Ryan and I were in KL over the weekend to ride at OCBC Cycle Malaysia, the second year this event has been held in Malaysia.
We brought along two foldies, a pink Moulton TSR and a white Tyrell fx, with super-comfy Rido saddles, kindly sponsored by onesport for our 48km Challenge ride. We also shot some video with our sponsored Looxcie HD cameras. I will share that in a later post.
We were joined by bloggers like @Sivasothi a.k.a. Otterman who blogs at Cycling in Singapore, Kevin a.k.a. @BrainOpera and other media friends like Shawn and Adrian.
We spent Saturday watching the races like the Men’s Open and Masters’ Criteriums, where the pros showed us how fast they can ride.
In the photo below is the lead dancer of a group that did a dance number just before the Men's Open Criterium.
Ryan muttered to me just before the pre-race dance began, "They'd better not be doing Gangnam Style…" and just as he finished that sentence, the overplayed music of Psy kicked in. It was like a pre-Criterium war dance of joy.
As for this next photo, I have no idea how it got into my camera. I think her role was to pass the prizes and the starting airhorn to the VIPs.
On Sunday morning, we woke up at 4am and met at 5.45am at our hotel lobby for the short ride to the starting point at KLCC.
Yes, FOUR. A. M.
That is the time I usually go to SLEEP but I was a good boy and slept early on Saturday night.
Kevin was there with his Pugsley and its giant tires (it drew a LOT of attention). That's Shawn Chung behind Kevin, who rides like the wind (he overtook us on his third lap while Ryan and I were at our second of four laps around KLCC).
Siva was there with more lights on his bike than a Christmas tree. He is a kindred spirit because I love lights too. Siva took a photo of me adjusting my timing chip on my Moulton.
When all of us were assembled, we rode to join the riders at KLCC and found ourselves in front of the second wave. I have no idea how we ended up there but Kevin has a photo of us poised to go.
I looked like i was high on cough mixture in that photo.
[Photo courtesy of Julian]
Ryan and I fell behind, to the back of the pack very quickly but we knew our own pace. We were to do four laps around Suria KLCC, a total of 48km.
Once we started riding, we realized how many slopes there were in the route. Good grief, some of these inclines went on forever. But once you reached the top, bombing downhill was fast and fun. We also got to see the potholed streets of KL, and it took some maneuvering to avoid them.
Kevin has a photo of the road marshal who bravely stood for an hour warning cyclists to slow down before a dangerous sinkhole.
There were some riders who overestimated themselves and pengsan-ed by the second lap. There were a few who buanged but no one was seriously hurt, I think. Some rode too fast over humps or huge cracks on the road, and blew their skinny racing tires out, requiring a tube change by the road.
What was amazing was that the organizers managed to close so many roads in the heart of KL for those few hours on Sunday morning. Although that did not stop one or two stubborn Malaysian cars and motorbikes from trying to break into the closed roads filled with us cyclists. They got a lot of "Oi!" and shouts of "Idiot!" from all of us.
While others were trying to beat their personal times, Ryan and I had but one goal: to finish our 48km Challenge in time for breakfast back at the hotel. You can tell we have our priorities straight. And in case you are wondering, we did make it in time for the buffet. It was a fun weekend indeed.
