Sellaronda Hero

Last year October the entries for this 'fabulous' race opened. Zane & Dave had done this race before and it came highly recommended. Christiaan was very keen to do it and I obviously didn't want to miss out. I consulted Zane about the toughness of the race and he made it clear that it was no tea & cake party. I convinced myself that it couldn't be that bad, so decided I am accepting the challenge and waited till 23:00 for the entries to open. I have mentioned *FOMO in previous posts! Well FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) always has a snowball effect... by lunch time the next day, 6 of us were already signed up! 

 

June 21st, 10 riders and a support crew of 3 (wags - wives & girlfriend) descended onto Wolkenstein, Italian Dolomites for the toughest mountain bike race.

The night before the race, Zelda, Kerryn, Pokkeltjie, Zane, Milli, Willem, Christiaan, Jason, TC & Albert
 



Making new friends on the start line

Liezl and I entered the 62km with 3300m ascent. The boys entered the 84km with 4300m of climbing. We were all in for a very long day in the saddle.

The route went immediately out of town and after 1km we were straight into the first climb of the day. I have never seen anything like it. A long 7km climb with people in front and behind you as far as the eyes can see. 

Zane catching up with us already

I hate the start of a race. So many people fighting for position, riding outside their comfort zones, taking risks ie almost riding into you. I decided that I am going to ride at my 'comfortable' pace and hoped that the field will thin out eventually.

Looking back to Val Gardena where we started the climb

It was quite funny to see men falling over on an uphill because they are just too excited. ;) My main aim was not to fall over or get into an unworthy crash like this. Somehow these guys also left their manners at home, they cut in front of you etc. I followed the same principle as in the Argus, pick a side of the road and stay on that side. I still expected any man to be stronger than me so in my head I thought I can't overtake them, well I soon learnt otherwise and started saying passing in the middle left or right wherever the opportunity arose.
 

Heavily pregnant Zelda pumping Liezl's tyre

At the top of the first hill, Kerryn, Zelda an Milli was waiting on us. They took the gondola up and could actually see us from the gondola. It was such an encouragement to see them there. Liezl waited at the top for me and as soon as we were about to descend we realised she had a puncture. We quickly fixed it, the girls helped her to pump the tyre as they were so cold and wanted to heat up. 

We started our first downhill, this was awesome single track, bermy etc. I realised quickly that by being polite to not damage the male egos in front of me I will be pushing my bike on single track. I couldn't stand the thought of having had to work so hard to get to the top of the mountain and not being able to enjoy the single track as reward. 

On one of these tight berms a guy was going a bit too fast and ended coming off his bike running down the bank of the berm whilst his bike was at the top of the bend. It was funny to see and I burst out laughing, thankfully he also saw the humour of the situation. 

In all honesty the 1st water point is a bit of blur to me. We refilled, got Liezl's back tyre pumped up & carried on riding onto the second climb of the day. 

We passed a tiny town called St Tarina, I was quite touched, nothing has ever been named after me before. I was also embarrassed so didn't take photo evidence. 

The 2nd climb consisted of the connection of shorter climbs that all made up climb 2. 

I realised that we were running out of time to make the cut off time at Arabba, but there was nothing that we could do about it as we were riding as fast as we could.







Arriving at Arabba was a scene of devastation, the officials waiting with their clippers, clipping our timing boards, a sea of empty water bottle & lots of disappointed people.

 

Place of devastation: Arabba

Liezl's words to me were: "I feel defeated." TC: "No we can carry on & finish it, we just won't get a time." Unfortunately we stood around a little bit too long & then got into deliberations of whether we should go back with the shuttle or complete the race.

TC's Question: "What would you be able to cope with tomorrow? We didn't complete or we complete the race, but don't get a finish time?"
Liezl's Answer: "Well we were going to go the distance anyway, we should finish the ride."

So we got back onto our bikes for about 30 seconds when we saw the start of the next climb, talked more, but eventually started going onto climb 3!

Climb 3 wasn't that bad a lot of it was actually on the road & we were able to get into a nice rhythm before going off road again. I almost got taken out by a motorbike that I didn't see, Pokkeltjie had such a freight and gave me a lecture for not looking, but I did look - I promise!

Christiaan catching up with us

As we were going up the tar road I could see a line of 'ants' (other riders) pushing there bikes. I knew we were going to go up & join them & were dreading the thought of pushing my bike as I could see that it was rideable singletrack.

Our route did join up with the longer version again. It wasn't long before Christiaan came past & said that he was stuck behind people and had to walk the whole of their 3rd climb. Needless to say he wasn't very happy about that.

