I'm looking at doing an endurance race this weekend and was looking for some advice, I've raced downhill, motocross and enduro (motorbike) before but neaver an xc based event. I'm planning on doing a 100km roughly how long would this take and how much food/ supplies should I take along? I think it's a laps event so is it the norm to allow pit stops? Also a bit of a bike set up question but what sort of PSI should I be running? It gves a guide of 35 PSI but i'm thinking that a lower PSI might give me a bit more comfort something in the 25-30PSI range befor sacrficing reliability.

Cheers Iain

100k you will need to be taking on food, and drinking lots, if its laps thats handy as you can pitstop, if its like a sportive you need to have it all with you..

Tyre pressure is impossible to gauge not knowing what tyre and what terrain.

6 hours will be a rough time depending on you, and again what terrain.

Big distance for a first go, how much a week do you normally ride?

find out what the event format is, big 100km races often have feed stops where you can refill bottles, pick up bannanas and flapjack etc.

As for fuel, dont try anything new or unusal on the day, if you train eating harribo, take that on the day. Energy drinks and gells gave me stomach cramp, so I stick with flapjack and jelly beans.

Tyre pressure, whatever feels good and works, higher PSI's will reduce rolling resistance on hard/smooth ground, softer will increace grip and comfort at the expense of speed. But dont play about on the day, if youve been training at 35-40psi stick to that, i did a sportive and droped my pressures by 10psi for comfort (100 down form 110) and it felt horrible, the tires went all squidgy in the corners.

are you doing spam biking the blast on sunday?

cheers for the advice everyone, dobo, I'm hoping to if I can get an entry on the day. Tinsy, I am fairly fit I usually manage to ride 20-25miles 4 days a week (road) as well as getting to the gym 4 days a week and riding motocross 2 days a week, I have been upping the distance to 40-50 miles in the last week to prepare myself for the extra distance.

Iain

Don't do anything you don't normally do, if you normally ride at 35, ride at 35, if you normally drink water, drink water, if you normally take hallucinogenic drugs at 3-mile intervals… you get the picture.

Enjoy it, pace yourself, even if everyone around you is going really fast. Eat before you're hungry, drink before you're thirsty. You'll be fine!

if my manflu's gone by sunday i'll be doing the Spam Blast too. but not the 100k
just the 50k as i've not really been doing much riding recently.

What njee says, but if i recall they had a water station half way round last year, which was a god send as i lost a bottle and laps were long

Dont underestimate the course, some of the grassy hills are a slog, i did 2x 1:40 laps.. which is a lot slower than i expected but timelaps says i was 4th in the 2 laps cat, fastest lap was 1:13 to give you an idea

no idea if the course will be the same or not though