Fort William: Pics from the Pits

We took a wander around the pits at the Fort William DH World Cup to see who or what we could find..

The DVO chaps were displaying the DVO Emerald inverted DH fork and Jade rear shock. Unsurprisingly, green features heavily. We featured their new Diamond fork earlier on today.

The good folk at Buff had a couple of anachronistic bikes on display that had us drooling. First of all was this lovely old tandem..

..followed by this magnificent cruiser. Its impracticality in most circumstances (going uphill, basically) rendered moot by the application of a lovely, effort saving motorised rear hub. WANT.

Team Singletrack/GB rider Nial Oxley’s bike in the work stand.

Comes with a revolutionary ZiipThai polymer composite damping system (or perhaps the shock was being repaired).

Kenda’s Honey Badger in 29er, 2.2in Pro flavour is now available in the UK, priced £36.99..

On the subject of tyres, the Maxxis Shorty DH tyre is only available in 26″.

For the first time in AGES, Spy+ goggles are available in the UK, in a range of colours and designs.

Including some truly magnificent examples..

The new M series wheels from ENVE were being shiny.

Mmm, look at the mouldings on that..

Here’s the view from the top of the multi-storey (well, two) SRAM truck. I can see your house from here..

5:10 shoes are available in a variety of subtle and understated colours.

Fox Team replica kit now available.

And finally, some riders we met on our travels today:

Ruaridh Cunningham rides for Trek/Unior Tools

Luca Shaw from the SRAM/TLD Racing Team

and Roger, a privateer from Brazil who, despite speaking very little English, endured a ride to the top of the mountain in the gondola with me with uncommon good grace. Good luck, Roger!

If you’re interested in keeping abreast of our take on the happenings at Fort William, take a look at our Fort William Twitter feed..

Barney Marsh

Barney Marsh takes the word ‘career’ literally, veering wildly across the road of his life, as thoroughly in control as a goldfish on the dashboard of a motorhome. He’s been, with varying degrees of success, a scientist, teacher, shop assistant, binman and, for one memorable day, a hospital laundry worker. These days, he’s a dad, husband, guitarist, and writer, also with varying degrees of success. He sometimes takes photographs. Some of them are acceptable. Occasionally he rides bikes to cast the rest of his life into sharp relief. Or just to ride through puddles. Sometimes he writes about them. Bikes, not puddles. He is a writer of rongs, a stealer of souls and a polisher of turds. He isn’t nearly as clever or as funny as he thinks he is.