julianwilson – Member

I thought the luff bus was ok really, and although i concur with the ‘festival’ vibe i thought they seemed a lot better organised/set up than last year or other events in which i encountered them.

You mean they get worse? 😯 😆

My wife chatted to Keith B – apparently he had asked for pulled pork and was told it wasn’t going to be ready for 4 hours. I’ll bet that caused some amusement at 10pm… She was getting me a hot chocolate, which was, ironically, probably the coldest drink I had all weekend. And although £7 for a meal doesn’t seem too bad, when you’ve got 3 kids to feed you might as well drive into Plymouth and find a pub. At least the food will turn up hot and on proper plates. And be cheaper – we had a meal at the The Navy Inn in the Barbican (so proper tourist trap) for about £10 less than the Luffbus would have charged us.

And what’s this about braking bumps? It’s mountain biking, guys. If you complain about 10m of braking bumps in a 11km course you should really find a road to ride on. 😉

@ Monkeychild:

Go to the album page and instructions are on first image.

What’s this about Tea Ladies in the shooting ground? I saw the lights on from late evening and had a few laps with the rowdy DJ set, but never saw any tea…..

Second the helpfulness of Cycle Surgery, and the Bike Cellar. My front mech gave up on Friday evening and between the Bike Cellar and Cycle surgery I had a working front mech come race time. Was a bit stressful, but they were both very helpful.

julioflo – Member
What’s this about Tea Ladies in the shooting ground? I saw the lights on from late evening and had a few laps with the rowdy DJ set, but never saw any tea…..

Aaargh that reminds me. Sunday morning I followed a lady in orange not-torque lycra down the cottage return then into the other side of the campsite. She pulled to one side where her colleague then said “here you go, I’ve got you a cup or tea ready” FFS, I spent the next lap (I was 24 solo) craving Tea!

And what’s this about braking bumps? It’s mountain biking, guys. If you complain about 10m of braking bumps in a 11km course you should really find a road to ride on. 😉

I am sure that they were nothing to write home about at 12.00 on saturday, but your 10m is an underestimation of about oooh, 390m by the time the real riders were into their double-figures laps the next morning. 😉

Does anyone have more photos? I have looked through all the ones on here and cant find any of the river crossing at night. I had my photo taken there three times and thought it would be a good one?

Loads here

http://www.davehayward.com/

This was my first 24 solo, and although the heat made me feel ill so I had to sit out for an hour about 7pm, I was able to get back on the bike and do my longest ride ever – 125 miles! Can’t wait to do it again and try and get to 150 next time 🙂 Everyone was so friendly and that helped me keep going. Thanks to beerbabe for fixing my chain at 2am, I will practice before my next race 😀 Thanks, Millie

Oh and catering wise, the Luffy bus- when I finished the race, I fancied some proper food, so tried to order the various dishes. Was offered a plate of spicy spuds for £4 as thats all there was! Tea ladies in the wee hours in the shooting ground however were awesome 🙂 although they thought we were all mad!

not sure where this tea lady was.

All I know is a still don’t feel right at all, foot still half numb and feel like crap in the mornings, no chance i’m racing wembo this year!

Chris – eat more. Don’t bother trying to do much on your bike for a week at least. You’ll be fine…with time.

Hi Chris, great effort!

I’m with you there on the not feeling right. I still feel really weird. I think the heat took quite a lot out of me. I felt properly spaced when we went up on the podium, like I was about to faint. I drank one of the beers they gave us last night and that had a pretty big effect!

You did seem pretty vacant when you passed me on the first climb near the end. I think I said hello and asked how it was going. There was silence for about 10 seconds as you stared straight ahead in a glassy eyed way and then grunted something. I think you must have been pushing pretty hard at that point!

Sorry Tom, the last few laps were quite hard! you did a grand job to pass the few who were near the top to start with. I gave the beers to dad, they looked a bit exotic for my tastes!!

ok greg, maybe i’ll leave the bike a bit longer…maybe

Cheers Chris. I basically could’t cope with the heat at the start and felt like I was at half power until the sun dropped. Once it cooled off I started to have a lot more fun. No chance of catching you or Matt though!

The beers have been great so far!

Little Yak (age 6) eventually got a kids race entry – massive thanks to James’s team for that! Best wishes and get well soon to your team-mate too. Little Yak was made up and smashed it round for 5th.

Yay, well done little yak. Good to meet you Yak glad you had a good time, thanks for the beers.

My second 24/12 and had a great time, our teams results suffered for being fat, unfit and 1 member short, but we were never going to bother the top (or middle) of the timesheets.

The guy on the mic was great, he always had a quip or info on the rider crossing the line. As I crossed the line, arms triumphantly aloft, “ah well at least you’ve had a nice day”

The support around the track, as others have said was brilliant, loved the night laps- clouds of dust, the sports massage really helped and getting as much free clif down my gob must’ve done some good.

Could the dj please get more downloads/cds/vinyl for next year though.
James

Some thoughts from me here:

http://mattjonesmtb.wordpress.com/