b1b200 Brevet

b1b200 Brevet: BasVanBetta aka Bas Kar Bet(t)a

I was at the base of the hill, the 11 % starting gradient staring me in the face. 

With 450 mtr elevation gain in just 5 km , this was going to be very tough. The Phone rang:

Wife " Hi , where are you"

Me " About to attempt the Betta, it looks difficult"

Wife "I can make it easier"

Me(snarkily) " You will remote coach me to Round pedal, maintain advanced Pranayamic breathing and conquer the Betta with a serene smile ? "

Wife " You are not evolved enough as a rider and a yogi to do that, for you simple shock therapy will do"

Me (starting to gasp due to the steep start of the climb) " Whatever"

Wife " You forgot, it is our anniversary today "

She was right, suddenly the Betta looked like a very small problem to tackle !

Each brevet ride turns out to be different, but this one was even more so. I have been volunteering on Brevet efforts, but this was the first ride I was organizing. This meant a lot of prep went into the route planning, multiple reccees and finetuning the route, so I rode bits of the route 3 times, and once completely on the Organizers ride.

The organizers ride consisted of Me, Sunil and Abhijit. We started off at 5:30 am from Silkboard and quickly made our way to the scenic Harohalli-Jigani stretch. The sunrise over the low hills was mesmerizing, and the crisp morning breeze was invigorating. We got to Sathnur and had a nice breakfast of Thatte idli/ Lemon rice and refilled our bottles. We got to the base of the climb and that is when the phone rang..

The sounds of silence on the climb are wonderful, birds twittering, the faint sounds of tires squealing on the gravel at corners, and later on the hammering of my heart beat, and labored breathing. Of course I knew this was nothing compared to the silent treatment I would get back home !

The sun was out in its full glory, and there is no tree cover on the climb. As I started climbing slowly, a grasshopper jumped onto my handle bar and stayed there till almost the top, when the sweat raining down from my forehead made it jump away. The climb has signposts that are in Bike precision at 3.875 mtr , 2.875 km etc, telling you how agonizingly slowly you are climbing, and the speedometer refuses to get into double digits. At points, I felt walking might be faster than riding. To motivate myself, I conjured up a vision of how Cycle Baba aka Anil Kadsur would do, and Mudit Sethi created a brilliant sketch of it which we used as the promo poster for the ride. 

The bikers bravado prevailed and I rode without stopping, 40 min later I was at the top, savoring the tranquil surroundings waiting for the fellow riders to come up. The downhill was more painful that the uphill, with me hanging on to dear life on the steep descent, brakes jammed hard on many of the sections, but it got over in just a few min.

The ride back to Kanakapura was under hot and humid conditions, we stopped for full meals at Gokul, and then quick stops for the ATM controls and water/Lassi in Harohalli, Jigani and reached the end control.

Now to get back to where it all started. The anniversary call. Well it did not end right there. 

Wife: "Dont worry I forgot the anniversary too, and when my parents called up and wished me, I asked them what for?" 

Me "Thank god".

Being Married for 14 years, and having known each other for 28 makes it easier to focus on making each day count, rather than waiting for a "special occasion." It takes two to forget as they say.

Kottai 200 Brevet Ride Report : The Ad Hoc Train

Kottai 200 Brevet Ride Report : The Ad Hoc Train

I was huffing and puffing up the slope, in granny gears when I saw the Sign. I was stunned. Maybe I was hallucinating , but on second thoughts, hallucinations happen on the second night of sleep deprivation on long rides, not on a mere 200. Maybe I had misread due to the sweat pouring into my eyes. I turned to the other 3 venerable members of the Ad-Hoc train. They could see it too. On a 7 % gradient up-slope near Rayakottai was the board

 " Go Slow. Dangerous Curves " 

 I gasped out "I am trying" , while Sunil quipped " I am just trying to go, damn the slow". 

I have been lazy about writing up the rides lately, restarting after a years gap so many of the 2014 memorable rides like the Yellagiri 400, Anchetty 200 are missing. Hope to be more regular this riding season.The Season starter Kottai 200 ride fulfilled all the criteria I have for a prefect brevet ride: scenic route, pleasant weather,good food and great company. It is a beautiful route, with good road surface, and we were fortunate to have cloud cover till 10 am and after 3 pm. I had a great set of people in the Ad-Hoc train, with lots of interesting conversations, and ample breaks to enjoy the view, and the eclectic menu items like farm fresh peanuts and tamarind of the trees.

