how was your karkloof

[jwagga]

What a great ride thanks to all the organisers,well done

[Sepia]

Yip. I agree! Well done organizers! Excellent! (Too many hills......Damn!)

[Andrew_ew]

Great ride but not sure the orginastion was so good - gripes: parking was chaos; almost no rubbish bins; for entry fee of R200 no goody bag, cheap medal & they had very few large shirts mainly small and xxsmall - this despite ROAG knowing from their databse most pre-entrants sizes I was told by the people handing out the shirt tokens that they would order the right size - when I got to the shirt people I was told that no this is not the case but would I please write to the organizers to complain because they were embarrased for them! , poor marking on the course - guys on 60k got lost, I did 40 k and sometimes had to guess the way - I have done two before and the kk trailblazer so could make an educated guess, start area was chaos - seriously why narrow the only access to the start batches by putting up a big tent there?; only saw two medics on the 40k course - in those conditions surely more would have been a good idea?; the singletrack was not as manicured as it was in previous years - although I concede the heavy prior rains played a big part in this, seriously if they want to retain the UCI status they are going to have to up their game; the water tables only had coke & water - for such high entry fee's could they not have laid on some usn or even powerade?

 

Gripes aside the trails were awesome the weather perfect, the riders friendly, but in future I may just pay R20 and ride the same trails all day outside of the kk classic!

[Sepia]

Sure, I agree the parking was chaotic. But is this not the fault of the local farmers? I was parked in by late comers and the parkies had left already. Wives and family arriving afterwards?

Entry fee was high plus transport. Yes, better to pay privately and have the whole place to yourself?

Goodie bags were seriously lacking for the price........

All in all, great ride, great riders, great weather - hey, I thought it was tremendous cycling wise.

Wan't bad organisation......try a Mudman.

[jwagga]

By great event I meant the cycling part and it being my first one I can't realy compare

[Skott5]

Lebanon broke me ... Up and Down.

Didn't have my best day on a bike, so I felt it, and when my Garmin hit 60km my brain told my legs that it was all over and time to relax. Except there was still 3 kays to go. Why do they always do that ..

[Caerus]

Just looking through the race results and it looks like a lot of guys did not even start the race

[sage]

I guess they didn't want to buy the Mr Price timing chip for R50 ?

 

Or maybe the S and XS cycleshirts squeezed them too much..

[Bat-ass]

Km for km, i rekon this 60km route was harder then the privious 75km route?? You can see it in the leaders times aswell (dispite them being sent wrong).

always amazing singletrack, but the down hill after lebanon was hard on the body....

I'll be honost, i'm licking my wounds this morning!!!!

[Monark]

I got there early to register and move into my mates batch only to be told that we both had to start at the back... fail...

 

The single track was horribly conjested at the beginning but after 18km the field spread out... thank goodness.

 

I was riding with a first timer so we just had fun... lots of wooping/shouting/yelling in pleasure on the single track...

 

The *** part was not having anything to eat once the race ended. Spur and all of the other food stalls had closed.

 

wtf??

 

Oh well. Some single track was VERY slippery but it was a great test of one's skill or lack thereof.

 

Great course and what awesome climbs. Caroline's Climb MUST be the best climb in KZN mtb... thank goodness for the water point at the top!

[shova1]

Great morning out on a bike. Did the 40km & had a blast, the single track was simply awesome!

Thanks organisers, job well done.

[Monark]

Why was there only water and coke at the water points? and green bananas??

[pauloc]

Phenomenal course! The best single track in the world. Iron Maiden was the fastest flowing and most manicured single track I've ever ridden. Water bridge crossing was a first for me. Nice start to the 40km with a long open stretch of district road. Allowed people to get into their correct places before hitting the single track. Climbs were tough, but the reward was worth it!

 

Downsides - parking was a nightmare. I ended up parking miles away from the start tent. Getting to the starting batches was chaos. Whoever thought it'd be a good idea to make people walk through a crowded tent should be shot. I was running late for my start and had to mission to get through the crowds. And as for the shirts.... poor showing on the organizers part. I had a choice of S / XS so ended up getting my wife a nice Karkloof cycling shirt. As someone's said, they have our sizes on the ROAG DB, so why not prepare accordingly.

 

Anyways, those are all minor irritants in the greater scheme of things. What a race!

[tommy two shoes]

I was assuming that this years marathon course would be slightly easier than last year so did not train as hard. Man did I suffer! Otherwise I feel the course is a lot better than the previous years, its a real challenge with beautiful singletrack. The last 4-5ks where extremely difficult but should smooth out once more people ride it. Def back next year, just more prepared!

[Stretch]

gripes: parking was chaos;

In their defense - not being able to make use of the polo fields (having recently graded and planted) made things a little bit more difficult. Previous years, everyone would just park on the fields.

 

Mt kk was non-existent as a result of realising bust suspension bolt and seized bearings on my bike on the saturday - so i had a (very) relaxing 10km ride with my daughter - one of the rare occasions i will get to do that !

[Edgar]

I would describe it as the best single track that I could not ride and will not race again. Got punished for being a JHB rider and not having done a ROAG event before. Starting in F batch is not fun for me, Just hurry up and wait. This despite doing the National series that are also UCI events. Ended up finishing in the top 50 but with a lot more enemies then when I started. It is just very frustrating, and the guys that are holding up the Field did not ask to be seeded above guys that are faster so it is not as fun for them either having guys pushing past them. Parking and the start area seemed to be chaotic and that is a little thing they can work on.

 

The 60km course was unreal, just flipping fantastic. You cannot ask for more then that in a race. I will rather drive down for a weekend and ride it when it is not a race though. I felt the course was really well marked and marshalled.

 

The small things make the difference on how you vote with your feet though.