PUNCHEUR Sportive

2014 will be the 6th PUNCHEUR. It sells out every year. It’s a carefully planned route, with a unique selling point: a tough, summit finish.

The challenge of the PUNCHEUR Sportive is not a long list of nasty climbs, neither is it mega-endurance. The challenge is to keep up a good tempo along rolling roads over 65 miles, and to keep your rhythm up the short climbs and drags.

Don’t take it lightly, however! Your endurance level will be tested, and you will get a good idea of your early-season fitness, and where your strengths and weaknesses are.

There are long, flat stretches; draggy climbs; fast descents; and short, sharp, steeper hills to get out the saddle and punch your way over. Can you pace it so you don’t blow up early, AND, also make sure you have something in your legs to get you up Ditchling Beacon at the end? If this butters your muffin

The Route

Leaving the HQ car park at Ditchling Recreation Ground, you head east towards Lewes, the South Downs looming over your right shoulder. Before reaching Lewes, you swing north and head for Ashdown Forest, via Barcombe, Spithurst, Sharpsbridge, Piltdown, Fletching and Nutley, all on unclassified, quiet, pretty roads, and with excellent road surfaces. You’ll get some speed up on this stretch, although the last few km to Nutley is a draggy uphill.

Once through Handcross village you take a left and start the very fast southern leg of the course, which takes you via Warninglid and Wineham down to the B2116, where you turn left and head for Hurstpierpoint. At the traffic lights just before Hassocks you turn right onto the A273 and head south for about a mile until you swing left onto the B2112. You’re only a few miles away from Ditchling and the Beacon now.

You then head north for the B2110 and then west for Turners Hill. You can really push the pace along here on a gently rolling stretch with a great road surface as you go straight though Turners Hill and then swing left and south, heading for Ardingly Resevoir. The 2012 enforced route change cut off the original PUNCHEUR loop around the reservoir, and this proved more popular, so as you approach the reservoir, you turn right for Balcombe on Mill Lane, which has a technical descent and then a steep climb up the other side – it’s only a few minutes of pain, though.

Once through Handcross village you take a left and start the very fast southern leg of the course, which takes you via Warninglid and Wineham down to the B2116, where you turn left and head for Hurstpierpoint. You’re only a few miles away from Ditchling now, but when you get to Ditchling High Street, instead of going straight across the roundabout to the HQ, you turn right and take the mile-and-a-half approach to the Beacon.

The Beacon is about 1km, averaging 10%. It’s painful if you want to get it done fast, but you can spin up it in 10 minutes or so if you want to. At the summit, get off the road to the right, get your timing tag registered by a marshall, and enjoy the panoramic views for as long or as short as you want, before going back down the Beacon into Ditchling and back to HQ for a warm drink and some pasta.