Moor 2 Sea sportive

Austin316

Ouch. That was a tough one.

_andy

yeh that rain made it interesting.. I did the extreme route and found mile 80 to 90 very tough indeed..

Austin316

I think that was the climb out of Ashburton and over the Dart? That was nasty. And then the rain started hammering down!

jmillen

I was fortune in that I was back before the rain started (challenge route), so stood under the roof in the finish area waiting for others to finish when it really came down hard. Feel for anyone stuck out in that.

Good day though and really enjoyed the route, preferred it to last years.

reformedfatty

Challenge route completed here for my second sportive.. riding the cross bike was a total godsend for spinning up the hills and for the descents when the rain came down.

I was one of the bods in the rifles shirts. Was riding with an injured colleague so our time was appalling, however at least I have completed a sportive in the spirit it was intended ie relaxed pace, and stopped at a feed station.

2 particularly memorable moments, 1 was that a short but horrendous climb, not the 20% one, but shortly after that, and another was on the uppy downy stuff around the 42 mile marker those curving descents into corners and out the other side, max speed of 48mph during that

_andy

Austin316 wrote:

I think that was the climb out of Ashburton and over the Dart? That was nasty. And then the rain started hammering down!

Yup that was the one, I was feeling pretty good up till then despite riding most of it on my own and had managed to maintain a reasonable average but that next ten miles or so was really tough, then it started to rain heavy again when I hit the main road coming back at about 90 odd miles just north of the ymca place and I felt very cold and was shivering for a few miles (I had decided a coat wasn't necessary when I set out but thank goodness for that baselayer!!). Really nice course though and enjoyed the KOM climb section I managed to get inside the required time despite being flagged down by a dog walker half way up to ask me "is this a race or just a ride"!! lol and I enjoyed going down through Princetown and the road through the china clay quarries then down into Ivybridge that was a nice run despite heavy rain in that section.

The people at the feed stations were superb especially the Ashburton rescue people who were really friendly and a special thanks to all those marshal's standing out in the cold and rain looking after all the junctions, they were really good and very dedicated to do it all day and made those difficult junctions so much easier and safer. I even got a "well done" from the guy on the medic bike as he passed me at about 95 miles, a nice touch! Shame about the weather but cant be helped.. Overall a good day and was pleased with my time considering my lack of training this year but would I undertake the extreme route again? maybe if I was fitter but it certainly was tough.

Austin316

reformedfatty wrote:

Challenge route completed here for my second sportive.. riding the cross bike was a total godsend for spinning up the hills and for the descents when the rain came down.

Nice one! My 2nd sportive too. Cross bike would've been great in the conditions, especially the tyres. Have to say I was taking the descents in the rain quite gingerly, and back tyre spinning out in the wet on some of the steeper ascents too.

reformedfatty

Austin316 wrote:

Nice one! My 2nd sportive too. Cross bike would've been great in the conditions, especially the tyres. Have to say I was taking the descents in the rain quite gingerly, and back tyre spinning out in the wet on some of the steeper ascents too.

Egads I didn't ride it on knobblies that would have been too much.. albeit not for the ~13 year old lad I passed riding the challenge route on a FS mtb! chapeau