First road event for me, had a lot of fun. Lot of different dynamics than what I’m used to. Have a CX bike for the trainer in the winter, but ride MTB otherwise. I took a bus down from Whistler the night before and borrowed a friend’s road bike. Fit was a bit of an issue with hands going numb with 100km to go, but I probably would have given up on the CX bike. Got dropped off a group in Squamish when I thought more people were behind me, then worked my way back working with a really good paceline 20 minutes later.
Finished in 3:47 and think I crossed the start banner at 7:12 by my math. Really buried myself on the West Van highway trying to get up to the faster groups, but never made it to the front. I basically started at the very end of the 3:30+ corral. Did you guys start pretty close to the front?
What time did you have to get there to seed up front? Sounds like it was a bit different than prior years as I was told 15 minutes early would be plenty. I did see that the corrals open up at 5:30.
I was there at 5:45 to get a position near the front although you could probably still get pretty close if you showed up around 6:00. Anything much later than that though and you might have to squeeze your way in.
Haha, why thank you! The final climb of the day up Cypress just about killed me (the heat certainly didn’t help). I actually had to stop half way up to collect myself…I was very close to pulling chute.
I remember doing the provincial hill climb championships back in 2000(?). Cummulative time for both Seymour and Cypress. I came in 3rd. First place was some dude from Aussie who took off at the gun and beat everyone by 5min. Do they even do that race any more?
First I’ve heard of it, so I don’t believe so. Cool idea for an event though - it would be great to see some of the great local climbers duke it out over Cypress and Seymour.
Were the respective climbs on the same day or different days?
In my experience I would say the triple is a bit more difficult just because of the extra ~1000m of climbing, however if you can do the Fondo you can do the triple crown. Just make sure to fuel properly and I would stop at a cafe and get some coffee and a snack after Grouse.
Also start from Seymour, starting Cypress makes it a lot harder since you have Seymour when you are feeling the most tired.
Now that you’ve all “recovered” from the Fondo, any of you suckers…er…super awesome peeps signing up for this doozie event? If you think you still have enough gas left in the tank, that is.
Ugh, that looks… challenging? More like lung busting. Hill climbing has not quite been my strength. I’m not sure what will be worse, this or the upcoming Diaster Day…
For those interested, GCN posted their video of Jeremy and Simon riding the Whistler Gran Fondo - https://youtu.be/cSN5fhS9B-o
It was great to see some GCN coverage of the event!
