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Toronto’s Gran Fondo: The Halton Epic Tour

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We’d been planning this ride, the Halton Epic Tour, for quite awhile. Originally it was to be Kim, Eaton, David, and me and the 140 km distance.

But plans change. David has injured his elbow and so we dropped down to the 80 km. Eaton joined a new bike club in Toronto and had people from it to ride with so he stuck with the longer distance.

Personally, I’m glad the three of us swapped. The 80 km was fun but tough. David and I both agreed it was harder than the 125 km Niagara Falls Gran Fondo we’d ridden last year. On the Halton Epic Tour we climbed about 850 m over the 80 km. But it was pretty continuous climbing or descending, not much flat. Long slow climbs with rolling hills. That’s wearing.

At one point I saw people stopped by the side of the road, resting, and I was puzzled. These were just rolling hills, I thought. I like rolling hills. But about 10 km later exhaustion found me too. Yes they were rolling but they were trending up. I didn’t stop but I certainly slowed down.

The Niagara Falls ride had sharp steep bits but they came after lots and lots of flat so you were fresh when you got to them. That felt different somehow. These hills were more relentless.

But we kept on and enjoyed the beautiful scenery, the police escort through intersections, and the lovely country roads.

You can read the Garmin profile here.

Some further thoughts:

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