Sherpa duties: The Serpentine 13/04/2014)

I had met Gary Beazley once at the Domestique Mount Buller ride on the 22nd February 2014. At that stage he was preparing to do his first Everest on Mount Alexander. He not only finished it, but kept on riding, and knocked off well over 10,000 vertical. I kept in contact with him, and late one afternoon I got a message from him on Facebook saying “I’m Everesting the Serpentine now”. WTF! I was staggered that anyone would consider doing the Serpentine. I talked with the missus & begged for a leave pass to go & to ride a few laps with him after dinner.

https://app.strava.com/segments/817004

 

It was a nice night, and when I showed up Gary had John Van Seters riding with him. I asked how much he had left to do & he said 20 laps. I could see that he had it in the bag, but there was no way I wouldn’t miss the end of this, & and had to call home to get permission to stay out a bit later than what I originally planned. I asked Gary how he came to choose the Serpentine, and he said that he wanted the shortest ever Everest, and asked how many times he had climbed it before and laughed when he said once. The Serpentine is on a really narrow goat track of a road that zig zag’s through a quite back street. The descent is a shocker, which would have been the main reason most wouldn’t have considered it, but Gary managed to find a smooth line, and I was surprised at how easily he was doing it.

There was a family at one of the houses that were watching us the whole time, and must have thought that we were crazy.  They stayed up until after 10:00pm, watching the crazy people's go up & down their street, lots & lots of times. 



Yep, its a Goat track!

His pace was really consistent & only started to slow down a little on the last 5 laps. We finished close to 11:45pm. I suggested that he was going so well that he should go for the 10,000, and he said “I think 8,848 metres is good enough for me thank you very much!”. Gary played a victory song by NWA, which I found a novel way to finish off an Everest. I had a great night, and you get so much experience and appreciation for a climb doing so many repeats. I spent the night chatting with Gazza & JVS and was one of the more enjoyable rides that I’ve ever done.



Me & JVS

Here is a link to Gary’s Everest. After doing 100 repeats of the Serpentine, he definitely deserves mega Kudos for doing this one:

https://app.strava.com/activities/130038003

I didn’t get home till well after midnight, and was a tired boy at work the next day, but it was certainly worth it.

Gary's reward for Everesting the Serpentine J

Here is a link to my Strava Activity here:

https://app.strava.com/activities/129838060