Spinnekop

Hope everyone recovers

Surely the dumbest decision ever to bring us down Lynnwood. You have 4 lanes open on Atterbury. Let us finish in Atterbury.

We as a club ride the R104 on a weekly basis. It is not all bad.

The one was shown quite near the Grootfontein entrance. The other was a photo of where the sinkhole is.

3rd time in a week. Last Saturday. This Saturday and now Tuesday also. Same modus operandi. Same car.

I might have some. Will let you know.

The best race you will ever do. I have done 6 of the short Kremetarts (77km) back when I was a youngster and 13 of the 180km once. Awesome goody bag. Great atmosphere. Amazing route - Bushveld.

Some feedback. I go to the page. Links are copied wrong. Eventually get web page open. Mix between tours and racing and etc. Confusing. What is what? 5min later I see it costs R2k. Now I want to see the route and climbing. I get to a map with two routes on it. Is the third route not showing? No idea how long each stage is. Route profile? How to get between stages? Do you have to pedal to the next stage seeing it is unsupported? etc. etc. etc. Further confused. 10 min later I just give up because I am not in the mood to forensically go search how to do this event. That coupled with the fact that I can go ride this route unsupported for free makes the R2k kinda stupid in my books. Maybe its just me. Good luck with the event.

S-Caliber 😎😆

On the fueling topic. In my experience, you should try and stay away from processed stuff, ie. gells, bars, etc. Rather do bananas, potatoes, droëwors, dates etc. It will help you stomach in the long run over the 3 days.

Serious question wrt to the above statement. I have done a couple of stage race events over the past 28 years......and I have almost ALWAYS seen people stuff food in them that they don't really need? I respect the hell out of the fact that each and every body is different and fuels different. Trick is to figure out your own recipe that works for YOU. Rererencing my experience with Sani2C and W2W (3 day stuff): I can get by on a 4-5 hour stage race 3 days in a row with 4x 500ml of bottles per stage. 1 water (refill half way) and 1 juice (In my case USN or PowerB)(refill with whatever is available half way). Burning matches as fast and hard as I can along the say. No food. Maybe a banana and hand full salt-covered potatos that I grab when I stop on a MTB halfway mark to fill the bottles. That is it. Does the above statement make sense? Am I "under-fueling". (I have not bonked in a race recently) Or is my body just different compared to other people and I should be glad I don't consume R500 worth of gels during a race? Or are people over fueling themselves? Thoughts?

As ChrisF states above. Recovery BETWEEN stages is critical. If you take your event "serious", alcohol will make it more challenging....so try stay away.

One of the best things that helped me was this: Figure out what you need every day. Set kit, Socks. Go-go juice for your bottle. Drugs. recovery drink. Sweets/bar/gel. Take all that and pack each day in his own bag. 3 Day stage race = 3 bags. Keeps the suitcase organised and you know you have everything for the next day when you pitch your tent without having to think.

You can go two ways about it: Go full-on Elite like the old days of Giro del Capo. For that you need sponsors. One batch. Rolling road closure. Bring pros to SA to do road races. The other way is to try and attract more entries ie. the "fun rider bunch" to finance the operation. To take ideas read above: Skip the useless goody bag. MAYBE an even shirt- people love clothing and it is something to keep the memory lingering. But even that is not a must have Five bunches. 1x Elites men. 1x Ladies. 3x Seeded. (No age cat crap. That way you earn your start batch like the MTBers do). Gives you 15 motorbikes with rolling road closures for the 5 bunches Don't do stupid distances. Want to get more entries? Keep it around 80-100km Keep it less that R500 a day. That is what you pay for Panorama tour. And a typical Gauteng one day race. My 2c

I did the TdC back in 2020 the week before the gogga closed everything down. Loved the event. And the momories of that one race kept me going for the remainder of the "closed for racing" year that followed. Not many entries though........and riding 100km every day is daunting for most of the "avg" riders out there.

And how many riders in SA can do more than 1 (maybe 2) long days long routes? Which brings you down again on entry quantities and economics, sadly.

Early morning pothole-dodging in Pretoria

But a year long without one puncture? Priceless.

Read somewhere on some patent docs for the future, thumb lever is designed out.........

I see Conti will launch (have unofficially launched) a GP5000 All season tyre. Think that will be a good choice to balance out kilos and punctures and "racing"

Agreed. But.....so.....does anyone know if the race organisers have been contacted yet and made aware or is it still just Hubkakkingandkerming101?

So at least have a little respect for people who are still trying to advance our sport by putting up events. Don't say thank you for yourself but please say thank you just because you are a cyclist and a general nice guy that appreciate their efforts and would only like to resolve an issue Just a thought. Use it, Don't.

110bcd: 110mm between opposite holes. On the 5 hole system you get 110 and 130 110 is typically reserved for "compact" chainrings 50/34 type stuff (But not limited to compact though) 130 is typically reserved for big blade stuff 54/42 etc. 10/11/12 speed blades should all work but with SRAM flat chain you might have issues is some cases.

Dude.......no........it's too large. Racing setup asks for a 10-15mm drop from top of seat to bars. The pic shows they are level. He can go smaller. Smaller is better = more stiff. Secondly. It's a Merida. So anything else will immediately become better for him for racing, big or small.