Before and After Stage Seven! Thanks for the misery! What a great Tour, so proud to represent the Nation. I had a friend texting last night who has another friend with Parkinson’s he donated $400 more just to be sure I made my goal. This is making a Difference people!
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Luck! 
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WOWZER. My first even TOS complete, Nuclear the whole way through. Thank you all for this amazing community, it definitely kept me going in some of the dark moments.
Defender was hard, but I got through it. Attacker destroyed me, though. I kept stalling, and then with 17 minutes to go I actually got off the bike and considered throwing in the towel.
Instead, I had a talk with myself about what it would take to get me through the last few intervals. I had already given up on the standing segments, so for the last two intervals ignored the cadence targets, and just focused on keeping those dead legs moving. I’m considering that a win.
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Finished stage & albeit with some pain!
I think this is my first time on both rides…Defender sub-stage 2 and 3 were hard…with pauses by me and Laser Goats close by. Attacker I was really cooked and decided to cut back to 80-85-90-95-100 % FTP on the five attacks…got it done but GvA says the closest I will get to the Suf Team is warming up the stationary bikes. Learned alot about my abilities and many thanks to the Suf Staff for putting this together. All in all my first ToS was a lot of fun and a great challenge! Congrats to all Sufferlandrians who took it on.
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First Tour complete! and what a great time I’ve had. Thanks to the organisers and fellow sufferers for all the fun along the way. 
Now for some serious recovery and calorie replacement - post ride tea and scones already gone!
Before
After
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Finished my second TOS and the first one on nuclear. I was happy to end on the Hardennes! I live in Belgium and one of my motivations for structured training is to suffer less on the Flemish epic hills.
Now time to recover after this feat of endurance!
Looking forward to the tour next year!
Congratulations everybody and it’s great to be part of such an awesome community.
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That was horrific. Hated every moment of Stage 7 - struggle from the first warm up on Defender and that workout destroyed anything I had left in the tank. Attacker was a grind and bonked big time - just finishing felt like an achievement.
This week has destroyed me but ToS #5 in the books and at a much higher power output than ever before. Thank god there is no Stage 8 - found this the hardest of the 5 I have done
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A definite win! Sufferlandrians are awesome. You are awesome.
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Just completed Stage 7. This has been my first ToS and I have enjoyed (through gritted teeth and buckets of holy water) every painful, single minute of it. Almost sad its over in a strange way, I been really fired up at the end of the day to get on the turbo, so hoping I can keep that motivation going. A very, very big thank you to all the team that organised it. Can’t wait for ToS '22.
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A fantastic finish to the tour. Feel very happy with what I accomplished this week.
I opened with Open 15 as a warmup, then went right into Defender, both on ERG. The music choices were excellent on both Defender and Attacker – keeping me right in the zone. Loved the (special for the tour?) messages at the beginning of Defender.
For Attacker, I swapped to level mode in order to wring every possible drop of Holy Water out of my system, bumped the targets to 105% and still stayed ahead of them! In the last effort of the last set I left it all on the table, knowing there was well deserved rest around the corner. I ended up setting season records for both 1minute and 20minute power during Attacker. 
On closer inspection of the combined TCX file, it looks like I set or matched season records for large stretches of my power curve: 45s - 2m and 11m - 2h.
Clearly I’m due for some brutal suffering in 4DP in two weeks as the post-tour plan wraps up, but for now I’m thrilled at how the tour has helped me push my own limits. Thanks to the SUF team and the community here for providing encouragement and inspiration. 
Now to go scrounge for more food, perhaps some 
and 
?
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I’m amazed that I feel as completely wiped after 7 days in my 4th Tour as 9 days in the previous 3. Well done minions!
This tour may have a friend of mine pursuing a run at the Castle. Several others join The Sufferfest and rode in their first ever Tours. I told them based on their comments they should apply for passports. After all, they can never leave. 
All in all, a fantastic tour - the stats (riders and donations all up over previous years) are amazing. The support, camaraderie, and humo(u)r are fantastic as always. Chapeau all!
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Completed tour in nuclear option. Defender was mentally tough but found enthusiasm for attacker.
I am very proud of my daughter for getting through this. I now have to buy her her choice of biking kit.
Great tour. Well done to everyone who got to the end. 357 ish days to the start of the 2022 tour - we cannot wait.
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Tour #5 finished! That was a hard finish. Even with reduced numbers that third interval during Defender was tough work, 10 mins at 100rpm isn’t my thing. 100% for Attacker seemed the only way to finish. Those 1 minute rests really were short. Real struggle once the effort started to ramp up in the last interval as you’ll see from the photo
Thanks to everyone at Sufferfest for a great tour especially GvA for the route - those double days scared me beforehand but worked really well. Thanks to everyone on here as well and on the FB group for the motivation and laughs along the way.
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I really wanted to do Defender last, but went ahead and did it first instead, as intended.
Defender was tough even at the reduced intensity. But it’s one of my favorites and I can always seem to power thru it, so I did.
Then came Attacker at 100%. I did not feel like I had enough left to do it at 100. My tummy was growling but not feeling that great, so I started it at 90% with the intention of turning it down when it became too much.
Just before the first interval my video began buffering a cut out. Oh no! I was horrified! I am glad it happened during that long easy spin section before the first interval hit. I was able to take stock and realize that somehow my pc disconnected from the WiFi. So all I had to do was turn WiFi off and back on and then the video reconnected and I was back in business without having to stop in the middle of my workout. Crisis averted! 
whew!
Fortunately, despite my expectations, Attacker wasn’t as difficult as I had feared and never felt as hard as I was expecting. So, despite the painfully short recoveries, I was feeling good after the third interval, so I turned it up to 95% for the 4th. And then up to 100% for the final interval.
The finale was glorious suffering!
In the end I was glad I chose to keep Attacker as the final video.
TOS 2021 suffered and conquered
Thank you DPF and SUF-Wahoo for the amazing experience!
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OMG. That was a tough stage! But what a great way to finish.
Two intervals into defender I thought I had it. The first two mins each time were almost unbearable but knew I’d be ok once it eased off. The switch to high cadence in the 3rd changed that confident feeling instantly and it felt like a long day in the saddle after that!
Attacker was hard but increasing fatigue was offset by the sense of accomplishment in getting that far. Don’t think I could have managed it if that was a double header earlier in week.
Done at last. Loved it all and really loved hearing the updates from around the world. Felt able to tap into the energy of others to help me get going each day. Thank you!!
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Thanks everyone for a great Tour! Already looking forward to ToS '22!
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We did it! And what a fab ending - with the motivational words at the end of Attacker, so appropriate. 
Started Defender at 100%, but that only lasted my first defence, well and truly knocked out by the fifth. Was dreading Attacker as although I’ve done it once before, I misremembered and thought it would be an exact reverse of Defender, with 10 minutes ramping up to full speed. Thank gawd it wasn’t! 
Much more manageable, and worked back up to 100% by the end.
I’d forgotten about the personal texts on screen too at the start of Defender, that was a special last day of Tour thing wasn’t it?
A great route, definitely harder than my previous two Tours I reckon, and this forum is a great place for support, especially for those of us not on FB.
If you’re thinking of a Knighthood, go for it. I was inspired by finishing a Tour. You have to be able to tolerate 11 hours or so in the saddle, and have a bit more training time available to make the best of it. And as an anti-monarchist, I’ll still in a bit of a dilemma.
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A firm resolve knows not how to weaken - GvA approves!
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