VeloNomad Readers Trip Reports #2 – Steve M, John H, Hannah & Dave N, Arabella, Will Buchan
Steve M, UK
Steve M was one of the hardy individuals who did both Etapes. Pretty good effort considering the weather in Etape 2.
Check out his Etape stories here and here.
John Hodgart
John sent me an awesome email. I love getting emails like this. A new-found love of cycling, raising money and back again next year! Brilliant.
Keep up the good work, Have a brilliant day today in the Alps,
John
Hannah and Dave N
Dave and Hannah trekked through Europe racking up the miles. Stelvio – jealous!
The short version is…it took Dave about 5hrs to finish. It took me about 7+hrs. I was part of the group that got neutralized. I was fairly close to the front which equaled cold and noodle legs. Alpe D'Huez pretty much sucked.
Here is our link to our blog; we have been in Europe since the end of June. Since Etape we have had some epic days…such as the Gavia and Stelvio and AdH again.
Keep the post coming… it may tempt us to come back.
Cheers and best of luck to you.
Hannah & David Neubeck
Arabella
Great report and well done on your time….it took us some what longer!! We were doing really well till we got the bottom of Alpe d'Huez..and then it took a very long time…we finished in 8hrs 19 but I'm just over the moon that we finished.
You probably won't be interested at all but if you are you can have a little look at my blog; I only started cycling 8 months ago so this was my big challenge!! Loved all your emails so thank you!
Will Buchan
Will had a good suggestion for an addition to my motivational tips for climbing.
I was one of Sunday’s Etapers. I’m afraid the camera didn’t make it out of its pocket as everything was soaked and it was the last thing on my list! You may have heard/read that the conditions were pretty horrendous (particularly first 2/3 hours depending on how quick you were) and a good 50-60% bailed out. Now they were regretting the leg shaving…..! At one point the group couldn’t have been doing much more than 10mph on the flat because on the headwind and driving rain, and everyone was completely strung out along the road.
It was my First Etape though and really enjoyed the experience (esp. once the weather cheered up later on). The crowds were amazing despite the rain. I haven’t got much to compare it to sportive-wise but didn’t think the hills were actually that bad. Final reading of 12,738ft of climbing on my Garmin. I think things maxed out at 14% for a couple of short 300-400m stretches but I can’t remember anything consistent above 9 or so. I do have the added advantage of being 26, 68 kg (albeit on a steel bike) and riding a compact, so I picked up 50-100+ places on most of the climbs. Add counting the number of people you’ve passed to your motivational tips for those designed to climb! That really got the legs going. Placed 973 in 9hr 35 out of roughly 1900 finishers and 4100 starters I think.
Anyway really enjoyed reading your stuff (including the guide) and it certainly spurred me on with the training and preparation which might have fallen by the wayside (even if I did manage to leave my shorts hanging on the washing wrack at home in spite of your packing list – a nervous moment when I discovered this the night before the race but I was saved by our rep with a far better pair than the ones I should have remembered!).
Back again next year potentially. One idea with some buddies is to make it the last day of a 4 day consecutive TDF route, if it can work.
Anyway thanks again for all the interesting reading.
Will
p.s. Hammer Enduralytes, Hammer sustained energy, Torq gel+caffeine combo really did the trick.
These are awesome stories, thanks guys and girls for sending them in!
Got Your Own Etape, TDF or Cycling Story or Report?
Then email me the details and I'll check it out!
Support VeloNomad
A significant amount of time and effort goes into these reviews, all with the aim of helping you. As lots of readers say, I give way too much information away for nothing, and it really does take a lot of time and effort (but I do love doing it!).
If you found the site useful, and you didn’t need a SIM card or ebook, I’d really appreciate it if you dropped something in the Paypal tip jar below. Or if you’re buying something online, use one of the affiliate links below the Paypal button.
Paypal tip jar (choose your own amount)
These affiliate links provide me a small commission (2-4%) on each sale and they don’t cost you a cent extra.