Only now have a minute to reflect on this fine event.
Was very please to finish ( along with Mike who was riding fixed) in 39.75 hours, so we were the last finishers.We rode together for most of Sunday.
Was grateful for the flattish last 90km as the ride was harder than expected, probably due to the weather conditions (as already noted above:-heat, sun, thunder, lightning, mist, etc. The early morning mist was the most annoying for me, because I had to keep stopping to wipe my glasses. I didnt have time to sort out my sat nav and it wasn't properly charged up so I had to estimate the distances to the next turn during the (dark) night, so had to use intuition a bit, and wasted a bit of time as a result. Felt pretty stong all through the event, so it was mainly due to my errors in following the route sheet that I was slower than usual, I think. However, I didn't get badly lost at any point. It was an advantage being slow in the night in that I managed to avoid the heavy rain and storms completely, and only caught it at the end. Rode with Mel and the triathlete for a while earlier on, when they caught me after they had earlier gone wrong following Mel's satnav in reverse order. Also Patrick Field and Colin.
Had an interesting 'attention deficit ' incident on Sunday afternoon whilst following Mike on the last hilly section. Although still in control of the bike I lost focus for a while and thought we were 'testing bikes' and forgot we were on an audax
I remember thinking that we had already climbed enough hills to form an opinion...After some caffeine at the next stop I was fine til I got home after the event (around 10pm). Just shows how heat can accentuate the effects of sleep deprivation, i suppose (but good practise for the MM ride in Italy in August. The possible improvements to the route suggested above sound reasonable.
