The woods were fine. They were rideable and the last section was really enjoyable if you had a clean run at it. The fact that they are being moaned about so much just shows how dry the rest of the course was.

What I hate about mayhem is that you loose all your height very quickly riding across grass fields back to the arena. If it was possible to put some more interesting decents in their place the grin/pain ratio would be much lower.

does anyone know who the photographer was in the 2nd set of woods (the fast flowy ones before you descended back towards the campsite?) at around 8 on the saturday night?

Umm, I was all over the place. On the saturday night I was mostly on that sketchy dusty downhill which most people came off on. 🙂 As well as the last downhill section toward the end. I was there about 9ish.

Take a look at the photos you might be in them, I took loads. I have about 1500 shots, only 200 are on flickr. If you know your race number I'll take a look for you.

I thought it was a great course that got better after sunset, my best & most enjoyable lap was around 1am – everywhere was really grippy & fast
even the dusty decent that claimed so many was good – the detour around it just wasn't worth taking IMO

loved it. course was amazing. bit hard on the up hills after several laps but well worth it for the downhill sections

best bits:
– loads of brilliant spectators making it such a fun event
– awesome bloke in the sram tent sorting me out with some disc pads for nowt. would have given him some beer but didn't have any 🙁
– the lady feeding solo riders chocies in the campsite bit
– the bloke playing guitar on the last steep climb

Johnels – Member
Gotta say, I thought the course had too much 'grimace' and not enough 'grin'. We don't go to compete, it's a fun challenge with a bunch of mates and hopefully some good riding. The course lacked flow, especially through plasticine woods. I thought it was me being grumpy and knackered, but I heard it a lot over the weekend. That the weather held out was a blessing. Rain would have made it hell. I did enjoy the challenge of riding along the shelf in the off-camber woods though.
Hopefully someone will take notice and next year the course will challenge riders 'and' be fast, flowing and fun to ride, even if you're not keeping up with the Nick Craigs of this world.

I have to say I can’t really agree with, there was planty of “Flow” and I did really struggled with the climbing (Basic lack of fitness though) the “plasticine woods” (or “Focus pocus” as the course map has it) single track wasn’t that bad, it was only a short section with a couple of tight, techy, muddy climbs to deal with, yes it would have been nighmareish in the wet, but it wasn’t wet so not really the issue, the rest of the track had plenty of flow though, just looking back over the course map; the Syncros singletrack, the satmap track, the whoosh ‘a’ tron, woodland weave, the sandy bit, and the final descent back to the arena all had plenty of speed and flow, there was lots to enjoy on that course…

It's not all mean't to be easy or else where's the challenge?

even the dusty decent that claimed so many was good – the detour around it just wasn't worth taking IMO

amen to that! did the detour once and hated it.

The weather is key and you had good weather. My only memories of Eastnor is mud running like rivers down the hills, stalls running out of pads, broken hangers and tents disappearing over night 😥

Speaking as someone who decided to ride it singlespeed and rigid forks, I wish I hadn't!

Actually it wasn't that bad – the fast descents made my arms ache and I was struggling to hold on and brake at times, especially on Sunday. The plasticine woods – I couldnt get through there on the ss so ran the first twiddly bit and the two steep ups each lap, after the sharp drop it was good though.

The long climb was only a problem if there was traffic on the narrow bits, so I used that as an excuse to hop off and walk (still keeping up wirth the granny ring spinners!)

The rest of it was great, and I loved the Singletrack whoosh-a-tron (the bit from the monument down to the old Kenda Klimb track?)

My biggest problem was that it was so cold at night – old sleeping bag meant little sleep shivering through Friday night, and whilst I tried a quick kip on Saturday night I was so cold I figured it was better to get out riding again!

I hope everyone enjoyed our heckling too, the sunshine and cider helped with this (we were on the bend just before the 2nd bridge, immediately before the start on the Kenda Klimb. 'If youre happy and you know it shout hooray' gets a bit tedious after 24 hours though!

One final thing – I can heartily recommend a trip to the Westons cider place down the road for a tour and extensive sampling, made a great start to the weekend!

It's not all mean't to be easy or else where's the challenge?

I never said it should be easy. it should be a challenge, and rewarding. I guess it's subjective, but horses for courses eh?

ac282 – Member
What I hate about mayhem is that you loose all your height very quickly riding across grass fields back to the arena. If it was possible to put some more interesting descents in their place the grin/pain ratio would be much lower.

Which is pretty much the point I was making. But I guess when marking out the course in a setting like Eastnor, the organisers have to work with what they've got.

– the bloke playing guitar on the last steep climb

I forgot about him, I joined in as I rode past, load of people loved him..

"Right, Right, Right" oops I went left

…yeah the marshal saying that had the quietest voice in the world, i went left and ended up going sideways in a handbrake turn stylee. Didnt fall of though 🙂

I thought the climbs were actually a bit more gentle than they had been in previous years, although the course overall was harder because it was more technical. The steep dusty shoot was fun, although tis a good thing they had the chicken run, because I think there may have been some injuries there in the middle of the night without it!

Good course, though was quite demoralised after my first lap as I hadn't realised there would be that much climbing, or that horrible blu-tack wooded section that sapped so much energy! For my 2nd lap though, I was expecting it all, so was better prepared, and a couple of minutes faster as a result.

