Brilliant event. Cracking route, you know the climbs are tough when your arms hurt as much as your legs from yanking on the bars. Impressed they’d cleared all the roads, the views over the moors from the top of Oxenhope were spectacular, and in places the remains of the roadside drifts were still shoulder high. Terrific atmosphere on the road, lots of encouragement between fellow riders and with a field limited to 100 you couldn’t blame anyone else for stalling. We were on elastic with a large group from Alba Rosa (new Leeds based club) who’ve challenged all the preconceptions I had about roadie clubs, top bunch of guys with a lot of humour and really supportive of others.
Average speeds were shocking because when you weren’t climbing 20% grades you were descending them, they’d designed a route with almost no flats in it.
Chapeau to all who finished it. All our riding mates mtb’ed the dry south downs this weekend, I doubt they had more fun than we did. Probably hurt less, mind.