2018 PPA CycloSportif

[LeoKnight]

With the exception of one CycloSportiff where the turnout was far greater than anticipated, registration was a painless exercise on the morning of the race at all the others so far this year.

what make this one a challenge is the fact that the previous one was moved, and people had the option to sign up for this one.  But will just go early and see how it goes

[LeoKnight]

THE SIMONSVLEI CYCLOSPORTIF ENTRIES CLOSE THURSDAY 

The next event in our Cyclosportif series, the Simonsvlei Cyclosportif (#5), takes place on Sunday 16 September. The Cyclosportif funrides are aimed at beginner and experienced cyclists alike, with a long route (around 100 km) and short route (around 40 km) per event. The easier short route is specifically aimed at beginners and younger riders. You are welcome to only one of the events in the series, or as many as you want. 

[Mamil]

RACE REPORT

 

I hardly slept Saturday night - a consequence of eating about 5 pieces of fillet more than I should have at a dinner party and topping it off with port. This is a recipe for middle aged insomnia. I also had the tail end of a cold which had kept me out of the DC team's Saturday ride. 

 

These are my excuses for being bleary eyed as I put the old wheel I use on the front of my Trek when transporting it to races to spare the good one from being damaged by the roof carrier. So bleary eyed in fact that the good wheel was waiting patiently for me exactly where I left it next to the front door. The old wheel isn't quite true and has a worn out Bontrager tyre which I just knew was a chink in the otherwise intimidating figure I cut as I lined up with the other Mamils in F-H batch.

 

One nice thing about having group F thrown in with G and H is that things are sure to be lot less fierce than when we have to throw in our lot with D and E and this proved to be the case. The pace as we began was sedate and my circus wheel wobbling only slightly, I found myself able to keep up. Billy Goat was there too and when he told me that he was going to take it easy because he'd been going to gym (what a stupid thing to do) I knew there was no way he would be able to contain himself and sure enough, just after the first left turn he went to the front and things picked up nicely.

 

If you've read any of my other reports you'll know that getting dropped is just another day at the office for me but I am thrilled to report that as we crested Hels Hoogte, with the exception of a small batch of fast looking young people who rode away from us, I was still in the top third of the group. This despite the uncomfortable and somewhat threatening interoceptive cues coming from the fillet and port in my mamilian belly.

 

The ambulance went past me and another guy and he pointed out that the paramedic was staring at us - perhaps she was just super keen and wanted one of us to go into cardiac arrest or maybe we just looked bad.

 

I did wonder how they'd handle the gastric emergency that threatened my smooth progress up the hill but in the end this wasn't necessary.

 

I picked up Billy Goat at the top of the hill and we and a guy from L to M that had ridden away from his group and a nice bunch of our FGH's bombed down the hill - a nice fast group that I was happy to wheel suck with and that actually caught the breakaway bunch on the drag up to Wellington where everything slowed down again. 

 

I was so excited. I'd held onto the group which, as if by telepathy was surging when I felt strong and resting when I needed a break.

 

This is it - I thought. I'm going to win this group. I started planning my tactics. I am very adept at using my weight advantage (98kg of pure South African beef) to move up the group on the downhills so that if the hill starts making me feel too bovine to be fast, I have some leeway and can hopefully hang on. I was imagining the thrill of my first ever bunch finish and I fancied my chances.

 

And then that old worn out Bontrager hit something very hard in the road - I don't know what it was. At first I thought I'd got away with it. but about 3 minutes later there was no doubt - a slow puncture.

 

Bleeding fingers from wrestling it off the rim - solo until Windmeul where a group of mixed droppees caught me - I sulked along with them to the end and came in 3:10 when 2:55 was definitely on the cards.

 

Going away next weekend to Gansbaai - two days of the funky fynbos - wooo hoo.

[lechatnoir]

<good bits snipped>

 

Going away next weekend to Gansbaai - two days of the funky fynbos - wooo hoo.

 

Always great to read your race reports. thanks for sharing

[Andrew_Smith]

Could not ask for a better way to spend my birthday!

 

Finished with a time of 3:09:11 according to the Strava Sportif segment.

 

Full gas from the start in the U-Z group. There was a super strong oke with a Trek kitted out with a dual-sided Stages power meter and he meant business!

 

Only managed to tag for a few kilometres after pulling the plug. I could not sustain the effort any longer.

 

We could not ask for better weather!

 

I tried to catch faster groups but the gap was just too big.

 

Probably rode 80% solo but nonetheless a great experience and I was very happy with my performance.

[DJTerblanche]

When looking at the results, I noticed this guy from U-Z group ending up with a 38km/h average. Normally I would have said this is a long distance riders who decided to do this short route but I recognized his name and he is a 21y old triathlete (with national colours). Anyways he must be super strong averaging 38km/h on this course. His time is 1 second faster than mine arrrrg.

Thor's hammer struck me at Windmeul and I was all alone the last 15km's, passed no one and no one passed me.

['Dale]

Urgh

Embattled with a gogga in the throat

Could feel I was missing a gear in my engine check yesterday.

 

Fizzled out like a cheap firecracker in a strung out paceline to Paarl and limped back to car at km 65.

 

Was a sweet day for racing.

Always lekka to see the peoples coming out to play with their bicycles.

The road marshalling seems very organized and on point this season. ????????

[billygoat0523]

@Mamil - Our group was really interesting today.  Pedestrian pace at the start, small breakaway group up Hels, which we caught later and then those random surges as we headed towards Wellington. 

