MC's Cycling Diary

Date: 1 November 2016 Total distance: 211 Kilometers Start Time: 5:30 am Return Time:  5:15 pm With: Siddling Swamy, Shashidhar, Prasad Sadashiva, Thimanna Bhat Altitude Profile: Lavelle Road – Chikkaballapur – Chintamani – Kolar – Lavelle Road The 2016-2017 season has commenced and Bangalore Randonneurs has announced a 200KM ride on the first day of the new season. There is a huge turn up as well for the event with more than 50 riders registering for it. I am familiar with most of the route except for the stretch from Devanahalli to Chintamani to Kolar. It should not be a difficult ride and am going for it just to get going in the new season. The Diwali holidays were on and the ride was scheduled immediately after the Diwali holidays. I replaced the groupset on the Btwin and wanted to test the shifting before I went for the brevet. I went for a ride to Sarjapur and was happy with the gear shifting. The day before the ride I got the cycle ready by fixing th...

Date: 22 October 2016 Start Time: 4:35 am End Time: 12:45 pm From: Koramangala, Bangalore To: Nandi Hills With: Sushanth & Sunil till Hebbal flyover, Chetan till Airport Road Toll Distance: 136 kilometers Altitude Profile: Chetan is the new addition to the cycling group and every time there is an addition there is a push to get things going again. A welcome ride had to be done and my requirement to do some climbing made me lean towards Nandi Hills since it is the closest hill. A few rounds of checking about who will come on the ride and the list was down to Sushanth and Sunil riding till Hebbal and Chetan and I to continue riding towards Nandi Hills. I was surprised that I was able to do the ride to Madikeri and Ooty which involved a lot of climbing without suffering from cramps at anytime during the ride. I will have to test myself on Nandi Hills now to be certain that the climbing ability has improved since this hill has always been difficult for me an...

Date: 15 October 2016 - 16 October 2016 Start Time: 5:00 am 15 October 2016 End Time: 11:00 am 16 October 2016 From: Ponnampet, Kodagu To: Ooty Distance: 200 kilometers The cycle was in Ponnampet and I had not been able to go the previous weekend to bring it back. The additional time gave me time to plan to ride further rather than returning back to Bangalore. I looked up different options and finalised on cycling to Ooty. The route would take me from Karnataka to Kerala before crossing over to Tamil Nadu. I wanted to ride further and complete the loop by riding onward to Salem and then returning to Bangalore through Hosur. However, I was short on time since I would have to travel to Coorg again mid week and I did not want to leave the cycle at an intermediate location and then go back to collect it. I was travelling to Mysore during the week and the plan was to travel to Ponnampet on Friday and ride to Ooty on Saturday and then ride to Bangalore on Sunday. There we...