Day 3 - the longest day

Today was scheduled to be our longest day - 162km. We agreed the night before to keep the speed to 25/26 km/h as this would be the furthest that many of us have ridden. This was quite difficult to stick to - we were bowling along at over 30km/h yesterday with the average ending up above 28 - high for us. But today would be 40k more than yesterday so we needed to pace ourselves. There wasn't much in the way of towns on the route so our first stop was in the middle of nowhere after 47km - Carl's dad found a bus shelter (it had been raining) and brought coffee which was awesome. I also changed into dry socks and put on my shoe covers which helped my mood hugely. We stopped for a photo at the Lakes Entrance sign and I felt a pain in my knee as we pushed off to go into the town for lunch. Two bread rolls, a coffee and a load of full-fat coke later, (sugar... caffeine... rocket fuel) we were off again. We split the remainder of the day into two 30k sections and for the first one I felt awesome, still strong and in a good mood. After the push off for the second 30k I felt some knee pain again and it didn't go away for the rest of the ride. We have a shorter day tomorrow and a later start so hopefully the extra time will help. Anyway, stats are here: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/123346328. Reading this back I realize it's a very self-centred view so hopefully the other teams members will post their points of view too. Paul