Just a brief report on the Brecon 100 - it was a brief ride. On Saturday night I phoned Ruth (the organiser) to check that the ride was still on (there having been so much snow) - it was, but the Devil's Staircase was unlikely to be on the route as it was covered in ice. Without the Devil's Staircase it seemed that the ride would be a main road bash from Brecon to Builth to Llandovery and back. I was tempted not to go, but I wanted that AAA point and I imagined that Ruth would put in some climbs to compensate for the lack of Staircase if it was still unusable the following day.
Off at 7am, NightSun blazing, to Neath to get a lift with Phil Rowlands: man, it was cold. On arriving at Brecon the lack of Staircase was confirmed and no alternative was supplied other than to use the main road - it would be a 100k ride, but no AAA points. :-( And so it was a much depleted and resigned bunch of 60 riders that set out into the cold at 9.30. One of the compensating factors for me was the large number of familiar faces - many of whom I could put a name to: Phil, Dai, Ron and David from Swansea, Trevor (the guy with the Roberts we met up with at the end of the Elgar), points champions Dave Lewis and Anne Learmonth from Cardiff, Barrie Lewis from Carmarthen, and few other people who came up to me and were very friendly as if we had known each other for ages, but whom I felt I'd never seen before. I toured around with a familiar face for a while before I unwittingly dropped him - I later found out he was Mark Houlford, AAA points champ from last year (!)
The climb over the hill to Buith was tough but scenic in the snow. Tough because I set off far too fast and felt like packing after about 10 miles. I refused to let my group drop me and was not happy. Eventually however I realised that they must be averaging 3mph or so more than me so I let them go and the malaise thankfully left me, and I was more or less happy to plod (as it felt like) along at my own pace. I think one thing that helped me was that my computer wasn't working so the only indicator I had was how my legs felt, so I just retreated into myself and kept the pedals going around as I grimped up the hills through the falling snow and hail.
Eventually I was caught by a hugely fit-looking Himalayan mountaineer (!) on a racer carrying a Iberian-size rucksack on his back. He was new to Audax so we had plenty to talk about which made the going easier. Eventually he pressed on and left me to the hills again - snow everywhere, and in some places the only parts of the road that were not snow-covered were where cars had left 6-inch deep ruts in the snow. It wasn't icy though which was some relief. The hills were very scenic, but it was very cold so I was glad to get into the control at Builth for tea and doughnuts. (Yes!)
Next the main road slog to Llandovery. This had no saving graces whatsoever. Long straight roads, some climbing big hills, and there wasn't much company either. I later found out that Dave and Anne had made up their own route through the lanes - I wish I'd thought to do that, even though I would have missed the "secret" control. This was a pointless control as it was situated on the main road between Builth and Llandovery, and this is more-or-less a straight line. We did get hot soup there however, and I met up with the mountaineer again so I had some company for the last 10 miles into Llandovery.
Somewhere along the road I'd wondered why my computer wasn't working. I remembered that the last time it stopped that it started working again once I took the cling film off, and when I took the current lot of film off it started to work again!? So I can report that my average speed along the Builth- Llandovery leg was 14.3mph - not bad for the conditions.
At Llandovery the marvellous West End Cafe. Tea, Cheese on toast (made with half a pound of butter :-), and a nice sticky cake. I was in much better spirits now and feeling strong, so I had a leisurely stop here - there was bags of time. David and Anne decided to use the lanes again and I joined in with Dai Harris. This was by far the best leg. The lanes were pretty, the company was good, and I was feeling really macho and charged up everything in sight. Dai was carrying a flask of coffee, so we had a superb stop with a view en route.
With about 4 miles to go my front gear cable snapped and left me with the small chainring. I also noticed that the dust covers on one side of both hubs had come out (indicating bent spindles?), but I couldn't be bothered to do anything about any of this at the time and so just trundled into the control.
Stats: 105k, 6.5 hours, 1350m climbing
© Kilgore's Enterprises February 1997