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The Death AKA Tour of the Californian Alps is a 162Km 3998 metre tour. Starting and finishing at Turtle Rock Park in Markleeville, Calif., the 103 mile course begins at 5:00 am and covers both sides of three mountain passes: Monitor Pass (Hwy 89), Ebbetts Pass (Hwy 4), and  the Pacific Grade (Hwy 4). The full course is not for the faint at heart! The image and the previous sentence is from the ride website

It was filmed for Fulgaz on a quiet day in October 2023. It is the hardest ride, with the most elevation out of the 2500 ride Fulgaz catalogue. Clearly it was calling out to me to be completed. Wishing to share my pain I arranged a challenge through the month of February to ride it and I was the first one to complete it.

Below are some of the lessons learned, how I fuelled and tips for others.

I planned to start at about 07:30 but I was awake early and was in the garage by 06:15.

PositionTimeMtrs ascendedDistanceNotes
Top of Monitor from West1:3887225km
Top of Monitor from East3:36181857km
Halfway4:40223881.4km56% climbed
Top of Ebbetts from North5:33270088km
100K mark6:163000100km
Top of Ebbetts from South8:003784136km Approx distance
Finish9:163992162.8km

The obvious positive is that halfway in distance is 2238 meters climbed or 56% of the total. Me at about halfway – looking quite bright and cheerful. One bonus is that it achieved double my weekly elevation taget in one ride.

There are several Strava segments on the course but I would recommend turning them off as the 3rd section is 61km long and frankly gets really off-putting, also it overlaps with a fourth section. The video is made by a cyclist who keeps a good pace and I was always between 0.7-0.8x of his time bar parts of the downhills. I didn’t really pedal downhill and when I did it didn’t make any noticeable difference in speed

There is little traffic on the first half with slightly more later on and very few people around. I did not see any cyclists at all. The filming is well done, on a bright sunny day. The lake (Lake Heenan) at the top of Ebbetts looked very inviting but was likely icy cold.

For pacing I would use the table above and adjust to your own schedule. My biggest (and probably only) mistake was in not having a target time. I had cycled further virtually (Kona Ironman 180Km) but nowhere near as much climbing or as long a time. I didn’t really have an idea of how long it would take and how fast the descents were so it was a matter of completing rather than making a certain time. In hindsight, given that I ‘lost’ about 20 minutes getting food etc I would see 8:30 as achievable and definitely sub 9.

I am not a great liquid drinker when doing longer rides and I took on a total of less than 2 litres of liquid, including 500ml of energy powder and 3 cups of tea. Food was toast, a coconut macaroon, an energy bar and a cereal bar. I never felt under fed or watered but I should probably have drunk more.

Edit: Also two gels

Link to my Strava file. If it is not on Strava it didn’t happen. 39 comments and 75 kudos. Thanks everyone.

Will I do it again. Definitely. Probably not until after February as if I am slower or do not finish I wipe my first time from the leaderboard. Currently 5/6 on the leaderboard, although I was first on 8th Feb. Times range from 6:43 to 10:21

Good luck to anybody having a go. It is a hard but satisfying challenge. I hope the information I provided is helpful

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Comments and input welcome