hubbernero

A suggestion, depending on when you are planning on doing this ride. There are loads of people travelling up for the Karoo2Coast. Enter the K2C and see if you can potentially get a lift up for the K2C (Uniondale). Ride the K2C (You end up in Knysna). Stay over in Knysna the Sunday night and start your ride from there - you are only missing out on the Plett - Knysna section, but you have done Uniondale - Knysna.

I’m based in Cape Town.

Looking to join a more social/non-racing DC team, if there are perhaps any available?

Are aero extensions allowed? Just asking because I looked at the rules and they mention the below in the rules: No dropped handle bars or aero bars will be allowed. This rule will be strictly enforced and riders who fail to comply will lead to disqualification. I don't want to rock up at the race only to be told that you can't have those on your bike.

I will be beyond pissed off if we loose access to the trails because of someone who thinks he does not have to abide by the rules, just because he has a "marshal" board on his handlebar. So until someone who's involved with the management/building of the trails says marshals are allowed to ride before sunrise/after sunset with lights - they need to abide by the same rules.

Someone discussing the groupset, giving a reasonable explanation with real world examples of actually riding his bicycle. The other saying his one groupset shifts better than the other.

Spoke to him yesterday. He got a puncture on the first lap (porcupine "spike") through the back tyre. Then he got another puncture on the 19th lap quite far from the start/finish, so he had to run the remaining loop back to the start/finish area. After fixing the puncture he got going again but once riding, he said his Achilles tendon was very painful, and his lower back muscles went into spasm. Attempting to run in cycling shoes while pushing a bike was obviously not a great idea. He decided to call it quits after that lap because he did not want to add another injury to his ever growing list. I'm not sure if he was in the lead at that point, could have been. Maybe somebody can confirm? He didn't train for the race and only found out about it last Wednesday.

What Christie said. You can skip the R44. Take R101, left onto Elsenburg Road. Over railway crossing, right to the train station. Take the service road along side the railway line until you get to Kromme Rhee road. Take a right there and at traffic light cross over onto Bottelary Road, left at the traffic circle. Up and over Devon Valley onto Adam Tas into Stellenbosch. There is currently road works on Devon Valley road with stop and goes. I commute there daily, just use the closed off side to ride. Adam Tas can be very busy but the traffic is generally slow moving. The traffic should be much better in December.

Not a gravel bike. He did it on his Canyon Exceed hardtail, setup as a monster cross with drop bars. The same bike in this article: https://www.bikehub.co.za/features/_/gear/gear-news/the-bikes-of-tour-de-braai-r6553

If you read Mike's post again you will see he specifically mentioned a top 10 finisher. I have sympathy for those not racing at the sharp end of the race but the upshot of the rule relaxation is that even top 10 riders took advantage of it much to the frustration of their competitors. This was from another rider: "We had someone in our group while on the road to Britstown stating aloud to all of us that he was going to draft us for the rest of the event, knowing the only penalty would be no prize money (that's a 20 to 30% energy saving). He drafted my wheel for around 700km's (not exaggerating there!) all within the gambit of the rules, still receiving his finishers medal at the end. No transgression of the rules but I do feel sorry for the 11th placed finisher who missed out on a top 10. If it was me I wouldn't be happy."

From what I heard there was one one rider who placed very high in the top 10 that was drafting for the majority of the race. Perhaps one can look at what penalties were handed out and put one and one together. You cannot draft yourself to a top 10 (as an example) finish and expect people to accept it just because you take yourself out of the running for prize money. Also, I cannot think of something more annoying than you riding/working your butt off while there is someone sitting in your slip getting a "free" ride.

https://www.transcontinental.cc/

Can one enter on the day?

Exactly what she said.

Once again, please point me in the direction when/where the ladies were not being recognised before? I'm not going to get into a discussion re males vs females because there is nothing I will say that will not be construed as being a male chauvinist pig...

Having done W2W Race many times through the years not ONCE have I gotten the impression that the ladies did not get the same recognition as the men. They got the same podium time, category finishers/leaders jerseys, etc etc. I think it's brilliant that they are racing their own race now. However, I have to agree with Grease_Monkey here. In my opinion the least they could have done was to put the top 3 males teams on the stage during prize giving. I would've taken less than 5 mins of their time. Like I said, the ladies teams were never ignored before, or not given any recognition. Why ignore the men during this event completely?

They offered him a reduction in his sentence if he gave up names. He basically told them to f-off.... Every time they had some mtb race on stupid sport and his name popped up he was referred to as a "legend of the sport". I would just cringe. Good riddance I say!

Holy moly! Maybe one day when I'm big...

I think the amount of water to carry is very much weather dependant. From what I can make out 2016 was ridiculously hot and windy from the start. Last year the weather seemed a lot milder and more favourable (the times definitely seem to suggest this too). If you get 2016 conditions, 3L might not cut it, whereas similar weather to last year it might be fine? Agreed that a HT does potentially give more space for bottles in frame compared to a dual suss.

Going to be following this thread with great interest. Carrying 4L without a camelback might be rather problematic I would think? Which made me think of bike choice for this race. Hardtail or Dual Suss? 2015/16 was won on a HT, 2017 on a dual suss. I read the report of Vetseun and he was saying his bike (HT) was the perfect bike for the race. Would be interested to know what others opinion on this matter is?