JohanDiv

We did the 60miler. Was my wife's first ride over 70km and first ride in a few months, so we just aimed at finishing in 7 hours. I did the 60miler last year in just under 5 hours and initially was aiming to do it on my own this year and try and get close or under the 4hour mark, but I'd take this experience with my wife over that any day! We actually had time to take in the scenery and enjoy the waterpoints. I ended up lending her a hand on every hill from start to finish to save her legs for the entire distance and that seemed to work quite well for us, we ended up doing it in just over 6 hours! She absolutely loved the event and she seems a bit hooked now. Keeps on talking about the day and already started planning for next years Around the Pot weekend.. One mistake we made..We reached the pont basically midpack of the 60milers at the same time the 100miler guys started arriving..We got our roosterkoek, sat down to eat it in around 10-15min and only then joined the massive que for the pont. We stood in the que watching three ferries come and go before we could get on. Checked ourselves back into the race after 1 hour and 9 minutes instead of 45 minutes. Next year I'll just grab the roosterkoek and stand and eat it in the que.

Why the hell would Rohan Dennis retire the day before TT?!! I'm done playing..

Ooooffff courrseeee he'll win now!! [emoji2357]

Yip, but just doing the 60miler with my wife on Saturday. Will try and work in another longish ride on Sunday in that area.

Too late to start training now? Haha, just got an entry today and had to take it! I was lazy and sick the last two months, let's see if I can get fit in three weeks time! Also, any tips and hints for this race..please direct them this way. I'm completely in the dark and have no clue what to expect.

Didn't they put a grader on the road like two days before the event last year? Pretty sure that is what they said. I wonder what's the chances of them still doing that before Saturday..

I tried that move the other day on a short ride where you put your hand on her lower back and push her up a hill..thought that might be a tactic to push for 6 hours instead of 7 hours..the next morning I realized my upper body is completely out of shape and this will not work for 100km! Neck, shoulder, back, bicep, tricep, forearm everything was eina!

Subbing Caleb Ewan for Warren Barguil. Absolute gamble! Caleb looks out of contention for scoring points for young rider but might still take a few points in tomorrow's stage. 1 flat stage vs 3 mountain stages and 1 time trial.. Warren did't show much form until now, but I'm hoping he can score a few points in the mountains at least! Then an obvious sub for Laporte that fell sick and out of the tour. Subbing with Rohan Dennis who I'm backing to take the win in the time trial.

Guys in my team picking up tummy bugs and dropping out of the race. At least no headaches for me around substitions now

Can't make a miraculous comeback in the third week of the tour if you don't fall behind in these early stages I say..

She's a runner, so her general fitness is good I think..but that doesn't really translate directly to good fitness on the bike.. She still pedals slowly and skill level not great. We did a 78km ride with 800m climbing about a month ago averaging around 17kmh without any training. Since then we basically did two or three 20km rides with 400m climbing, but she still runs around 35km-40km per week. The plan is to get her on the indoor trainer from tomorrow for an hour everyday or every second day until the Tuesday before the race just to get her used to sitting on the saddle.. even that won't be enough to get used to the saddle for a 7 hour ride, but it's better than nothing.

But it would be close to perfect if that prediction holds up!

Waayyy too soon to rely on that prediction..

Showing my hand and I'm not changing it again!! Or am I bluffing..double bluffing?

My wife decided a few weeks ago she wants to do a 100km race. I think Around the Pot 60miler is a good place to start. On the one hand I'm excited that she's starting to show interest in my hobby. This could get really fun in a year or two if she gains a bit of cycling fitness and we can do some proper events together as a team. On the other hand my target of sub 4 is now a target of sub 7 and my gat is already hating me..

Did the ramp test this morning, but Zwift crashed on saving. If I log in now my FTP has changed to 261 Watts(Higher than I expected). Intervals.icu estimated FTP at 254Watts that sounds more believable to me. I've never done the long FTP test on Zwift, think I'll give that a go in a week or two to see how the results compare.

That's pretty damn close!! If the estimate is that accurate then my FTP went doooowwwnn. Think I'll also do the ramp or long FTP test tomorrow morning to see how close it is

I'd gladly pay R200-R300 more for a Ciovita Corsa bib just to avoid dealing with them again..

Thanks David. Great work by the way! Say if I did 8 activities within the last few weeks with power and HR, will that estimate training load work backwards for activities of around 3-4 months back or only for future activities? Doesn't look that way?

Thanks! It seems to work. But now I notice something else. With some of my activities where I have HR monitor but no powermeter, it shows no load, and those activities also don't add to the fitness/fatigue graph. Do I need a powermeter? I know on the Elevate app only needs HR for the fitness/fatigue graph.

Hi David, This has probably already been discussed before. I have a few activities where HR monitor failed or recorded without it. These activities do not count anything towards the fitness/fatigue/form graphs. Is there any way these activities can be edited to add a more or less average heart rate to give a more realistic fitness/fatigue/form graph? For example last weekend I did a 113km ride with 1800m elevation gain in just over 4hours where I completely chopped off! But without HR monitor, so basically it looks like I had a rest day on the graph. If I could just somehow estimate a low average of 130 bpm (Was probably closer to 160-170bpm) that would at least show the graph in a more realistic way

Haha I think we will still be able to! That jeep track and singletrack next to the N2 is still 10km from the finish. 5km from the finish is where the single track next to the N2 stops. They will probably make us turn right onto Swellengrebel Road just after that N2 singletrack and take us through town instead of turning left on the gravel road that runs through the dodgy outskirts if I had to guess.

Only suggestion I have for the organizers is to start the 50km race first. Say 07:30 instead of last at 08:30. By the time we finished, almost everyone had left already and only a few people stayed for the prize giving and lucky draw at 12:00. My wife did the 10km trailrun at 08:15 and had time to drive back to Paarl, take a shower, eat, and drive back to see me finish at 11:30. The gravelbike guys could go last because they would finish in the least amount of time. Plus it really gets hot later in the day for us on the 50km. Surely there are enough trails in this network to select from for the shorter distances if they are worried about the traffic on the trails. Just seems silly that the shorter the race, the earlier the start, it should be the other way around I think. That would ensure that the bulk of the people finish more or less in the same timeframe and would stay for the beers, the vibe and the prize giving.

Haha no must've been someone else. I still have no idea where I got the puncture from, noticed the semi pap tyre on the luislang climb already. Luckily I finished my last bomb just before the Rollercoaster descent 2km before the finish line

Haha I was NOT ready to face the luislang climb yesterday and the heat caught me! Struggled with a slow puncture all day, had to stop 5 times to bomb it and missed my 3hours target with 10min. Also this year there were almost no free kilometers of gravelroad like there was last year. Still remains one of the best events on the calendar for me!