Gerhard Labuschagne

I'm taking on an epic cycling challenge: Le Loop.

Le Loop follows the official route of the Tour de France, one week ahead of the professionals and finishes 21 stages later in Paris, some 3,400kms later.

I won't be doing the full Loop, but will be tackling 9 of the stages covering 1,626km from Bilbao, Spain, to Puy de Dome in France, in what is to be my biggest cycling challenge yet.

In addition to the physical challenge of cycling an average of 180km per day across some of Europe's biggest mountains, I have also challenged myself to raise a minimum of £1,200 in support of the William Wates Memorial Trust (WWMT). The fundraised money is entirely separate from the participation fee - donations do not pay for my Tour.

All monies raised go directly to the William Wates Memorial Trust whose mission is to help the most disadvantaged young people keep away from a life of crime and violence and fulfil their potential. This is achieved by giving grants to charities that engage young people through the medium of sports, arts and education.

Le Loop is no small undertaking. Riding even ONE stage of the Tour de France route is going to hurt! Please reward my pain by giving generously.

Merci!

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My Achievements

My Updates

Training, Cyclones and Sickness

Thursday 26th Jan

Funny thing about training and setting goals is that the world seems against you when you just start off, which I guess is why many people give up shortly after starting.

Maybe you just simply don't see all the challenges when you are just riding for fun, with no pressure, so a missed day doesn't mean that much. But with a goal in mind, suddenly every small obstacle becomes a big issue.

This is what it felt like for me after announcing that formal training for Le Loop has now started. Since my last (and first) update, training started fairly well. With my road bike still in storage, all training so far has been on my mountain bike. But I have found a few reasonable hills which I ride often and have managed a couple of longer efforts to keep on building the base.

Then the world seemed to turn against me. The last 10 days had its challenges with Tropical Storm Cheneso passing North of Mauritius and hitting Madagascar. This brought heavy rain and winds over Mauritius which made finding a gap to ride very difficult. And with my Kickr still in storage, no indoor riding either. The few rides that I did manage, I ended up soaking wet which also may have led to me being sick most of this week. Got up a few morning to ride in the rain, but decided against it. Got the Kickr out of storage to do some indoor training, but then work got in the way of that. And we have to move house twice in the coming weeks (to temporary place and then permanent place), so more disruption coming. All I can do now is try to ride as often as I can to just not lose momentum. Things will settle, the weather will turn, I will make it to Spain.

Cheneso is set to reach intense tropical cyclone status during the course of Friday 27 January while moving South away from Madagascar (and Mauritius). Hopefully this brings better weather next week to intensify training, although we are only at the start of cyclone season, so my expectation is more rain to come.

I have a few rides planned going right around the island in the coming weeks/months, but will update more on that later.

If you took the time to read this, please consider donating to the cause and support my Le Loop effort. Every cent helps. Note that all donation goes directly to WWMT and not to fund my trip.

Thoughts and prayers are with the people of Madagascar where sadly 15,000 people have so far been impacted by Cheneso, with 4 confirmed deaths and 14 people missing. I should stop complaining about not being able to cycle....

Training started

Wednesday 11th Jan

With a little under 6 months to go, training has started on the beautiful island of Mauritius I now call home. The plan is in place, weather just needs to hold up!

I am being shown around by some locals to find the biggest climbs on the island, which still is not close to a European mountain. So hill repeats are coming for the next 5 months.

Thank you to my Sponsors

£108

Richardt

Good luck Gerhard!!

£81

Lana & Rowan Grundlingh

Hou bene hou!

£54