As we finish this year’s Tour, it is time once again to reflect on our experiences.
I will start out with my traditional post:
To all those who started, even if they did not finish, to all who finished, however they finished:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Theodore Roosevelt
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Always come to read your post tour reflections. I’m sad this is the very last one.
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@DameLisa and @Heretic, you guys are The Best!!
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I feel like I’ve only just started. 
I’m going to wait for my badge to light up and let the feelings sink in before I post my reflections. That and my remaining shenanigans (thanks to @Heretic ).
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Did you think because the Tour was almost over that you escaped?
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It never over till the the fundraising deadline hits. 
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When does the badge light up? I see there’s a separate post about it. Mine is still greyed out.
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Rupert said it takes a day to do so. Apparently the minions have to get out their crayons and color it in.
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After doing Stage 6, I was dreading Stage 7. Not because of the difficulty but because it was the LAST stage of what is (probably) the last Tour. The satisfaction of completing another Tour was offset by that sadness. But, like riding a bike, I will overcome that obstacle and keep moving forward.
In the nine years of riding the ToS/TWT, I’ve never completed at 100%. I’ve always had some failure point…which is good as I push myself to my limit. If I didn’t have that failure, I would have always asked ‘did I give it everything I had’? So Hammer #9 wasn’t a failure, it was reassurance.
What I will miss is the camaraderie of the Tours. The cheering each other on, the benevolence of those who could donate to ensure Suffer-nanigans and the fact that we came together (despite our differences) to ride united for DPF.
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Indeed. When I did my workout today, it felt different. Something was missing. It was almost as if there was a letdown. Nonetheless, as you say, we will all go forward.
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I enjoyed this years final tour & having come in with no prep was delighted to see it through and finish strongly 
It was probably the loneliest tour I’ve done though, with the race village/socials notably quieter & for good parts felt more like a solo quest like my Knighthood. Sign of the times though I guess & every dog has it’s day as the saying goes, so maybe timing is right to close out this era of Sufferlandrian & usher in the new. One things for sure, once a Sufferlandrian, always a Sufferlandrian, so we can never leave even if we wanted to 
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You can see this analytically because the number of responses to the Recovery Drink poll, and the Reflections topic have declined over the years.
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So this was my first tour since I only started indoor cycling last summer.
Of course that means I can’t compare it to prior years but y’all were fun here!
I quite enjoyed it, was an unexpected challenge on top of my regular commuting.
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Hey Sir Richard @richie_engineer, you can always ride all the historical Tour of Sufferlandria routes. I think it was Sir Stuart @Critmark who did that for, umm…“fun”.
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Free will is a wild thing
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I am glad that you participated in the Tour (as well as your Knighthood Quest).
I recall your post from a couple of months ago about what you were ‘missing’ by just doing the Wahoo workouts and not watching the Sufferfest video storylines. When you decided to take on the challenge of the Knighthood Quest, something changed. If I recall correctly, you had The Bat at an opportune time in the Quest and the overt mental training helped you complete it. I think even the more sublime ones in most of the videos help us all get through them.
Hopefully you continue to explore the Sufferfest videos. You will probably find some favorites in the library. They become the ‘go to’ ones to do when you need some motivation, kind of like a favorite outdoor riding route.
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I mean don’t get me wrong I still like just staring at numbers but some of them are quite enjoyable and they will be part of my list.
Plus I just noticed there are badges in SYSTM for completing things and I’m a sucker for a badge quest!
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