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Is there a chance they won't take you guys? Oudenaarde is great! And extra kudos for cobbles.
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@fussballclub I guess.
You have to register. - I've only done this part, I hate stuff like the 2nd.
Then you apply with a life story about how much of a hero.
Then you find out if you're accepted. -
The second bit, the actual application, seemed to be more about whether you fully understood the legalities of the ride and the rules herein... It was hard to tell how relevant the actual bit about experience is given that I can't see how many people would be in the position to say they had done anything that would come close to riding 4,000km across Europe. I just mentioned a few audax's that I'd done that were pushing the same daily mileage as required for the Transcontinental Race.
4,000km across Europe.... that's a lot of bus stops to sleep in... I hope I am accepted.
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If they're being picky about who gets to ride (I thought it was just first come first served but that might have been the first two) then I'd expect them to be favouring people who have done some long multi-day rides (e.g. LEJOG/JOGLE or other long A-to-B trips) or at least some very long single day rides.
From my limited audax experience there are two things that some people struggle with when moving to the longer distances:
a) Prolonged night riding
With some people their body just wants to shut down after a few hours of night riding. They can do a 300km ride with no problems but riding through some of the night on a 400km (unless you're fast) puts them into all kinds of problems. For example, a friend I ride with has terrible problems with his eyes (watering and blurry vision) after a couple of hours of night riding.
b) Starting again on subsequent days
It's interesting to see how many people give up after a few hours sleep at one of the controls. The lure of staying in their makeshift bed is just too much, or they've nearly destroyed themselves to get to that point and they are simply not up to continuing. It's tough after a day with 20+ hours riding to set your alarm for 3 hours' time (3am or so) and get up when it goes off. On one 600 where I actually had enough time in the bank to sleep I had the luxury of asking to be woken in just 45 minutes. Joy.
The first you don't really have a choice, either your body is going to support you or it isn't. The second is down to training, willpower and sheer bloody mindedness.
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It's not so much experiance, that section is tiny.
It's more the 25 questions you have to answer that take around 30-60mins. I presume to stop people just applying on a whim and more to ensure those who apply are serious about their application. I guess last year they had people just applying for 'fun' without real serious intention.
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enter code hereCoordinates for this and that place?
Where is this?
Work out what this means?
Checking you've read the race manual via questions on stuff from there.I mean you can google most but it still takes time. And you need to have read the manual properly.
That also ask what you believe the be private assistance from 10 different scenarios and what you believe to be cheating from 10 different scenarios.
Is lending a fellow competitor a pump assistance?
I said it's good fucking sportsmanship. -
It's a race, surely better to make a race bike more comfy than to make a tourer more aggressive...?
Skinny, congrats. Jealous.
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It's a still a race. Thousands of miles, yes, but it's about getting there as fast as you can, it's not 'touring'. I'd wager the winner won't be on a Thorn Raven.
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The faster lot will tend to choose carbon race bikes setup to be a bit more forgiving and comfy than you would set it up for a 100 mile ride. No aggressive TT positions, but tribars positioned for a comfortable/maintainable all-day position.
The slower/touring lot will tend to use tourers. People in between will use a mix (probably more race bikes than audax/tourers).
There's no cause and effect here. A tourer doesn't make you slow. Kristoff would probably have still won if he had been riding a steel Audax bike with tri-bars, he'd probably just have been a tiny bit slower (given the slight weight penalty).
I've done 600km Audaxes on a steel tourer/audax bike, a steel fixed (with tribars) and a carbon race bike (with no tribars). It's all about how they are setup rather than the individual frame geometry (of standard bikes, you wouldn't want to enter this race on a Lo Pro for example). A badly setup bike will start hurting very soon regardless of its frame material and stiffness.
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How dare you butt into our childish feud with all that rational talkin'...!
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Okay, so I'm entered fomally now...
I'm somewhere between being excited and quite nervous, it's clearly going to be a massive challenge.
Has anyone got any thoughts on training? I was thinking personally (bearing in mind I'm targetting the Lanterne Rouge) that my training should focus on being able to recover quickly, then to be able to manage with a reasonable 275km per day, repeatedly... as opposed to looking at being able to manage significantly further distances per day and the associated night riding and sleep deprivation.
Who has experience of this type of multi day riding? and what kind of training had they done?
Is it just myself and Skinny that are entered?
user49780
skinny
fussballclub
Yossarian
Greenbank
Mule 
caveatgez
Philbythesea
TTM
noiser-
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About
Transcontinental Race (London - Istanbul) - #TCRNo4
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@hippy
This is awesome.