New Timing System For Scottish Enduro Series

The whole premise of enduro is that it works like car rally events in that competitors ride to a number of stages during the day and they are then timed on those sections (normally all DH sections). It’s the rider with the lowest total time on the timed sections who is the winner.

Now, timing at all mtb events has often been the make or break feature of success – many events have been reduced to chaos when the timing system has failed – and it is undoubtedly the one aspect of event organisation that if done badly can destroy the reputation of the event. Every second counts, as they say.

The early enduro events used a ‘dibber’ system, where each rider has a unique ‘dibber’ that they ‘dib’ at the top of each timed section to start the clock and then again at the bottom to stop it. That’s all well and good when riders are split by many seconds but in today’s slightly more closely packed timings, the few seconds it can take to pull a dibber out of a pocket can be what loses you a stage. The problem is of course, that proper and reliable, to the 100th of a second, electronic timing systems are expensive – especially when you have a multi-stage event with up to five concurrent timing systems needed to record every rider. But that’s what the competitors are demanding and for the Scottish Enduro Series, that’s what they are now going to get.

Here’s the full press release from Scottish Enduro Series organiser, Fraser Coupland.

The team at the Scottish Enduro series believe that courses come first but timing is an important part of the event and one we need to consider for 2016. Over recent months there has been a huge social media and PR hype around the different Enduro series and what they’ll provide for the rider. Alongside the fantastic courses and high standard of No Fuss organization one of the recurring topics of discussion at No Fuss Towers has been the fact the Scottish Enduro Series has not had a roll in and a roll out timing system and with races often being won and lost with only a second between first and second place. Whilst on the one hand you could argue that the art of dibbing at start and finish of a stage is just another skill that riders have to master, however having watched the developments within the sport both nationally and internationally it is clear that the best races will be using roll in and roll out timing systems.

We are delighted to announce that the Scottish Enduro Series will also be using this type of system in 2016, to do this will involve a significant investment from the series and as such will see the price of racing increase to £55 for the full race and £45 for the Lite race. The new prices are effective as of today the 1st of December. David Spook Munro the man behind the computer at the series said “The Sportident system has been amazing and has worked very well, we are delighted that we will be working with their air plus system in 2016 which I believe will improve the rider experience for the 2016 series,” he went on to say “The price increase still sees the Scottish Series being great value for money and having a few years’ experience at running enduro’s I think riders will love the venues and stages we have planned for them in 2016”. Sportident themselves report that “MTB Enduro is another major sport which has embraced SPORTident Air+ and SIACs have been used faultlessly at 3 rounds of the Enduro World Series with more than 1200 competitors.”

Reflecting back on the 2015 series, the average winning race time was a fraction over 18 minutes of racing with the biggest day of racing clocking in at just over 23 minutes for the top rider. There can be little doubt or argument that the topography of Scotland gives the series organisers the upper hand when it comes to choice and sheer variety of riding experiences. Frazer Coupland from the Series said “The winning race times in 2015 added up to 108 minutes of racing on a variety of stages, it is the variety and the scale that sets the Scottish Series apart from the others. At the end of the day it’s about the challenge and the enjoyment of riding your bike, I have no doubt that 2016 will be amazing with new venues, state of the art timing and the experience that the team has gained over the last couple of years.”

The Scottish Enduro series kicks off in March at Dunkeld, with subsequent rounds located across Scotland and the final round and showdown at Ae in October. Riders will carry their four best results forward to take the national title with the top two men and top two women getting an opportunity to have priority entry to the EWS through the reserve list.

For full details and series entries please visit www.scottishenduroseries.co.uk

Mark Alker

Singletrack Owner/Publisher

What Mark doesn’t know about social media isn’t worth knowing and his ability to balance “The Stack” is bested only by his agility on a snowboard. Graphs are what gets his engine revving, at least they would if his car wasn’t electric, and data is what you’ll find him poring over in the office. Mark enjoys good whisky, sci-fi and the latest Apple gadget, he is also the best boss in the world (Yes, he is paying me to write this).

More posts from Mark