Cyclosport Sportive Difficulty Ratings

Escher303

Anyone know how the difficulty ratings for sportives, on Cyclosport are calculated? Is it by votes? Or do the site owners come up with them by some sort of formula perhaps distance and ascent? I cycled the route of Le Terrier yesterday and wondered how it stacked up (it gets 5/10), the only other route I've done is the Tour of the Weald which gets 7/10 which is shorter and has less hills. Is there some 'politics' involved in what rating they get? A fight for mine's the hardest?

Buckled_Rims

The only ratings I've seen are on sportive websites like cyclosport, etc and they're made up from riders ratings. I take no notice of them as one hill could be easy to a local and hard to a visitoring rider, both giving vastly different scores.

A good point is on the Cyclone that has the Ryals in Northumberland. I've ridden up it many times (I'm fairly local) and think it's just a simple 2 part hill, yet many riders I've read on the web are terrified of it!

I suppose there is some politics involved on which is hardest, which is stupid because any sportive that uses Hard knott is the hardest ;-)

Edward H

Escher303
I saw that LE terrier had a 5 as well. Had a peep at the first section as I was driving past the other day. Must say, the HQ is pretty spectacular.
Did you ride through Roeburndale? What's it like - difficult? I think cyclosport ratings are nowhere near as I have had a call from a friend, he says cyclosport rated Le terrier as a 9, 2yrs ago and my friend rode it last year and he said it was pretty accurate.
If you do a search of postings on this forum, you will find all sorts of opinions. Probably better to use those!

Escher303

Buckled rims: you're dead right. What you know is always much less terrifying and easier to pace yourself on, must be based on readers opinions otherwise the Tour of the Weald gets the same rating as the Keswick sportive, I'm not sure there are two equivalents to twice up Honister in Kent! Not in the bit I used to live in anyway!

Edward H: yes I did go through Roeburndale, the road in is pretty steep, 20% max though, no worse than the rest of the route. Then the bit on the bridle way is next, the track is actually ok, it is tarmacced and mostly fine with a few gates to negotiate, though it is slender, two tracks with a grass bit in middle (actually it is fully tarmacced like a lane but grass has grown in the centre due to lack of traffic) so you wouldn't want to ride with many around you. Fortunately there were some motorbikes going through that way and they opened most of the gates for me. There was one bit that was 22% which was the steepest I'd registered the whole route, it wsn't long though. The worst bit was the field of cows with lots of calves. They weren't happy at me being there and nor was I to be honest! But they snorted a bit but left me alone. Theres still a couple of short and steep climbs after that so the route doesn't really let up all the way around. It is brilliant though, interesting country, amazingly quiet roads and hill after hill. I did the mid route yesterday but planning to do the full one on the day as Bowland Knotts is brilliant too and I measured 9300 feet of ascent. Give it a go I say!