Wicklow 200 2012 - please read post #1 re entries wanted/FS

JT86

I will be attempting the Wicklow 200 for the first time this summer.

I was reading the course description and came across the "dreaded " slieve maan.

Anybody knows how tough this hill is?

Mod note 23/05/12

All new WW200 entry wanted and entries for sale must go into this thread

Thanks

Beasty

billyhead

Its basically one tough climb after another. Its doable however unless completely unfit

531

The 3 Peaks Challenge next Sunday (see www.southeastroadclub.com) includes Sliabh Maan. Forecast is good, great training for W200, give it a go.

Sliabh Maan is a long climb, steep in parts, but doable by most if you try to keep it steady at your own pace.

WAPAIC

I did it for the first time last year, in fact the longest I'd cycled before that was 120km the weekend before so I really was unprepared. It was tough but doable. Try to get out most weekends between now with plenty of hills on those spins and then and maybe get one short sharp sprint with a bit of a hill in during the week. Try to do all the parts of the route during your training (if you live local enough) This approach is rather unscientific advice but its practical if you have a busy life and it worked ok for me last year - finished in just over 11 hours.

On the day, take your time. There will plenty racing past you for the first bit and then it settles down. Keep your breaks short and your pace steady.

There was plenty of folk pushing very expensive bikes up the SM but there's no reason why you couldn't slowly get up there with pedal power. I actually found the smaller hills in the last 30 or 40km to be worse. If you do falter, it will be on the steepest section and you can walk a kilometre and give it another go. Walking a kilometre will take you 10-15min and get you out of trouble. If you complete the WW200 it doesn't matter a damn if you walked 1 of the 200, you'll still go home happy. Well you'll be happy a few days later when the memories fade. In Jan 2013 you'll even sign up again despite promising not to in June 2012. Don't let one little hill put you off giving it a go!

simonhumphries

I just read that CycleSuperstore are having a talk tomorrow on training for the Wicklow. Maybe worth a look?

smacl

JT86 wrote: »

Anybody knows how tough this hill is?

As others have said, best thing to do is cheat, and go up and down it and the other hills a few times before the event. The devil you know and all that. Last year was my first time doing the W200, and given the weather I actually found the descents more difficult than the climbs. Set off nice and early and you can time your time at it.

kincsem

Slieve Maan is most difficult at the start of the climb where my guess is it goes over 10% (I have 14% in my head). I got cramp there in the W200 and had to walk about 100 metres to loosen up and get over the steep bit.
What impressed me most was the guy with a mobile phone at the top of Slieve Maan who called his wife to collect him.

greenmat

First time last year. Agree with posts above, descents were the hardest part, very scary and full concentration needed. Weather just made it so difficult but in some ways distracted you from the worst of your suffering. Also when all the bigger climbs were finished and you think your nearly home a stinger at Avoca awaits, didn't know about it, thought my climbing was over. That was the hardest part for me. I had trained on all of the route except the last 30-40 kms. Plenty of time get in shape for the Wicklow 200, do loads of Km's, plenty of climbing in wicklow if possible, try train with others who you can do the event with, It's a long day on your own but I must say the friendship and support you will get from total strangers is amazing, either way go for it. Another thing, whats your gearing, are you on a Compact with a climbing friendly cassette? That will make the day easier. 50-34 with 12-27 cassette or similar.

WAPAIC

Actually the gearing on your bike is a very relevant point. I have a lovely triple chainring which I had to really try and persuade bike shops to get for me. It seems to me that for a person who is racing short enough races on level enough courses a double is perfectly fine but if you're more into longer, slower cycling in mountainous areas and you're not the fittest then a triple is preferable.

Maybe you can achieve the same effect with a double or compact setup but there is a nice security in knowing you have the granny ring to drop down to as well.

smacl

WAPAIC wrote: »

Maybe you can achieve the same effect with a double or compact setup but there is a nice security in knowing you have the granny ring to drop down to as well.

Worth having a look at the gears you're running ok, the right cassette on a compact is as good as some triples. e.g. granny ring of 30, 23 as largest sprocket in the cassette yields a gain ratio of 2.6, whereas a compact ring of 34 with 27 as the largest sprocket is actually lower geared with a gain ratio of 2.5. See http://sheldonbrown.com/gears/ I find I climb best spinning quite fast in lower gears, so I've got 53/42/30 in the front and 13/28 on the back. I'm also way happier with too many gears rather than too few.

seamus

The thing about the triple that I always tell people is that if the granny ring is there, you'll use it. If it's not there, you won't use it, but you'll still get up the hill anyway.

