Etape Loch Ness 2015

fat_cat

Now open for priority booking. Received an email this morning.

Anyone else in?

qube

I'm in.

skyeflyguy

Yep doing it again this year.

bobmcstuff

I'm in - Not done it before but looks reasonably straightforwards-ish, that one big hill looks hard so should be good training for the 3 Pistes the month after

Excited about closed roads. Not sure what bike I'll use as will be riding with a fairly slow group.

thegreatdivide

I’ve decided to do it again this year. It’s a good route – very rolling with a satisfyingly steep climb at Ft Augustus. The first part of it is a beast and it caught a lot of folk out. I’ve still got visions of the guy up ahead of me putting his foot down then trying to remount and carry on. Everyone around him was shouting ‘don’t remount!’ but he did and promptly fell down a ditch. If you stop on that first section it’s a sorry walk to the next flattish bit.

a4ndyp

I'm in this year rode that hill out of Fort Augustus on an 18kg mountain bike in April... looking forward to doing it properly this time

Is anyone staying in Inverness the night before? Ive booked in to the Glen Mhor hotel

bobmcstuff

I'll probably be driving up from Aberdeen I expect, although that might change closer to the time... think there's 4 or 5 people I know doing it, including my boss and his wife!

thegreatdivide wrote:

I’ve decided to do it again this year. It’s a good route – very rolling with a satisfyingly steep climb at Ft Augustus. The first part of it is a beast and it caught a lot of folk out. I’ve still got visions of the guy up ahead of me putting his foot down then trying to remount and carry on. Everyone around him was shouting ‘don’t remount!’ but he did and promptly fell down a ditch. If you stop on that first section it’s a sorry walk to the next flattish bit.

Maybe I'll use my Fratello for it as it will have a triple chainset by then

ben@31

I'm patiently sat in Inverness now, waiting for tomorrow. Not looking forward to the ridiculously early start. Lets hope the rain stays off. There's a lot of bike porn around the registration area, who ever has the matt black Specialized Venge with Mavic Cosmic Carbone wheels, it's a lovely looking bike.

fat_cat

Great ride today, and thankfully didn't snow until this afternoon.

Climb out of Fort Augustus is a real challenge, particularly for a southern softie like me.

Would definitely do this again.

PS hope the rider who crashed 5 miles from the end is OK. Didn't look pretty when I went past, bur at least he was being looked after by paramedics.

Kevo27

Great event, 4:30 rise for me as the bnb we had was 6 miles out….doh!!!
Cant fault the setup though, plenty of parking etc and mech support day before and during the event was spot on.
Was a bit apprehensive of the climb out of Fort Augustus but managed it which for a lard ass like me i was quite chuffed. Lone Piper at the summit was a good boost also.

Glad the weather was good, but i think i had every season on the way home, Sun,sleet,snow,hail, rain, only one missing was wind. Would be tough going with poor weather.

Seen the rider 5 miles out, hope he is alright, was holding his shoulder when i passed.

thegreatdivide

I had the beginnings of a cold when I got on the train in Dundee and by the time I got to Inverness it had gone nuclear. Spent the night sweating in bed and couldn't get to sleep for all the pi$$ed up folk walking by our apartment :-(

Pumped myself full of max strength cold remedies, ibuprofen, beetroot juice and coffee and headed down to the start line (which has now been moved down the road due to the number of entrants this year). We were in wave C but couldn't make our way forward so headed out with wave I. The first mile or so were taken at a relaxed pace but I decided to just go for it and see what happened. Hooked up with a lass from a local club (she ended up 3rd fastest female on the day) and via various groups we put in some good time on the out leg. Nature eventually took its toll and I had to go for a MASSIVE pee just before the start of the climb which meant I lost my pack. I'd stuck a 29 on so I could spin up the climb and I reckon it was a wise move what with the cold kicking in. The majority of the back leg was spent bridging groups but by the 55 mile mark was starting to fade...then a freight train on a Giant and Zipps came past at Dores and offered me a draft so I got towed into Inverness at great speed.

