I don’t see the point in riding up hills if you don’t get timed on them.

The idea is that, whilst all-round abilty (inc fitness) is important, the emphasis is put on riding skill.
The more long uphill slogs you time, the less riding skill comes into it at all. All down to the fact that EVERYONE takes longer to ride uphill than downhill… i.e. for every minute of uphill you time, you have to time about five minutes of descent for technical riding prowess to come into it. This is the basis of the “gravity” Enduro thing.

munrobiker – Member

Personally, I don’t “get” the new breed of enduros- I don’t see the point in riding up hills if you don’t get timed on them.

I have tried descending while sat in the car park but it didn’t really work out, eventually I gave in and rode up some hills.

I’ll be using this, SC Blur 4x with 36 vans, 1×10 and reverb.

Blur by le_grande_momo, on Flickr

I don’t see the point in riding up hills if you don’t get timed on them.

You are timed, you just have to be under the time limit. Whether the organisers choose to make those sections difficult is a different matter, there’d be uproar amongst the weekend warriors if the climbs were set at an XC race pace.

This:

Does anyone know what speed and rate of climb these enduro races base their uphill stage maximum times on?

How useful is an uppy downy seatpost?

Unless there is a lot of climbing in the timed stages then surely it would be better to save the weight and just put your saddle up and down the old fashioned way?

we’ll its gonna cost you almost a lb in weight

Considering the fact that the closest thing I’ve got to an enduro bike right now is around 37 lbs I’m shaving weight wherever I can. It does have a gravity dropper but I’m not sure how much use it will be if all I’m using it for is saving a couple of seconds before and after each timed run.

I can see the benefit on something like the megavalance though

The Gravity Dropper Classic weighs 0.5lbs more than a Thomson of the same length. I don’t ever ride without the dropper post, prefer being able to keep it down much of the time but raise it immediately when required – that’s far more important to me than a 0.25% change in total system mass. This Cotic Soul weighs just under 26.5lbs despite the ‘all-mountain’ (marketing box ticking) build.

This isn’t my ‘enduro race bike’ though, it’s just my bike! 😉 But the enduro race format is pretty much how I spend my time riding (hopefully my normal rides are quicker uphill).

One of my team-mates will be on a coil-shocked Orange Alpine, another on a Santa Cruz 150mm full-sus, the other on a 29er of some breed (am guessing his full-sus one). I don’t think any of them have dropper posts (yet…)

I’m not especially good though, but the guys who are sponsored by XC Racer, Loco and several others who buy their own bikes ride Anthems and are beating everyone at the moment.

No they don’t, the XCRacer team use Treks (formerly Gary Fishers) and always have done 😕

How are they beating everyone too?

The AW Cycles team have had Giant for ages, but are changing to Trek 29ers this season. Struggling to think of any other team that use them.

They’re good bikes (if a bit heavy), but dominant they are not. No one bike is.

I quite want to try one of these Enduros (in the Euro sense). Light 6″ travel bike with a dropper post FTW. Not that I own such a thing.

This isn’t my ‘enduro race bike’ though, it’s just my bike! But the enduro race format is pretty much how I spend my time riding (hopefully my normal rides are quicker uphill).

Yeah, for normal riding I agree it’s well worth it, especially if you’re on terrain that is rolling.

I’m just wondering why people would use them for a race, especially if you want to be competitive (many small things rather than one big thing and all that).

Judging by the number of dropper posts on the big enduro races like the Trans Provence I’d guess they remain a good thing on our UK races. 0.25% change in mass isn’t going to make much difference to your overall time but being able to sit and spin up some of the uphills within the timed race stages could give your legs enough of a rest to ride harder and faster on the downhills.

BruceWee – Member

How useful is an uppy downy seatpost?

Depends on the course. A lot of UK enduro events end up with pretty short stages of almost entirely descent, which really reduces the benefit.

But some courses they’re a godsend… I ended up not racing innerleithen winter series 2 due to injury but I prerode the course and the climb at the end of stage 2/4 could have broken me without a dropper.

I’ve actually removed mine for some enduro events! (not so much because of weight, but because it was expensive and I tend to crash my brains out in races because I’m a knob). Didn’t miss it at all in that race, there was a fire-road climb but it was for beasting not spinning.

780 bars

µHA HA HA HA HA HA HA…

Trees are going to love you…
More to the point Ash is right you know. I probably am riding more enduro races than most of you. The uphill may not be timed, but you hard have time for a bbq at the top. And the stages are MOSTLY descending, so people with a DH bike are in for a nasty surprise…
I think mr nichastic needs to broaden his horizon a bit.

I’d say a dropper is well worth getting because there were a few more pedally stages and it’d save your legs if you could sit and sit for a bit and then get the post out of the way again.

2 examples at Afan:
Stage 3- pedally trail centre type bit where you’e bettwer off having it a bit higher but on some bits you’d want it slammed just so you can mvoe a bit easier.

