Hi Tom - [...] While I admire your fortitude and preparation and commitment to the UK ethos I am remembering the teams of Euro club riders and their vans and thinking that a drop bag is not exactly out of the spirit of the event.
I think the point you're missing, or possibly doubting, is exactly how f!cked up the drop-bag situation was in Loudéac in 2015
Al, seriously, I was telling it absolutely straight when I said — "
Unfortunately, the bag drop was literally that — 1000 bags all dropped under a covered area to the right of the bike park, with no organisation and seemingly nobody in charge. The unfortunate riders who were hoping to change shorts were faced with diving into the pile and checking every single label to find their own bag — the sense of anguish was palpable!"
If the bag drop is the same this time around then you would be in that group of anguished riders, made worse by your
need, because of your plan to rely on that. It
could be better this time around; then again it could be
worse.
In your shoes, I would plan to take at least the bare minimum with me to get all the way around unsupported; I would also consider sneaking some into Tomsk's Carradice without him noticing and then ride with for the duration
I thought the "bag drop" was a misnomer and was referring to an ability to leave stuff in a bag at the start for pick up on the return?
Nope — there's a "bag drop at the start" and there is a "bag drop" — the former is effectively "left luggage" and will most likely be a pile in the corner of one of the two registration "barns"; the latter will be hoiked into the back of a van and transported up the road, probably to Loudéac again, as that is just over two thirds the way to Brest, and so breaks self-supportedness into "convenient" 445-340-440km chunks, or thereabouts, assuming you can actually find your dropped bag ...
TBH, I don't know whether there were bag drop options that included Brest?