Burn, Burn, Burnt!

I was looking forward to getting away from the stress of school and what better way to start the recess week with a 180km ride through eastern Johor. Like the numerous trips I have done to Sungei Rengit via JB and Desaru, I expected to be home mid-afternoon. With two other pretty seasoned riders on this ride, what could possibly go wrong?

We met up at 4.30am but it was past 5am when we set off. Getting across the border by 5.30am, we set off for Kota Tinggi in the semi-darkness. We pulled into town at a pretty good pace, more than ready for breakfast, but not before Matthew's front tire ran a flat - nothing too surprising.

Kah Kiong preferred prata hence we visited my "favourite" coffee-shop, "favourite" defined as my most frequented prata haunt in the area, given my very limited knowledge. We spent a pretty long time there chilling and getting our feet to continue our journey proved difficult.

The sun was midway up as we pushed on to Bandar Penawar. The rolling hills appeared more daunting as our fatigue increased and I willed myself to push on, employing the most efficient climbing techniques in my arsenal to get the most out of my mountain bike.

This time round, I had pumped up the pressure of my rear RP2 to 200psi and left the rear link active (lock-out off). It was also my first long ride overseas with a fully active rear suspension and I was pretty apprehensive of the energy I would waste through pedal bob. Interestingly, at certain smooth cadences, pedal feedback was a minimum and from the ache in my butt, the bike was definitely feeling more like a hard-tail. However, beyond a certain cadence, the bike tended to bob more at high speed. I couldn't feel the power transmission from my legs to the drivetrain - something so typical in full suspension models.

In short, without the presence of a lock-out, the energy forfeited through pedal feedback still proved the biggest limitation to using a full suspension mountain bike for long road rides.

The sight of the all-too-familiar Petronas at Bandar Penawar was a welcome relief and we took the opportunity to inject ourselves with the fuel for cyclists - isotonic drinks. There were a few cyclists from Singapore and we had a friendly chat, especially with one of them who was acting as a safety vehicle for his convoy. We would run into him at the Desaru roundabout later. We decided to take the longer but more scenic and flatter route to Sungei Rengit via Batu Layar. it was a great route with few vehicles but this time round, the headwind was incredibly strong. Coupled with the intense heat from the afternoon sun, I think our pedalling efficiency decreased terribly.

The going got real tough after our scenic detour into the Batu Layar beach and village. Back on the main road, our progress was severely hampered by headwind and we were down to about 15km/h. I also lost sight of Kah Kiong and Matthew on my tail as they made several stops. It was past 1pm and I was feeling terribly hungry and weak. My fingers were trembling.

We finally reached Sungei Rengit at 2pm and lunch was the only thing I needed to keep me alive. We spent almost an hour at the restaurant - any food tastes great when you are on the brink of losing it - before heading for the jetty at a decent pace. In fact, we reached Tanjung Pengelih before 4pm but were told there were no more boats to Changi. Amazing. We were told to book a boat (RM110) or take the ferry (RM35 per pax one way excluding the cost of shipping the bikes). A group of Singaporeans had booked a boat but there wasn't sufficient space for us. Eventually, a boat "happened" to deposit passengers at Tanjung Pengelih and was returning home. We hopped on. The bumboat operator tried to get more from us but we couldn't pay him more than the exact cost (with all our S$ pooled together!). I wonder if it's a ploy the operators use to get their passengers to cough out more cash.

Back on familiar ground, we had a snack at the Changi Village hawker centre before heading home. Dusk fell swiftly and the batteries in my front lamp failed on me. We reached home much later than I had expected; nonetheless, it was another great ride to the countryside very much absent in the Singaporean landscape.

Total distance: 185km
Expenditure: RM47; S$13
Participants: LSH, Matthew, Kah Kiong