Ridgeway Rouleur Sportive - Sat 22 April

A 7:45 sign-on at the Kassam Stadium (home of Oxford United FC) meant a pretty early start on a bright, sunny morning. Prospects for the weather were mixed, with rain, sunshine, breezes and cloud all mentioned. Another difficult day for clothing choice!
Alex and Graham set off at about 8:15. Apart from a short hill after about 10 miles, the first 35 miles of the route led them west on the flat-lands just to the north of the Berkshire Downs. With plenty of riders to follow, the pace was quite high (at least for one of us).
The route then turned south towards the Downs then east towards Wantage. For 40 miles it was decidedly lumpy with a mixture of some long, moderate hills and some short and steep (occasionally very steep). This section peaked out at about 870 feet near Farnborough before rolling down to near Goring-on-Thames. The weather turned up trumps and was mostly bright sunshine; decidedly warm on the ups but still cool on the downs. This section decisively revealed who was the better hill climber, (but you knew that already!).
After that there was one more big rise en-route to Wallington before a generally down-hill return to Oxford. Despite the general spreading out there were still plenty of sportive riders in evidence, hence groups to cling on to - exhilarating but exhausting. Graham, at least, was quite glad when, eventually, they were dropped with a couple of miles to go.
This was an excellent ride with beautiful weather and well-spaced, well-stocked feed stations. Alex and Graham finished in 5h43m which were silver award times.