MUCKERS NOVEMBER CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL RACE! 30/11/23
ROUVY Route Used : Sani Gravel Climb | Tour of South Africa | 4.96 miles | 3021ft climbing
100 Registered | 70 Starters | 58 Finishers | 12 DNF | 30 DNS
Remembering back to when we needed to sort a route out for the last race in the championship, we had no more challenge routes left so we went with this classic, just for the fun of it! Then ROUVY decide to release hill climb challenge after hill climb challenge so this ended up being perfect practice for them, well that’s the story I’m going with anyway……
we’d love to know what peoples thoughts were when they loaded up this route and them saw it was basically a profile of red and orange!?? If this was a surprise to you, please let us know in the comments!!??
Top 7 all check out but how did you all do this in under 40 mins! well done to “Alieno79” who gets the gold, “luca_ma” the silver and “magayol” getting bronze, but is the highest placed smart trainer rider! “breers33” thankfully gets to the end this week without glitching out in a very impressive 4th, with Tuesdays winner “RuddBaars” getting 5th here, “karel_sousek” in 6th and “FlyingSkywalker” getting 7th.
“Stefan_Smit” keeps his good run going with 8th, with “Rocket996” not too far behind in 9th, “lrollin” in 10th then Top Mucker “batbuilder” getting a strong 11th. “hj2010 claims 12th, “neminenlaedere” 13th and “tranberg” in a respectable 14th. 15th place is awarded to “leonelcunha”, who finishes just 16 seconds in front of “boogbill70” in 16th then “Oliver.D” comes next in a strong 17th.
2 Muckers Worldwide Team Riders next with “Gazinho” in 18th and “Kylofski” in 19th. Final mention goes to Top Woman Rider “HeikeHardt” with a superb ride to the 20th place and who mentioned a monkey on the route which i never saw so I’m gonna have to do this again now!! 😁
Well done to you all! And everyone else who completed this! Not everyone has the option to change gear sets etc etc so for those that did this on your normal road bike set up, massive respect! Final standings will be published tomorrow evening after i get the results through for the 2 late versions of this race.
Cheers everyone!
| HR? | # | Cat. | User | Points | Team | Distance | Time |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Y | 1 | Men |  Alieno79 | 245 | Forno Pioppi | 4.959 mi | 0:35:02.3 |
| Y | 2 | Men | luca_ma | 242 | +0 ft | + 0:01:02.3 | |
| Y | 3 | Men |  magayol | 239 | +0 ft | + 0:01:08.3 | |
| Y | 4 | Men |  breers33 | 237 | Protech Velo | +0 ft | + 0:01:52.9 |
| Y | 5 | Men |  RuudBaars | 235 | Rouvy Achterhoek (NL) | +0 ft | + 0:02:53.1 |
| Y | 6 | Men |  karel_sousek | 230 | CK Vinohradské Šlapky | +0 ft | + 0:03:37.2 |
| Y | 7 | Men |  FlyingSkywalker | 227 | +0 ft | + 0:04:23.3 | |
| N | – | Men | -Kulis | +0 ft | + 0:04:55.4 | ||
| Y | 8 | Men | Stefan_Smit | 224 | +0 ft | + 0:06:01.2 | |
| Y | 9 | Men | Rocket996 | 222 | Moon Riders | +0 ft | + 0:06:11.6 |
| Y | 10 | Men |  lrollin | 220 | +0 ft | + 0:06:42.9 | |
| Y | 11 | Men | batbuilder | 215 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:07:12.3 |
| N | – | Men | nigelhardy | www.matthias-heil.co.uk/rvy_racing | +0 ft | + 0:07:48.1 | |
| Y | 12 | Men |  hj2010 | 211 | +0 ft | + 0:08:43.6 | |
| Y | 13 | Men | neminemlaedere | 209 | +0 ft | + 0:08:58.1 | |
| Y | 14 | Men | tranberg | 207 | CK GOG | +0 ft | + 0:09:18.4 |
| N | – | Men | giorgiotriboldi | B.B TEAM | +0 ft | + 0:09:49.8 | |
| Y | 15 | Men |  leonelcunha | 205 | ZARCO | +0 ft | + 0:10:00.3 |
