Race Report: Mallorca 312

Race Report: Mallorca 312

This is a race report from one of our athletes, Sara. It is a review of her experience cycling the epic Mallorca 312. It is a really good, detailed account (I felt like I was pedalling with her) of a day she’ll remember for a long time to come!

Build up

Of all events I wanted to do this year, the 312 was the event I was most nervous about – I genuinely wasn’t sure if I could do it. 

The training block building up to it went well. I squeezed a few good long rides back to back, practiced nutrition and enjoyed it all. Then exactly a week before 312 I came off my TT bike, hit my head (and shoulder and a stitch in my chin). I had a concussion, stitch in my chin and I couldn’t lift my shoulder although no serious damage was done. Tash came to A&E with me and her and Jan kept checking how I was doing the whole week 🙏. I did ask if I can do 312 and the doctor said yes. The whole week was rough – I was achy, I had headaches, brain fog, and terrible memory, couldn’t concentrate on anything. Towards the end of the week, my shoulder was better but I was worried I won’t be able to keep the focus on the road for that long. 

The Day Before The Ride

I flew to Mallorca on Thursday night and on Friday I went on a 45km easy ride with a group from the hotel where I was staying. Throughout that ride my head was pounding, I could feel every pothole in the road. I thought this could be the concussion, poor sleep after a late flight or stress related to packing and flying with a bike. Packing a bike earlier is definitely a learning experience 😅

After the ride, I went to pick the bib number and the scale of the event became apparent – the whole town was packed – I was surprised how many men were there (later I found that 2369 men and just 113 women completed the 312 distance this year and there were about 8000 cyclists taking part in the event on 3 distances in total).

I felt a bit intimidated.

I made a decision to officially acknowledge this to Bryan (sorry!) and did my best to re-focus on what was within my control … so I made a list 😅

• My bike was in a perfect condition
• I diligently carb loaded for 2 days 8g carbs/kg body weight
• I had a nutrition plan and I practiced it
• My clothes were ready
• The weather was looking ideal.

I studied the course, made a table that was attached to my stem where I marked climbs, cut off times, shops in case I needed food / bike parts between feed stations, feed stations, dodgy road surface, good points to pee, should I need to 😂. I repeated the key details on my water bottle. 

In the evening, I caught up with a few guys I trained with (we were all staying in different hotels). We were all nervous about the cut offs and the pen situation which was confusing but I felt better after chatting. A very early night for me- I planned to be up by 4:25!

The Red Pen 

I woke up and the headache was gone. I couldn’t quite believe that I begun to feel my usual self literally only hours before the ride, but it was a relief.

The official ride was starting between 6:30 and 7:00. I knew that with 8000 cyclists, 5 start pens and all of my friends in different hotels, I won’t find anyone I know on the start. I was assigned the red pen, which started last. The cut off points were based on the gun time, not chip time, the red pen meant I was starting closer to 7 than 6:30.

I was on the start line for 5:00. The street was already packed with thousands of riders. I was directed to the red pen facing forward. It seems like majority of people were directed to the other red pen, in a side alley, that had to loop back to the start after my side departed, so this was lucky! I chatted with everyone around me, (we had time!) we compared snacks. I wrapped myself in my silver foil blanket and waited for 90 min to start, but it went quickly. On the start I met Ian and we decided to stick together as much as possible. 

The Hilly Part – Up To 160km

My strategy was to eat 60g of carbs/ hour (I set a reminder in my watch), use high cadence on the way up, keeping HR around 165, and stick to the right hand side of the road when descending leaving space for faster riders to overtake me on the left. I’m not very good at going down hill and thought this will be a time to recover and a way to keep out of trouble. 

At 6:45 we took off. The first 10km was on a flat road with a lot of road furniture, roundabouts and absolutely crammed with riders, all going at a different speeds. Without realising I set off going 40km/h for the first 5-6km- drafting off everyone ahead, I didn’t feel like I was putting much effort. Clearly I was ready to go!

