Haute Route Dolomites, Stage 2. Descending "fun"....

Stage 2 took us from our overnight stay in Cortina d'Ampezzo to Merano. The first point I noted looking at the map, was we started higher than we ended, this in short equals plenty of descending, which, lets say I generally dislike. We had been warned by the organisers that it was the biggest bank holiday in Italy and the roads would be busy, they were not joking!!

Today I awoke to a 05:00 alarm, good start to the day. Breakfast eaten, and rolled to the start. It was very very cold. Glad I had taken my gilet, arm warmers and overshoes for the fun ahead. The first climb and descent went reasonably well as most of the holidaying tourists were still tucked up in bed or nursing a hangover. By the time we tackled the second and third descents the roads were carnage. The only way round it was if you decided you were going to take massive risks! If like me you stay risk free, you would end up sitting behind cars endlessly. and the villages were packed so rolling through them was ridiculious.

My fear on this stage was the 40k+ form the bottom of the final descent to the finish where I knew if I was alone I would lose a load of time to the guys who descended faster and stayed in groups. My fear came true and I was on my own, well I did catch one guy but he offer no help on the work front. Luckily we eventually caught a Swiss guy called Raphael with 15k to the finish. He was an asset and put some work on the front which gave me a few little breaks.

Looking at the results I believe provisionally I was 13th which I was actually quite pleased with, not losing a huge amount of time, on what was, a bad looking stage for me.

Tomorrow we have a big big day.... and another summit finish, lets see how the legs recover overnight and see what we can do. Looks like it may be another cold start.... Low single figures.