oops 😳

if it helps anyone not local, we had close to an inch of rain in Bristol today, more expected overnight but its supposed to be dry tomorrow and saturday…

There was water last year. One of those tanker jobbies. Plus the tap on the side of the cafe is actually working……….at last

The tap on the side of the cafe is turned off outside of opening hours, apparently some hilarious types were leaving it running all night.

Look for the big blue tanker in the event field.

Racing as a pair here. Hope they bring back the finish jump so I can do my trademark “safety pencil”. 🙂

to quote Bob Marley
“Sun is shining, the weather is sweet, yeah
Make you wanna move your dancing feet now
To the rescue, here I am
Want you to know, y’all, can you understand?”

or rather, its not raining in Bristol today.

i can’t decide between gears and SS!!! 😥

SS makes you overtake lots of dawdlers on the climbs.
Gears make you overtake lots of people on the flat bit after the gatehouse.

My fastest lap at Bikefest was done after consuming a recovery beer, so I reckon hydration strategy is more important than drivetrain.

i can’t decide between gears and SS!!!

Are you faster than me ?
If so, I recommend gears, I don’t want you pushing me down the results. 😉

haha, how many SSs are there? my primary reason is that i reckon i can do comparatively better SS than i can geared 😉

Unless you go too niche, in which case you’ll get bumped into a proper category and come nowhereth.

If you’re thinking of switching to be in with a chance of winning a prize, bear in mind that it’s usually a 20″ inner tube or something equally glam. 😉

this is all about self glory for me 😉

Would anyone be interested in buying pics of themselves from this event, we’re toying with the idea of covering it the same as the exmoor Enduro.

Sort of thing we do is Here

some really heavy rain overnight and it’s still drizzling now though it’s dying out…

So it’ll be wet though the new trails mean it shouldn’t be muddy other than a couple of spots.

Have fun and Go Vegas!

Good luck everyone. Cheer for Team Unelite!

That was one of the best events I’ve ridden on the mtb. Great course, lovely organisers and an especially nice podium that we somehow fluked.

aye, good event. bit of a bugger having to ride 30 mins there and back with a massive bag though – i really need a car (or some mates!).

happy with how i rode, surprised at how strong the field was though in solo mens (and in general).

given the number of sponsors, i was surprised at the lack of spot/podium prizes (in a non-greedy way), seems to be the norm in scotland, as do timing chips (i had a bit of a ‘oh bugger, where’s my chip?!’ moment just before the start…)

pretty fubared now, and off to bed i think!

Timelaps use chips in the number boards I think (they certainly tried it) but always back it up manually, and I’ve seen far fewer errors from them than any chip-based system, I’d not worry.

At Bristol Bike Fest the prizes were meant to be collected off the podium, rather than handed out, could have been the same today. Sadly no one told us and we never got ours!

Prize was beer, drinking mine now.

We did have a timelaps issue, they missed one of our laps, but gave it back when they saw we rode a consistent 34-36 min average over the 8 hours

good start and first 2 laps then for some reson cramp set in early this time.. then my right shifter blew up.. then it got so deep i had no front traction got pissed off got up to 6 laps and i blew up and say eating pork pies for the rest of the time,
sorry for anyone that got stuck behind me at any point

one thing i have noticed the maners have got allot better sins i rode 2011 bikefest which made it abit more plesurable

I won 8hr solo, no prizes despite it being announced at the start ‘amazing prizes for winners’.

Sucks.

Got a very nice trophy though which was cool and some free beers. Oh and a pretzel. Plus I got to watch Matt and Matt throwing some shapes which was say better than any prize. But really – it was a great event, nice course that can stand the weather (take note Mayhem/sits) and friendly fellow racers, apart from the total nobber no 55 who started on a friend of mine for being ‘too slow’. Nobber.

GB

I had a great day – i was entered for the four hour afternoon solo, but won a comp to be on Martyn Ashtons VitoSport team. I think either the timeing guys missed one of our laps, or counted Blakes lap which he did with one of the other comp winners. Missed beating Steve Peats team by 1min.
I’m already signed up for Bikefest.

Great event once again. Surprisingly muddy for Ashton Court but not many courses in the UK would have been anywhere near as fun, fast and rideable as that with the weather we had before hand!

Finally got a podium in the mixed team of four at my home event which was nice! Need to check the laps as we were running Torq close and ended up a lap down so not sure what happened there…

Results
I won the 8 hour SS class, although there were only 3 starters.

