JohanDiv

And Cape Town?

All five guys from our office that did it last year didn't do it this year. Not sure what the reasons are, we didn't really discuss it. For me personally there's just too many races now and this one got cut because it's a bit of a drive for us to get to the start line.

Feedback on this event? Will we be getting a fight night in Cape Town sometime?

Anybody here that have ridden Aspens and can give some feedback? I've ridden with an Ikon 2.2 at the back and Ardent 2.4 on the front (XC) for the last two years. Seemed like the perfect combo and did not puncture or give trouble once. Then recently bought Aspen 2.25 front and back because they were on special and needed new tires. Really like them, rolling resistance uphill is great while sacrificing very little going down. Had them for about two months now, but on the last three rides I had to plug three different holes. On straight forward gravel roads. Unlucky? Or are the prone to puncture frequently?

Went to buy a replacement brake lever, instead walked out with this and forgot about the brake lever

But can also be motivating if you know you easily have another 10kg to drop and you can see the huge difference just a few kgs make. Time to push on and get to race weight before Karoo 2 Coast!!

When I bought my bike new they were fitted with TR tyres with tubes. Bikeshop said that although they are tubeless ready, they wouldn't convert it to tubeless because it already had tubes in, something about the tubes stretching the tyre and then they are prone to "burping" sealant at the rims. Any truth in this, or were they just looking to make an extra buck by selling me two new tyres? Sounded like BS to me..

Hi David, just a question: My estimated FTP has slowly been decreasing over the last few months from 254 to 241, although I feel stronger on the bike. I haven't taken a FTP test in a while, but yesterday I put out a 85-90% effort outdoors(just heart rate, no power meter) getting PR's on my local climbs. Strava has my estimated average power for the 50min ride at 286 Watts, but on intervals.icu my estimated FTP still dropped from 242 to 241. Does the estimated FTP on intervals.icu only recalculate for rides done with a powermeter, in my case only on the Wahoo Kickr since I don't have a power meter on bike, or is Strava's estimated average power just that far off? I thought with enough workout history with power meter and HR data intervals.icu would be able to make a estimated FTP guesstimate for rides done outdoors with just HR data? Thanks!

And that's after they had rear derailleur problems!! Clawing their way back.. could be a close finish!

Don't bother putting dry socks in the crate for CP3. At CP4 I put on dry socks, plastic bags, and then shoes because my shoes were still wet. There is three or four shallow water crossings after Big Dipper, but you can avoid getting feet wet there. My toes were freezing on Never Ender even through the dry socks and plastic bags. The following morning my shoes were still wet. I'm due a new pair of shoes. Next year I'll throw dry shoes in the CP4 crate or get them at CP5 from support driver.

Eish.. luckily the weather is the same for everyone on the day!

Epic Ride Weather

What a great event!! I'm definitely coming back next year! I only got a entry 3 weeks ago, so my training was not nearly enough in the months leading up to the race. I only met my 3 team mates two weeks before the race. Our initial aim was to finish in 14-16 hours, but I was feeling confident that we can make it in 14 hours with 12h30min moving time and 90mins total stoppage at checkpoints. I ended up doing just over 12hours moving time, but 5 hours + of stopping!! The weaker rider in our team already started cracking at 80kms, and pushed every uphill onwards from CP2. It took some motivating from the rest of the team to convince him not to pull out of the race. On top of Baviaans Back, waited 30mins for him. On top of second Fang another 30mins.. at CP3 we took a bit more time for him to try and recover. We decided to start MAC together as a team, and he gave us permission to pedal to the top and wait for him at Bergplaas. We gladly took the time penalty at Bergplaas for arriving one team mate short. There we waited over an hour for him to arrive, plus another 45mins for him to recover. He was adamant that he already decided while walking up MAC that he is pulling out at Bergplaas. We convinced him it is downhill from Bergplaas to CP5 where his wife will be waiting, so he might as well continue instead of calling it quits. From Bergplaas we decided there is no point for us to pedal out in front and wait 30min for him every now and then, and from that point forward this will be a support ride from us to stay with him and making sure we get him to the end. At CP5 after seeing his wife and refueling his spirits improved a bit and we got him convinced that Neverender isn't so bad and he'll see his wife again at CP7. He still fell behind a bit on Neverender and Mini Mac, but we tried to keep the gaps smaller than 10mins and wait at the top of every climb to regroup. We finally went over the finish line at 03:20 in the morning. 17h20mins later!! Through all of this there was no tantrums thrown, no moaning, and the sense of humor never left our team. I think that was the key to get all 4 of us over the line together. At least I never had to get off my bike to push, climbed MAC in 30mins, and finished still feeling quite strong with an average 40kmh tempo ride from Mini Mac to the singletrack section. I have a bit of an unfinished business feeling hanging over me knowing that we still had something left in the tank when we crossed the line and missing our target by that much. So we'll just have to come back next year!

Is Langwater the one just after CP3? We got off our bikes and carried them overhead. That was a proper knee deep water crossing

Anybody know if there will be a live feed of the event and where it can be viewed?

I haven't done TB before, but looking at the map, surely before CP4

Let's hope it holds up!!

We heard the same as Amelis from the tannie at the Willowmore Rolbalklub.

286-4. Will probably be finishing between 12:00 and 02:00 if someone would be so kind to keep a beer ready!

I'm probably using intervals.icu in its most basic form, but it helps me keep track! Fitness has picked up around 15 points in the last three weeks and tapering week for Trans Baviaans going well. I'll be fresh come Saturday.. Haven't done a FTP test since end of April..will give it a go again after TB.

I see YR looks a bit more relaxed today! Took this screenshot yesterday and got excited..

I'm also considering packing my kite!

Thanks Wik! Just found out from my team mates we are aiming for 16 hours. Will be meeting them on Saturday for the first time when we are going for a long ride together. Not much time left to get fit. Saturday doing a 140km ride with 1800m climbing, Following it up the next day with a 55km 1400m climbing ride. Then I'll just take it easy for the next two weeks with a few indoor sessions during the week and a 4-5 hour ride the weekend before the race.

I also wanted to drop Adam Yates. Zero points in two weeks! Unfortunately I'm sitting with two other riders that already had to withdraw from the race that's occupying my subs bench..

The missus was actually game face on at that point and was the one stressing about the clock starting to tick again haha! We reached the pont with an average speed of 23kmh and overtook a bunch of people that just triggered her inner competitiveness . As the clock was ticking away and we not getting going again she started to get demotivated again. i think she was silently starting to hope for a time in the region of 5,5 hours..