WHEN SPORTIVES GO WRONG!
Broken bones, hypothermia, falling asleep at the wheel! Not all sportives end with you happily collecting your medal. What can we learn from these tales of woe?
01 THE LOOSE CANNON THE STORY
It was 2007 and I was riding the Tour de France sportive between Greenwich and Canterbury. The day went well until the 90-mile mark. I was in a small group that was working well together and seemed experienced so I thought I was where I needed to be. Then the guy in front of me wandered from his line and did a little wheelie to correct it, which should have been a warning that he was beginning to flag.
Two minutes later he did it again, but lost control and went down. I had nowhere to go and went down with him. I remember the popping sensation as my shoulder broke. I got back on my bike but the adrenaline only took me another couple of miles before the pain and swelling took over. The final 30 miles were agony but a Did Not Finish wasn’t an option.
I was out of action for a while but there was a silver lining. Being on the sidelines made me concentrate on my photography career and I’m now the official photographer of the Fred Whitton Challenge. I still ride around 3500 miles each year but every day my stiff shoulder is a reminder of that day in Canterbury. Steve Fleming, Clitheroe THE ADVICE Sportives can be dangerous places, with thousands of riders and a range of abilities mixing together. A rider can be as fit as a fiddle and strong as an ox but poor group riding technique will let them down. In this scenario the rider causing it should have recognised that they’d overspent and backed out of the group safely, communicating and talking to the others around him both verbally and with hand signals. Alternatively he could have missed his turns in the bunch and sat at the back of the group to recover. Good group riding techniques can be learnt and practiced in the local club chain gang. Check out the British Cycling website for your local club. Stuart Gourley, Radeon Cycle Coaching
02 THE CATASTROPHE
THE STORY The Adventure Cross Sportive in the Lakes a few years ago was one of those where I look back and think I learnt a lot that day. It was my first mixed-terrain sportive so was a step into the unknown as I lined up on the start with my dad on our cyclo-cross bikes – mine new, his borrowed for the first time. It was a true test of skill, with some hair-raising descents, one of which was coming out of Grizedale Forest on the stone forestry trail. This was a boneshaker that gave me the surreal sensation of having no feeling below the elbows. The trail was loose so rocks were pinging off in all directions.
The effort on such technical sections of the course increased our fatigue, physically and mentally. Our concentration suffered. Coming off some moorland, my dad was ahead of me and managed to bury his pedal into the ground, going from 40 to 0mph in an instant. He went over his handlebar and somersaulted through the air – a spectacular dive that only didn’t score him the perfect 10 because of a hopeless landing. We limped our way to the finish line with ripped jerseys, shredded arm warmers and rather shaken. Fortunately he managed to avoid serious injury. Steve Fleming, Clitheroe THE ADVICE A common mistake many riders make is not appreciating the technical aspects of riding long events and especially the toll that fatigue can have on reaction times and concentration. I can’t impress enough the importance of taking time to look at the route and familiarising yourself with potential hazards. They can be pinch points at the bottom of steep hills like one might experience in the Tour of Flanders, descents that are treacherous in the wet like in the Fred Whitton or just not appreciating the weather at altitude in events taking place in the mountains. Tiredness can slow down your reaction times and being on unfamiliar terrain can soon put you outside of your comfort zone. Stay alert, concentrate and remember that perceived skill level and actual skill level can be very different.
Avoid using new bikes or equipment at an event without having spent time to get used to it beforehand. You need to be fully accustomed to how it feels and its limits before you ride it in a sportive. Ben Wilson, coach, Personal Best Cycling Services
“We limped our way to the finish line with ripped jerseys and shredded arm warmers...”