Tuesday, December 09, 2014

Mandhardevi Climber 200k BRM Experience



It had been over 4 months since I moved to Pune for my job and I had used my cycle only to commute around the city. When I noticed the Mandhardevi Event on my Facebook feed, I decided that I was gonna do it. It seemed perfect -a ride through the hills. I’ve always loved the hills. Cycling through one just puts you in perfect harmony with nature. You realize how tiny you are in comparison with the mighty mountain! You don’t get that realization when you whiz up one in a car. At least, I never did. Anyway, having decided to take part, I did a lot of small rides and a few odd long rides to prep myself up.

The ride for me actually started from my house, from where I headed to the start point of the brevet, a distance of around 13kms. It was COLD! Having lived all my life in the warm and cozy city of Coimbatore, I wasn’t used to these low Pune temperatures. Upon reaching the start point, I met up with the other guys who were taking part and we completed the formalities. There were a few first timers, so I didn’t feel too out of zone. We started at around 6:20 am and I joined up with a group of around 4 riders led by Kedar Tokekar of Pune Randonneurs. We were on the excellent Mumbai-Bangalore highway for about 45 kms. I didn’t really take note of the gradients at different sections of the road. This was a big mistake, and I would realize this later on. Kedar was riding really strong and I was happy to be able to keep pace with him. We soon reached the first control at Bhatgarh Dam and we were over an hour ahead of the control closing time. We proceeded towards Bhor and since I was feeling a bit hungry, I stopped to have a quick bite while the others went ahead. The stretch from Bhor to the base of the Mandhardevi hill was a steady climb at a gentle gradient and the road was a bit bad. 

I had been to a session on ‘Training and Nutrition for Cycling’ by Michael Lehnig, organized by ‘Bums on the Saddle’, Pune (a cool bicycle shop). He had given great insight into treating your mind and body as your two friends when going on rides and listening to the signs given by each. A great rule of thumb that Michael had mentioned was to ‘drink before you get thirsty and eat before you feel hungry’ during rides. His points made a lot of sense to me and I tried to adhere to them as much as I could, during the ride.

The ascent to Mandhardevi started and I was only able to climb at a much slower pace than I had imagined I would be able to. The climb to Coonoor is around 7% and I had seen online that this Mandhardevi climb is around 4% on average. So I had anticipated that I would at least be able to climb at the pace with which I had climbed Coonoor. I could come up with only a couple of explanations for my pace. Either the climb was steeper than I had imagined or I was not as fit as I used to be. I’m pretty sure it’s the latter. Guess I’ve to put in a couple of rides to Sinhagad in the coming weeks  :D 

The descent from Mandhardevi to Wai was pure bliss. I just had to follow Deepak Sir’s (Deepak Samuel of Coimbatore Cycling) simple advice of feathering the brakes during the descent to prevent skidding and also avoid the rims from heating up.  I then reached the half-way point at Wai. The control point was manned by the awe-inspiring Prasad Erande (to be World Record Holder – has completed over 14,000 kms in a bicycle in 136 days!). It was a great privilege to get his autograph on our time cards and chat up with him for a while.
The climb back up to Mandhardevi was less taxing and I soon reached the secret control point set up near the summit at a restaurant. I spent a nice 40 minutes there and ate a good lunch J The descent was thankfully uneventful except for a few langurs crossing the road in front of me. I did stop and click a few pictures :)




After crossing Bhor I reached the Bangalore-Mumbai highway and calculated that I just needed to maintain an average speed of 15km/hr or above to be able to finish on time. However, I had no idea about the road gradient ahead and it seemed like it was all climbs. I started getting apprehensive and was cursing myself for having taken the ridiculous 40 minute lunch break. Then came the ‘New Katrej Tunnel’ (an excellent 1.4 km long tunnel through a hill), where the road started descending to my immense relief. Boy, what a descent it was! The road was super smooth with hardly any bends and all I had to do was take a good aero position. I was soon coasting at a speed of around 55km/hr. The descent lasted for over 8 kms and took away all my fears. I felt super energetic after that stretch and continued on at a brisk pace to finish my first 200k Brevet at 7:27 pm, 13hours and 7 minutes after I had started (well within the stipulated time of 13hours and 30 minutes).

A big thank you to Divya Tate and the folks at Pune Randonneurs for organizing this wonderful brevet! Looking forward to all the exciting rides you guys have planned for the upcoming season :)