me the chance of a short spin on the rollers - 1 hour. Hey, better than nothing and would not make me tired, that's for sure.

Week 11: 278.5 km/10h30min

Monday was rest day and today I will go out for a couple of hours. I will just cruise to Sandgate and back. I will take a bit of time to look for anything that needs to be done to the bike and will try out my "new bib" before Saturday!!



The Party

There is the 49th Grafton to Inverell this year but before that, there was my 49th birthday party. Not trying to compare the two, just having thoughts of the two numbers having some kind of esoteric significance... I might need some esoteric forces next Saturday.

For the party, Sandra invited a few friends over for an informal dinner on Sunday. We discussed all the options for a healthy and interesting meal (with lots of carbs) and decided to cook the Brazilian national dish and hope that our friends would like it.

Lots of shopping, lots of preparation but by 7 pm we were serving a vegetarian Feijoada, a dish that the Brazilians would have for lunch on Sundays, with a few beers and Caipirinhas. We left the Caipirinhas out, you don't drink them in the evening if you have to go to work the next morning. But we had a taste of Cachaca, just to add a little spice to the Brazilian evening.

A big thank you to Sandra for organising it all and to everyone who came, we really enjoyed your company! Here we have some photos of the evening:



Petrina and Scott


Peter and Sandra


Guil, Natalie, James, Narelle, Greg and Peter


Mark


Maria, Brian and Debbs


Donna and Debbs


Dean, Janine and Richard


Adam, Sue Ann and Daniel


Beautiful gifts, thank you!


Very happy hosts

Ate mais!!!
PS. Could have more photos but the official photographer was too busy savouring the Feijoada.

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