Working again, but still very frustrated with the incredibly frequent stage maker crashes.
Okay so I'm a new to stage making, and well everything else really. But I'm learning and working on getting better. So I thought I would really start on my stage making experience with what I'm calling the 4x4 tour. It is simple, 4 stages, 4 different stage types, 4 different countries.
To make things more difficult, I hate traveling, so every stage starts where the last one ended. And I will be releasing the stages as I complete them with some colorful notes about them. The stages are in increasing difficulty and likewise will be released in the same manner. The tour will have a Prologue, Flat, Hilly and Mountain stages, with sprint points to be won in the flat and hilly stage, and mountain points in the hilly and mountain stage.
Edited by Kentaurus on 15-08-2011 22:21
An 11km prologue starting us off in Germany will set the tone for this year's tour. While the starting and ending elevation are the same, the stage is not entirely flat. Immediately riders will have to climb a bit over 45 meters in the first 3 kilometers before getting a bit of a down hill to the only checkpoint halfway into the stage. After the checkpoint it's back uphill until the riders are given a break to descend back down in the final 4 kilometers to the finish. Knowing how and when to use the power in the legs will be just as important as having the power with the two small climbs and descents keeping it from being completely flat. Expect some of the climbers and hill riders to be willing to give it everything they have as tomorrow will be a fairly flat road and a day for the sprinters, so the climbers can prepare for the nightmares that await on days 3 and 4.
Day two of the four by four tour is the flat stage, well mostly flat at least. We start right where we left off in Gottmadingen, Germany, and immediately head east into Switzerland. The riders will head into the city of Schaffhausen and make two crossings over the Rhine. As carelessly as the route seems to play around the river, so it seems to carelessly cross between German and Switzerland making no less than 5 border crossings during the day, but I don't expect the riders will take notice, as the alps will always be looming in the south. the last border crossing, going over the Rhein at Rheinhelm, the rider will leave Germany for good and prepare quickly for the first of two intermediate sprints. Koblenz, a small town on the Swiss side of the Rhein will see the first sprint, and even those fans from Schmittenau, Germany can watch from across the river as the riders race for points on the riverside road.
From Koblenz we leave the Rhine, and instead follow one of its tributaries the Aar River. The riders will twice cross the Aar before leaving it behind, once at Stilli and again two and a half kilometers later at Brugg. The riders will take a short time away from the Aar avoiding the main part of the city of Aarau, and going though the outskirt towns of Rupperswil, Suhr, and Oberentfelden. The riders will meet up again with the Aar river at Rothrist, and also sprint again for our second intermediate sprint.
The riders will now start to head south, towards the alps from Rothrist, to Langenthal where we no longer follow the Aar to Bern but rather follow the nooks and crannies of the hills until reaching the Emme river. The riders will follow the Emme as the rivers keep the ride fairly flat, but they do not stay with it for long, after one corssing the riders will say goodbye to the river and continue to find their way through the now numerous foothills.
Just 15 kilometers short of our finish the riders will again meet the Aar river and follow in into the city of Thun. The riders will make their way through Thun, crossing the Aar once again, and getting to the west side of the Thunersee. It is along the side of the sea that we will have a good stretch of flat for our sprinters and the finish just before the city of Spiez in the town of Einigen.