I saw a moody sunrise by the sea in in Alcudia and it was the first breathtaking view of the day. There were so many, that it’s all a bit of a blur. 

By 7km I already lost Ian. 

I tried to find a group to follow before the first climb around 37km but it was so busy it was hard to follow one set of wheels. I still felt nervous and the adrenaline was pumping. 

The first climb was Col de Femenia – it was quite gentle, I found myself overtaking people on the way up- turns out this was going the be the pattern for the whole day. I begun to breathe and relax into the ride. This wasn’t even an official climb but descending was already a tad scary with riders cutting each other off on the left and right.

Around 50 km I found Ian again and we hit the first official climb Gorg Blau and after that Puig Major together. Again, the climbs weren’t bad – we were motoring up at a similar pace, overtaking people. I was expecting it to thin out a bit by then, but it was still packed. The views were jaw dropping, I knew I couldn’t risk taking my phone out to take photos so I focused hard on committing them to memory and took a moment to reflect how lucky I was to be there. 

During the first long descent, it felt like everyone I overtook the last 15 km just overtook me again 😂 There were quite a few crashes along the way, all on the descents, which reinforced my plan to go easy. About 65km in, my chain came off, I had a vision of causing a pile up as I slowed down but managed to get to the side of the road to fix it. That meant I lost Ian for the rest of the day. 

I made the first cut off at 97km with 45 min to spare and I was still feeling fresh. The wind picked up, I felt like a leaf in the middle of the road going downhill. I remembered advice to sing or count to relax when descending so I started singing and hoped no one can hear that. The wind picked up and I switched to counting – in English, then Polish and German 😂 I planned to stop for the first time at the feed station at 101km but when I got there I had enough nutrition so I carried on. There was no dreaded bottleneck there either – a good sign – people lost up to 20min in a bottlenecks by the feed station in previous years.

My shoulder begun to hurt, I thought it’s probably from climbing and reminded myself that most climbs will be done by 160km. It didn’t feel like 60km was far away at that point. 

I stopped at the next feed station at 138km in Ed Capdella. I was feeling a bit tired and aching before it but a cheese butty (which was a treat after a tonne of rice bars and haribos) perked me up. Took some painkillers and got out of there quickly. I was aware I can faff a lot so was thinking how to make my stops quick and efficient all the time.

This next part of a ride is a bit of a blur – more climbing, more descending. I started to descend better, the road was more empty and I felt I could pick my line rather than just stick to the right. I chatted with a rider in yellow jacket who gave me a tip to stick my legs to the frame on the descents to stop the bike from rattling in the wind and this helped. I was only overtaken by 2/3 of people I overtook on the way up by then 😂 I kept on eating. I saw a group of cyclists from Poznan and cheered them on. I chatted with Lucy from Ireland about the next cut of point (220km at 16:30) and we concluded we’re probably ok, but still had a while to go. 

“Come”

Around 145k the road flattened, and for the first time I found a good group to ride with – about 15 of us including a few women. This was the first good bus of the day 😂

Chatting with others after the event, those buses made a lot of difference.

We made a chainy, picked up the pace, averaging around 36/h for a good 5-10km. I felt quite energised by this like switching what we were doing gave me a bit of a boost. I remembered that the private feed stop was at 167km and I wanted more liquid carbs – I debated if I should stop because it would mean getting off that good bus. I reminded myself that it’s a long ride and stopped, quickly refilling my bottles and grabbing extra food.

It was a long straight road and I could only see some figures at the distance. I knew I won’t be able to get back to “my” bus, but I thought if I just bridge the gap to whoever is ahead of me, it’ll make my life easier. I put my head down and pedalled hard. Suddenly a huge man in aero suit appears next to me, locks eyes with me and says “come” in German. This was Ludwig and next to Ludwig was Juan – they both looked like terminators on their bikes. We made a 3 up, although they did most of the work. Think for the next 5km we were averaging 40km/h. We caught up and overtook my original good bus, and powered through a bit further, until I couldn’t keep up any more. I stopped for coke and some oranges in Llosseta at 194km. Just 25km to the next cut off and I was doing well for time.