I've done the Etape Caledonia a few times and I'll be doing it again one last time this year due to mates from the club wanting to ride it, but next year I'll deffo do the ELN again. Apart from the great route I like Inverness. We had a superb burger and bottle of vino at Cafe 1 up the hill followed by pints of IPA in the Castle Tavern while watching the blizzard outside!.

Managed it in 3:21 btw. Wish I hadn't stopped for a pee!

bompington

You may have to pee, but you don't have to stop...

Well done all. Certainly interesting weather for you... I'm hoping it might improve before the 3 Pistes: here's a view on the final climb...

bobmcstuff

I had a great time - did 3.54 which I was happy enough with, pretty sure I could go sub 3.30. The wave we were in was pretty slow, thanks to my colleague who signed up first and said he was going to take 5 hours, then later dropped out before the event anyway! There was an awful lot of traffic before the climb strung things out, and some dodgy riding which made it a bit difficult to pass. Also having not done the climb before I wanted to save myself.

It seems I did the climb in 27 minutes which I am happy with as well. I wish there was a leaderboard for that - I'm ~160th of ~2100 on the Strava segment which is way higher than I normally come, but I'd be interested to know how I came on the day because I did better than I was expecting. I could certainly have gone quite a bit faster except for all the people walking their bikes up the middle of the road or weaving around erratically.

Surprised myself to find I averaged 34km/h from the top of the climb to the finish, if I'd done that on the bit before the climb I would have been well under 3.5 hours!

Great ride, friendly atmosphere/marshalls, well organised, great views, weather held out and apparently I am faster than I thought I was, so all in all a fun day out.

There was a massive blizzard on the drive back to Aberdeen, must have been 4 or 5cm of snow settled and we got diverted down some farm roads because of a crash on the A96. Was an interesting drive for sure.

Fat Cat wrote:

PS hope the rider who crashed 5 miles from the end is OK. Didn't look pretty when I went past, bur at least he was being looked after by paramedics.

I saw that too, he looked in a bad way - those cones in the middle of the road were a bit of a hazard when everyone was tired.

bobmcstuff

bompington wrote:

Well done all. Certainly interesting weather for you... I'm hoping it might improve before the 3 Pistes: here's a view on the final climb...

I'm doing that one too - thinking it may be more a case of getting round rather than trying to go fast!

fat_cat

Just made it home. Great couple of days in Inverness.

3.49 for me which I was very happy with. Think a lot of people overestimated their ability as I seemed to overtake loads over the first 10 miles (admittedly using my normal sportive technique for caning it from the start by my standards at least, and trying to hold on like grim death at the end). I was off in wave I having entered 4.10 so I was a bit quicker than this but even so.

Only criticism would be the time of year makes the weather a bit of an lottery. We got very lucky and I was tucked up in a pub watching the football when it started snowing. Gave me just the excuse I needed to stay for a couple of extra pints.

bill_gates

I'm in the area over the coming weeks and fancied a shot of the route. With this being mainly on the A82, is it maybe not a great idea due to traffic volume?

bompington

A82 is indeed not a great road to ride on, like most of the trunk roads through the highlands. Fast, quite heavy traffic, quite narrow and winding.
Roads on the south side of loch are better, but if you really want great roads head over to the north west - Bealach of course, or then there's the north coast 500...

Nevis2

Don't do it! Riding the Loch Ness side is nuts - do the south route twice if you must, there's a very good reason for this event being on a closed road!

bobmcstuff

I haven't ridden up there much but would support not doing the north side out of choice.

Check out the route for an event called ride the north (ride-the-north.co.UK) - this was on open roads and went out from Inverness down to the south over some great roads.

The other posters probably have more experience round there than me though.

Silly Old Hector

[url=http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=19701846#p19701846]Nevis2[/url] wrote:

Don't do it! Riding the Loch Ness side is nuts - do the south route twice if you must, there's a very good reason for this event being on a closed road!

+1