Skubarra

I was on 44C Tufo tyres. Like @vulgar I got caught out by a few unexpected rocks in river beds and concrete ledges, certainly rode my luck at some points with the bike & tyres taking a beating. I might have made some different choices if I had to do most of the route in the dark.

Congrats on winning the team event, its a monster route whatever bike you choose 👍 My perspective on the gravel bike was a bit different though 😀 Had an easy time behind the lead-out vehicle and given it was my 2nd event on a gravel bike it was quite enjoyable to see the mtb's pop out of the bunch one after the other before the race event started... By my estimate there was at most one mtb among the Top 15 (despite the majority or riders being on mtbs), I was about an 1h30m faster on my gravel bike than on my mtb 2 years ago. Was faster on my gravel bike on every single Strava segment, only thing I would say is that the last 40km was more fun on the mtb as at this point on the gravel bike I was feeling every rock and corrugation shuddering my bones. At that point faster did not = more fun. Congrats on everyone that finished! It's a proper achievement.

Don't know the exact details but as I understand things went sour between the Darling Brew new owners and previous organisers of the DBX. Old organisers now do the Living Colours race and Darling Brew not having access to all the trails they used in the past ( so now more gravel travel as @cadenceblur mentioned) Edit - I see already mentioned that a year ago on the same thread 🤣

Recently realised my old light is not working properly, drove through yesterday to Stellenbosch and asked them to take a look. They immediately repaired my light, 10 minutes in & out free of charge.

Kind of what happened here, and we are used to the day setup of other trails where you buy your permit online or pay via snapscan and you are off for the day riding until sunset or however long you like but Lourensford is very different. Very much a nanny system where you sign in at the desk, sign an extra indemnity form, are not allowed to ride on your own, get a tracker and off you go for a short ride and will get scolded like a child if you are not back 30min before lunchtime. (If only they could back that up with half decent route markings). Even the members still have to go through the same sign-up schlep and rules. Clearly they are working on a different business model here, low volume high-end riders, happy to do a short ride and then spend more money to do coffee/beer at the restaurants. Preferably no day visitors (I think the R250 fee is really a not-so-subtle hint of either buy an annual membership or preferably avoid our venue please). In fairness part of this likely to be dictated by farm management, its Christo Wiese's posh venue after all.

In principal I am ok with the R250 for a once-off outing for the experience, I do think the trails & scenery on the farm are really good. (And we have done most of the other trails in the wider area) What caught me off guard is the time cut-off, that really doesn't leave enough time to do a proper ride or get to the further out trails for a group of social riders. Combine that with the bad signage and you can quickly run out of time before getting to the fun stuff. But yes - the message here is clearly we don't need you on our trails but will tolerate you for a short time if you drop a lot of money.

There are already good answers on here on where the gains are so wont go into that. In theory you can convert your mtb into a Frankenstein gravel bike (especially if you can fit the large chainring which wont be possible for all mtb's) - people are already doing it. There are a wide range of gravel bike settings and there are certainly some gray areas between mtb's and gravel bikes. But most likely its going to take more than a few "tweaks" and you will possibly end up at a point where you are spending enough money on your Frankengravelbike that it would have been cheaper/easier to just buy a gravel bike in the first place.

There is this part as well in the maroela media report It could really just have been an accident? Or maybe he did swerve AND the taxi was going too fast? 🤷‍♂️ Still, very sad to see someone losing their live in an event, not something we ever want to see

Was thinking the same thing (and I was one who said exactly that after the Houwhoek tour last week) Cannot comment on the route here but what I would say that if a race is specifically marketed as a gravel race there is some onus on the route planner / organiser to make sure the route is as gravel friendly as possible. If not then warn people and do that "choose your weapon" marketing blurb (and maybe not use it as national gravel champs?) If you enter a traditional mtb race (like 36One or Trans Baviaans?) on your gravel bike then the risk is on you and then there is no point complaining afterwards.

No honesty required in the WC, your CSA number is rigorously checked at every single funride, even the kerkbasaar race in the platteland.

Due to too many hours working I never got round to responding but what a great write-up! One of the creeds I live by is that I refuse to do any ride, race or otherwise longer than 250km. Your write up of this epic adventure inspired me for a few moments to reconsider that life choice. All the best for your wife, I trust she will make a full recovery and I hope that next year this time we will read on here how you tamed the Tankwa!

Very glad he is kind of ok, didn't see the fall but went past him after the fall (3 fellow riders were attending to him) and it looked really serious.

Oh wow - somehow missed the turn-off there, ended up riding through the township and ended up at the N2 🤣 For the life of me I couldn't understand why the turn-off back to Katpass wasn't signposted, I just recognised it from riding down there at the start. Wasn't impressed with the organisers at the time but no harm done I guess. Finished mid-bunch, but for the last 2 hours of my race I saw exactly zero other other riders, add the "already packed up" vibe at the finish and one left with a bit of a meh feeling. Was hard to shake the feeling that the weekend was really about the mtb stage race with the gravel ride just tacked on as a sideshow.

Saying this tongue in cheek but I would say if you own a gravel bike but decide to do the national gravel champs on your mtb then you need to consider that owning a gravel bike is possibly a waste of your money.

Overall I enjoyed the challenge, had a lekker day out. Nice gravel riding around Greyton. Enjoy that pass that went through private property (even though going up was stupid steep). Was my first gravel race on a gravel bike, Katpass down was a rude introduction! Not sure this event in its current format will catch on, too many mtb sections. Don't think a downhill like Katpass is really suitable for a gravel race. Going up a bit better but not exactly gravel riding imo. Riding rough jeeptrack next to a perfectly good tar road near Greyton, what's up with that? If I come back I'll probably bring the mtb and stick with the mtb event.

I find the numbers pretty impressive for a new-ish cycling event in the the Karoo. Try organising a mtb or road event in Prince Albert and see if anyone shows up? Also along with the trinkling of a few international riders you see people attending from the whole country, not just the Western Cape. I suspect/hope that this event will grow much more going forward.

Out of 49 that finished or 49 that started?.... If it is the latter then I suggest you write the organisers a strongly worded complaint 😉

How does one respond meaningful to a question like that without having access to the entry system or database?

Yes And if you are over 60 male or over 50 female you must do the short route if you want to qualify which I think is daft.

Top 25% per age cat qualify for the UCI medal and world champs

Wow - waterpoints with pancakes and boerewors rolls! What kind of gourmet offering is required to get a passmark from @Titleist? 🤣

If this is your idea of a fun challenge on your bike then go for it!!

Think most of it is actually tar, but still a bastard of a climb Few years back I was with the family at the wedding venue at the bottom, did a little social mtb ride down to McGregor and on the way I thought - let me see where this road goes.... Was certainly a longer and less fun afternoon than I imagined it would be, I also remember an involuntary little nap at the top just to get my breath back...

Are those bikes a material upgrade to your old bike though? One thing I think its worth mentioning is that mtb geometry improved a lot over the last 10 years, I don't think trading in a 12 year old bike for a slightly better specced 12/10 year old bike is particularly good value for money. If you go second hand I would suggest not going further back than 2017 or thereabouts.

My garmin recorded just under 1,400m climbing. For 160km thats not a lot. No big climbs but one or 2 nasty drags and at the end the rollers do add up.