| Y | 16 | Men | boogybill70 | 200 | +0 ft | + 0:10:16.8 | |
| Y | 17 | Men |  Oliver.D | 197 | Explorer | +0 ft | + 0:10:43.8 |
| Y | 18 | Men | Gazinho | 194 | Muckers Worldwide/Farnham R/C | +0 ft | + 0:11:00.9 |
| Y | 19 | Men | kylofski | 192 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:11:18.2 |
| Y | 20 | Women | HeikeHardt | 190 | +0 ft | + 0:11:56.2 | |
| Y | 21 | Men | Baggers69 | 185 | TCC | +0 ft | + 0:12:37.9 |
| Y | 22 | Men |  macko | 182 | rvy_racing, Qlarze | +0 ft | + 0:12:51.3 |
| Y | 23 | Men | Grochang | 179 | Muckers Worldwide & Barecykling | +0 ft | + 0:13:12.9 |
| Y | 24 | Men | m-forby | 177 | +0 ft | + 0:13:17.2 | |
| Y | 25 | Men | nielsbrynnum | 175 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:13:17.5 |
| Y | 26 | Men |  Michelleke | 170 | +0 ft | + 0:14:17.2 | |
| Y | 27 | Men |  tomlerieger | 167 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:14:32.1 |
| Y | 28 | Men |  HalAir | 164 | M49 | +0 ft | + 0:14:41.5 |
| Y | 29 | Men | SwissChris69 | 162 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:15:35.2 |
| Y | 30 | Men | MatthiasHeil | 160 | www.matthias-heil.co.uk/rvy_racing | +0 ft | + 0:15:58.5 |
| N | – | Men | flyger | +0 ft | + 0:16:14.2 | ||
| Y | 31 | Men | Andy_UP | 155 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:16:28.6 |
| N | – | Men | henrikhahn | +0 ft | + 0:17:40.9 | ||
| Y | 32 | Men | Rens_Piccavet | 152 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:17:50.2 |
| Y | 33 | Men | jakob_mt | 149 | CK GOG | +0 ft | + 0:17:51.1 |
| Y | 34 | Men | chorus | 147 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:18:01.5 |
| Y | 35 | Men |  rouvy1bryon | 145 | Muckers world wide | +0 ft | + 0:18:24.4 |
| Y | 36 | Men | mareckii | 140 | VO2max MTB Team | +0 ft | + 0:18:30.7 |
| Y | 37 | Men | Grep. | 137 | +0 ft | + 0:18:31.7 | |
| Y | 38 | Men |  Slyfly | 134 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:19:25.3 |
| Y | 39 | Men | Squalo_delle_Alpi | 132 | Muckers Worldwide & Shark Attack | +0 ft | + 0:20:36.1 |
| N | – | Men | tomekvo2maxMTBTeam | VO2max MTB Team | +0 ft | + 0:21:18.6 | |
| Y | 40 | Men | Chak | 130 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:22:09.4 |
| Y | 41 | Men | S.Ludford | 125 | Muckers Worldwide/Farnham R/C | +0 ft | + 0:22:38.3 |
| Y | 42 | Men | Mucker1974 | 122 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:22:52.3 |
| Y | 43 | Women | SillySilNL | 119 | Muckers Worldwide & de Gastjes | +0 ft | + 0:23:15.4 |
| Y | 44 | Men | Stefan793 | 117 | +0 ft | + 0:23:45.9 | |
| 51 | Men | skripnit | 95 | +0 ft | + 0:24:12.3 | ||
| 52 | Men | gunnera | 94 | Farnham Road Club | +0 ft | + 0:24:30.2 | |
| 53 | Women |  ommegangster | 93 | +0 ft | + 0:25:57.3 | ||
| 54 | Men | Mick_Michel | 92 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:28:00.3 | |
| 55 | Men | NicklasMF | 91 | +0 ft | + 0:29:34.2 | ||
| 56 | Men | jeff65 | 90 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:36:33.9 | |
| 57 | Men | DolphWader | 89 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:38:48.3 | |
| 58 | Men | stelviobound | 88 | Muckers Worldwide | +0 ft | + 0:43:31.2 | |
| 59 | Men | mgk1971 | 12 | Muckers Worldwide | – | ||
| 60 | Men | yayarecki | 11 | – | |||
| 61 | Men | BTK_jiri70_cz | 10 | BTK Eurobike Praha | – | ||
| 62 | Men | hardX | 9 | – | |||
| 63 | Men | tabuyo | 8 | OnceOnce | – | ||
| 64 | Men | M.Glogowski | 7 | Kameleon – nadruki na odzieży | – | ||
| 65 | Men | MARK_J | 6 | Wrexham Roads Club | – | ||
| 66 | Men | Mupel | 5 | – | |||
