Pick up the light 🔦 and scouting 🕵‍♂️

#gravel-after-work 👩‍💻👨‍💻👨‍💻

Sunrise 🌄 run 🏃‍♂️

Fresh day 😶‍🌫️  in Jura ⛰️

Connect the towns 🏘🔗🏘

***Bricolage of all the gpx files put together. Reduced the other to 0 to don't mess up statistics***

💰 Added some more pics from the last days 💰

The adventure started in Sežana, a town just across the border with Italy, on June 3rd and I finished in the checkpoint 2 with 885* km and ~16000m ⬆️ after 108h (13h sleep 😴)

Oficially km 861 of the race

Day 1 - Friday, June 3rd
190 kms | 4075m ⬆️ | 15.5h 🚴‍♂️ | 3h 😴

The race started well with a little bit more of a 100 participants and the first hours passed by easily finding riders 🚴‍♂️🚴‍♂️ quite often.

The first kms were in quite good gravel. Then some downhill where with fresh body felt good but there were some short tricky trail and very loose broken gravel. Had a small fall with no consequence for me but shoe broken that needed some shoe mechanic👟👨‍🔧. The day was quite warm but felt quite good.

After 73 kms, in Senožeče I could find supermarket where me and some other riders bought food amd drinks. After a 15 min stop I kept going.

Another section went by and around km 135 it started raining. 15 kms later I stopped at Babno Polje where there was a house 🏡, a supermarket 🛒 and a bar ☕️. It was almost 7pm, so close to 12h and night was coming, so I bought some food and I drank coffee and a Bruschetta in "Bar Toni".

The waitress talked with me and asked where I came, where I was going, where I was going to sleep and I answered if I find something somewhere if not in the forest. She said me in the area there are wolves 🐺 and bears 🐻 but in Croatia most likely not 🤷‍♂️. So I ask where is the border and she said me 500m further 🤣. I did not know I was so close.

Raining 🌧 kept on and off and it took me 4h to arrive to Platak. Before the top there was some connection trails with some tree to jump and it was quite time consuming to sort out all the obstacles 🚧.

In Platak, at km 190 there was a mountain hut where I asked for food and drinks. While eating I found Mathieu and they were sleeping some hours there waiting for the rain to go, so I asked for a room too and did a 3h nap.

Route: Sežana - Slavnik - Senožeče - Babno Polje ☕️🥪 - Platak 😴

Day 2 - Saturday, June 4th
285 kms | 5166m ⬆️ | 26h 🚴‍♂️ | 3h 😴

I started the day around 4am with a descent and then a quite dense trail while seing the first sunrise of the adventure. Later another downhill, cross the valley and up ⬆️ again.

Here I started to be a bit worry because I did not have a lot of water and food and there was just a fountain 100 kms from a town with a fountain and a hut (with food) 115 kms away 🤔.

I luckily found a house with 3 people and asked for water and they gave me water and breakfast 🙏. That made me less worry of the some 100 kms I had ahead for the food.

Afterthat the scenery was very impressive with wild horses 🐎 at one side and crossing the road and views to the see 🌊 in the other side. When I passed this area where started to be hot I found another group of houses to ask for water 🚰.

I kept going up ⬆️ and down ⬇️... trails, gravel asphalt and found the town with a tap to refill and a few houses but nothing else. I needed to do some 15 kms more for the food.

It was hot... I was craving food and finally when I got to the hut, around 4pm there was no food 😭😢😭. I got some sugary drinks and with my pitty face the man of the hut gave me 2 small pieces of a cake that there was left.

With that I had no option than doing another 93 kms to get to Gospić which luckily there I could get something in a restaurant but supermarkets were already close at 9:30pm. When I arrived I saw Mathieu and Samuel in a Pizzeria and asked for pasta 🍝 and 2 pizzas🍕🍕. I took one to take away that I had something beside gels and bars which are not appealing.

Check point 1 was about 83 kms away, so around 11pm I decided to go for it. First through big bushes trail between mine fields and later 2 small climbs and a final big climb.

It was endless... any time forescast I've been doing during last days I always failed miserably. While I was thinking I would arrive around 4am.. I arrived at 6:30 am. I had an extra sunrise in the same ride 🌄🌄.

#Route: Platak - Lič - Maševo - Javorje - Alan - Stolac - Oltari 🚰 - Babić Sića - Gospić 🍕 - Donji Lapac (Checkpoint 1)

Day 3 - Sunday, June 5th
125 kms | 3449m ⬆️ | 11h 🚴‍♂️ | 4h 😴 | 1 flat tyre

Day 3 started late since it was partly consumed by the previous day. It started with a small climb on road and then join a traverse of not so good conditions. I met Samuel and from here I did not see anyone else more. From there down to a road and I made 2km extra to get water since there was an stretch of 65k from Srb to Knin without water and who knows how is going to be 🤷‍♂️.

I got my first flat tyre in one uphill, but I felt I was quite good on time to arrive to Knin.

Of course I was wrong, very tough and the downhill quite very time consuming to end up with 2 river crossing in the dark. I arrivee after 9pm again with supermarket closed I looked for some place were I could dry my feet and shoes... I found it and then I joined Mathieu, and 2 other racers for dinner and we talked how those broken gravel (macadam) were distroying our hands, arms, backs... everything. Every bounce with gravel bikes shake your whole body and is multiplied for 1000×.