Generally had a good time, though I do have one slight rant… Bearing in mind that we're all running high powered HID or LED lights these days for our night laps, and there is no traffic around trying to knock you off your bike as we are riding on a closed off-road loop, why the hell do people insist on having flashing red LED lights on their bike (and even worse, their helmet!)? Are they trying to induce epilepsy on those of us following them? FFS, leave the red LED's at home for a 24hr bike race, chuck em back on for your commute home on the road… I VERY nearly had a sense of humour failure when I'd been following one guy for about 15 minutes (sadly he was just about exactly the same pace as me) when I though "bollox to it, I've got to get past" so put in 20 seconds of hard pedalling to get past… Only then 2 minutes later, he did the same, then proceeded to sit 10 yards in front of me for a good portion of the rest of the lap, until we got to the DH after reaching the obelisk where I was able to overtake him for good as he wasn't that quick on the DH sections thank god… Rant over anyway!

I love the Mayhem courses, really fast and great fun.

Only crashed once on Furious Freds (first time using them and got a bit too cocky on my 2nd lap).

Really glad it was finally as dry as the last dry event (2005 I think).

"Right, Right, Right" oops I went left

…yeah the marshal saying that had the quietest voice in the world

You try saying it a few thousand times with that amount of dust in the air, and see what it does to your voice. 😉

40mpg & Mostly Balanced – I'm slowly collecting some piccies from any links put up ~ I'll email them out when I get a chance.

Oh – who gets the fastest lap prize ❓ 😀

Mayhem 2010:

I loved:
The spectators – what an amazing bunch! Especially those cheering the soloists!
The Marshalls – chap at the top of the penultimate climb was awesome.
The guy playing guitar – rode past when he was singing wonderwall – really atmospheric and what a top bloke for that. Respect.
The course – very hard and very worthy.
The Mayhem Spirit – nothing else like it – back for more next year. Maybe in a team for a change though 🙂

I didn't like:
The woods – not good riding in sticky mud – lucky it was dry or that would be like the somme.
My race – couple of mechanicals, bit of exhaustion and a very packed up tummy for a few hours made it my worst 24 yet and one bad race in 12 isn't tooooo bad. Roll on Bonty 24/12!

Other than that – AWESOME event.

All round lovely. No complaints. And I'd forgotten that the Pro 2 freehub is the ultimate singletrack weapon. Just ace. People were 99.9% fantastic – courteous and friendly. And I really enjoyed the course. Mildly astonished that mboy realised who I was by my bike – nice to meet you. 🙂

Take a look at the photos you might be in them, I took loads. I have about 1500 shots, only 200 are on flickr. If you know your race number I'll take a look for you.

Any of rider 1950??

Cheers!

Take a look at the photos you might be in them, I took loads. I have about 1500 shots, only 200 are on flickr. If you know your race number I'll take a look for you.

Or riders 1613-1616 please?

Any photos of rider 1090? 🙂

I loved the course, very tough and I agree with the comments about the plasticine woods.. I'm used to riding tight singletrack but the first section did lack flow I thought 🙁

I had a great lap on the sunday morning, spent most of it talking to a lad from the south downs? finally parted company when his chain came off at the bottom of the fern climb.. we spent a good half putting the world to rights.. probably my favourite lap of any mayhem I've done!

Agree with other posters though, would have sucked in the rain! 🙂

Was it just me that smelt some very strong weed at the top of the climb from the main campsite, probably around 1am?

Thought I was going mad!

"the bloke playing guitar on the last steep climb"

glad to see my music went appreciated, thanks!:D

Bloke with guitar – you were very well placed, much appreciated!

JOGLESBY…… IF that was you, your the man!!! I looked forward to seeing you each lap..

Will, no it wasn't just you. those cadets mush have been mashed off their heads, I could smell it a mile away!

It sure was me! Thanks that's awesome! Yeah I drew a crowd in the last half hour or so, saw one of them the next day, he was SO HUNGOVER!

"The Marshalls – chap at the top of the penultimate climb was awesome.
The guy playing guitar – rode past when he was singing wonderwall – really atmospheric and what a top bloke for that. Respect."

ditto that! and a 'thanks' to the mashalls playing Led Zep at 2am 🙂

The course did feel like it should finish at a higher altitude than it started and was more tiring than i expected, but all the dusty chutes, open dh sections and twisty stuff at night was great fun. A day lap and you think it's not too techy, then it comes into it's own at night. there were some great fun sections that made it worth the climbing, a bit more fun strack on the way into the arena and it's be as good asit could be

the one thing i'd like to see is less grass and more dirt – dunno how they'd arrange that though )

I think I rode through that cloud of cannabis smoke on each of my 22 laps. No wonder I was all spaced out at the end.

was all spaced out at the end.

and still are given the double post 😆

Yeah, the guitar made me smile on my last lap, which took some doing, that climb hurt. Thanks fella, appreciated 🙂

it also explains why I've not stopped eating since.

First Mayhem and really enjoyed it, I'll be back for more (pain) next year.

Joglesby – Member
"the bloke playing guitar on the last steep climb"

glad to see my music went appreciated, thanks!:D

Your cover of Tenacious D's 'Tribute' cheered me up no end, nice one! 🙂

It also then got stuck in my head for the remainder of the race, for which I'm not so grateful 😛

Yeah, the guitar made me smile on my last lap, which took some doing, that climb hurt. Thanks fella, appreciated

Was playing "Don't look back in anger" when I went past, which made me chuckle somewhat at the irony! 😉

Mildly astonished that mboy realised who I was by my bike – nice to meet you.

You too mate, to be fair though, you've posted a pic of your Maverick up a fair few times, and the fact it looks pretty much just like my old one (black frame, silver forks) gave you away! Well done on getting a couple of quick laps in at the end too mate, my legs were jelly by the end!