| 67 | Men |  grajski | 4 | – | |||
| 68 | Men | maciekm | 3 | – | |||
| 69 | Men | Wilier7441 | 2 | aSTIFTERbau RACINGteam | – | ||
| 70 | Men | MartinP76 | 1 | – |
So does a race format actually make you do a route faster than a solo/just ride effort? I’ve done this route 3 times in the past and got faster and faster with every effort but was still over a minute away from getting under the hour mark! Well, i can say the race format really does bring that extra out of you as I just “raced” up here in 57mins and 54 seconds!! over 3 whole minutes faster than my previous best!!
But i didnt actually race up here tonight, instead i worked out i needed to try and stay at 3.0w/kg and average 5mph or more to achieve my goal. so with the stats screen on my iphone, and the live stream on the tv, i set off and i was doing very well indeed, but held myself back as i knew the top part was the part to worry about. And it was! after 40 mins of this pace, you hit the really steep parts and you either bonk or you dig into the reserves. this time i had a little in reserve so was able to keep close to3.0 and got it over the line with minutes to spare…. and a top 50 position so i get good points for this last race in the championship!
How hard could it be to climb 8K?
I spoke with Nielsbrynnum, some days before and just up the race, who warned me about the steep climbs, and how hard it would be for those with trainers who could take 20 and 24%. 🚵🏻🥵 But still I kept saying it’s just a climb like any other mountain you have conger on Rouvy🙈 But no way, this was maybe the hardest climb I’ve ever experienced🤮 It didn’t help I dropped the chain twice in the beginning, but this was no excuse for not fighting back for a good position. I just couldn’t do the job today and wanted to quit. But thanks to my two strong Danish patriots, m-forby and Nielsbrynnum, who carried me all the way to the top, I managed to keep going🙏 Got number 26 unofficial and fingers crossed for staying on the podium😬 lrolling and rocket996 did well today, and might take the podium from me, so a well deserved applause to your both, for your big effort👏
I’m m not a climber, so my intention was to just finish this ride so I could finally collect my Muckers jersey 😎. Staying at 2.8 W/kg and in Z5 I saw some riders drop out and all of a sudden I was in the top 50 😳 and I saw Neil Rushby a few riders in front of me. He told me to let him win, or I wouldn’t get the Muckers jersey 🫣, but maybe I could give him a scare 👻. New tactic: no Z7 and shift to a smaller blade every 10 m in height to go 3.5 W/kg. Then shift back and get HR back to low Z6. I gained slowly on Neil and Steven Ludford. All of a sudden some ‘dropouts’ came back. Chorus passed me and Chak appeared in front of Neil and Steven, dropping me another place. Desperately wanted to stay at place 49 I entered Z7. Forget about Neil and Steven, just make sure no one passes me anymore. Made it and got rewarded with QOM 👑 💪
As soon as the route line opens, I only see red and its shades… OMG I’m already tired before the start. It was a tough race, and the goal was to make a good pace without dying. I rode for a long time with Chak even if he had some connection problems, thanks for the stimulus, as well as when I sometimes saw S.Loudford and Mucker1974 behind me. Even though I have a 9V bike and in my opinion I lose something uphill compared to reality when I use my 12V, but I didn’t give up and I closed with a purposeful 44th then transformed into 39th. Thanks to all my friends for this November of challenges.
