a new course was released this week with quite a few significant changes from the qualifier.  the race starts at the city, but now finishes in kalamunda.  there is a loop around kalamunda/mundaring/darlington that will be negotiated once for women/senior riders and twice for everyone else.  our training ride will only do the loop once, but you have the option for 2 laps if you have the time.

as with the qualifier, the course heads up the zig-zag.  as it is a one-way road heading down, we will not be using this road for training.  instead, we will head up gooseberry.  there may be other minor changes that we need to make for training, so make sure that you have a good look at both the training map and the actual race day map so you know where the differences are.

the initial recon ride on the 3rd july will not be at race pace as it will allow people to understand where the course goes and the turns that you will need to make.  on race day, i expect that the traffic management will help you navigate the course, but up till then, make sure you don’t get lost during our training rides.

as per the qualifier training, it will be neutralised out to helena valley road, then race pace from when it crosses roe hwy.  the final actually does a hard right hand turn just after roe onto midland rd and tackles ridgehill from the other side.  however, we will skip that and head across to gooseberry.  there are a few other subtle differences, but they have been made for safety reasons.  we do not have closed roads and will be travelling in packs probably at speed.  however, you must obey all road rules at all times.  this is training, best not get in a serious accident before your big race.

for training, we will head up gooseberry a second time and race to the service station at the top of kalamunda.  there we will have a 20 min regroup allowing people time to get food/water or toilet.  after that, it will be a controlled return to the city via lesmurdie/welshpool road.  if anyone wants to do a second lap, then they can regroup at the servo and head off when they have their group together.

have a look at the map below and upload it to your gps enabled device.  this training is open to anyone, not just qualifiers, but please be aware that unlike our other rides, there are no regroups till after the second time up to kalmunda.  please be aware of your own abilities and make sure you have adequate food/water for the ride.

• uwct grand fondo final 2016 training

today’s uwct training ride (24th jan) was pretty massive.  there were over 70 riders in attendance and this meant that we were continuously getting split at lights. people were stupidly taking risks and going through red lights to stay on the group, even though the group was not going very fast and it was easy to get back on.

our regroup at the top of kalamunda is also getting too big for the area.  the servo regroup is ok, as long as we don’t get in the way of any customers.

there are also a number of riders that are not making the 20 min cut-off.  although we have said that it is a race pace ride, the more we can look after our riders the better.

so, what is the solution?

• splitting the group is the obvious thing, but getting people to self select into 2 groups is always hard as people will want to be in the “fast” group and get picked up by the next group if they get dropped.
• so we will split, but the “fast” group will start 15min after the main group.  this means that we effectively have a chase group.

so who should be in each group?

• if you currently make it to the regroup point within 10min of the lead riders, then you should be in the second group.  anything past this and you really need to be in the 6:00am group.

so what else will change?

• the regroup at the top of gooseberry will now be removed.  basically all the hills will be at race pace.  make sure you dose your effort as there are lots of hills to go after the goose.
• the ride out to the hills in both groups will be at a steady, neutral pace, not at race pace.  there are too many traffic lights and intersections to negotiate which would encourage people to take unnecessary risks. however, to stop people taking further risks vying for position before the bottom of ridgehill rd, the race pace section begins after the bridge over roe hwy.  where bushmead rd becomes helena valley rd.  it is then all on till we are back to the servo after guilford.  remember, race pace does not mean it is a race.  all road rules must be obeyed.  do not take unnecessary risks.  see the map below for where the neutral section starts.

what about the regroup and finish?

• the servo after guilford will still be the focus for refueling and  regrouping.  the 20min limit will still be set, but will start from when the first group hits the servo from either the fast or main groups.  this is why it is important for the fast riders not to be in the 6:00am group or it would mean no real change to what we currently do.  this hopefully will allow more people to be at the regroup point before we head back into the city.
• the run into the city will still be the same.  once we are past the lights at bassendean, we are back to race pace all the way to coffee.  for anyone wanting to do some extra km’s once we hit the city, it is best to organise that at the servo regroup.

at the end of the day this is a club training ride to allow our members some solid training leading up to the event.  it is open to all riders, but just be aware that if they do not want to align to how the club runs things, then they will be asked not to come back and in the worst case, asked to leave the ride straight away.  there are lots of riders that do our rides that may not necessarily read the blog.  please forward this onto them so that they know what we expect on this ride.

see the original post for even more info.

ride route – spr 2016 uwct training course