Bangarpet Brevet

Short summary: It was an easy ride. Feel-good moral boost. Other than Kolar - Hoskote headwinds, no trouble at all. Super scenic roads. Four controls (an extra one at Chikka Tirupathi added as a last minute surprise) meant very little error margin for slow riders.

The rocky hills near Bangarpet

 

Rajankunte Ride

The plan for a relaxed group ride came not too soon. After months of randonneuring dominating the IISc bicycling scene, there was a yearning for the group rides of the past - characterized by a scenic route, some nice breakfast. Most importantly, these are not ride-by-numbers; one is not a slave to the watch and cyclocomputer. There is no pressure to complete so many kms in so many minutes, no pressure to maintain this average speed or cadence or anything. 

Tour of Yelagiri

It started out with a hunt for a new 400km route for the IISc brevets. When the route was chalked out as Bangalore-Yelagiri-Bangalore it was too tempting not to ride it. Mustafa, Alex, Nirmal and I decided to give it a try over the weekend. We had planned to start on Friday night, and reach Yelagiri base via the Chennai highway by dawn on Saturday. We hoped to get up to the top before it got too hot, rest all day and start back early on Sunday morning, to reach Bangalore by nightfall.

The Road leading to Yelagiri