We were all devastated, so I decided for 1h more sleep than usual. This time 4h 😴.

#Route: Donji Lapac (Checkpoint 1) - Srb - Knin

Day 4 - Monday, June 6th
147.3 kms | 2944m ⬆️ - 2244m ⬇️ | 16h 🚴‍♂️ | 3h 😴 | 2 flat tyres

Around 6am I was on course again, luckily some kiosk and bakery was open so I bought what I found. I had another 100k ahead with a big climb of 1000m ⬆️ at once.

It started with 30 kms approach which actually was quite nice despite getting a flat tyre... I fixed it and kept going, I had only 1 left so I started to be worry.

Do you remember the pizza 🍕 from 2 days ago? Is the only real food I had with me... It was on the bike with foil, so after some 100s of kms shaking 📳 on the trails, it was a mix. I ended up removing foil parts from everywhere to have some more "appealing" food to bring to the mouth 😅.

I arrived around 9am to the foot of the climb and it started to be warm until temperatures rised to 37°C with my 3L of water. I made the climb and I had 1L left. I found Bartosz at the top resting at the shade of a closed hut trying to bring down the temperature of his body. A bit further we had a crosing to Bosnia 🇧🇦 over the mountains.

It was not all done. There was left 20 kms of up and down on altitude on crappy gravel which took me another 3h with the 1L of water 💧. I had to invent all the tricks to my mind to rationalize the water. I got an extra puncture to make it slower 😭.

Finally a broken downhill that willI had to stop every 5 min to let my back rest. Finally at the bottom I still needed 20k to get to Livno but I found few houses 🏘 and asked desperatelly for water. I got it in the first house 🙏.

I drank 2L in those 18 kms to arribe to Livno where I met Mathieu and Charlie and later Didier and Bartosz arrived. On the restaurant I drank another 3L of liquids... We arrived all seriously dehydratated.

After eating somthing, I looked for tubes since I had no tubes left and in a shopping center I found something...

I rode 32 kms more to arrive around 9:30pm to Šuica were I arrived pomping my tyre 4 times since I was loosing air. I found Charlie who said he was going to push it through the night and I said I need a place with water to fix tubes.

I found it, had dinner and spend 1h 30' fixing tubes and realized the ones I bought in the shopping center were the wrong valve 😭. But I found out that 3 of the tubes I had were puncture in the same place but could not fins the reason.

I cut the useless tubes and put it as a protection... after 3h sleep it kept with air so it looked it worked.

#Route: Knin Vjetar Dinare - Livno - Šuica

Day 5 Tuesday, June 7th
138.5 kms | 2325m ⬆️ - 3225m ⬇️ | 15.5h 🚴‍♂️ | 1 flat tyre

I started at 4:30am and head up towards a steep trail and follow by a trail with 1m tall grass... It was difficult to find it.

After 3h I saw Charlie who had 6 issues with the tyre and he spend over 2h fixing the tubeless and ended up with a tube.

I said aee you later and 1km later I was too fast hitting a rock and I bit the tube... While changing I saw Charlie passing and it was the only person I saw in 12h.

Again up, unclick push the bike, get on the bike... downhill pum pum pum, get off the bike, push... on... An average speed below 10 km/h on a day with more downhill than uphill... I was in the deep... Since 5am my mind was out of the race... Usually my down time use to come around 3-4pm... but today was much earlier.

The highlight of the day was a man (Ivan) around 4pm saying me...

#Route: Šuica - Meet Ivan 🍻 - Široki Brijeg 🥗 - Mostar - Baglaj

- Hi David
- mmm... 🤔, he know my name
- Hi
- Do you want a cold beer
- 💭 mmm... I should not drink while riding
- ok, but small...
- I have only half a liter
- 🤷‍♂️
- We talked for good 40 min

I kept going to a restaurant he recomended and then did the last 20k to checkpoint 2.

--------
Checkpoint 2
I ate, lay down 30 min and I did what I thought what I thought the last days...
- Would you recommend the race?
- No, unless you want a survival experience and with a MTB
- Would you be happy if you finish?
- No
I scratched ❌️
--------

The fun was gone and there is good 5 days to Discover Bosnia and Montenegro, so a new adventure starts.

I really like the conceot of traversing 4 countries with a special history and I enjoyed 5 days of good landscape, experiences and challenges and made me think what I like from bikepacking. I like discover and I don't mind the challengeof sleep deprivation and long days. But it made me think that the places we were we could reach it with half of the pain and avoiding 200kms without food.

💡 The race is recommended if you want a "survival experience".

#Transbalkanrace
#✅️ Slovenia 🇸🇮
#✅️ Croatia 🇭🇷
#✅️ Bosnia 🇧🇦
#❌️ Montenegro 🇲🇪　
🎷🐛 862.77 new kilometers

-- From Wandrer.earth

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David Lopez Valero

Transbalkanrace 2022 🇸🇮🇭🇷🇧🇦🇲🇪 | DNF ❌️

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Pick up the light 🔦 and scouting 🕵‍♂️

#gravel-after-work 👩‍💻👨‍💻👨‍💻

Sunrise 🌄 run 🏃‍♂️

Fresh day 😶‍🌫️ in Jura ⛰️

Connect the towns 🏘🔗🏘

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