Anyone racing?

Well I am riding, not entirely sure I’ll be racing 😉 Looks brilliant, I’ve been getting good vibes from Scott on the course for what seems like half a year now. Last year was great but it’ll be good to get outside of the trail centre more I think.

Yep, looking forward to it 🙂

Not familiar with any of the stuff on the course outside the trail centre bits. Will I die? 😉

Are you riding your Hemlock Northwind? Was thinking of hardtailing it (‘cos that’s what’s built at the moment!) but the length is making me think a bit of bounce might be a good idea.

What’s the non-trail centre stuff like?

I have no idea tbh! Never been over the other side of the river.

Any tips for stage 3?

Ill be there, camping all weekend so praying for decent weather. 😀

Oh I didn’t see the stage info in the email! I don’t know what “the choker” is, maybe they’ve plugged the fireroad section between Ho chi minh and zorb? Otherwise it looks the same as last year’s last stage. which was mint.

So, bit weather dependant- Ho Chi Minh can be very boggy, in the dry it’s fast as **** though. Zoom or Bust is nearly-trailcentre stuff, it’s not on the maps but is an official GT trail and pretty solidly built. Lovely- wiggles and some roots and such. Then there’s a couple of ways they could link us to the fort, last year it was up and down a walker’s path- steep up, fast down. Fort descent is sort of natural-plus stuff, starts out sheeptracky then gets into woods and gets twistier with some line choices, mostly dirt with some roots and small rocks. Again changes a lot in different conditions, was gorgeous last year in the dust but can be very slippy in the wet.

Boundary trail is a big old thing when you do it in one go, that’s pretty cool.

I’ll only have Saturday afternoon to practice, so I’ll probably go and check out 3,4,5 as they’re the bits I’ve never ridden before.

Meh, as with last year it clashes with the UK Enduro at Hamsterley, which is where I’ll be

Yeah looks like good work from the course designers. Big stages, going to be hard work!

Yeah Stage 3 was lovely in the dry, was the final stage last year, rode it in the wet a few weeks after and it was pretty different, I had to stop and remove my bender fender as the front wheel stopped moving…

Cademuir also a mystery here, from the contours it looks well steep. Don’t think I’ll be putting the slant six on the back for this one.

Cademuir also a mystery here, from the contours it looks well steep. Don’t think I’ll be putting the slant six on the back for this one.

It is steep, from all sides and if its wet, it’ll be muddy and slippery.

My first ever enduro, looking forward to it(with a bit of scardeyness) ,what could possibly go wrong? 🙂

the cademuir trails are ace but completely different to GT. steep, roots and very tight in some of the trees.

riding well though, lets hope it stays dry or they’ll be carnage on the day, especially after the 1st 3 stages.

Oh as for trail conditions- they’ve released the map 2 weeks in advance so let’s just assume all the unsurfaced trails will have had the arse ripped out of them by then.

Tbh I will just be having a bit of fun,so no daft stuff.I need to save my body for the GT7. 😉

I really don’t understand why they released the trail map so early 😕

I’m in. The Cademuir trails are brilliant, they’ve been signposted all week so it’s been getting busier up there. Very different from the Glentress stages, quite steep and loose. The last section will be testing if it’s wet. I live at the bottom of the hill so have been riding in there for years, it’s usually very quiet in Cademuir so it will be strange to see loads of folk riding there.

Northwind – Member

Oh as for trail conditions- they’ve released the map 2 weeks in advance so let’s just assume all the unsurfaced trails will have had the arse ripped out of them by then.

Even more of Zoom or Bust’s wiggles will be eroded away. 🙁

I don’t think its bad that they released the route this early, it was about a week before last year. Its going to give people that live closer more chance to know the trails better, but unless you are one of the top guns it isn’t going to make any difference in terms of winning or podium places, and I imagine through word of mouth the local podium candidates would know the likely route by now anyway.

It’s not so much about competitiveness, more about tyre pressure- look at what happens to the innerleithen enduro trails the day before a race there, mince baby mince is pretty well annihilated. Less notice = less practice = less damage.

ChrisL’s spot on too- it being enduro, loads of people will be out to find “clever lines”, or “cheating shortcuts”, and since there’s no tape up that’ll mean lots of offpiste riding between now and then, never good. (and then on race day most of them will be taped off anyway!)

Ah well, can’t be helped. Probably I’m getting oversensitive, it was nothing like as bad for the King/Queen last year as it was for the UKGE.

I’m in. First enduro. Really, really looking forward to it. Proper excited 🙂

I’ve not ridden at Glentress or the Tweed Valley for 3 years. I don’t even think Berm Baby Berm or Electric Blue where there when I rode last.

Although it’s exciting to receive the race pack with the route and special stages I always thought that the idea was to ride these sections blind. Isn’t this how all enduros work? So I would have preferred the route to be announced Fri 24th.

I’m not complaining though. I intend to have a pootle round Glentress on the Friday when we get up there and maybe Cademuir on the Saturday for official practice. Although I’m not going over board in an attempt to ride all stages.

Can’t wait. Proper excited. A weekend of riding new trails. What more could you want.

I’m probably gonna head down for a bimble round on monday, mainly for sections 4 and 5. I reckon a lot of people will be round this weekend. Although the biblical rain forecast for saturday will stop a few.

