It was by chance I met OM at Treknology that fateful day. I was introduced to him as he was chewing his Powerbar and buying some more at the same time. "Join us!" I said I would and before we parted company he reminded me to check with the website www.teamabsolut.net.

"I have someone to ride with now" I thought to myself.

I have been riding a bike for many years now. In fact, I started cycling when I actively competed in triathlons in the late 80’s up till early 90’s. Spidey was probably still in primary school. Triathlon consisted of swimming, cycling and running. I concentrated mainly on swimming and running thinking that cycling was the easiest. During the races, I suffered on the bike leg. To cut my story short, I injured my shoulders from excessive swimming and had to stop. That was 1995.

From 1995 to that fateful day which I met OM, I managed to exercise on an aerobic level to keep my fitness intact and body shape from changing too much.

Back to that fateful day. "How difficult can it be riding with a bunch of other guys"

"I don’t think they are that serious for they are not like the Geylang or Schroders Team at all." "I’ll have some fun with them"

It was TTT which I made my debut. OM directed me to his place and I met the group. I was introduced to some of the members then and had a hard time remembering the nicknames and actual names.

DOC- I knew him before he was a doc. I went to bible study class together with his sister at his home.

ELVIS-I could remember his Shimano DA jersey. Why was he known as Elvis? Could he sing or ride?

GOOSE and SPIDEY-Tri geeks. Perhaps I could bond with them because we had something in common. Kennedy had the Quintana Roo then and he told me his crown jewels hurt because of the extreme angle and he was looking for a new bike. Winston just smiled.

PIANOMAN-He drove that huge van and I could see why he was so called the pianoman.

OM-Very obliging guy who kept telling me that he was the oldest among the group. I wasn’t too sure as I was told he was the age as me. He was the most dedicated guy to the team as far as I could see then.

BEEF-I thought who was this tough guy with the tattoo and beard. Better not get in his way or I would be in trouble. But I liked his 5900 and was willing to strike up a conversation on it.

LARDO-Controversial guy I thought. IT guy. It was then the dot.com thing was rosy and he could have been one of them eccentric millionaires.

SANDMAN, MAX, FREEDOM -He looked very familiar to me. Could have seen him somewhere before. I liked his USPS stuff that he collected. His nicknames confused me. I still don’t know his real call sign. Actually, I thought he was a DJ whom I knew when designing discos.

KEITH-This guy sure knows his stuff. He seemed to have the coolest stuff from his Subaru to his Giro helmet. Very nice and soft spoken.

We starting riding.

Going up the gap was easy at the foot and as it got steeper, I started to get into trouble. Luckily, I was able to slowly make it up the hill with OM waiting for me. Suddenly I realised that I am no match for the others. We regrouped just after the junction of West Coast Road and Clementi Road and we headed toward the Pandan Loop. I can’t remember who started the break and everyone followed. I followed and before I knew it , my heart was pounding so hard that I couldn’t even breathe. I tried to draft behind somebody and still was dropped. Very demoralised, I told Pianoman to let the others know that I would not be joining them for the second round of Pandan Loop.

I slowly cycled back to OM’s place.

"What happened?" "There are heavier people there and I can’t keep up" "Why" "Should I cycle with them again?" I had to re-evaluate.

After that debut, I rode another dozen times with the TA’s. I would have loved to ride more but my job required me to travel.

July came and the TdF was won by Lance Armstrong. I was still struggling. I decided to turn to Chris Carmichael. If he can train Lance to win the Tour, I am sure I can be trained to keep up with the boys.

In August this year, I started training on the 7 week programme for intermediate cyclist. It was one to increase my endurance level. I had to ride tempos, recoveries, fast pedals 6 day a week for 7 weeks.

There were days that my training programme would be interrupted by travelling and I had to ride tempo on a cycling machine in a gym.

I tested my new found fitness on certain rides and I found some improvement in my endurance. As long as I don’t follow the breakaways I will be OK. As far as I am concerned, I ‘ll continue to improve when I move into the next phase of power intervals and stomps which would be able for me to simulate the fast rides we are doing. I noticed as I improved, the entire improved. Our riding speed is faster and longer.

Riding with the TA’s changed my life. It has given me the opportunity to learn cycling in a very different way from what I used to know. And I always have the motley crew to call upon when I need help or info. It is reassuring.

Today, I still have the problem of keeping up. Perhaps it will not be as difficult as time goes by. But the important thing is that I can always count on one of my team members waiting up for me to pace me back into the speeding pack. I am grateful for that.

TA’s Forever.