An absolute scorcher of a day for our top sportive the Evans 'King Of The Down's '.
This is a really hard route of 53 miles with 5 major climbs. We stayed together for a little way but it wasn't long before myself and Chris were dropped by the others. I thought I would be able to drop Chris and ride on my own in no mans land but as it happened Chris was riding strongly and even without clip ons Chris and I were an even match and stayed together throughout the whole ride. Malcolm was the strongest rider and had talked about doing the 110 mile route before the start (although at the end he was glad just to do the 56 miler). John was riding really well and got the end ahead of Paul K who was suffering a little with the heat. For every up there is a down and some of the descents were a bit hairy with narrow gravelly roads. We heard later that one rider had lost it on a decent and hit the ground face first (ouch!), ending up being taken to hospital in an ambulance. I was dreading the hill called Combe Bottom but in the end it was Ranmore Common hill that proved to be the hardest. Although it was almost as expensive to enter as last weeks Eastbourne sportive we all thought it was better value for money with porridge and hot drinks at the start and pasta and hot drinks at the end. The goody bad was also pretty good with a cap, 5 energy powders/gels and a very useful wide necked water bottle. We will definitely be back next year.
S.C
53 miles 14.9 Av
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