Ravensthorpe on the Cobblestones

After having done the Cape Argus for the second time - this time less windy, but still - and only beaten by Mr Armstrong by 1 hour….. - I represented our club on the Flemish Cobblestones. This Sunday I did the E3 Harelbeke cyclosportive. The pro’s did this one on Saturday, and many of the banners and stuff was still out. The wind seems to follow me, because as in South Africa, this time it was windy again. The E3 includes 11 of the famous Flemish cobblestone climbs (well not all cobblestones…) and I have to say, that hurts - I think my shoulders were more painful than my legs. Anyway, lots of cyclists (must have been close to a 1000) with very good food, clear road signs and hard hard work. The sportive is shorter than the pro-race as they leave out the starting boring part - it’s just a bit shy of 140 km with around 1400 mtr climbing - it includes amongst others the Oude Kwaremont, de Kluisberg and de Patersberg (which are in the Tour of Flanders as well). De Patersberg goes over 20% on cobblestones without a gutter (de Kwaremont has at least some concrete for parts on the side).  My brother and I did the ride just under 5 hours, getting us an average of around 27.5 km/h.

Would be a great clubride for next year - see the pro’s on Saturday and do the sportive on Sunday!

Jack

This entry was posted on 30/03/2010 at 08:19 pm and is filed under Blogroll. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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