Surely, riding up a hill at 2.9w/kg is no harder than 2.9w/kg on the flat, I guess it’s not so simple, looking uphill at the constant gradient instills fear and trepidation, and you can ‘bonk’ on a flat route and just roll home, ‘bonk’ on a hill and you still have to ride up the hill … so you fear the ‘bonk’.
My target was to be under 1 hour so I was very pleased with the result. Going against my normal strict rules of virtual bike must match outdoor bike, I did put an easier virtual cassette on for tonight so I could spin my usual 100rpm … my heart is stronger than my legs. Top50 was a secondary bonus…these days Top50 is amazing, well it is to me. Oh, I also saw the Monkey.
Race stats: Age : 56, Weight : 95kg, IF=0.988
Averages : 156bpm, 282w, 2.96w/kg.
First of all, this is a good opportunity to say ‘Thank you Neil’, for the great job you’re doing here with the Muckers Race Series. Today’s route was a great choice.
I’m not a regular participant, but when I spot a route/race here that appeals me, I sign up to take part. Today’s route, or better climb, was one of those, and a perfect one for racing too. I know it, and the last time I rode it, was in March 2022, twice in fact (back when I was part of the team of Lauren Wolff and Noel van den Brande that used to offer group rides here, now thankfully done by bots). That was with a finishing time of 53.xx min. It’s a hard one, but I like this off-road route very much, it was always on my agenda to ride it again, and yes, there it was, coming up as a race. It’s much more fun to do it with a big group of riders. My goal today was to beat my own time, wich I managed to do successfully. Some steady pacing up there did the trick.
I was happy to see Silvia here again, the only female regular here. She once kindly called me ‘her all time female opponent’, but who cares, the only thing that counts is your own effort, just to compare just to yoursellf and be happy that you have achieved it. I am pleased to read she also pushed herself to the limit and finished with an amazing time.
And finally, yes, there are those little things/stories that sometimes happen, when riding a route. I remembered this cute monkey very well and was happy to meet him again today, glad someone else saw him too (I tried to get it a snapshot, but didn’t get it).
Thanks again, it was a pleasure and see you on another race sometime!
Great to read about your ride here queen Heike 😜. I know I’m no match for you on a climb and I admire the way you compete with the guys 💪. Like I do with guys on my own level. Your right, it’s all about improving yourself and in these Mucker races I do that a lot. It’s so much more fun if you see familiar names to race with or try to catch!
Hope to see you more regularly here, so we can attract more female riders [and I can try to race you on a flatter route 😇]
So, that was it. “Sani”, the climb we were all scared of. Looking back, I can’t even say why. I started a bit slower, not wanting to go too fast. But I was at the top in no time and thought it was too easy, so I did it again right after the race. Just a bit faster this time.
…cut!!! Who believes this rubbish, please 😉 What a killer climb after highlights like Rossfeld and Großglockner. I actually started a bit slower as I had a lot of respect for the steep ramps and the only target was to survive. I stayed below my HR threshold to keep some energy in the tank. And I needed it! The steep passages with a cadence of 60-70rpm were totally exhausting me. I struggled 2 times and was near to quit the race but finally got it done. I felt like an old, steaming, stamping steam engine (quite rusty, by the way). In the end, however, I was able to add a few more coals to the fire and did something like a final sprint. 1h03m at the finish line, with a fighting weight of 95kg. I’m happy with that. Well done, muckers!
