Re: Dragon Ride

[Morganite]

When the Alarm went at 5AM, I was thinking what the hell had i let myself in for and what the day had in store. The weather forecast was terrible.

We arrived at Bridgend at 7.15 to find cars queuing to get in, we got ready to go and found the start line at 7.45. Weather was looking ok, in the waiting to start there was a lot of admiring of Rogers new bike and 3 pee stops later we got to the front of the line and at 9.07 we where off, and off at a pace we where, Roger the Road Runner was setting the pace and Andrew and myself followed along, we had lost Mark by now, by the time we got to the first feed station we were averaging over 20mph, the weather was great.

Out of the feed station which Roger did not want to stop at, the pace continued all the way to Port Talbot by the time we got past Port Talbot Roger was not to be seen he had got the jump on us though the traffic lights. The big climb was ahead of us of the Bwlch. Roger was up to his old tricks hit the climb hard and first and by the time the top comes hopefully will not have slipped back to far. I fell off the back of Andrew about halfway up. When i arrived at the feed station at the top, Roger and Andrew was still there, so i tagged on with them for another 10 miles until the next big climb. By now i knew the time spent so far with these guys was coming to an end.

So up the Rhigos on my own 60 miles in thinking so far so good, few climbs later into the next feed station 82 miles gone, then down though Neath one thing about a big sportive there is always a group not far away to tag on to, the Bwlch lay ahead this was going to the biggest challenge of the day 2nd time up the same climb 97 miles in to the event and a 8.5 mile climb ahead. And guess what the heavens open and down came the rain. Halfway up the climb I was looking at my time thinking this could be sub 8 hrs and then thinking it was not possible.

By the time i got over the top the rain had stopped and it was 15 mile run in, and some of it was steep downhill. The further on i got the more i could see sub 8hrs was possible. When i got back the time was 7hrs 48min which was better than i ever thought i could do, thinking all the training put in had paid off

Once back i found Roger and Andrew, Roger comment was he only finished 3 sec behind Andrew, i thought they had rode together to the end, but later i found out Andrew had dropped Roger on the Bwlch by 2 to 3 min and Roger was trying to gain it back on the downhill run home we would not heard the end of it if Roger had piped Andrew to the line.

We waited around then Mark came in he looked like he was in a daze.

There was a number of issues with the timing chips, with Andrew Rogers and Mark it show they did not attend the event, i can confirm they did attend, mine did not register the start.

Distance 122 miles provisional results

My time was 7hrs 48min Average 16.31mph

Andrew time was 7hrs 21min and 31 sec Average 16.92mph

Roger time was 7hrs 21 min and 34 sec Average 16.92mph

Mark time was 8hrs 10 min Average 15.10mph

All in all it was a great day and good company while it lasted cannot wait for next year.