So I'm
back home, some 70 or so miles away from Brands Hatch down in Kent which for today’s
event acted as its start and finish.
My day got off to a relatively poor start with me having forgotten to set my
alarm which luckily became superseded by my 13 month old and a well-timed coughing
fit from down the hallway.
Breakfasted,
changed and ready to get going, the second annoyance of the day greeted me upon
getting outside to find my car encrusted with a firm and as it turned out, an
almost immovable layer of ice.
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| Above: Ice Anyone? |
With that
remedied I set off into the dawn with the sun popping out into an almost clear
blue sky. The drive was easy and upon arrival
at Brands Hatch I parked, walked over to the registration tend and was back out
again within 5 or so minuets.
Good job I
thought, most Sportives I’ve ridden require at least half hour of queuing
before the off. Not so here so a big
congratulations to the organisers for this.
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| Above: Brands Hatch in the Morning Sun |
8 Mins in
and were lost already?
Come my allotted
start time I joined 50 or so other people and headed out onto the road. Sadly within just a few minutes, well 8 if we
are counting, our little group of 5 that had formed after an initial kick out
from the line came across perhaps 7 or 8 others standing beside a cross-road. They flagged us down and one of
the riders, a member of one of the local clubs, indicated we had taken a wrong
turn and that we had better follow him and his group to get back onto the
route.
OK I
thought, these things happen. Perhaps we
all missed the sign or worse, it had been removed (I gather from other riders that indeed the sign we missed was there.... just that it was hard to see). In any case we followed this said Gentleman for
15 or perhaps 20 minutes before seemingly re-joining the rest of the riders. Undeterred we cracked on into the sunshine.
Really,
we missed another turn?
An hour
or so in and once more it became quite clear we were off the course. Not lost exactly but not on same route as we
should have been. The simple clue of a
nasty little cross road with no marshal and heavy heavy traffic was more than enough evidence.
So again, myself and the little group of
people I was with decided to take a left and head back towards where we thought
the route should be and within 20 or so mins we had somehow found our way back amongst
other riders with similar numbers on their bars as our own.
Yes we
were. Some two and half hours into the
ride and once more we were off route. At
this point I decided to bail.
I roughly
knew I was 20 or so miles away from where Mrs T's family lives and decided to
head to theirs for a cup of tea and a lift back to Brands Hatch. Today was, and hopefully will remain, my
first and only DNF from a Sportive.
So what
went wrong?
I really don’t
know. I don’t for one moment think this
was due to an organisational error but due to me and the group I rode with
missing the signage. That said, we were
all surprised to have missed the signage what with them being nice and large
and bright and yellow.
Of course, we all had the route guide although I'd argue without local knowledge and or checking off each direction and route note in turn these guides are somewhat hard to follow. Perhaps others have more of a natural sense of direction than me and my fellow lost riders.
Anyway,
for the most part I enjoyed the ride. I
felt really strong and put out some really good numbers showing the work I’ve
done over the winter has clearly worked.
Would I
ride this Sportive again? Perhaps although I’ll
need a little convincing......
My congratulations
to everyone who got round.
