Dartmoor Classic

jamlala

Just signed up to do the 100 miler in the above. Thus far my longest 'event' is the London to Brighton, but I want to do this cos a) Dartmoor and South Devon are lovely, and b) it gives me something to aim at.

1) Am I mad?
2) Can I do it on my hybrid bike (time isn't REALLY important as I'm not racing)?
3) IS it a good event (for those that have done it!)?

Ta

GeorgeBurgess

Hi JamLala!

I haven't ridden the event myself but for want of another reply I thought I'd reply!

a)Yes you are mad.. we are all! It rocks!
b) yeah you can do it on a hybrid... jst makesure you have nice low gears, thin tyres and pump them up well!
c) by all accounts it looks like a great event. The best part has to be the number of photographers.... more photographers than signposts i reckon!! And we are all uber cool! Esp the one with the wooly hat!

usual tips apply though. Start early. Dont hammer it over the first few hours not matter how good you feel. Eat and drink plenty, even if you dont feel hugry.

perhaps do a few rides with 6000ft of climbing in them before hand. 11,000ft on the day will be a fair bit!

Anyway, I hope that ramble helps! If all else fails, if you collapse into a sweaty mess I will give you a lift to the finish!

George

felgen

Sorry, I didn't get round to replying until just now.

I have done it this year, and it was a great sportive I realy enjoyed it and I will definitely be doing it again. Marshalling was excellent, every junction was marshalled - the weather held mostly, but Dartmoor can be a miserable place when its raining. The scenery is lovely though, and I wanted to do it for just this reason, having lived on the edge of Dartmoor for a year.

There's lots of climbing on the course, so be prepared to grind up some of the hills in a pretty low gear. I was thanking the lord for having a compact on my road bike for the event, but I hadn't trained that much, so wouldn't struggle as much at the moment.

Don't be a numpty and forget one of your water bottles like I did. I got dehydrated and cramped horribly coming up on to the moor for the second time - I drank 3 litres of fluid at the second visit to the feed station, and the suffered for about 30 minutes more before I came good and then hammered it to the finish.

Do some preparation. I havent done the London to Brighton, but its pretty much like doing the London to Brighton twice in terms of climbing/distance. Can you manage that? I woudl think you need to be able to ride 70miles comofortably to manage ok. I am sure if you search on here people have said you need to build up to 80% of the distance in the run up to the event.

Your bike sounds fine - there were people doing it on MTB's this year - as George Burgess says.... slick correctly inflated tyres will go a long way to making your day more pleasant.

Oh and I got a gold, medal came in the post yesterday