The start was very smoothly managed by the organizer and volunteer group of Sandeep,Anita,Arvind,Sohan and Karthik, with some nice innovations around queue management. The 78 riders were processed smoothly,and we started off on time.

When the ride was announced, one group decided to do a super quick ride in 50 % of allotted time, and called themselves the Superfast express, with plans to have no halts, and just slowing down to eat on the go. As expected, the immediate rejoinder to that effort was the announcement of the Super Slow IVC special train, which promised to stop every hour for Idli/Vada/Coffee. And then for the undecided there was the WTF express. I had no plans to join any of them, but luckily I fell into my own Ad-Hoc train.

The big bonus for me was riding with the ad-hoc train,which as the name suggests was completely unplanned, we all started at different times, we came together at Hosur and then rode all the way to the finish chatting and reminiscing of the old times.The Gang consisted of Chiddu,Mudit and Sunil, ,it was a lot of fun chatting and riding together, all of us have roughly the same pace and outlook on riding and enjoying the scenery. Thanks guys for the great riding company and stimulating conversations. 

Bangalore -Krishnagiri was a fast descent , got to the control at 8:45 and had a nice breakfast of fluffy idlis. Then we rode past the lovely Krishnagiri lake, with a fresh cool breeze helping us make good progress on the gentle climb towards Rayakottai. There were fruit orchards on both sides, with papaya, cheeku on the trees, and some lovely flower cultivation patches of Dahlias too.The Tamarind Tree lined stretch  was like the Pernambut part on the KGF300 , it brought back interesting memories, I have finished KGF 300 the last 3 years with each of the ad-hoc train team one by one, and we had a good time chatting about some of the details of the rides. 

Rayakottai- Bevanatham was a bit slow, with the sun coming out, and the road being patchy in a few places. A few village kids very kindly offered us peanuts, freshly pulled up from their fields. It is always amazing to see the zest and joy kids show when they meet riders, it cheers up the lot too. We took a nice long break at the Bevanatham board control at Noon, with some hydration, snacks, and stretching. One bad side of the brevet riders who were ahead was visible, trash strewn below the board, clearly left by the riders: Gatorade sachets, Juice tetra packs, Cake wrappers. Amidst the debris , Chiddu also found a pair of Sun glasses ! I do hope we riders are more conscious of keeping these beautiful rustic routes in the same pristine condition we have enjoyed. Starting after the Bevanatham control, we came to the Hill, about 5 minutes later. We were debating climbing the hill or not, given the blazing sun, the  decided to drop the idea. But the debate then triggered another welcome halt of 30 min (barely 5 min after a 20 min halt !) at the base of the hill.We saw some mountain goats clambering over near vertical rock faces. There were a lot of tamarind trees, so we plucked some tamarind and ate them with generous doses of salt. I also put some in my bag which I gave to Sandeep and Suman Paul the amazing guy, he turned up to cheer the riders at end control despite both hands being fractured.

We were expecting some climbs after the initial "board one" , and kept looking out for the climbs, but somehow they did not materialize. After a while Chiddu became the "bored one" and started complaining about the lack of climbs. Sandeep who riding his first brevet, and was on board the train at that point said, " Look at the splendid views etc" . Chiddu tried the best to brainwash him saying " Boss, yeh scenery etc sab theek hain, but to enjoy the brevet it has to have some meaningful (read painful) climbs". 

Post the break started the "This part of the route is Influenced by IISc", experienced Bangalore Brevet riders will know what I mean ;-) Mercifully it was a short stretch , and we rolled into Denkanikottai at 2 pm. Took our ATM slips, and since we were not hungry enough for lunch, had some Curd, Egg Puffs and Juice. The cloud cover was back by then, and we had a quick ride to Sagar juice junction in Attibele by 3:30 PM. Had a round of the juice ,we actually looked up the cue sheet to ensure we were having the recommended one. The final stretch was unusually traffic free given the Karnataka Day holiday, so we had a peaceful ride to the end control by 5 pm.