RSS Feed

Tag Archives: Campaign For A Lane

Grow Your Jersey Collection One Ride at a Time – 2016

This is my fourth annual gallery of jerseys and T-shirts that were given out by event organisers.

You can look at previous year’s galleries here:

2013

2014

2015

The first event jersey for 2016 was collected in April at the BP MS150.  This is normally a  two-day 150mi / 241km charity ride from Houston to Austin.  In 2016 inclement weather forced the organisers to reduce the ride to one day.  I was a part of the team representing Hess Corporation, a company I worked for from 2006 to 2010.

I don’t have the 2016 Hess jersey.  I must have left it in Houston.  Here are my friends and I, in what is one of the better Hess jersey designs that we have worn over the years.

hess-bp-ms150-2016

The RHB Shimano Highway Ride LEKAS was at the end of April.  The unique thing about that event was that it was held at night, on a closed highway, under LED street lights.

lekas-2016

Next was the Perak Century Ride in May.  I didn’t know the significance of the bull that featured prominently on the event jersey was.  Reader Hanafiah Aris pointed out that it is not a bull, but a seladang, or gaur in English.  Hanafiah also reminded me that the Perak  state soccer team is nicknamed the Seladang.

perak-2016

I have a jersey from the Klang Premiere Century Ride that was held in July.  I didn’t ride in that event though.  I opted to do the two-day BCG Tour from Klang to Port Dickson and back, which happened on the same weekend, instead.

klang-premiere-2016

The next event jersey that I “earned” was from the Campaign For A Lane ride in Penang, at the end of August.  For the first time the organisers required participants to wear the event jersey during the ride.  If not riders would not get support at the water stops and at the finish.

cfal-2016

Participants got a finisher’s T-shirt as well.

cfal-t-shirt-2016

The Putrajaya Century Ride was held on the first weekend in September.  This was one of the more elegant jersey designs of the year.

putrajaya-2016

The last organised ride with swag was the Satun International Century at the end of November.  It was a rather subdued affair because Thailand was in mourning following the passing of King Bhumibol Adulyej.

satun-2016

There was a T-shirt for that event too.  The design was very much like the event jersey.

satun-t-shirt-2016

As I have done in previous years, I will offer these jerseys to anyone who wants one.  Better that they are worn regularly by others, rather than sitting at the back of my closet.

I wonder what event jerseys 2017 will bring.

Campaign For A Lane 2013

There were two organised rides scheduled in Penang on 8th September.

One was the first ever ride across the Penang Second Bridge, from Batu Kawan on the mainland to Penang island and back again.  This bridge is in the final stages of construction and is not yet open to traffic.  It will be the longest bridge in Southeast Asia.  The other was the 5th Campaign For A Lane (CFAL) ride around the island of Penang.

My Racun Cycling Gang buddies did the CFAL ride last year.  So we signed up for the bridge ride.  A bus was chartered and accommodation booked.  Only for the bridge ride to be postponed at the very last minute.

Hello CFAL!

CFAL Banner

Registration for the CFAL ride had long closed.  Not a problem.  We would be ghost riders.  The term for unofficial participants in an event.

The bus rolled to Penang on Saturday as planned.

Photo courtesy of Marco Lai

Photo courtesy of Marco Lai

Penang is touted by some as having the best street food in Malaysia.  So Saturday was spent cycling from one food venue to another.

Photo courtesy of Debrizio Wong

Photo courtesy of Debrizio Wong

The Campaign For A Lane has been a success in Penang.  These symbols,

Penang Bike Lane

and dedicated bike lanes, have popped up all around the city.

Photo courtesy of Christopher Chin

Photo courtesy of Christopher Chin

The first CFAL ride in 2009 drew 750 cyclists.  Registration for the 2013 edition was cut off at 3,000 cyclists.  A total no doubt exceeded thanks to us ghosts in the peloton.

The ride started promptly at 7.00am from the Esplanade Park.  The start line was at the Penang Town Hall.

CFAL Penang Town Hall

The clock-wise route circumnavigated the island.

CFAL Route

10 km into the ride we caught sight of the first Penang Bridge, opened in 1985.

CFAL Penang Bridge

Those clouds were a warning.  A further 10 km down the Lim Chong Eu Highway the clouds became ominous.

CFAL Tun Dr Lin Chong Eu Highway

We got rained on.  A lot and for most of the remainder of the ride.  The big plus for me was that the rain kept the day fairly cool.  I had no issues with hyperthermia on this ride.

Penang looks flat but there were two substantial lumps to get over.  The first was at the south end of the island where the route turned north through Kampung Tengah.  We went from sea level to about 140 meters / 460 feet.

The bigger lump was the approach to the Teluk Bahang Dam in the north-west corner of the island.  That climb topped out at about 225 meters / 740 feet.  The payoff was views like this.

Photo courtesy of Mark Lim

Photo courtesy of Mark Lim

The wet road meant that this descent had to be negotiated with care.  The turns were especially tight in places.

There were a few more short and sharp climbs to get over as the road made its way along the coast through Batu Feringgi and Tanjong Bungah at the northern tip of the island.  Then it was past the beachfront hotels and malls along Persiaran Gurney to the finish at the Esplanade Park.

CFAL Penang City Hall

We were starving ghosts by the end of 82 km ride.  Albeit for only as long as it took to get to a restaurant!

I wonder how many of us weighed more when we arrived back in Kuala Lumpur on Sunday evening than we did when we left KL on Saturday morning.