Really impressed with how well the course holds up, lots of fun too. 4th time at Bristol & think it’s one of the most chilled events. 5th again in the old men’s 4hr & resigned to never getting better unless I either learn to run really fast uphill (or walk really slowly down the hill ;o)

We won our class.

I stood on the podium with my fellow team mates, which included Steve Peat. Yes, that’s shared a hard won podium with a World Champ.

Just sayin’

We were saying we will probably do Bike/Oktober Fests instead of Mayhem and SITS next year. It’s just so much more enjoyable and weatherproof. No slog!

My Strava of the race:

http://app.strava.com/rides/24978881

GB

Really enjoyed yesterday.

Great atmosphere as has been in the Bikefest and Oktoberfest races for the past few years. Weather just about held out although the bit of rain near the end made things interesting.

By Ashton Court (new testament) standards it was very muddy but compared to most other places given recent weather the course held up amazingly well and infact I think dryed out quite abit over the first few hours. My crossmark / larsen combo was fine, anything draggier would annoy me on the climbs!

Had no bother at all out on the course, infact everyone was very polite and gave the right calls and moves (whether it was passing or being passed). Had a lot of fun out there.

Our team were mid table obscurity which considering for most of it we were only 3 peeps and weren’t taking it too seriously (not ready at end of lap handover!!) was respectable.

Curry and beers last night, bimble round the harbourside in the sun today. Good Bristol weekend 🙂

oh and the burgers in the bus were ace!

Great event.
Nice to see Steve peat being a very normal world champ. Down to earth, plastic cup of cider.
Thanks for the cider.
And sausages
And beer
And more sausages

Oh and I won my class, old gits on fat bikes. There were no other teams, and its not even a real category, but we ruled it anyway.

Little video bike test report from mid race…

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOoELNtrsV4&feature=plcp[/video]

Anyone know if the results are online yet? Just wanna see how I compare to Steve peat, and flash on my team who must be almost 60 years old now.

yep – results are up now – http://www.timelaps.co.uk/assets/uploads/EVENTREPORT.aspx?eventid=221AshtonCourt13/10/2012#4hr%20PM%20Team%204%20Male

Steve did the 29.29 by the way.

Steve’s lap was the 1st and 5th lap (mine was the 4th)…

ooo – so you did manage a sub 30 then…. Nice one Neil.

Nah, only a 32.43 – but then I did get spat into the trees at one point, and held up once or twice.

Nontheless, chuffed with that.

charlie the bikemonger – Member
Great event.
Nice to see Steve peat being a very normal world champ. Down to earth, plastic cup of cider.
Thanks for the cider.

The cider (and pickled eggs) was courtesy of our team – wideopenmag.co.uk

We were disappointed by the amount of people who didn’t stop/take the hand up – they can’t all have been race leaders…

Argh, I’m slower than Peaty at XC as well as DH now… 😆

I managed a 29:58, not quite!

We were disappointed by the amount of people who didn’t stop/take the hand up – they can’t all have been race leaders…

In my my defence, we weren’t totally out of the race for 1st place when I turned the Cider down!

It was far more people than you Gary!

I thought it was water! Would definitely have taken cider. Did say a polite, “no thanks” (in my defence I was utterly shagged and under pressure to ride a 34 minute lap, I missed the cut-off by 20 seconds so bloody wish I’d taken the cider and chilled out).

I had a really fun day, marred slightly by a last lap that came in a few seconds over the cut-off. 🙁

Second what everyone else is saying about the insanely polite manners out on the course. Most people were pretty much stuffing themselves into the undergrowth to let you past.

Gary, apologies for not grabbing those bars off you. In the end we had our hands full with an escaping event shelter, and then after subduing and dismantling that it started raining, which meant packing everything into the car. Gah.

We were disappointed by the amount of people who didn’t stop/take the hand up

One word: roofies.

Another great event

Was tough out on the course with muddy (for Bristol) conditions and a tough head wind. Tweaked my calf on the run up the gravel track so had a woeful start. Managed a few 32m ish laps and then completely bonked on my 6th lap coming in at around 38 mins.

Decided not to start a 7th lap unless I had 35 mins. Thankfully my mate had a terrible 6th lap and left me just 32m, so we hit the beer 🙂

Very polite passing all around apart from one bad move on my part where I accidentally cut a guy off at the red/blue bomb hole option at the bottom of Keepers Wood (?). I apologised immediately and he accepted so all was all right. 😳