Depending on the weather this coming week the place could easily turn into a mud bath with so many riders practicing.

Good or bad? who knows. It is what it is. 😀

Should be a blast though. Did the Perth one a couple of weeks back and that was a good one with about 30 miles of riding and 1100m of descending / ascending.

I reckon I might head over to the Cademuir side for practice on Saturday, don’t want to beast myself too much and have knackered legs for the race! Really looking forward to it, though there’s a fair chunk of rain forecast so it might be a bit boggy. Boo.

I am going to be there. None of this racing stuff though. I was planning on taking a pootle around a taped out course.

KingofBiscuits – Member

Although it’s exciting to receive the race pack with the route and special stages I always thought that the idea was to ride these sections blind. Isn’t this how all enduros work?

Nah, most UK enduros have practice. I think it’s generally seen as fairer, since there’s so few trails that aren’t known, it’d hand a big advantage to locals/folks with inside knowledge if there was no practice/early access. So does this, mind, but I reckon one practice run is a massive improvement over none at all, whereas the difference between 1 practice run and 5 is less. The locals will always have the advantage but it narrows it some…

I’ve done some of these events totally blind and it’s great fun but a whole different kettle of fish- not so much about clever lines etc, but just knowing when to push and when not to. I pedalled like **** on a descent in an inners one then discovered a horrible climb at the end of it, frinstance 😆 Disaster.

Practice isn’t just fairer, it’s safer. Hitting trails at race pace with no idea what is around the corner is just daft. It’s a big old long course, it would be madness in terms of recovery to reccie the day before, so the map coming out a couple of weeks before is a good compromise if you ask me. Most people know the first three courses. I’m off for a look at the last two next sunny day !

Practice isn’t just fairer, it’s safer. Hitting trails at race pace with no idea what is around the corner is just daft.

No, that’s the original spirit of enduro. Being able to read the trail as you come across it, rather than memorising every single braking point and turn as in Downhill where you have days of practice.

No, that’s the original spirit of enduro.

Really? I’ve ridden several Enduros under several different organisers over the last 5 years. All of them have allowed practice.

That looks like a cracking course. Big old day on the hill.

Bike choice – I’d probably go for a 4″ fs race bike.

Really? I’ve ridden several Enduros under several different organisers over the last 5 years. All of them have allowed practice.

http://www.pinkbike.com/u/mattwragg/blog/Enduro-and-the-Politics-of-Practice.html

Practice is definitely safer, and lets organisers push the courses a bit more too- frinstance in this one, on the Fort descent there’s a split where the right hand line, ridden blind, would be pretty marginal- 2 blind sections with Consequences. I think it’d be pretty hard to retain stuff like that with blind riding, it’d push up the risk of proper accidents pretty high (and track closures/delays are unfair on other riders too not just the person who stacks it)

justinbieber – Member

rather than memorising every single braking point and turn as in Downhill

Very few people will be able to do that, even if they have the time it’s a lot of trail to remember much detail of (and it’ll evolve over the weeks before too)

It’s not a simple better/worse but practice has some pretty big advantages, and no practice would be impossible to make anything like fair on routes like this.

I’m not saying that no practice isn’t safer, I just disagree with the blanket comment of “no practice is daft”

I agree that practice makes it fairer and safer, but IMO there are reasons why no practice is a good idea and I can see why some people (myself included) prefer it.

I wouldn’t want to do it blind – as Northwind points out, the drops on the right fort option have consequences – I’d have crashed badly coming across them at speed, being a mere mortal.

So what you’re saying is, The Fort would be a good section to practice?

If I get the chance I am practising stages 3, 4, 5 on the assumption that they are likely to be the ones that may require riding ability rather than my usual technique of closing my eyes and hanging on.

I’ll see if I can get down the Thursday or Friday before the race or something.

The knobber’s perspective:

TBF I think it’d be useful to ride them all if you can, just to figure out when to charge and when to take it easier- I blew up completely on stage 1 last year, it’s easy riding and I know it well but I tried to go flat out all the way down and just died completely- and inevitably in a bit where pedalling would be most useful. Genius. Andy Barlow set the fastest time but says he never pedalled in berm baby berm after the first berm, interesting that I thought.

Fort descent isn’t massively hard but it’s the sort of thing where knowing what happens next is going to be a big boost. It’s a big ol stage that. I remember last year I decided to take the chicken line at the split, just because I was blowing out my arse and it’d only take a tiny wee error to lose more time in the proper line…

Boundary… Well I always ride that as about 3 or 4 sections so doing it all at speed is going to be a balancing act I reckon. So tempting just to blast everything but I’ll die.

Cheers for the advice. I didn’t think about the effort needed if riding more than one “section” at once. Hmm.

If I can I will do them all. It depends on when I am doing the practice as I haven’t ridden a bike in two months and I am going to be doing this on a new, heavy, 1×9 bike so I am a bit worried about destroying myself.

So what you’re saying is, The Fort would be a good section to practice?

There were a couple of drop offs on one of the route options last year which I wouldn’t have wanted to hit blind at speed with my lack of skills. I went the easier left route anyway in the end.

Northwind, I blew myself up at the start last year too, too much adrenaline 😆 Also I rode everything the day before last year and didn’t have much left in the tank.