Slieve Maan is relentless, which is the real problem. The bonus of spinning up in a triple is that although you will get to the top slower, you will get there with more juice in your legs. On a double you reach a cadence where you have no option but to keep pushing and you've used more juice to get to the top.

But for the sake of Wicklow 200 I wouldn't switch to a triple if you don't have one already. Unless you're planning a year of riding in the Alps, changing to a triple is a waste of money.

I'm running an 11-28 cassette at the moment with a compact for ****s 'n' giggles. Total waste, I think I've used the 28 once.

WAPAIC

I use the granny ring around Wicklow a fair bit, it's all well and good saying you'll power up if you don't have it but I doubt I'd make it up those hills without it or a similar ratio. Even if I did make it up the hill, as you pointed out I'd be knackered by the time I got there.

Anyway, I guess the point is it's worth looking at your gearing if you plan to tackle a fair few hills.

JT86

Thanks for the info, my wife has warned me not to be calling her from the top of any mountain to be rescued. Tough love and all that,,,

531

It's when you're at the bottom of the mountain, looking up and seeing what's ahead of you, that you'll need rescuing!

Iwernia

Too late now but this one would have set you up rightly,

http://www.mapmyride.com/routes/view/72141504
(garmin reckons its closer to 4000m of climbing)

I doubt there will be anything tougher on the calendar this year.

Well done to Errigal Cycling Club for organising such a bruiser.

JT86

Thats an incredible amount of climbing I wonder what was the average time to finish that course.

golfirl

Looking to try my hand at the 200 and would like some advice on the gears that I currently have on my bike , they are 39/52 and at the back 12-25 and find that while I dont have any real problems with them if there was a quick and cheap mod I could do to give me all the help I will need to finish the 200

Thanks

07Lapierre

golfirl wrote: »

Looking to try my hand at the 200 and would like some advice on the gears that I currently have on my bike , they are 39/52 and at the back 12-25 and find that while I dont have any real problems with them if there was a quick and cheap mod I could do to give me all the help I will need to finish the 200

Thanks

Change the 12-25 to a 12-27. You'll have to replace the chain as well.

Iwernia

JT86 wrote: »

Thats an incredible amount of climbing I wonder what was the average time to finish that course.

I was home at 7hours 40 and the car park was pretty empty, maybe 6hours 45 or 7.

stanleybowles

I've done the Ring of Kerry 4 times.

How does it compare with the Wicklow 200?

Lumen

stanleybowles wrote: »

I've done the Ring of Kerry 4 times.

How does it compare with the Wicklow 200?

The ROK is much easier than the WW200.

ROK ON

Lumen wrote: »

The ROK is much easier than the WW200.

. . . and is much more fun, with better weather, more cake and pretty ladies.

El Vino

I'd say the ROK 4 times would be roughly equal to the Wicklow 200

AstraMonti

Rok is still 170kms so it's not that "easy" and it has 1300m of climbing. W200 is 194kms and has 2430m of climbing.

Inquitus

AstraMonti wrote: »

Rok is still 170kms so it's not that "easy" and it has 1300m of climbing. W200 is 194kms and has 2430m of climbing.

Last years WW200 came in at 3,353m on my Garmin 500.

midlands1

I have a 53/39/30 , would that be better or worse than a 54/42/30 for climbing them wicklow hills

AstraMonti

Inquitus wrote: »

Last years WW200 came in at 3,353m on my Garmin 500.

With Elevation Corrections enabled? I found 3-4 random strava w200 uploads and they are all around the 2500 mark.

Inquitus

AstraMonti wrote: »

With Elevation Corrections enabled? I found 3-4 random strava w200 uploads and they are all around the 2500 mark.

Aye I enabled corrections as the weather played havok.

If you search Strava is varies from 2350 to 3350, based on how it felt I'd go with the higher end of the scale, but I guess its open to discussion and not cut and dried.

Lumen

I don't think any kind of "metres ascent" measure really does justice to the WW200.

A smooth, steady continental climb is like climbing stairs, whereas the WW200 is like tripping over boulders.

Lovely day out.

g0g

midlands1 wrote: »

I have a 53/39/30 , would that be better or worse than a 54/42/30 for climbing them wicklow hills

Based on my (very limited, granted!) knowledge the small ring on both of those is the same so surely no difference when it comes to hills?

smacl

Lumen wrote: »

Lovely day out.

I'd hate to see a nasty one so.

stanleybowles

Lumen wrote: »

The ROK is much easier than the WW200.

Planning on doing the Valentia Tri in 3 weeks Saturday and then concentrating on longer spins and hills in preparation for the W200.

Doesn't look like its the best idea after all.

fat bloke

Lumen wrote: »

Lovely day out.