At the 3rd water point I was properly 'gatvol' translated to fed-up to say the least & just wanted to sit down on a normal chair & not my bike. There was a hotel/bar close by where we went for a loo stop & sit down for more deliberations. We met some guys from Norway & Belgium who missed the cut off & were not happy about that. Liezl took a sip of their beer before we took on our 4th & final climb.

One of the hard realisations about this race is that, it isn't just a hill that you can quickly do in 15 minutes, you KNOW that it will take you at least another hour to get to the top...

On hill 3 we were riding with a guy who has tried to do this race for the 3rd time, he was determined to complete it this year even if he doesn't get the time. We past him & then suddenly at the bottom of climb 4 there he was again. Pokkels & I were confused because he didn't come past us on the single track. When we asked him, he said that he stayed on the tar road instead of going via the single track. He told us that even if we pushed our bikes it will take us only an hour to get to the top. So we started the 4th & final climb together. The gradient was often too steep to ride, so we pushed & we actually started chatting for the first time during the race. We weren't cross with each other we were just a little bit too far from each other. Eventually the altitude combined with fatigue made us stop talking as it took too much energy. We took some photos and we also knew that we are 'almost' home.



The FINAL CLIMB and just look at that view!

At the top of this climb we were close to Passo Sella which we rode the day before. We bumped into some Germans & Pokkeltjie had the chance to chat with them for a little bit. We then got a little confused as to where the route was & could see on the profile that there was still a little bit of a kick before it was downhill to the finish line. We faffed a little searching for the route, but eventually got going.

Because we lost our time chips the others couldn't follow us anymore so I text Kerryn to say we were on our way down & that it would be nice if they can be at the finish line. At that point emotion came over me as I realised I was about to finish the longest ride of my life on the longest day of the year. Sniffling along we started descending. Man it felt good, you wanted to go fast, but then you also don't want to get injured or do something stupid so close to the finish.

Unfortunately Liezl had another puncture & we quickly worked together to fix it before we carried on. The single track was pretty awesome, but all I wanted was to be at the finish & see the rest of my friends.

We made it! Kerryn, Zelda, Milli, Zane, Albert & Jason were all waiting for us! Wow! That was a long amazing day.

We waited for Willem to come in before we took some final photos & went back to the hotel to clean up before going out for a celebratory dinner!

We made it!
Jason, Zane, TC, Pokkeltjie, Albert & Willem

Facts: 

1. Any man wearing white tights shouldn't be on a MTB

2. Any man in white tights on a MTB doesn't know how to ride single track
3. There is no flats! You are either going to ride up or ride down in this race.

Things that I am very grateful for:

1. We had NO crashes

2. Neither of us hit 'the wall'  or bonked (No it isn't what you are thinking... It is when you run out of energy and hit 'the wall'. The wall being where body and mind decides they can't do this anymore) 

3. Fresh ice cold Italian water

4. I expected to throw at least one tantrum about the terrain etc, but that thankfully didn't happen!

Highlights: 

1. Eating a white flesh nectarine in Riva del Garda

2. Buying a new set of earrings

3. Swimming in Lake Garda

4. Our last meal, seafood spaghetti
(note none of these were actually cycling related - OOPS)

Quote of the weekend:
TC: "Are we at altitude?"

I would highly recommend this race as it is just so beautiful, Val Gardena is geared for cyclists and they welcome you with open arms. I would love to do it again. I will adjust my training though. I will start off with 4 days of road riding for some base training, I'll do hill reps till it comes out of my ears & ride as often as I can. Physically I couldn't train more than I did for this race as life still goes on & training for a race like this is time demanding & steals a lot of energy from other things, so I would have to think carefully before taking something like this on again, but I would definitely do it again. The mental strength and potentially muscle memory that I've gained from this race will go a long way in the future. It was great to train for this race with friends & we had so much fun during training & going away together.

The B&B we stayed in was just perfect, our hostess were a mom away from home. Not in our space, but just so incredibly helpful & knowledgeable of the area. She arranged an emergency dentist appointment for me within 2 minutes after I broke a tooth after biting through a breadroll. http://www.garni-crepaz.com/Default.aspx?lang=en

Saying goodbye to Raphaela our lovely sweet host

*TC's Definition of FOMO: That feeling that if you don't participate the disappointment will be too big to deal with OR scared that anybody else is going to have more fun than you.

Sella Ronda Bike Day - this was the cycling highlight of our trip to me. The Italians close the roads that form a circular route around the Sella mountains on the day after the race and anyone & everyone can ride this. Everybody rides in the same direction at their own pace. The four of us rode up to Passo Sella where we sat in the sun for hours whilst drinking beer before we went back down into down with the final downhill of the race.

Tessa, Lizeli, myself & Pokkeltjie chilling in the sun - Passo Sella



Swimming in Riva del Garda

Our most delicious final meal & wearing my new earrings. :)