One more thing: how can you do the climb in 35 minutes? The guys at the top of our races are Tadej, Wout and Jonas in real life, aren’t they? Incredibly strong!
327W, 65 kg, for a 2nd, it is 5 w/kg and it would not be enough to win on similar climb in Italy in any well known amateur race. Tadej or Jonas would do >6 w/kg and even getting close to 7 w/kg if well rested.
There is not much to the race itself, it was pure hell, just to make it up as fast as possible, not reacting on others and just try to hold the pace as even as possible. Still it was good efforf I guess, so I am satisfied.
Before I begin my recap of the race, I’d like to apologize. This route was my choice for the championship. After a meeting with Neil at the end of October, he presented the routes for the November Championship. They were all relatively flat, and he suggested a Crit for the final race. However, I insisted on a hill climb, and that’s how we ended up with this challenging route. I take full responsibility for the intensity you, Muckers, experienced. Well done.
After pushing myself to the limit on Tuesday when I had initially planned for a more relaxed ride, I anticipated that this race would be exceptionally tough. And indeed, it was relentless. I started in 35th position at 3.8W/KG and finished at 3.9W/KG. Throughout the race, the mantra “Pain is temporary, pride is forever” echoed in my mind. I couldn’t keep track of who was passing whom—my mental focus was at 100%.
I noticed “HeikeHardt” staying close to me, and “Gazinho” was just ahead, maintaining a distance of about 150ft. Crossing the finish line in under 50 minutes was a significant accomplishment for me, with an average of 286 watts. Thanks, Muckers. Without your support, I wouldn’t be where I am.
I quite enjoyed this race. Got off to a good start, then everything seemed to happen in slow motion as it does on climbs, with distance of riders behind and ahead very slowly ticking up or down. Stefan Smit , hj2010 and rocket 996 came past me. I managed to catch a couple of them up before the baboon crossing. With the climbing coming to the end I was about 100m away from any other riders and hence managed to finish without collapsing in a heap as usual.
Its the first time I’ve done a gravel route on rouvy and I like the way that riders try and weave in and out of the rocks.
Thank you very much Neil. That was an iconic nature race and eventhoug the road was for gravel it was nice road race. I really liked jumping from stone to stone yesterday. Unfortunately I started with a 6.5 min gap to the head of race, but the tail of the race is also a nice and absolutely different world. Why, because you have many magnetos ahead and reason to keep going. The shame was the 2 times ROUVY crashed (eventhoug the newest release), and I twice lost my hard obtained position. But never mind I like the competitions with you. I saw suddenly 100 meters ahead of me a good magneto. The guy is as good as the Campagnolo’s set name he is is carrying on (try to puzzle who is it?) 🙂 Unfortunately the application crashes did not allow me to catch him, but thanks to this I had a chance to say hello to Silvia wearing the same dress, Neil to encourage him to continue with creating these nice Championships and others who went to this hill.
Aaah, was it you that also passed me and almost kicked me out of the top 50 😉. Glad for you, you were able to recover 👍. Last time we wore this Santini set Grep, now we can wear the nice blue Muckers jersey we won. Will be harder to recognize each other though, so many Muckers around lately 😂
For me everything started well, I had not warmed up much but enough, and I looked strong in my legs. and everything went to hell, after 5 minutes my trainer began to smell burned and stopped controlling. I got off the bike and dismounted to see what happened, I disconnected it three or four times, being quite hot, and about 5 minutes later it recovered again.
When I got back on the bike I was 65th, but I started to climb gradually thanks to the 36×40 gear that I had mounted for the occasion, that saved my life and made me arrive in less than an hour to the finish line.
It was fun to see the monkey and how the riders jumped between the stones.
