After a week of April showers and sunshine before Sunday we expected the course to be very wet, but it was in surprisingly good condition apart from one particularly muddy, slippery descent and a few shin-deep puddles that I found myself in at times.
The course was longer and seemed tougher this year but it may have been down to me being further up the field battling to keep my forty-something position that I found myself in early on during the event. Being higher up the field was a new experience to me and I found it tough having to constantly watch over my shoulder for riders gaining on me. One thing it did do was to give me the incentive to keep pushing hard up the climbs.
The course was 53km long (plus an additional 10km road ride to get back to Machynlleth at the end), with approximately 1,900m climbing. For those who enjoy stats and figures or would just like to know the route, I have uploaded the data from my Garmin Edge 705 onto Motion Based.
The route took us up seemingly endless climbs, only for us to lose the height which we gained within minutes, down steep, shaley descents which if you messed up, had the potential to slice open any exposed skin.
It got difficult towards the end and with 10km to go I ran out of water, which wasn't ideal as I had the dreaded "bonus climb" that the first 200 riders have the pleasure of completing before the last descent. I was however met at the bottom of the climb with a gorilla offering a banana, which helped my mood and hunger! After what seemed like hours, I finally reached the top and cramp started settling in, but fortunately it was downhill from here to the end.
So, another great Howies Dyfi Enduro, and a great start to the season, which hopefully, will only improve from here.
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