Yes folks I did the white-river rafting at Kuala Kubu Baru (KKB) on Saturday, August 7th 2010!

Ok Folks, this is it. I'm posting something from the past. This ride was on sunny Sunday, May 23rd 2010. I just wanted to make clear that my recent state of hiatus has nothing to do with me hanging or selling my bike. My USPS TREK 5900 OCLV 110 is still intact, lying dormant, waiting to burn rubbers before the fasting month.

Well for the record , this has been the longest sabbatical ever to date. The thing is, It's not just the series of domestic problems but a combination of few things which I'm not particularly incline to divulge.

One thing for sure, to start riding back is so damn hard.

No one in this world are born to write a perfect condolence message. Of course, part of the reason is because things like this doesn’t happen most of the time. Unfortunately, we do have to face this problem once in a while.

Today, It is with the great sorrow that we learn the death of Abang Man and I struggled to find inspiration to write this condolence note. He left us his passion for cycling, his kindness, jokes, humility and above all a great friendship.

We extend our condolence to his family. May his soul rest in eternal peace and may Almighty give his family the strength to bear this irreplaceable loss.

Amen..

I has been 2 month since my last post. Have no fear my friends for I'll be back on the wheels! Only this time I'll be chubbier than before but still faster than MiTador!

Yatta!

Are you reading the same contents in our blog for the past 2 months??? Me too. This is because Faizol aka blogger/reporter/journalist was either unable to rode, on school holiday/vacation, domestic problem or unreachable when I tried to contact him.


Faizol aka blogger/reporter/journalist


How about others?? Yes. We ride as usual on weekend.
Even as we rode on weekend for the past 2 months, I was not updating our activities regularly since I'm not a good story teller/writer/reporter. Besides, I don't have any riding pictures to sharing with.


17/7/2010

Saturday's Sg Long route ride was a boring ride. Farizal and myself was the only members to shown. Abg ManTador just start pedaling while we already reached and waiting for him at RV point @ Kajang Perdana. Farizal and myself decided to continue riding without waiting for Abg Man and headed for usual roti canai at Tmn Sutera. We finished our roti canai before 9.30am and start pedaling back home. Wow... That was early. As for Abg Man... sorry for left you behind.

18/7/2010

I received sms from MieTador on 8.30pm Saturday night asking for Sunday's ride plan. Immediately I texed to all Cycling Addicts members. Route: Putrajaya-Cyberjaya-PICC is on. RV point at Petronas Ikram @ 8.15am.

When I reached at RV@Petronas before 8.15am, Farizal, Zam "Besar", Zam "Kecik", Abg Man, Wan & Ah Meng already waiting for me. Where is MieTador??? He's running late again... We decided to continue without him as the sun start rising. While we catching our breath below the flyover near Cyberjaya, MieTador called asking our current location. He was riding with Romzi and already reaching PICC tried to chasing us. We decided to met at Mamak Restaurant @ Presint Diplomatik. We continue pedaling to Presint Diplomatik via PICC and Persiaran Selatan/Timur. Abg Man was struggling while climbing "Bukit Malang" as the other members are waiting for him at the top of the hill. Just a little advise for Abg Man... start practising high cadence and avoid big gears. After regrouping we continue heading to our meeting point @ mamak restaurant as Mie and Romzi already waiting with empty stomach. Everybody's having a heavy refuel at Mamak except Ah Meng who just sipping Teh O Limau and some power stick. We continue cycling via Kg Abu Bakar Baginda and was split at Sg Ramal heading back home.


Zam "Kecik", Farizal, Zam "Besar", Wan
No.. we did'nt wait for "ganti tiub" services to come as we already have our spare tube ready in our saddlebag


Abg Man showing his sore feet to Ah Meng. The remedy... power stick & power pipe


p/s:
Another few weekend to go before Ramadhan/Bulan Puasa/Fasting Month

Life doesn’t have "undo move" or "do -over" button. When we get old, things get taken away from us. That's part of life. But you only learn about it when you start losing staff. You'll find out that life is about the will to fight for what you believe in or love, just like how Al Pacino had eloquently put it in the movie Any Given Sunday, life is a game of inches. The inches we need are every where around us, the cubic centimeters of chance that differentiate between truly living your life or just passing time. If we are going to have any life anymore it's because we are willing to fight for that inch.

The title sounded like Danzel Washington's Man on Fire (2004), one of many favourite movies of mine.  But this weekend ride was not about a body guard  who went out to hunt everyone involved in the kidnapping of his client's little girl. It's about Man"Tador" making a comeback after the Mantin-Ladu Interstate Ride. "The Man on Fire" is the most apt description there is to describe Bro Man's appearance that had everyone at Sungai Balak toll awed in amazement.

I almost forgot about the sunny Sunday ride on May 2nd. Anyway, better late than never.

Farizal proposed to do Putrajaya route on Sunday but due to poor response we had to settle for Sungai Long instead and that's why we love this route. Its a mystical bond, unexplainable, something that one cannot fathom except for the Addicts. This is our home field, our sacred arena. But then again, this is unequivocally the easiest route.

Salam Gang,

*UPDATED*

Below is the propose route for our coming Sunday Ride as requested by Suhaimi aka Mitador.

Propose date: 9/5/2010
Total distance: Approx 55km
Terrain: Lots of climbing especially around Sg Merab area.
Propose refuel stall: Presint Diplomatik/Kg Abu Bakar Baginda

Let's discuss this route at our chatter box.




For Saturday ride: Sg Long 1 1/2 Loop with 1/2 loop in reverse climbing of Big Mac

From left: Zaha, Farizal, Romzi, Faizol, Mitador(Suhaimi) Saipol, Ah Meng, Zam & Syamsul.
P/S: Too bad the camera timer was preset, otherwise I would have set it to 30 sec and see how many of us can hold our tummies breaths.  posers!

It's already 1st of May 2010. For all labours out there, happy labour's day!

Hard to tell how far the wheels would roll. So far we've added additional flavour on the weekend ride menu. A dash of variety wouldn't hurt would it? To much of Sungai Long route is not good for the fun factor either  but it all depends on individual  "domestic" schedules.

Prelude

There was no solid plan for Sunday.  There’s this seed idea on doing a ride to Mantin last week but generally most of us were a little hesitant due to few factors but the crazy hot weather was the mother of all reasons. The horrid time we had to go through during the ride to Pajam was still fresh on our minds.

I find this situation as very odd. At times during a ride, while under immense conditions (searing sun and headwinds), I felt like throwing my bike off a cliff or just ditch it on the road site. The LEKAS hell can bring the beast in you yet after the ride you yearn for more...One thing for sure, if you’re riding at 12 noon on LEKAS, you’d be running on adrenalin.

From left: Ah Meng, Sham, Zam (Besar), Farizal, Bro Man, Zaha and Faizol
Note: I seriously have any idea why this picture has a huge watermark on it...

The Prelude
Zaha texted me on Saturday that the gang wanted to do the Putrajaya route. An interesting choice indeed. Bro Man would have had something to do with this decision. All of us knew how much he loved this route.