Looking at really pushing my limits next year and entering a couple of really tough spotives.
Just tried entering the Wiggle Dragon Devil ride which is 300km but even though its next June its sold out.
Only done the Tour De Staveley & King of the Pennines rides, but loved them both.

Any inspiration or recommendations on ones to look out for, preferably in the Yorkshire area but could travel if its a special one.

Fred Whitton?

Bronte Sportive from Keighley doesn’t look too bad in figures, but I can assure you is pretty tough on the ground (I think only 3 riders got a ‘gold’ time this year)! For charity too and won’t sell out.
Etape du Dales is a great route, although not super hard.

Etape Cymru just gone on sale. I’ve got a place on both that and Devil Ride, must get some miles in!

Dartmoor Classic was a tough one this year just gone. I think its sold out already but loads of places change hands nearer the time.

If budget allows I’d go continental: not done it but I reckon L’Etape du Tour would be great.

I’ve done the Quebrantahuesos twice and I’d certainly recommend it – it crosses from Spain to France and back again, over some excellent pyrenean climbs, including a great 40km descent…

Bealach Mor?

if you want a 300km ride, do the mosstrooper audax.

6ish quid to enter, goes through northumberland, cumbria and scotland, before returning to northumberland. one of the best rides I’ve ever done.

Did Wiggle Tour of the Peak a couple of years ago. That’s plenty tough, particularly if you do the full route. That said, it’s not going to compete with a 300km ride! Not relevant to your question for 2014, but every four years there’s the London-Edinburgh-London ride. There and back in 5 days. That’s just under 300k a day IIRC. Got it pencilled in for 2017 but not sure that the knees are going to play ball..

http://www.londonedinburghlondon.com/event-info

the Bowland Badass may well not be running in 2014 but we’re thinking up another big one….

Audax UK. Lots of events, cheaper than sportives, and as tough as you like.

Bronte sportive is great. Very low key and a really tough ride. White Rose Classic is also good but very different (5 big climbs as opposed to 15ish short sharp ones on the Bronte)

Do you need an organised sportive? Tour de France route in 2 days? I did Dales bottom to top and back this year: Skipton > Malham > Halton Gill > Kettlewell > Leyburn > Reeth > Tan Hill > Hawes > Dent > Horton > Airton > Skipton. Supported by cafes and pubs. Lovely!

Get a road license and start racing that will push you a 3 hour road race

Looking at really pushing my limits next year and entering a couple of really tough spotives.
Just tried entering the Wiggle Dragon Devil ride which is 300km but even though its next June its sold out.

Could you not just do the route another time?

Bealach Mor isn’t that difficult, there’s a lot tougher.

http://www.hauteroute.org/

Ronde Van Calderdale

~75 miles of all the cobbled/rough/steep as climbs around Halifax. Lovely 🙂

Whenever I see the word tough sportive ,I think of the Dave Lloyd Mega.
Death by hills ,jeepers that was hard. 😯

Done a search but they seem to have binned it.

The Tour of Wessex is another big weekend

L’eroica

you want hard, try these:

la Marmotte (quite hard)
Maratona dles Dolomites (not quite as hard, but really good fun)
Cent Cols (ouch)
Gran Fondo Prosecco (no where near as hard as the others – but they dole out Prosecco like its going out of fashion, which can make it quite hard)

Replace the word “sportive” with the word “audax,” then you can describe it as tough

Woody’s got it – the Ronde van Calderdale really is a brutal ride. It might be the new kid on the block, but it’s already the Daddy!

Oban Sportive is quite interesting for its length, much more up and down than you might imagine. Or on another level altogether, the Snow Roads Audax is properly hard. But that’s already booked out for 2014.

Replace the word “sportive” with the word “Audax” then you can describe it as tough

Aye 😉

Some big boys made me sign up for the
snow roads

http://audax.lvis.org.uk

Bit of a trek for you but one of the best Audaxes out there and the 200k route is pretty tough though if you want to make it really tough, just do the 200k route then one of the 100k ones 🙂

And it has the best cake going

http://road.cc/content/blog/79546-190km-rule-five-and-22km-our-own-rules

(I’m part of the team that organises the event but look at the feedback/comments for some independent views)

Want a tough ride in Yorkshire ?

RVC profile – climbs are not necessarily massive, but there’s a lot of them…

And they mostly look like this…

If you can wait until August 2015, there’s the Paris-Brest-Paris. 1200km with maximum time limits of 80, 84 or 90 hours. Tough enough?

If you can wait until August 2015, there’s the Paris-Brest-Paris. 1200km with maximum time limits of 80, 84 or 90 hours. Tough enough?

But don’t forget that you need to have ridden a number of qualifying events to get in to the PBP.

But don’t forget that you need to have ridden a number of qualifying events to get in to the PBP

The Audax UK calendar of qualifying events is good source of ‘tough’ events in the UK for 2014
http://www.aukweb.net/events/?Category=BRM (need to adjust the date range, STW doesn’t like the URL format)

Another vote for RvC. Over 3000m of climbing, most of it cobbled and 20%+ gradients. Ride of the year (on or off road) for me. Bigger field next year and BC getting behind it promotion-wise. Terrific atmosphere too.

What is it about this place that means when someone asks for recommendations of X, loads of folk turn up and offer Y and Z instead? OP asked for sportives, not road races or audax, no matter how hard they might be.

So tough sportives… ‘tough’ will depend on your experience, but the daddy has to the be the Fred Whitton? 110 miles, about 13000 feet of ascent over 7 or 8 pretty monster passes. Some mega steep and some more gentle.

The Bealach Mor and Ullapool sportives are pretty good. First half of the Bealach is pretty each, but the Bealach itself is long and steep at the end, and the last 40 miles are full of lots of short and moderately steep hills that sap a lot of energy. Ullapool is similar, probably easier, but factor in the weather and it can be really hard.

Etape Du Dales always struck me as hard going too, never done it myself, but know a lot of folk who have and they all rated it as hard going.

+1 for snow roads. entries may be full but roads are there all year round. tho you may not want to do it this time of year….

OP asked for sportives, not road races or audax

What’s the difference between an Audax and a Sportive (apart from the entrance fee usually)? Genuine question, not trying to be difficult.

Tour of Flanders its about 270km with cobbles steep short hills and a 13 hour time limit .Thats on the Saturday ,then watch the pros do it properly on the Sunday

there can be a better chance of riding with a larger number of other riders if you pick a popular sportives. Audax rides don’t tend to have so many riders afaik

l`eroica is pretty tough as well 205km and over 3000m of climbing and white chalky gravel on about half of it ,and wine ,and boar stew and cake and did I mention wine and ……

The 112 mile route of this is good:
http://www.3countieschallenge.org/

I did it in it’s first year (2007) when it was a longer route of 125 miles and held in September but that led to a few people finishing in darkness after 10+hrs on the bike!

Brilliant ride back then, not sure if it’s the same organising team now. The time I did it was helped by fantastic weather.

OP asked for sportives, not road races or audax, no matter how hard they might be.

Cos Audax is betterer and cheaper !! and longer in a few cases usually with loads of food for about 7 quid.

OP asked for sportives, not road races or audax, no matter how hard they might be

Audax and Sportives are near enough the same thing with different names.

Audax and Sportives are near enough the same thing with different names.

Show me an Audax with 2000 folk doing it and I’ll agree. They may be similar, or better value for money, but they’re not the same.