A mountain bike race but without the gear ratios of a mountain bike. The last two kilometers were horrible, standing on the pedals without being able to turn them properly. And way too much avatar jerking that caused a bit of seasickness. The encouragement from the monkey towards the end didn’t allow me to stay ahead of Stefan_Smit and Rocket996. I let them go, thinking that a spot in the top 10 was sufficient on such a steep course.
Every time I hit slopes over 16%, I felt like giving up. It was really the motivation from the overall November ranking that kept me in this race. I wouldn’t do this course just for the sake of riding it.
Tough climb, similar to Luca Ma’s comments above i decided to ride this at my own pace, and not react to other riders, however for a while i was riding alongside Luca Ma who was doing similar w/kg to myself, he then pulled away and i kept at my pace, he was strong so i had let him go, good race, drafting issues were irrelevant today if they did exist on such a steep course, and was happy with my 35 mins power for that one, and that rouvy did not freeze as i crossed the finish line this week – hats off to Luca Ma who earned that win there……
Ouch! My Direto XR certainly can simulate 25%. I had fitted a cassette that looked like a 9″ pepperoni pizza before this race and I’m glad I did as it allowed me to stay seated and spin. After the race it felt only right to eat an actual 9″ pepperoni as my reward. A race long battle to try and keep Stefan_Smit and lrollin at bay then try to catch them again once they had passed me. Stefan_Smit was long gone but I managed to just catch lrollin by using the lactate buffer that consuming sodium bicarbonate before the race gave me. My legs were on fire but just like in my real life time trials I went full on anaerobic for the last kilometer and got the job done. Thanks Neil for arranging and all the stuff that goes on behind the scenes that only an organiser can appreciate. Thanks to Kyle too for selecting a climbers course rather than a flat route. At 66 Kg and under 300W I would have stood no chance otherwise. I’m quite pleased at how my first racing series has turned out on Rouvy so me and Karen have taken out a yearly dual plan at 50% off. It would have been rude not to.
Yes I spotted the monkey, and the sheppard closer to the top – So I guess I wasnt too deep into the red….
Still carrying some fatigue from Sunday and Thuesday, and looking on tonite route climb specs I knew it would become a really long slog over a deceptively short distance.. I use these races as my VO2max fixes for the week, tonite was no exception.
3-2-1-GO
First 10min was spent above threshold as I wanted to secure a decent position, relatively speaking, as I am no threat for the top20 tonite Not sure if that strategy paid off as power did drop throughout the ride but I did not explode. On the ascent I was passed by kylofski/HeikeHardt which seemed to have found their sweetspot and I went back and forth with Macko for a good while before he decided to leave me behind in the dust. He had better power output on the steeper sections while I was stronger on the “flatter” parts.
There was a group behind me chasing, they were not far behind (60-160m) so my main focus for the last half was to keep them behind me. I was almost capable to make a threat for tomleriger, a minor attempt to sprint him in when the climbed rolled over was made, but effort soon showed to be futile, so just “relaxed” off and rolled over the finish line, securing a 31st position.
There are some routes on Rouvy that inspire me to ride them in real life, “Sani” do not fall into that category..!
But I had fun! Thanks for the race all and keep it up! Next Muckers for me will be on Sunday Dec. 3rd, more vertical meters to conquer!
As a starter, Neil said he would rib my pants of in this race – well how hard could it be?
After the last three weeks having issues with two cold’s and not letting the body fully rest I thought I was ready to beat Mr. Mucker1974 yesterday. But I was wrong – again. I felt ok from the start doing 3,2 avg but from the start I had massive issues with my HR. I was in zone 3 HR from the start I started doing my warmup and just 1 km into the race I rammed up to over 180 bpm. My max is 186. I had to slow down to 3.0 but did never get my HR under control. Then 3 km before the end I soild my pants and had to stop for some minutes and do a change…….!
Coming back to the race and I was slowly starting to feel better and was overtaken by stelviobound… Slowly I was feeling strong again and did mostly 3,5 the rest of the climb trying to catch up on Jeff65 again, but there’s no more route.
