"Excuses don't get you up a hill." - Russell Noble (Psike)

I was totally hiding his name but realised, hey, what's the point? He's got twitter... the WHOLE world knows who he is. Anyway dropping the cloak and dagger conversation. I've got a major problem.

I need a whole lot of HTFU and positive thinking to get through the next two weeks (16 days, but, whose counting?) to make it to the Alpine Classics; actually start it and finish it. Normally for a little bit of motivation I would put my Britney Spears sound track and listen to Stronger (she sung that.. right?).

Today its going to take more than Britney to get me up those hills I'll be taking Lady GaGa though, thats for sure.

Motivation play is now in place, points to remember are.

• I've told everyone I will do it - Failure is not an option
• Its ONLY 200km
• I'll be doing the Murray to Moyne to raise funds for a medically based charity and this is good training

Shit that Russell said that actually makes sense...

• "It'll hurt and you're gonna love it." Russell Noble (Psike)

He's got a point, no matter how many times I say I'm gonna stop climbing mountains and work on the flat stuff, I keep climbing mountains, I do enjoy the pain of climbing, its not something I dislike.

We will be going past our hotel on the way back down Falls Creek as we head towards Tawonga Gap, so it is an opportunity to change anything that I'm not comfortable with and by then we'll have two climbs down with only two remaining (Tawonga Gap and Buffalo).

Goal setting is really important, but its even harder when the goal starts to scare you, what if I don't feel my best on the day, am I allowed to cry?

Russell did say that he was looking forward to a ride that wasn't going to be to fueled with testosterone, I'm happy about that and I owe it to Hannos, Psike, Cpical and Madgan to follow through. I pushed them into doing it, so to pull out now wouldn't be cool.

So I'm in, I'll cut all fat (as much as possible) in my diet for the next 9 days, I'll carb load in the final five days and taper in the final 5 days... this is going to be a sufferfest, but, we'll have some good times on the way.

I've been discussing with Champ all morning about my choices for this ride, he's said, don't do it. But I do sort of like doing things when he's told me not to, his reasons are...

• neck and shoulder aren't 100%
• its a REALLY long way

So in true Missy style, I'm going to ignore Champ and do what Russell has said to do, so to start with I'll be quitting with the negative jibber jabber and keeping it positive.

The First Cap

The idea came about when I decided that I wanted something to commemorate the 2011 Alpine Classics team that I had put together. I wanted something that was inexpensive that we could all afford and with the cost of good quality Lycra these days being on par with a good pair of Italian shoes I thought caps would be the go.

The designer is Susan from http://www.rocketfuel.net.au/, I gave her my ideas and she bought them to life

The cap has the name of our team on the side HackPRO Cycling Team and our sponsor, Clenbuterol and Spanish Beef, big thanks to Clenbuterol and the Spanish Beef Industry for keeping us going.

On the right hand side we have 2011, to commemorate the ride in 2011.

All the caps have each persons name underneath the brim, as you can see from this picture my name is Missy.

I look forward to introducing you to the members of the team as we have our first rides together, most people are going to stay anonymous and use different names, we are after all just a bunch of Professional Hack who like riding... some of them also like swimming and running.

The only person I have so far promised not to take the piss out of is Madgan, he promised to stop kicking my arse on Beach Road if I didn't take the piss out of him.

Champ, well, we discussed his name last night on the phone, he'd been telling me how he met Richie Porte in Launceston the other night and he said he wanted to be called Bear, after that dude with the TV show. He also mentioned that he once had a Care Bear called Champ, so instead of totally humiliating him with the name Care Bear, I had considered it, but I do value our friendship so I'll call him Champ.

I posted all the caps out yesterday at lunchtime, everyone should recieve them today and I look forward to hearing some feedback.... Oooooo red caps!