Sunday Road Ride Cancelled

Unfortunately we're going to have to cancel tomorrow's road ride.

The temperature is currently below freezing and forecast to be even colder tomorrow, we've checked some of the roads today and the smaller ones resemble an ice rink in places so it's just too dangerous for the ride to go ahead.

For those that have pre entered we'll be sorting out refunds next week. If you purchased a combined ride and TCR show ticket they'll still be someone here to give out your show entry tickets until 10:30am tomorrow morning.

TCR - Here's how it is

Been out on the course this morning.

The snow, rain and mud would have been fine but the temp drop has frozen it all. I'm up for a challenge as much as the next man, and had it just been the off road sections, I'd have probably gone ahead. But it's not! We have some roads linking the trails and they tend to be country lanes that haven't been gritted, which makes them ice rinks. It's just too dangerous to have cyclists and cars together on these roads.

I've tried to cut back on the distance, but we'll just end up with a short, mainly road ride that no one will enjoy.

So I'm afraid I'm going to have to cancel the ride for today.

Enjoy your lie-in!!

Dean

Full refunds will be sorted for all pre-entries next week

TCR Weather Latest

We've just been out marking the mountain bike course ready for tomorrow. At the moment the event is going to go ahead but check the blog first thing tomorrow as we'll be monitoring the weather over night and making a final call then. A final update will be posted around 7 am.

If you are planning to ride please bear in mind it's going to be a tough challenge, you should expect it to be wet from all the melting snow and obviously it's going to be fairly cold. It's not going to be a ride for fair weather riders that's for sure.

Due to the conditions we've not set a long route for this event, the 26 mile medium route should be plenty challenging for even the toughest riders given the conditions.

See the post below which outlines our plans for weekend in terms of final course checks, etc.

GPX Routes

Road GPX routes are now available to download, however, please bear in the mind that the route may change slightly should the weather conditions take a turn for the worst before Sunday.

Unfortunately were not going to be able to publish GPX files for mountain bike routes, we've been making a number of last minute changes to the route today and have run out of time to get the files published with enough time for anyone to actually getting round to downloading them.

TCR Weather?

Looking at the Met office 5 day forecast for the London area, it looks as if Friday is going to get the worst weather over the next 3 days. The outlook for Saturday and Sunday is mainly dry with showers in our area. This doesn't mean it's all going to be shorts and T-shirts though! There is a lot of ground water out there so even if it is a dry day you're probably end up wet.

Our road routes have been designed to include A or B roads as much as possible and , as such, are likely to remain in a better condition. They were all clear today (see Marks report below) and we have oppurtunties to re-route on the day if there are dangerous sections.

I've never really trusted weather reports though, so here's what we're going to do and how you can get any information:-

Saturday morning
We'll be at the venue at 7am and will have been on the road from 6am. This should give us an idea of the air temp and likelyhood of ice. As per usual, the route will be pre-ridden to check that the marking is still in place.

If you check this blog at about 7.15am I'll post on the general conditions and ultimately, if it's too dangerous, cancel the event.

If Keith, on his pre-ride, finds sections dangerous to ride, he'll either re-route or close sections down.

We have a manned drink station out on the course and you'll either see him once or twice depending on your choice of route. He will be able to respond to incidents if they occur.

Sunday
Again, I'll be pre-driving the course on Sunday morning. I will post conditions on the Blog at about 6.30 - 7am and if there are any changes I'll let you know then.

For both days, we'll assess the risks and will change or close parts of the course as apprpriate.

We'd also like to recomend that you dress appropriately and recomend using a rear light when on the road.

Thanks
Dean

TCR Show - Road Ride Preview

We've been out today marking out the road course ready for Sunday - not something I was looking forward to after waking up to find a couple of inches of fresh snow had fallen over night.

I actually decided to take the mountain bike rather than the road bike as was prepared for the worst, however, by the time we started most of the snow on the road seemed to have melted mainly aided by a couple of rain showers. Once you got moving it wasn't really that cold either and I think 4 layers might have been over doing it :-)

The route sticks to fairly main roads so unless we have loads of snow over the next few days we're not expecting any problems and it should be fine on a road bike. From the racecourse the route heads out towards Guildford and Albury then through Wonersh and on towards Cranleigh. From here the route starts to head back through Holmbury St Mary, Gomshall and East Horsley.

The only section for any real concern was the climb up from Gomshall, we had originally planned to take the route up the Combe Bottom climb but found out this morning that that road has been closed. We've changed the route but don't worry we've got an equally tough climb (18% in places) for you to tackle. The descent down after the climb was still a bit slushy so we're going to do a final check on this section early on Sunday morning to make sure the route is safe.

I think even if it's not raining on Sunday come prepared for a wet ride as there's a lot of water around from all the melting snow. Jon the Gore man might be in for a busy day lending out his fancy Gore Bike Wear jackets.

TCR this weekend

The weekend is fast approaching and if I can get the staff away from their toboganing, our next event is at the TCR show, Sandown. As usual, we'll be posting beforehand with some reports on the ride conditions, where to buy snow tyres etc, but before that, here's a brief rundown on what's there.

The TCR (Triathalon, Cycling and Running) show is based at Sandown race course and that's also the start of both our rides. Park in the show car park, but I suggest you try and get as far to the right as possible as that's where we're based. We'll be heading out south east onto the trails around Leatherhead and as far as the Northdowns for the Road ride on Sunday.

There is a special deal with a joint entry to the show and a ride which is £12.50. This is only available as a pre-entry, so get in quick as this will close on Wednesday at 6pm.

Cheers
Dean