115 is a coded term for difficulty. For a start, this stage has over a thousand feet of climbing in its twenty four miles. Secondly, none of it is flat: if you’re not going up, then you’re going down ahead of the next climb. It’s a stage in which you get precious little rest.
The rollout is uphill, continuing on from the climb that started at the end of stage 114 as the road left Lake Izhevskiyin its wake. However the climb is short lived because the M7 then descends back down to the northern end of the lake, losing all of the elevation gained in the previous few miles. The crossing of the Igermanka river at three miles provides both the lowest elevation of the day and the start of the most severe climb.
The road climbs three hundred feet between miles three and six, where the highway takes a right hander in the forest. That’s followed by four miles of straight road, downhill, to Novaya Vozhayka where the M7 crosses the river Vozhoyka where it feeds into the lake of the same name half a mile to the west.
The stage enters the forest at this point and remains there for virtually the whole of the remainder of the stage. Miles ten to fifteen are lumpy, with some steep ascents and descents, but nothing too major. The next significant climb is reserved for the road out of Selychinskoye and away from the merge of the rivers Izh and Vazhayka at fifteen miles. Another sharp climb takes you to Kalifol’nyy at seventeen miles before you embark upon a very undulating seven mile run to the finish: there is no respite here: it’s all up or down with no flat.
The finish is a mile and a half past Lake Selychka, and although the lake is in the forest, the finish itself is half a mile out of it on the short, steep descent into Yakshur-Bod’ya.
You’ll know you’ve worked after this stage, but beware, this is only the warmup act : there are even more testing stages lying in wait.
Distance: 24 miles / 38 kilometres
Ascent: 1096 feet / 334 metres
RGT Magic Road: ay66uLPTUxo9
Max elevation: 603 ft
Min elevation: 357 ft
Total climbing: 1090 ft
Total descent: -1137 ft
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