Sunday 1 November -- Ranelagh Ramble 100K - Audax Australia event
We started the new randonneuring season today with the Ranelagh Ramble 100K.
We rode this route two weeks ago as a test ride, in a howling gale, and yet still finished within the time limit. So a) I hoped that the wind would not be anywhere near as bad, and b) I had a small degree of confidence that we could finish within the time limit again.
Today was warm ... for a change. We started the ride at 9 am and the temp was already 19C/66F.
Up the main highway, that's uphill, and then a series of left turns to get us onto the backroads. We had three patches of gravel (several km long each) on the route, and hit the first one early in the ride. All was good until the rather steep descent. I'm not a confident descender at the best of times, but especially not on gravel. That was a very, very slow descent! But we were back onto pavement at the bottom and didn't hit the next gravel section until just before the first control. That one was OK because there wasn't much in the way of descending.
A comment about the gravel sections ... while they can be a bit of a pain for us road cyclists, they do help to reduce the amount of traffic, and slow the traffic a bit.
The ride organiser met us at the first control with bananas, lamingtons, and water. Very nice.
Then we were on our own for the next 70 km.
The lumpy route took us into the next town where we had a quick pitstop, and then up another main highway for about 10 km before turning off onto a quiet road running along the foreshore. That's quite a pretty road, and there we encountered our third patch of gravel.
Just before we reached the next control, the temperature hit its high for the day ... 28.4C. But we could see storm clouds gathering.
We stopped at the control, and each had a Coke Zero and ice cream bar while enjoying the few drops of rain those storm clouds tried to produce. And then we were off again for the last leg of the journey.
That leg starts with a fairly steady climb for about 5 km, and then a series of descents and smaller hills back into the start/finish location. After that 5 km climb, it is actually a reasonably quick run into town. And while the storm clouds lurked, they didn't develop into anything.
We rolled up to the cafe with 45 minutes to spare!
It was a good ride ... one of my fastest in a long time.
Stats
Distance: 98.5 km
Rolling Time: 5 hours 16 min
(18.7 km/h average)
Total Time: 5 hours 58 min
(16.5 km/h average)
Climbing: 1174 metres (3851 feet)
Temp High: 28.4 C (83 F)
Wind: 15 km/h gusting to about 25 km/h, with a few little gusts up to about 40 km/h.
[HR][/HR]
The first two photos were taken on our recce two weeks ago ...
