The build up coverage of Mountain Mayhem and Sleepless in the Saddle becomes almost unbearable.
Never seem to hear a peep about 10 under the Ben despite it having up to 1000 riders on one of the best marathon courses in the country.

How many ride at MM and/or SITS?

I suspect the answer is to do with how many people live within 100 miles of 10 under Ben.

Probably for the same reason Big Bike Bash gets ignored…..

I think locality has something to do with it – there seems to be a big Bristol and South West contingency on STW so something as low key on the calendar as the CLIC24 is going to get a huge build up because a lot of STWers will be doing it.

Speaking of which, is it too early for a Bristol Bike Fest role-call/build up thread?

Maybe because they’re ‘proper hard’ rufty mountain bike events, rather than an excuse to stand about supping expensive lager, bike watching?

😉

Joking, no really.

What he said.

They have hills and everything up there.

I wasn’t going to mention it, but yes I do wonder where to fun is in riding around a grassy field
Those that mentioned population density are probably correct though.

Probably for the same reason Big Bike Bash gets ignored

What’s that ? I’ve never heard of it 🙁

I think promoting any event is difficult unless you are well established, have a good publicity route and are prepared to work hard at it.

The team promoting Wild Boar 24 showed how it can go wrong, Hit the North are probably the best at viral marketing.

Last weekend Pat Adams got just over 60 riders, we got 78, he had 100 pre-entries, we had 35.

Personally I’m surprised the “classic weekender” hasn’t sold out and even SSUK09 has the odd place left. People seem to want to do “challenges” (Merida’s, Winlatter) more these days.

BBB, the blog hasn’t been updated since 11th March

Anyway, one more race for us and then off to SSUK09 to drink beer and push the bike around the course.

10under doesn’t need the publicity. The limited entries for the first time this year, and have almost sold those out.

The No Fuss team make an amazing job of their events, and rightly have a large following of riders who keep coming back for more. In any business, repeat customers and little marketing output is what you want.

Marketing wise, they do send out emails with offers of free bottles of whiskey, always going to be a winner when it comes to not ending up in the trash.

I will be there this year with a Mixed trio team and a solo entry. Have done it before in the rain a couple of years ago and looking forward to another great event.

TBH i prefer it to be kept quiet. TUTB is just about sold out and if this lot actually realised how good the Ten @ Kirroughtree is i would struggle to get entered for that one. Let them ride around fields whilst we ride around one of the best endurance courses in the country

I think the No Fuss team do a great job of advertising/marketing their events and they know the sort of audience they want. You’re right, the events are fanastic and 10 Around certainly ranks as one of the best MTB races I’ve ever done. So long as they’re happy with it and the paying punters are happy and keep coming back then all is good. 🙂

Course for next weeks TUTB is up!

It might just be this forum that is quiet. Hit the North 1 hardly registered anywhere else but here. With HtN 1.5 we deliberately kept the STW carpet bombing to a minimum to avoid annoying people and to see if it would virally promote after sending out a press release/e-mail to previous competitors. As it happened a cyclocross forum got wind of it too, and we managed to sell out in 4 days!

Brownbacks seem to have got it right too (while we’re doing some back slapping!) and I also can’t understand why the Singletrack Classic Weekender hasn’t sold out.

If 10 Under have nearly sold out then they must be doing something right. Not a lot of fuss is made on here about TwentyFour12 either, but they seem to be doing well.

Just because we’re not talking about it doesn’t mean that nobody else is.

I reckon everyones scared of having to compete in all three disciplines with one bike, I reckon it may be the format thats scary.

The STW classic weekender is very do-able, the trials section is in the skills area, the downhill is the RED route the XC will be probably be very rideable

the key is to go and play in the quarry, if you are not local turn up on the Friday and practice, once you have done the trails a few times you start to see the lines and the flow then comes

HTN caught the imagination of STW world and created a great event and the 1.5 proved that a smaller event could work also. It will be interesting to see what they do next!

