The Finish Line: Stage 7
Seven stages, 93 survivors from an original 108, and one 18-second margin I didn’t even know I was racing for until after I’d crossed the line.
I’ve reached the final stage of the MyWhoosh Championship 2026, and I’m not sure how to feel about it.
On one hand, elated that I managed to complete all seven stages. On the other hand, a little sad that the energy, the buzz, and, dare I say it, the excitement, are all over. For now, anyway.
But before I get all teary-eyed, I just want to say a big thanks to Matt Payne and Emma Martin for their live broadcasts and daily podcasts with Hayley Simmonds. I’d estimate Matt and Emma have been spending at least 10 hours a day, maybe more, prepping, writing, testing, organising guests, streaming, editing and breaking down every stage. And that’s before you account for Hayley competing and co-hosting the podcast as well. Well done to all of you ❤️.
If you haven’t subscribed to their YouTube channel or podcast, I have included the necessary details at the end of this post. Do yourself a favour: subscribe and tell them I sent you 😉.
The battle nobody else knew about
Of the 108 Cat 6 men who lined up for Stage 1, fifteen had pulled out by Stage 7, leaving 93 of us still standing. And of those 93, there was one rider I’d developed a “competition” with. Completely unintentional, entirely good-spirited, but a competition all the same. He knew about it, too.
Not Simon Llewellyn, who’d passed me convincingly on the leaderboard back in the middle stages. It was Bjorn, and we were fighting it out for 83rd in Category 6. Read that again if you need to. He came into Stage 7 sitting 2 minutes and 16 seconds ahead of me on GC. As Bjorn himself put it in the comments after an earlier stage, “coming in at 83rd or 84th overall shouldn’t feel important, but strangely enough, it does”. And he was right. The nerves were real. The strategy was real. How was I going to find over two minutes if we ended up in the same group? At what point would forcing a breakaway even make sense, late in the race, with the Bahrain Hills waiting to punish anyone who tried?
The race
I’d hoped the start of Stage 7 would be a more refined, orderly procession. Not on your life. The front went, and went hard. A minute in, I was dropped, no longer a surprise at this point. I clawed into the grupetto with familiar faces, Tim Sharp, Jan Gradys, Oscar H, but no Bjorn. Had he held the front group? Missed it entirely? Was he behind us?
Turned out he was behind, in the next group back, and our grupetto was opening a gap on him. When I say “gap,” don’t picture me sitting in, enjoying the view. I was suffering. Even this grupetto had teeth, and after 25 minutes of hanging on, I was dropped a second time. Nothing for it but to slide back toward Bjorn’s group, minutes behind by then. My grip on 83rd was slipping fast. That’s when fellow Aussie Steven Stolk and Sacha Ott came past, and I hooked onto their wheel, steadied the effort, and got back to something manageable. 83rd was back on the table, baby!
We picked up more shelled Cat 6 riders along the way: Tomi Lepisto, Oscar H again, Thor Kristian Skotte, and Tim Sharp, whom we caught napping on the way through. My lead over Bjorn ballooned back out to minutes, and I knew that if I could just hold this group through the Bahrain Hills, 83rd was mine MUAHAHAHA. The alternative, getting dropped with 10-15 km left and trying to solo it home with Bjorn’s group bearing down, wasn’t a situation I wanted any part of. Every time a higher category rolled through, someone in our group would attempt a breakaway off the temporary draft boost, and I’d curse them under my breath for making me work harder to stay attached. Fortunately, we, and by we I mean me, survived every one of those disruptions.
The sprint finish
Inside the last 10km, six of us were together, and you’d better believe that meant a sprint finish. I started bargaining with my legs about what they had left. The response wasn’t encouraging. 83rd was still on the line, and so was first from our sprint finish.
With just under 1.5km to go, a Cat 5 rider came through and disrupted the whole group. Oscar dug in to grab the wheel, which meant I had to dig in too, and so did everyone else. I wondered if this was the moment I got dropped. Punch, punch, punch again.
Inside the final 500m, the road bent right, straightened, and there it was: the finish, under 300m away. Now or never, legs be damned. I got into the drops and put out whatever was left in the tank, which by that point amounted to roughly two shakes of f*ck all, and drove for the line. I was so cooked I didn’t even register crossing it, still sprinting past the banner in confusion until the results appeared and I realised it was over.
Did I win our group’s sprint finish? No. Tomi and Tim beat me to it by less than a second. I did beat everyone else in our group, so some honour was salvaged.
Did I take 83rd overall from Bjorn? Yes, although it’s a subdued yes. A 2:16 deficit turned into a 12:02 lead by the finish. It was only after writing this post and checking the numbers that I realised I’d been just 18 seconds from claiming 82nd off Jan Gradys the entire time. That aside, there’s nothing quite like the fear and exhilaration of head-to-head racing in the closing kilometres, which is what I was quietly hoping for, but a good 83rd win is still a good 83rd win. Thanks again, Bjorn.
Who likes a good stat?
Beyond the obvious total distance (436km) and elevation (5,463m) numbers, a few things stood out across the seven stages:
I dropped to 84.2kg by around Stage 4, down from 88.5kg at the start of Stage 1, and I was losing roughly 2kg each race. When I woke up this morning, I’m down three and a half overall.
Total time on the bike across all seven stages, warm-ups excluded, was 16 hours, 59 minutes, and 33 seconds.
Of the 46 riders registered as Category 6 Masters (the old guys), only 38 finished. I placed 34th.
I burnt 11,393 kJ across the series, roughly the equivalent of 5.5 large Big Macs or 30 cans of Coke in calories.
And the latest I finished any stage was Stage 5, at 1:02 am Melbourne time. It took me 3 hours and 42 minutes. I didn’t get to bed until 5 am later that morning.
What I learned, and whether I’d recommend it
MyWhoosh is no joke. But I never thought it was; having completed all seven stages across a genuine range of routes, I can honestly say I was woefully underprepared for the mental effort and physical endurance this demanded.
Drafting on MyWhoosh, initially so different, is something I’m growing accustomed to, and it’s started to feel closer to real-world riding than I expected. I’ve also learnt that the 2026 Championship probably wasn’t the gentlest event to kick off a MyWhoosh campaign with.
And I’ve learned that the MyWhoosh community is every bit as vibrant, understanding, and welcoming as any I’ve found on any platform, which made this whole experience far more memorable than the results alone would have you believe.
As for recommending this to others, that’s a more nuanced call.
If the goal is simply to push through and complete all seven stages, forgetting about the racing entirely, then yes. Absolutely. Just be prepared to endure what is, in my opinion, one of the most brutal virtual cycling series currently out there, where just finishing is the reward.
If the expectation is to actually race it, to be a legitimate front-group contender just within Category 6, you’ll need to comfortably hold 3.5 watts per kilo for an hour or more, with plenty above that on the bumps, pinches, and climbs.
Would I do this again? I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t already considering it, but only after the nightmares have stopped.
Now, what’s the SRC route this week?
Inside The Race (Website): www.insidetherace.com
Inside The Race (YouTube): www.youtube.com/@mywhooshracing
Inside The Race (Instagram): www.instagram.com/mywhooshracing
Hayley Simmonds (Instagram): www.instagram.com/hayleyrsimmonds
Emma Martin (Instagram): www.instagram.com/biking_emma
Matt Payne (Instagram): www.instagram.com/mattfixerpayne