Not last year it flahucking wasn't!:eek:


.....even now, I still sometimes wake up screaming:(

Snako

Looking to attempt this for the first time, but am in fear that I am grossly unprepared, going to air my worries here, please tell me if this is a stupid attempt or not,

As far as training goes, have only started back last week, after a nine week period with absolutely no cycling, so far bin doing 30-40k spins, with a healthy portion of hills and an average of 25k/hr, going to attempt to double this at the weekend, but the more I do, the more posts I'v read about Slieve Mann, and hills by Avoca haunt me, is my training too late??

Also my other concern is that I be at home in time for the match, to miss even a minute would be such a travesty!!! Cycling gurus give me your two cents?

smacl

30k-40k is not going to prepare you for the WW200, I'd say you'd want to be comfortable with at least 140k with plenty of climbing before attempting the 200k. The amount of time left to bridge that gap in distance is pretty short so you may be better with the 100k route this year. That said, see how you go over the next few weeks and keep posting back.

Snako

smacl wrote: »

30k-40k is not going to prepare you for the WW200, I'd say you'd want to be comfortable with at least 140k with plenty of climbing before attempting the 200k. The amount of time left to bridge that gap in distance is pretty short so you may be better with the 100k route this year. That said, see how you go over the next few weeks and keep posting back.

Sound, yeah was thinking the 100km would be more sensible, roughly what fraction of the cycle is climbs, so for training for instance should I be aiming for 1/2, a 1/3 or 1/4 climbing?

smacl

Snako wrote: »

Sound, yeah was thinking the 100km would be more sensible, roughly what fraction of the cycle is climbs, so for training for instance should I be aiming for 1/2, a 1/3 or 1/4 climbing?

One good climb to start with up Kilmac, and an easier one later on outside Avoca. All very doable, and if you get shagged at any point, there's no law saying you can't put your feet down for a minute and take a breather.

seamus

Snako wrote: »

Sound, yeah was thinking the 100km would be more sensible, roughly what fraction of the cycle is climbs, so for training for instance should I be aiming for 1/2, a 1/3 or 1/4 climbing?

It's hard to quantify climbing like that because in theory if you start and end at the same position, your ride is always going to be 50% climbing, 50% descending.

I tend to look at % elevation in terms of distance when it comes to climbing. So if you have a 100km route with 1,000m of climbing, that's 1%.
A tough route is about 2%, and epically painful route is anything more than 3%. These sound like low figures, but you have to consider that the elevation isn't uniformly distributed along the course, they come in big chunks. And you waste more energy on the uphill than you will save in resting on the downhill.

Obviously distance matters - the longer the route, the harder a given % will feel. So a 200km route with 2% climbing would be pretty epic - 4,000m climbing. A 50km route @ 2% (1,000m of climbing) will be a tough training ride, but you won't feel like collapsing at the end. So you need to be able to go the distance too.
The Wicklow 100 (I believe they're renaming it the "Wicklow Challenge") is 100km @ 0.7%. So if you can manage 60km of riding at between 0.5% and 1% climbing, you'll be fine. If all you've done are 60km of flat riding, then you'll probably struggle on the climbs, but you'll get around it.

This is really only a rule of thumb. In some cases, two courses will have similar amount of climbing and the same ground distance, but the distribution of the climbs (e.g. one after another) makes a world of difference. But in general I find that climbing ÷ distance gives a reasonable indication of how tough any given course is going to be.

Snako

seamus wrote: »

It's hard to quantify climbing like that because in theory if you start and end at the same position, your ride is always going to be 50% climbing, 50% descending.

I tend to look at % elevation in terms of distance when it comes to climbing. So if you have a 100km route with 1,000m of climbing, that's 1%.
A tough route is about 2%, and epically painful route is anything more than 3%. These sound like low figures, but you have to consider that the elevation isn't uniformly distributed along the course, they come in big chunks. And you waste more energy on the uphill than you will save in resting on the downhill.

Obviously distance matters - the longer the route, the harder a given % will feel. So a 200km route with 2% climbing would be pretty epic - 4,000m climbing. A 50km route @ 2% (1,000m of climbing) will be a tough training ride, but you won't feel like collapsing at the end. So you need to be able to go the distance too.
The Wicklow 100 (I believe they're renaming it the "Wicklow Challenge") is 100km @ 0.7%. So if you can manage 60km of riding at between 0.5% and 1% climbing, you'll be fine. If all you've done are 60km of flat riding, then you'll probably struggle on the climbs, but you'll get around it.

This is really only a rule of thumb. In some cases, two courses will have similar amount of climbing and the same ground distance, but the distribution of the climbs (e.g. one after another) makes a world of difference. But in general I find that climbing ÷ distance gives a reasonable indication of how tough any given course is going to be.