Our events are different again and the crowd we attract is different, unfortunately we ran the full red week 1 and put off most of the bottom category which we are particularly keen to build (their course is now a lot easier). But the feedback is good and riders all seem to enjoy themselves. What is nice is when the previous weeks winner turns up to marshal because he can’t ride and the encouragement the marshals give the riders all the way around or the email about it being the politest race that someone has ever done etc

anyway if you are successful and established why spend valuable time and effort promoting to people who won’t get in.

I think part of the reason the weekender might not have sold out is that it’s a pretty busy weekend with other events. A pearce Dh race counts me out, the Wharncliffe weekender is on then too among others.

I also erkcon that the unknown element will be putting a lot of people off, especially the trials. I know they said that it won’t be difficult etc But I still feel that maybe some pics might help and not give too much away.

There’s video of the trials area on the front page and we are going up to the quarry in the next week or so to shoot some more.

I really like the sound of the STW weekender – think the fact that the format is a bit different will make it a fun atmosphere.

Sadly I’m leaving for the Alps/Mega on the sat night 😀

Correct me if i’m wrong… But the weekender sounds more like a social event with some bike races thrown in. Being any good at the trials/DH is secondary to having a laugh with your mates and meeting people off here.

If the DH is part of the red route then anybody can do it. Doing it quickly however is a different matter. The skills area is good fun too, and as I found out last Friday i’m a complete girlie when it comes to doing the see-saw.

To answer the original post, the 10 Under might not get many mentions, but we’re not deliberately ignoring it. As someone said, they seem to do very well with entries as it is – the same with the Strathpuffer, so hardly need much promotion. It usually is down to dull stuff like if someone here has a spare 20 minutes to get a story up on the site…

And as for the Weekender, we’ve run a video of the trials showing that it’s really not very difficult (like riding over some jumbly rocks…) and no actual trials skills will be needed. Just like in the old days. One bike, one set of tyres (yes…) though we might let you change your pedals. 🙂

It will be interesting to see what they do next!

we’ve been considering a 12 hour race using a huge moorland loop that includes Lee Quarry 😉

I’m joking. Or am I?

oh, and speaking from our experience, the Weekender will sell out in the final few days before the event.

A couple of months before HTN1 we were sh1tting ourselves.

we’ve been considering a 12 hour race using a huge moorland loop that includes Lee Quarry

I’m joking. Or am I?

Should I be ordering 52,000m of barrier tape?

yes. And 20 thousand glow sticks.

I’ll get another staple gun too then.

yeh. Might need a couple of wooden stakes too.

When I say me what I actually mean is i’ll e-mail Vince and he’ll sort it because he knows what he is doing.

Pre-rode the 10 under ben course last week and its a belter, tough though for a Glentress ‘smooth and jumpy-type trail’ lover like me, long climbs and short descents, ‘nessie’ will be fun if wet!

First time entering (team of two… oh no!!!) but here loads about it each year in Scotland, gets some press and news coverage too.

Looking forward to burning my less than fit body out.

Does 10UTb not have something like 900 people entered this year?

The Three 10s and Relentless 24 are great events on great courses. They do a great job of ensuring that people want to go back. When participants do return to these events they tend to take a few mates along and it grows like that.

I’m there next week.

Solo. 🙁

Jesus.

I’ll be there goign for gold in the men’s pairs.

Relentless was my favourite event last year- the nofuss team are the best at putting events on that I know of- the atmosphere is good, the prize giving has a HUGE turn out at the 10 unders and the courses are killers. Relentless was a rollercoaster of doing well and then suffering like dogs with a real photo finish for us and I’ll remember it forever.

The only thing I’d have changed was the music (one cd on loop for 24 hours was a very, very bad call!)

Oh, and Bob- solo’s not that hard. It’s not easy, but plod on and understand that the last hour will be horrible and you’ll get through it! I felt like having a little cry when I finished last year.

Ach, I’ve set myself a target of 5 laps.

Looking back at the 07 results, the winning solo rider did 11 laps (110 miles) 😯

I will be there riding as a pair (hoping to do 7 or 8 laps)

rolfharris
I’ll be there goign for gold in the men’s pairs.

Better than sandbagging in sport 😉

Dougal- by sandbagging do you mean hanging out my arse for an hour and a half to get a 6th?

I’ll be honest, this short racing malarky isn’t for me. I just go to make up the numbers!