 

I was trying to take it easy, but it felt very much like a Sunday group ride at the start.  Going up Hels I realised just how stupid my gym efforts were as I got an irritating cramp.  So I then had to take it easy for a bit.  at 20km to go i paid the price for my turns up front (one of those which Mamil peer pressured me into) and keeping up with the surges, so it was a solo ride to the finish. 

 

weirdly i finished only 6 minutes down from the first guy in the group which meant that it wasn't a bad day, after all.

[MDJ]

Good day out, warmer weather than last weekend at least! I would have thought we might have had a bigger turn out but it seems from my strava feed a lot of guys were training for DC or still in winter mode.

 

PPA is now pre-aggregating their letters into groups when they issue the race stickers i.e the sticker has a letter range v.s just one letter. I would assume they are trying to prevent the arguing/pleading of people wanting to sneak into a higher numbered batch - but on the other hand not knowing how many people would turn up for a specific seeding meant my F-H group was actually quite small, 29 in all.

 

The start pace in F-H was quite slow at the start as Mamil mentioned, I was in the second bunch of the group getting over Hels and I guess I should have pushed a bit more on the climb. The downhill into pniel was fast, but from there the pace was slow enough to frustrate me into a lot of long pulls at the front - in the back of your mind you know this is never a good idea, but hey its fun ride . My mini-group of 8 split over the last 10kms and I was taking strains only able to stick with the last two guys to cross the line in 3:04.

[Johnny82]

Another lekker day out. I was one of the marshals riding in the F-H group, ended up with a time 4mins slower than the previous time we did the route in April. All in all good fun and a nice ride, but also found that the group was taking it slow in some sections. After the two Sanlam guys caught us and took the front it picked up quite a bit and after the 10km to go flag you could see some guys making breaks just to be caught up again before the line. Quite happy with my 2:52. The A-B bunch were flying, 2:26 winning time 

 

Also interesting to see the number of foreigners riding in the race, the first two ladies were dropped from the C-E group and ended up with us and they were definitely not locals.

[Karman de Lange]

 

Good day out, warmer weather than last weekend at least! I would have thought we might have had a bigger turn out but it seems from my strava feed a lot of guys were training for DC or still in winter mode.

 

PPA is now pre-aggregating their letters into groups when they issue the race stickers i.e the sticker has a letter range v.s just one letter. I would assume they are trying to prevent the arguing/pleading of people wanting to sneak into a higher numbered batch - but on the other hand not knowing how many people would turn up for a specific seeding meant my F-H group was actually quite small, 29 in all.

 

The start pace in F-H was quite slow at the start as Mamil mentioned, I was in the second bunch of the group getting over Hels and I guess I should have pushed a bit more on the climb. The downhill into pniel was fast, but from there the pace was slow enough to frustrate me into a lot of long pulls at the front - in the back of your mind you know this is never a good idea, but hey its fun ride . My mini-group of 8 split over the last 10kms and I was taking strains only able to stick with the last two guys to cross the line in 3:04.

 

 

Seriously don't understand why you still in f-h group looking at the power you were producing on Sunday,(#stravastalker) you will easily keep up with c-d bunch. (Same power as me and you are definitley few pounds lighter than me) …. holding thumbs your seeding will improve this year!

[OneLove]

When looking at the results, I noticed this guy from U-Z group ending up with a 38km/h average. Normally I would have said this is a long distance riders who decided to do this short route but I recognized his name and he is a 21y old triathlete (with national colours). Anyways he must be super strong averaging 38km/h on this course. His time is 1 second faster than mine arrrrg.

Thor's hammer struck me at Windmeul and I was all alone the last 15km's, passed no one and no one passed me.

He ended up with us in C-E, I thought he snuck into the group at the start line at first. Must of been a serious effort to catch us or we were just slow lol

[Rouxenator]

The guys coming up Helshoogte as I rode out of Tokara looked pretty tired, then again it was 9:40 by that time so they were probably from the last batches. Did you guys experience any delays at Boschendal?

[LeoKnight]

The guys coming up Helshoogte as I rode out of Tokara looked pretty tired, then again it was 9:40 by that time so they were probably from the last batches. Did you guys experience any delays at Boschendal?

 

Think we went through there before that, but did think it would be interesting to see who would stop for whom.  The PPA riders vs the Fedhealth riders, roadies vs mtbers

[MDJ]

Seriously don't understand why you still in f-h group looking at the power you were producing on Sunday,(#stravastalker) you will easily keep up with c-d bunch. (Same power as me and you are definitley few pounds lighter than me) …. holding thumbs your seeding will improve this year!

 

Thanks man, your progress up the ranks has been inspiring!

 

I'm 86 kgs so not exactly top tube material . I'm enjoying the riding though - looking forward to the summer conditions and year-end holidays!

[DJTerblanche]

Urgh

Embattled with a gogga in the throat

Could feel I was missing a gear in my engine check yesterday.

 

Fizzled out like a cheap firecracker in a strung out paceline to Paarl and limped back to car at km 65.

 

That strung out paceline seriously hurteted me and blew all my matches there which is why I dropped from bunch at Windmeule.

 

We were about 7 guys chasing the front bunch after helz (Probably around 20 big then) and a little before the left turn to Paarl (unto the R301) a bigger group  (12 - 15 riders I guess) caught us and at first the pace was not too fast but the closer we got to Paarl the harder we rode. I checked the Strava data and saw that we averaged 45km/h from the bottom of Helshoogte to Paarl where we finally caught up with the front group.

 

On that little drag before you turn left in Wellington, I knew my legs wouldn't last much longer. I was actually in a great position on those Windmeul rollers but not too long after MC Dreyer (I think) attacked, my legs shut down.