Stage 5: Very pedally first half or maybe more than that and then you’re into the 4X track at the end.

Both of those stages I ahd to compromise both on pedaling and descending. With a dropper, you won’t.

Have a look at this from last year, insight into Enduro race bike set up.

This is what I’ll be entering a couple of the gravity enduro series races on, has a Reverb now too…

Not set up specifically for enduros, but happens to be just right for them IMO.

I was wondering how long it’d take this to descend to an Enduro v Enduro argument – only two replies and it had already started, excellent work!

Kudos though to munrobiker for recognising the problem and providing an answer to both possible questions. Sadly though, with good sense like that you’re not likely to last around here.

Maybe all those bumping chests about the use of the word enduro could reopen this thread and keep their cat fights out of other threads?

Personally, I’m unlikely to be entering many if any of either sort of event this year. If I did I expected I’d be using my new Anthem X for the how many-laps-in-some-time enduros and my Mojo for special-stages-and-an-overall-time-limit enduros. The Mojo wouldn’t be the best sort of bike for the enduros at Innerleithen but they seem to be weighted towards the DH end of that event type’s spectrum. From what I’ve heard you can push a DH bike up all the climbs and still keep within the time limit so perhaps Ash would consider that they’re not proper enduros either? 😉

njee- sorry, it’s not XC Racer, it’s another team and I can’t for the life of me remember their name.

Up in Scotland they certainly seem to be the race bike of choice, I think because of the more technical nature of the courses.

You should try some of these Euro Enduros njee, like I say, as a more traditional Endurance racer I don’t quite get the point of the uphills not counting but they’re a lot of fun, and there’s nothing to stop you battering up the hills anyway.

Up in Scotland they certainly seem to be the race bike of choice, I think because of the more technical nature of the courses.

Plenty of FS bikes down here, just not dominated by Anthems. Like I say, not one dominant model at all. Don’t see why an Anthem is more suited to a technical course than an Epic/Spark/Top Fuel/ASR/Blur XCc etc.

If there were any locally I’d give one a punt, CBA travelling to Wales or whatever! Like the idea though. Agree that the notion of having timed climbs but not competitive is a bit different, must work though!

Loco and several others who buy their own bikes ride Anthems and are beating everyone at the moment.

Huw was one of the BM Loco lads riding an anthem and is the Rookie champ at national 12 hour. He’s actually riding for Niner Stans Ergon on an RDO now – prefers it.

munrobiker – Member

I don’t quite get the point of the uphills not counting

Eh ???!
you said that earlier in the thread and I replied with…

The idea is that, whilst all-round abilty (inc fitness) is important, the emphasis is put on riding skill.
The more long uphill slogs you time, the less riding skill comes into it at all. All down to the fact that EVERYONE takes longer to ride uphill than downhill… i.e. for every minute of uphill you time, you have to time about five minutes of descent for technical riding prowess to come into it. This is the basis of the “gravity” Enduro thing.

Fair enough, this might not be your thing, but surely you “get the point” of what this racing is about?

Pro rider setups for Enduro racing…

JEROME CLEMENTZ

FABIEN BAREL

ANKA MARTIN

my set up for the Gravity Enduro’s this year, hoping to do two possibly three

new bike 9 by 99c5faa01725362d73494aff686e3664, on Flickr

Here’s my setup…

Meta 5 with Pike air U-turn (140mm F+R)
Now running with:
-maxle bolt through F+R
-Hope pro IIs (with the same 5.1d rims)
-2012 XT brakes (with the cooling fins!!)
-Charge ti saddle
-losing the dropper post
-easton carbon DH bars
(I really should get an up to date photo!)

Not sure on peadls – whether to stick with SPDs (which I ride 90% of the time on – big stuff and all) or go flats (which I only really use for the alps…..)

I’ll be honest – I have been eyeing up another dropper post, but think my money/weight would be better saved!
Hoping to get the forks/shock off to TFTuned for service and PUSH on the front…

DrP

This is the link to the new MDE EURO Enduro bike, http://www.mdebikes.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=420
we have a demo 1 that you’ll be seeing at all the Fetish Gravity Enduro’s, the demo 1 has BOS Devilles up front and a VIP’R air shock also, Full XO and a REVERB seatpost, it weighs with pedals 30.5lbs.
The Reverb uppy downy seat post is an absoulte must on a Gravity enduro, as this year were mixing things up a bit more, following my visit to the Italian Super Enduro, some stages throughout the year will have UP’s in them, times between stages have also been tightened, so no pushing DH bikes around 😉

Steve D almost made people cry by putting an orrible climb in the last innerleithen one, tread carefully or you might end up hanging from a forestry commission tree

as a more traditional Endurance racer I don’t quite get the point of the uphills not counting

It’s so that the rider with the best balance of fitness and skill wins ie. the all round rider, not just the strongest climber. Given the disproportionate length of climbs vs descents, if they timed the climbs it would simply become a competition to find the best climber, we already have that, it’s called xc racing.

There already in 🙂