The tough part is will the RRR be beneficial versus the sustained/century power profile… as a cat 1 mtb/cat 3 cx guy that has done some 100 mile mtb races, at some point you’re just trying to survive. I think that may be more beneficial… but I’m torn!
while I don’t have any idea what the route will be, Asheville gravel is generally pretty climby…it may be better to do climbing RR over rolling RR.
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I was going to say that very thing. Plan on some tough long climbs on loose gravel.
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I actually do my own planning, specifically because I ride these types of events. Heavy emphasis on long (60 minute +) Sweet Spot work with low cadence.
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This is really good advice… I know nothing about Asheville! Thanks!
Asheville sits right in the middle of the Blue Ridge mountains. I live about 2.5 hours northeast of Asheville in the BR mountains (near Roanoke) and it is very hilly. Gravel rides around here are nothing like out west - we don’t really have gravel roads that aren’t snaking up some mountain or hill.
I am curious to see how long people think a 130+ mile gravel race through this region will take. I recently did an 82 mile gravel “race” through the Blue Ridge area that had about 11K feet of climbing and took about 6.5 hours to ride. Average speed was 12.5 mph with a normalized power of 221w.
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My guesstimate has been 10 hours.
I’m envious of your location, down here in Tidewater we are pan flat! I have to drive up to your neck of the woods to ride hills. Was super bummed Mountain Mama was canned this year.
I’m jealous of the flats you all have out there! The grass is always greener I suppose…
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We just moved to Knoxville so I’d be interested in this event but they sure don’t have a lot of info on their site.
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The dirty 130, which is in TN and more gravel than BWR would have, and probably more elevation, has the fastest known time of just over 9 hrs. Id guess the fastest people doing BWR Avl at 7-8 hrs.
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As climby as it will be (140+ miles and 12k of climbing I’m hearing), wouldn’t the sustained power over the long climbs be better than the punch plan of the climbing road race plan? At hour 8 I’m not thinking of doing much over my FTP, just hoping to sustain at that point! Maybe I’m overanalyzing it?
Well as the new year is here and hopefully this event CAN happen it’s really got my attention…with ONE small problem–I need a(another) bike!! Thoughts on ‘type’ of gravel bike that you would recommend or ride for this possible route? The tire/training plan discussion about sums up my thoughts on the bike choice too…
I’m local to Asheville and I’ve riden on all the roads for the BGW, at least the route I’ve found on RidewithGPS. I’ve done the gravel stuff on 40c Maxxis Ramblers. For the condition the roads are in right now, I think you could run a slick or big road tire. There will be a few messy sections (1% of the route), but there is just so much road and so much climbing. I think Im going to try a Gravelking SS+ 700x35 on all these road over the next few months. None of the climbs are longer than ~20 minutes for me at 3.3w/kg. Any other info needed?
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Can you share a link to the ridewithgps route that you found?
What gravel sections are in the event? I’m local AVL too, from what I could gather it’s the gravel in Mills River to Brevard? Yellow Gap etc? Tire choice is tough for this but bias towards pavement makes sense.
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I’m actually running my road bike, BMC Roadmachine. Plan on Schwalbe G One Speeds for tires currently
Not sure how many here did Haute Route in Asheville 2018, but we also had two gravel sections. 99% of the folks were on full road bikes and road tires, with zero issues.
I rode it on Pirelli PZero clinchers, and was fine.
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This is what I found just searching RWGPS.
I’d love for someone to confirm if this is the actual route since I didnt pull this off the BWR site. For the locals, it includes the gravel in the southern part of Henderson County, none of that tasty mills river/pisgah/bent creek/parkway stuff. I found that puzzling, but Im guessing the park service would put limits on their roads? Perhaps they can have a larger event by using only public roads? Thoguhts?