Thank you very much for this Seamus, this is not only helpful but also encouraging, have been concentrating on the hills a fair bit, but I was thinking of them in terms of distance covered within the overall cycle, going to continue with the work, and report back with progress.

buffalo

I see someone's doing the full 200km on a dublinbike:

spare a thought for Richard Oakley who is the Editor of the Sunday Section, The Sunday Times Newspaper in Ireland, he has set a goal for to be the first person to complete the Wicklow 200 circuit on a standard Dublin City hire bike. He is being sponsored by Dublin City for the bike, on the condition that he does not make any changes to it. Richard is not very long at cycling and has only been training for the past 6 weeks and with help from Sports Med Ireland (sportsmedireland.ie) is getting up to speed,
We wish him well in the event, which he is doing for Our Lady's Children's Hospital, Crumlin. If you our your friends would like to sponsor Richard all you need do is log on to the official website hosted by Our Lady's Children's Hospital. Visit http://cmrf.org/sponsorshipPage/show/1026. Watch out for Richard on the day and cheer him along the way.

It's got the gearing I suppose, but fair bloody play to him!

monkeyslayer

buffalo wrote: »

I see someone's doing the full 200km on a dublinbike:

spare a thought for Richard Oakley who is the Editor of the Sunday Section, The Sunday Times Newspaper in Ireland, he has set a goal for to be the first person to complete the Wicklow 200 circuit on a standard Dublin City hire bike. He is being sponsored by Dublin City for the bike, on the condition that he does not make any changes to it. Richard is not very long at cycling and has only been training for the past 6 weeks and with help from Sports Med Ireland (sportsmedireland.ie) is getting up to speed,
We wish him well in the event, which he is doing for Our Lady's Children's Hospital, Crumlin. If you our your friends would like to sponsor Richard all you need do is log on to the official website hosted by Our Lady's Children's Hospital. Visit http://cmrf.org/sponsorshipPage/show/1026. Watch out for Richard on the day and cheer him along the way.

It's got the gearing I suppose, but fair bloody play to him!

I saw some guy do it on a Dublin bike in 2010. Or did he not complete it? Definatly saw him

seamus

Someone did the 100 on a Dublin bike before. Oakley was on twitter a couple of weeks back trying to track them down. Looking for tips no doubt.

lennymc

i hope the brakes work!!

spiderman1885

Have the heart set on doing the 200, I'd be fairly fit - but haven't done much on the bike in the last few weeks with final exams coming up - except for the commute to college round trip 40km. I feel like I'll regret doing the 100, but it may be a bigger mistake to do the 200! Hopefully next weekend I can get out for around 100km in Wicklow, What sort of distance would I need to be comfortable with for the 200?

Some helpful posts in here already actually!

Arthurdaly

The first year I complete the ww200 my maximum was 120km and nothing much in the way of climbing. I was regularly doing 80km spins at the weekend with about 600/700 metres climbing. I'd been over sally gap once or twice.

I was a complete newb and put up about 2500 km in training from the end of feb to the event.

I was pretty fit beforehand and in decent shape. I found it very tough and bonked on slieve mann, managed to keep moving and finished with a smile.
Last year I did'nt improve much on my previous which I will attribute to the disgusting conditions.

Tempted again this year, want to put down a decent PB.

AIR-AUSSIE

Being very busy for the last three weeks, I've managed to miss the deadline to apply for the W200.

So if anybody knows of someone who has an application but can't make it on the day, I'd be happy to take their spot .

Jeffm587

Im in the same situation, do many cycle on the day without a control card ? Not to pushed about missing the food and water , more the shower and change at the end.

monkeyslayer

not gonna register this year, have to say the past two years i've been bored to death on rathdrum to greystones section of it, so gonna do it from dublin, meet it at glencree and do the lakes and hills and double back at laragh and home via glenmacnass, bonus climbing points? good luck to anyone doing it for the first time anyhows, its actually not that bad, just a very long day on the bike

smacl

Registration arrived this morning, lucky number 5 for me. Please God let there be good weather and good cake this year. Looking forward to it in a masochistic kind of way, though feeling like I haven't got nearly enough miles in my legs this year.

Hatcho

This will be my first WW200 and am looking forward to it. Well, looking forward to finishing it! The 9 to 10 hours beforehand are another story!

Went out for a 140 training run yesterday - followed the Orwell Wheelers Randonee route - wow its a pretty tough one! :eek: This is all in the hope of prepping the legs (in truth, the whole body) for 200k in one day. Wishful thinking! :rolleyes:

seamus

If you can do the Orwell Route solo, then you can do the WW200, no question about it.