ChrisF

Nice to be back on the trails.

@'Dale thinking of you bud.

Sharing the weekend with friends from outside the Western Cape is such a pleasure ! "We" (the locals) get into a comfort zone, and we look past the beauty of the Western Cape. What an wake-up call when we see you appreciate what we have. The saddest part is the locals that do the race and rush home .... 2023 I got to experience the post race vibe, while we waited for the tannie. Overseas visitors walking up to us as we sat at the restaurant ... start talking like old friends, just because we are follow cyclists. 2024 walking down to the V&A Waterfront and spending the afternoon with friends. Still cant believe we walked back, and up the hill to the B&B with by then 120km in the legs, so fast ... What an absolute eye opener !!! Baie dankie dat julle my dorp met my deel

ebike Come race time, you easily ride 1 or 2 zones higher than during practice rides. After 2 or 3 or 4 hours your body only sees the effort, not the motor ... The main benefit of the ebike in this situation, as @'Dale said, you push until you feel the onset of the cramps. With an ebike it is so much easier to back off 5% and still keep a decent pace, recover and GO at the next hill.

I only started doing road events in 2023 (since 1995). The vast majority of Hub comments are about the first couple of racing groups. Looking at Durbie Dash, Winelands and 99er this is maybe 15% of the field. There are LOTS of slow riders !!! You can find your pace and have a fun day out. Your wife will have lots of other riders to ride with. This most certainly applies to CTCT as well. If I may .... what is your goal time ? If you are a 4 hour rider .... consider an ebike for your wife. You can then enjoy the ride together. Welllll .... she may spin out when you want to go faster ... and she may just hammer you on the climbs, and not in a good way. If you are aiming for 3:30 ... well then you will be faster than the 3:50 minimum time allowed for e-bikes.

UPDATE - The interval timing and living rider monitoring at CTCT 2024 went down VERY well with friends and family. Sure, it may not be perfect, but is was fit for purpose. For CTCT 2024 group results are CLEARLY split, with e-bikes in a different group. Wonder what will happen at the next event. Will the e-bike results be shown separately ?

Plenty correlation to my Vines and Views race in 2022. Quickly latched to two faster riders and set a solid pace ... 2 hours into the race I realised I had hardly taken a sip of water, nevermind any nutrition. This after spending months working on my hydration and nutrition plan. Since then I use an audible alarm on Garmin to snap me out of the mist of racing and to remind me to drink and eat. I still find that I drink too little on cooler days ... correct times, just too little each time.

Nice one for the 21-club https://www.facebook.com/100066609274887/posts/pfbid02taNKqqTc3EWuCWTpq4x6PFw5LBcJEEinaJsYK3KyGi6fEZ86AapBncLTyYynFhEWl/?app=fbl

OKAY .... now that I have your fullest attention .... Who wants TWO goodies bags ? (Second one MUCH nicer than the official CTCT goodie bag ?) Join the I-Love-Boobies pink train in 2025 @Silver rider can tell more about the contents ... The "few" riders that started with the I-Love-Boobies batch - Effectively a full start shute on their own !! Let's see if we can make it TWO start shutes full in 2025

Wind wont be worse than 2024 ... hopefully Rain wont be worse than 2022 .... HOPEFULLY ...

9th of March 2025. 2nd Sunday of March as always. According to the entry portal.

Entered even before you managed to get back to Potch 🤣

CTCT 2025 entries open ....

WOW !!!!! Respect !

I am 55. I have blood tests, for other medical stuff, every 6 months. I have added the PSA to the list for a few years already. Cycling has not impacted my PSA levels. Doubt this is the reason for your reading. Sorry. Listen to @Prince Albert Cycles Let's hope it was just a spike ..... in any event, EARLY DETECTION saves lives !

Certainly two sides to this. We drove the route a few weeks back. I was shocked at the number of potholes after the heavy rains. THESE were repaired. Also, a LOT of the mountain slides have been addressed before the race. BUT ..... after Dixies there was a marchel at a cones and danger tape routing bikes around a section of road that is in dire need of fixing. Could not help but wonder if it would not have been less effort to fix it than wave people past it .... In Houtbay, shortly before the water point I hit a hole in the middle of the road. The sound was so loud that the riders on either side looked over at me. I commented that I am glad I have large volume gravel tyres, as that knock could have damaged road tyres. Just past the circle a rider was working on his front tyre .... All things considered, the CoCT did a fine job. BUT, there is certainly more work to be done .... I did have a smile at the threads on FB where the Mayor and the Premier have their moment in the CTCT sunlight .... they DO react to compliments ..... but some very valid feedback is just ignored ..... As for the drinks at the end .... I was pushing so hard from Houtbay that I just stood under a tree for a few minutes before I could even open my Coke.

Marketing ..... Back in the 90's we DID get a heck of a lot of free stuff from Vitality, for very little input. They stepped up the gym attendance requirements .... so you had to at least clock in at the gym, and possibly have a juice twice a month. All of this in the name of "healthier living". Vitality became a different beast all together as Discovery grew, and branched out into other businesses. Those ENTERING today .... hey, do so with eyes wide open ! AND, know that the goal posts WILL shift as they "encourage" you to buy into new products .... Now spare a thought for the grumpy old farts that lived through 3 decades of behavioural modification as Vitality morfed again and again ..... Thus, it boils down to simple maths, AND lifestyle choices .... any rewards program works for some, not for others ...

Simple answer .... vote with your wallet. Vitality has long since moved from a HEALTH reward program to a carrot to draw people into the greater Discovery portfolio of products.

THIS is where that documentary started, and ended. Cable tv .... Torent sites .... Netflix (drastic reduction in torent activity, as Netflix worked) As the number of streaming sites increase, and the quality per site is diluted there is an uptick in torent sites again .... Now look at SA and cycling .... no legal way of watching cycling, other than the very limited SS races.

Movies and series have been so splintered by the now nearly 200 streaming services that it is becoming a talking point that customers are now WORSE off than the old cable days. People are starting to hop streaming providers on a very regular basis - hop to A, binge watch select content ... hop to B, rinse repeat .... Sport is following the exact same path !! Going to be a few "bad years" before a new model emerge ....

RESPECT !!!! No ways my knees will survive THAT ...

my 2c worth .... Before putting money down ... ride a road bike and a gravel bike. Actually, make sure to ride both a 1x and a 2x gravel bike. For these types of road races the top and bottom end gearing of the 2x setup has advantages .....

Herewith a photo-story of my CTCT weekend - @Scary Rider @Silver rider CTCT 2024.pdf

Somebody sat down and did some maths .... Then sucked their thumb ..... "Legally" only 250W pedal-assist bikes, with a spedd assist limit of 25km/h may be used, as per the relevant SANS regulations (as copied from the European regulations) Allowing for faster speeds down hill, and only the legal 26km/h on uphills yada yada .... they came up with 3:50. My knees are reasonably buggered. If I push it hard, I manage a 3:45 on a good weather day. Practically, the minimum time is the only way to try and minimize the impact ebikes can have on race results, i.e. towing other racers to better race times. Though the hour delayed start should be enough .....

Italics .... hahaha .... She spun out as soon as the group sped up .... Next year she is using a gravel bike with the right gearing 👍 Maar hoor nou daai storie soos n Noord Kaap tannie dit vertel 👍