The Panther turned 18 and 46 riders helped her celebrate!
Pimmie was there too, still riding sub-hour; not bad for the old fart he reckons he is. Anyway we thought it fitting that the man who started it all was able to present 'The Lady' to Craig Cooke who again blasted around the course in record time: so close now to going below 40min; he averaged 30km/h and was so very focussed!

Today we traded the traditional biting cold of Leschenaultia early-mornings for a bit of rain that providentially began about the time of the first starter and stopped to let the sun through about the time of the last-but-one finisher - great to see so many muddy faces; it's a long time since that's happened and it was, apparently, a bit slippery out on the course. So: not as many PBs as we anticipated despite the recent track grading. Of course a large number of first time riders also put a limit of the number of PBs possible.

The man who put a lot of time into making today happen -Troy Coulthard - had the mud drying on him when he crossed the finish line for the last time - not on his own four-lapper but with young Campbell who had been out with Troy and Dave and Carolyn Equid adding extra marker arrows at 8am. Campbell started his maiden one-lapper with Troy soon after Troy had finished his own ride; Dave set out soon after to remove the supplementary trail markers; Carolyn had looked after registrations with Karen Pimm before standing under an umbrella and calling numbers for the timekeeper happily ensconced under the shelter of a tent! Lorraine did duty as the starter once again. Thanks everyone for being part of a great event.

Oh - and Annie Bramley celebrated her FIFTIETH ride with ATTA.