"Richard Goodman" wrote in message
...
The Dragon Ride

In response to Arthur's request for more ride reports, here's mine for the
Dragon Ride. Sorry if it's too long! I don't know if anyone else here did
it? It's been very thoroughly discussed and disected on the C+ forum, and
I am a bit surprised it hasn't come up here.

Anyway, FWIW - the Dragon Ride took place last weekend, over a choice of
100 or 150k routes in South Wales heading up into the Brecon Beacons. The
150k route covers two UK cat 1 climbs, the Rhigos and the Blywch, and one
Hors Cat. climb near Ystradfellte. Despite sounding impressive, actually
although the scenery is quite impressive the climbs were not that
difficult - given low enough gears which I made sure to fit . About 750
riders had entered, making it probably one of the largest, if not the
largest, 'cyclosportive' type event in the UK (although I stand to be
corrected if I'm wrong). Transponder timing chips were provided for a
small fee, adding a further degree of competitive interest to the event.

The ride got underway under slightly cloudy skies at 9.30 on Sunday
morning with the first group of 50 riders. We were sent away in groups of
approximately 50 every couple of minutes so being mid-field my ride didn't
start until about 9.45, at the tail end of my group. I had done the Polka
Dot, very slightly longer and hillier, so I didn't have any qualms about
getting round, I just wanted to better my Polka Dot time. So I decided I
would not start conservatively, and as one of a group of club riders in
front of me said to the others 'ok, let's go', I thought to myself,
'right, I'm going with you'. So as they upped their pace I followed and we
were soon leaving my start group in our wake and skipping ahead towards
other groups that had started earlier. As we went further down the road
various riders from the other groups joined and left the paceline, and
somewhere along the way I even managed to leave my initial 'ride partners'
behind. The South Wales police kindly provided a motor cycle rider who
kept overtaking us and stopping traffic as large groups of cyclists made
their way around roundabouts on the A48 - it was great fun being part of a
peloton racing through the give way signs being given priority over other
traffic.

There was a slight climb up in to Neath which, on OS maps, has a chevron
on it - normally seeing any road with one of those on it makes me rather
worried - but somehow it went past rapidly as hardly more than a blip
which required a quick down change through the gears for a minute or two,
then straight back up through them as the road levelled off, and we sped
on towards Glyn Neath at a pace that, for me, was unaccustomedly fast and
furious - we were doing evens for the first 40 miles or so. Then came a
feed station where we all stopped to grab bananas and water, and
unfortunately 'my' group of about 20 riders then disintegrated as we each
seemed to set off individually.

Wanting to press on, I rode off alone towards the split for the 100/150k
routes, expecting at any moment that a new group would come up on my wheel
and I would latch on to them, but after the split the road started going
up slightly and somehow it didn't happen for quite a bit longer than I
expected, in fact I began overtaking other individual riders. Eventually I
did join with another group, who started riding through and off to
maintain a good pace against a slight headwind. When it was my turn in
front, I was relieved to find that we were just beginning a descent, so I
thought 'that's good, I can do my bit to keep the pace up without making
too much effort', but thinking it wouldn't be right to just coast at the
same pace I pushed the pace up a bit to take advantage of the downhill. I
cranked on as it levelled off and eventually, after a few km, looked
behind for someone else to come through but there wasn't anyone! I was
alone again! Was I impolite to push the pace on a descent, I wondered?
Eventually another cyclist from the group did catch me and said 'I don't
know what you had for breakfast but I want some!' I felt it was a nice
compliment, but not entirely appropriate since he was then about to
overtake me! Perhaps I should have had some of what he had! I stayed on
his wheel for a bit and in fact we repassed and took tows off each other
for most of the rest of the ride, at times being part of a larger group
and at times being alone.

100km came and went easily in about 3h15, a new PB for me, and it seemed
we had still yet to see any real climbs! It wasn't long after that they
started though. That it took me 3h15 for the first 100k and 2h15 for the
final 50k says a lot about the hillyness of the last 50k! I completed the
ride in just over 5h30, which I felt was not bad, placing me provisionally
32nd out of over 220 riders on the 150k who were 'chipped', and taking an
hour off my Polka Dot time - much of that due, I think, to being able to
work with fast-paced groups early on in the ride, which I never managed to
do on the Polka Dot - I went round most of that alone.

All in all great fun, and highly recommended. Now for l'etape!

Rich



Well done for finishing! A group of 6 of us entered the Dragon Ride. 4
attempting the 150k and 2 the 100k. I unfortunately succumbed at the 71-mile
mark. If you see the thread about 'Severe cramp sufferer', that's me trying
to make sure I can get all the way round next year!



Cheers



Peter.