RTL reflections

RTL was tough. Real tough.

Could we have been better prepared for it? It's kind of subjective. The hills were the like we had never seen, but if I can recall correctly, Malaysian terrain is similar. We could have tried to train in Malaysia except we would probably be run over by a speeding truck before we got past the first turn.

Which was one thing I rather liked about RTL. There is a very clear campaign for them to share the road with cyclist of all varieties. They gave you a wide berth. Even when you were riding in the middle of the road, they made a point to overtake you carefully.

However, some of them were a bit too friendly. I know they mean well and were trying to show their support, but when you're riding along and a car blares it's horn at you from behind, it's scary.

Anyway, back to RTL.

Day 1 was tough. I think it was partly due to us not being conditioned for it, partly because we have never rode hills like those and partly because we just did not know what to expect. Our strategy for changing riders was totally off. We were planning to ride 1 hour stretches, roughly 18km per rider. But we got tired too quickly and the hills didn't help.

Day 2 was better in the sense that we were more conditioned to cold, except that it had to rain. Riding in the rain was no fun. Riding in the rain at about 10 degrees Celsius is worse. Riding in the rain at about 10 degrees Celsius wearing only a t-shirt and pants is the stuff of nightmares. But we were more accustomed the the hills and had a better strategy and we got much closer to finishing on day 2.

More to come when I have additional writers juice.