Strade Bianche

After not having ridden in the hills the last couple of weeks, on Saturday I decided I couldn't handle what would be a slow time for me up the 1 in 20 (extremely popular ride on Mt Dandenong with over 33,000 times posted on Strava) so turned left instead onto the Basin-Olinda rd.

As the Basin-Olinda rd is gravel for 5.5km of the 6km, I have avoided it all these years like many other local cyclists. But I'd seen some positive comments about the climb and surface being fine on road tyres recently so was intrigued. It was still wet and a little slippery especially in the lower half from the rain earlier last week but was fine on 23mm tyres. Wonderful little climb and extremely enjoyable to ride another local climb I hadn't been on before. Loved it that much I had to ride it again Monday.

Keen now to search out other gravel roads!

Continued across to Montrose and back over the hill to Olinda and down the 1 in 20 to home...