Tour of the Black Mountains - the climbs

The Tour of the Black Mountains has a great sportive route, in my opinion the best in the UK due to the extent and variety of its climbs, linked to great views and (generally) good roads.

The climbs start from the off with 20km up an ever increasing gradient to Gospel pass.

Then after a long descent you a false flat leads you south of Brecon where you head west up the Mynydd Illtud. After that you turn south and a succession of climbs hits you, long ones, steep ones and long steep ones (longest steepest coming on the 160km/100 mile mark).

Finally there are a couple of stings in the tail on the run in to home.

All in all I count 13 climbs in all, listed below. These add up to 2300m climbing. The ride is rarely flat though and you end up doing another 13oom of climbing to make a grand total for the route of 3600m over its 185km length.

(Distances in kilometres)

		Route	Route	Elevation		Distance	Metres	Gradient
Climb		Start	End	Start	End	of Climb	Climbed	Average	Max	Comments
1	Gospel Pass	1.3	20.6	121	540	19.3	419	2.2%	16.2%	U valley, the further you go the steeper it gets.
2	Mynydd Illtud	57.6	63.0	134	340	5.5	206	3.8%	10.1%	Old roman road. Look left to see Pen y Fan
3	Cerrig Duon	76.8	84.1	210	473	7.2	263	3.6%	11.5%	Turn south and head up
4	Bryn Rhudd	89.8	93.8	222	378	4.0	155	3.9%	7.9%	Main road drag on A4067
5	Chwyth	95.3	97.3	338	418	2.0	80	4.0%	6.6%	Short climb after leaving A4067
6	Bryn Melyn	103.7	105.6	257	446	1.9	188	10.0%	14.4%	Sheer climb with hairpins, don’t look up at the bottom, feed at top
7	Aber Illia	112.4	114.2	248	346	1.8	99	5.6%	18.9%	Unexpected wall round a corner in the woods.
8	Sychbant	118.0	122.6	244	400	4.6	156	3.4%	9.2%	Straight on through the cows
9	Ponsticill Reservoir	132.3	134.2	257	362	1.9	104	5.4%	9.2%	Climb out of Merthyr ending in forest
10	Creigiau	140.0	141.5	329	438	1.5	109	7.3%	16.1%	Steep towards end just before feed.
11	Blaen Onnau	158.4	162.7	121	441	4.3	320	7.4%	11.0%	A mini Alp at 100 miles, great descent
12	Crickhowell	170.6	172.0	96	210	1.4	114	8.1%	11.7%	Evil climb around the corner out of Crickhowell
13	Forest Coal Pit	176.7	179.2	162	249	2.5	87	3.4%	11.8%	Last climb of the day!

Gradient details of some of the climbs: