A total of 6 Coburg Club members headed up to Ararat last weekend for the
inaugural Mt William Grampians Classic held by Ararat Cycling Club.  The
race is 80km in length starting in Ararat and finishing at the summit of Mt
William via Halls Gap.  Ryan Bilszta, Wayne Gebert, Walter Leoni and myself
were in B grade whilst Tom "Spud" McDonough and Rich Matison were
representing Coburg in the Masters division.

B grade commenced just after A grade and a field of just over 30 rolled out
of Ararat with the first 2km being under-control.  Almost immediately once
the flag had dropped the pace lifted considerably and within the first 5km a
number of riders were having a go off the front of the peloton.  It was also
pretty clear very early that the Decked Out Coaching / Moroni Cycles boys
were not going to let anyone get very far off the front and with about 8 of
them in the field they had greater control of the race than anyone else.

After 30km of attacking riding Leoni (Coburg) tried again and this time
gained a significant lead, now it seemed that Decked Out Coaching had lost a
little interest in chasing or had finally become a little tired.  Once Leoni
had gone Bilszta (Coburg) decided he would try and jump across the gap to his
teammate.  Bilszta had just about bridged the gap but Leoni was riding very
strongly and Bilszta could not get across, however luckily by now
McNamara (Warrnambool) had also decided that it was time to get across and
had reached the Coburg rider and the two of them managed to bridge to Leoni.
One other rider in the peloton had also jumped across and by now there was a
4 man break working really well together on the undulating road heading into
Halls Gap.

With 10km to go before Halls Gap and the first substantial climb of the race
(Mt Victory Road/Silverband Falls) the Decked Out boys had decided that the
break had got too much of a gap which was stretching out close to 3 min.
The whole team was now on the front stringing out the bunch at close to
50km/h.  The gap was coming down quickly now.  The peloton hit the climb
(6km @ 5%) now only 40sec in arrears and the intensity did not stop.  The
peloton were now climbing at 25km/h with only about 15 riders remaining all
stretched out in single file.  Gebert, having quite comfortably ridden with
the peloton to Halls Gap now could not quite manage the pace once the road
started climbing and was dropped from the peloton almost immediately.

Two thirds up the climb the break had now disintegrated and it was at this
stage Logan (Coburg) could no longer sustain the pace and also popped off the
back.  Bilszta (Coburg) was now swept up by the peloton but managed to hang
on to the summit, however McNamara and Leoni were caught and then dropped
from the speeding peloton.  Next came a fast and technical descent back to
the Halls Gap/Dunkeld Road with then only 8km remaining to the base of the
tough 12km climb up Mt William to the finish.  On the descent Bilszta also
was dropped from the peloton.

On the long climb the rain had started to fall making the climb quite
slippery and a persistent cold head wind also greeted us as we climbed
higher out of the tree line.  Mt William is 9.7km long at about 6% to the
car park and then the final 1.8km climbs at a vicious average gradient of
12.4% with sections at the bottom reaching 16%.  Together with the wet road
climbing out of the saddle was made difficult due to lack of traction and in
the saddle even harder due to the slope of the road.

Two kilometres up Mt William, Logan caught a quickly flagging Leoni and then
for the next 8km to the carpark he clung to Logan's wheel wishing for the
top to appear.  Once reaching the carpark we had 1.8km remaining but it was
to take in the order of 10min.  By now Leoni had rested sufficiently and now
opened a slight gap on the steepest section of the climb.  Both Leoni and
Logan couldn't quite manage to catch Bilstza before the top.
 

From L-R - Wayne, Rich, Tom, Paul and Ryan before the race.

Results: (B grade)

1.  Jason Pastor 2:29.48
2.  Christian McDonald @0.10
3.  Brenton Slotegraaf @1.11
4.  Chris Steffanoni @2.34
5.  Luke Hanley @3.03
6.  Jack Alexander @4.01
7.  Pete Knight @4.36
8.  Brian McNamara @5.09
9.  Ryan Bilszta @5.58
10. Walter Leoni @8.41
11. Paul Logan @9.04
.....
.....
23. Wayne Gebert @33.46

Results: (Masters grade)

1.  Daniel Bellis 2.43.42
2.  Tom Crebbin @0.34
3.  Ian Blackie @1.14
4.  Tom McDonough @2.48
.....
.....
11. Richard Matison @15.06
 

For full results, see Cyclesport Victoria.