Well done all for finishing this route and thumbs up for all doing it under 1 hour.
Being a lightweight, many think this is my kind of route. That’s not true, as I have a low FTP (as in: small but little power guy). So drafting and short (500m to max 2Km) steep climbs where I can go hard in the red are my thing. For this climb, I can make a plan and stick to it. Started just under my FTP 3,3w/kg. Because I didn’t fly off at the start, I was in 46th position. Didn’t drop power so along the way, I started to pick up the “too fast starters”. Over halfway the climb, not being in the red and staying under FTP, I still felt very good so upped the pace to just above my FTP. I have very low gears set on my Neo Bike so I could spin or stand on the pedals as I wished. Still felt ok at the finish, and even after. That’s nice because I did 98% of my FTP.
Oh my oh my, what a disaster. Goodbye top 20, goodbye top 30…it was looking so good😔. This is my subjective comment and I’m not speaking on anyone’s behalf. I totally understand that is very hard to keep everyone happy when it comes to choice of a course but this one for me was just way too much, total hardcore. Being a “heavy” cyclist at 81kg climbing is not my favourite thing. Not that I can’t do it or don’t do it, on another platform I’ve done AdZ in just over 51min and that was a climb over 12km but average gradient was around 8%. My setup is far from climbing set up, lowest gear is 36 in the front 32 in the back and when climbing I prefer to spin 95-100 and higher rather than grind. Of course my gearing is nobody’s fault but choosing such a difficult course is just not fair. Even pro cyclists change bikes mid race when tackling big climbs so for me with my set up it was a certain dnf. Still, I decided to give it a go. I feel so bad and sad that I was beaten by the choice of a course and equipment… I made special arrangements just to make it to the previous race, all for nothing🙁 Muckers events are gaining in popularity but if you look at how many started in this race it says it all that it was a bad choice. Please don’t take this as a complaint, it’s just a comment about my personal experience. To be honest, I dislike the same way completely flat courses and climbs like this one.
And now to finish off my mumbling, after watching Neil’s YT streaming I kind of analysed two guys. One of them consistently finishing ahead of the other but in this race it ended the other way around. So the lighter guy by about 2kg, the one who normally finishes ahead of the other and who also pushed 0.2 W/kg more during the whole race finished behind heavier and less powerful guy by about 30 seconds… Very very strange🤔
Anyway, I’d like to congratulate to everyone who managed to complete this race👏💪
I can understand your disappointment, because it means that you care a lot as you do for me. Today was difficult, but next time it will be better. I weigh 92 kg and I train consistently, I have improved but now the level is very high, once upon a time I often entered the top 20, now if I enter the top 40 it is an excellent result…. never give up!!!
Rouvy really need to implement virtual gearing or trainer intensity, call it what you will. It has been asked for before for years but still nothing. All smart bikes have virtual gearing already as they have no physical gears to change. You just program your gears via a phone and off you go so a massive advantage For them on Rouvy. For me I had to change my crankset from 53/39 to 50/34 and my cassette from 12-25 to 11-34. Fortunately I have the components and it only takes me 30 minutes. I can absolutely understand the frustration of the heavier guys, 66 Kg me, who were forced to grind at 50 rpm and less as they didn’t have low enough gears. Please can everybody ask Rouvy to implement virtual gears.
Great final for the Championship 🏆 had done a small recon prior to the race to get a feeling in the legs 😅 From the start of the championship race to the finish line my legs felt great and I was pleased to be able to support the super strong 🇩🇰 top GC rider Grochang 💪🏻👍🏻 🚴🏻♂️💨💨💨 🤞🏻🤞🏻 for his place at the podium 🏆
This month I have not been able to participate in all the races, so I don’t make calculations for the final classification.
The logical thing is to give the opportunity to all types of riders, riders who like the flat and riders who like to climb.
I’m not good either on the climbs or on the flats, so I don’t care about the route, the important thing is to have fun and give the best.