Hey cuds, it's really too bad that you weren't able to come but from the sounds of it you definitely made the smart choice. Everyone was really looking forward to meeting you, but doing that ride sick would have very likely smoked your IM bid. Staying home to rest was the best thing you could have done.
That was definitely the hardest 135km I've ever ridden, and is up there among the hardest rides I've done, period.
http://www.toporoute.com/...Metric,setFollowRoad Mt Currie is one nasty sonofabitch, and the road out past Duffy Lake is indeed pretty bad. The chipseal doesn't bother me so much as the huge cracks and potholes that could pretty easily take you out, and then there's the fun road to gravel transition with a 8" dropoff coming down into Lilloet that Phil and Diva hit at speed - luckily everyone stayed upright and intact.
Absolutely stunning scenery, and definitely lots of climbing even well past Mt Currie. That last 20km into Lillooet was killer. I'm SO glad that we had sag support, and also that we didn't start in Squamish. I probably went through 6 bottles of water and there's nowhere to stop once you get out of Pemberton - so lacking either of those would have made for absolute misery...
Total elapsed time was ~8hrs, but actual ride time was closer to 5:45. We lost ~1hr to mechanical, and easily an hour and a half to rest/refuel stops and just stopping by the side of the road to catch breath and psych up for the next pitch.
This is the elevation profile:
<If you're gonna be dumb, you gotta be tough>
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