You might think that the likes of the TransRockies and TransAlp would have TransWales licked for toughness. Well, think again. Sunday’s opening stage packed a mighty 2,600m of climbing. And that’s a lot.

Only TransWales’s special stages are timed and count for the overall results, but coming in later than the time limit on the untimed link stages incurs time penalties. Thankfully this wasn’t a problem for any of the BM teams, although Mike and Dave ran it a bit close (protracted lunch stop, puncture, general slowness yada yada…) – Those left in the office can imagine the faffing and hear the excuses coming from a long way off, especially seeing as they were still sizing up and fettling bikes only the day before…

Elsewhere in the TransWales peloton, and slightly more impressively, the BikeMagic mixed team competition winners Jon and Barbara were safely inside the time limit, despite Jon nursing a knee injury picked up just before the event – to take some load off it he rode with one flat pedal and one SPD. Heroic stuff. Meanwhile the BM/SheCycles.com team, Kim and Heather, showed what proper fast is, coming in a couple of hours early.

The course itself was properly epic, with some sweet singletrack sections, plenty of grunty climbs and, of course, a fair bit of pushing and the odd soul-destroying “undulating” section. We certainly knew that we’d been for a ride… Monday sees the first special stage, a team relay on the Summit trail at Nant y Arian. Then it’s a short 33km hop to Machynlleth. We’ll have another report tomorrow…