Found Barry

The road was flat and rural, we were surrounded by fields. There was no fanfare at 220km – a bit anticlimactic. The road split – 265 route to the left and 312 route to the right. I went right but soon begun to question my choice. The headwind was terrible and I was coughing because of the dust. I saw a big pack ahead so powered through to catch them. I joined at the back of that pack, spending a lot of energy getting there. The lads who were at the end of the pack and in front of me started to drop off and I didn’t have it in me to chase the main pack again. I thought “it’s fine, we’ll make a little bus and we’ll work together.” But none wanted to split the work and a group of 5 just sat on my wheel for the next 10-15 km. I hated that bit.

I was estimating how long will it take to get to the end, the next feed seemed miles away, my mood was changing too – I was annoyed, thought we’ll be here for the next 4-5 hours at this pace. Everything hurt -my bum, my feet, my arm. It was grim. Then as the road was turning left and up hill I saw my mate Barry with whom I did most of my training rides. Barry and Dave stopped to fix Dave’s puncture. We were all overjoyed to see each other. Puncture fixed, we set off together. Everything that was hurting stopped hurting in that moment and the vision of gruelling 4hours turned to a fun 3 and a half hours 😂 Barry setting the pace up hills, Dave taking the lead on the flat bits and me generally somewhere in between. We were lucky to catch a few good buses then and it was possible to pick up the pace again.

We stopped for food at 244km in Ariany – it already felt like a party. I saw Ludwig again, who again said “come” and helped me to bridge a gap to Dave’s wheel (it was a small gap and I knew I’ll be able to make it myself – but I thought what were the odds 😂). Me and Barry chatted all the way, retelling the first 2/3 of the ride. Aside for sore bums, we were fine. We knew that the last feed stop in Arta has beer- that beer was very motivating. The road became quite narrow and undulating, very sharp turns. Going through little villages, lined with locals, who turned it into a bit of a street party – the atmosphere was great.

Finally, we arrived at Arta – you could hear the noise about 600m ahead of the stop. The stop was on the town plaza, there were hundreds of people lining the streets, cheering us on like we were celebrities, giving hive fives – that was quite moving and it felt like we made it. As soon as we arrived at the square someone ran to me and handed me a beer. We danced a tiny bit (there was a DJ) and set off again. Only 27km to go. The last bit was on a main road with a great tarmac. As soon as we got onto the road we joined a really strong bus. That group took us all the way to the finish line. Barry insisted that I cross the line before him and Dave, but really we crossed together. 

All The Feelings

I couldn’t believe we finished it, not after that week! I felt quite tired but not too bad, proud, grateful, amazed by the friendliness and generosity of all spectators and volunteers – just overwhelmed with all of the good feelings. Used our tokens for beer, pasta, ice cream, someone gave us more tokens so we had some more beer 😅 At the hotel I bumped into Ian and it turned out we finished before him – must have overtook him when riding as part of our final bus. We exchanged all the stories over some more beer and a second dinner. 

The next day I felt a bit tired but fine. 

Learning

• It’s worth waiting 1-2 min for a good bus, it saves energy and it’s fun
• Try not to crash a bike a week before a big ride
• Pack a bike sooner – always more stressful than you think it’ll be
• Practice descending, practice cornering. Ride with people good at it and pick their lines. Count, sing, distract yourself on the way down to manage nerves – lots of work to do here
• Focus on controlling what’s within your control – all in all, I think I did well in the end. 
• Eat. Before, during, after – also did well.
• Knowing how to ride in a chainy helped 
• High cadence on the way up – made a huge difference
• Knowing where the feed stations were helped – I was only carrying enough water, I saw people with 4 full bottles.
• In long rides like this, focus on not faffing, not stopping – all those stops add up
• Chat to as many people as possible 😂

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