2022 Cover Shot Round-Up: Get Inspired

2022 was both opened and closed with cover photography from Pete Scullion, voted Photographer Of The Year by Singletrack World readers. We had an illustrated cover, a World Cup DH rider, Red Bull Formation, and some UK soil. Let’s take a look back at year of variety on the cover of Singletrack World.

Stob Coire an Lochain

• Cover Photographer: Pete Scullion
• Rider: Scott Lyndsay
• Location: Stob Coire an Lochain

There might not be a steeper way to bag two Munros. Stob Binnein and Ben More from Inverlochlaraig is a fierce day out with a real emphasis on the vertical. 8500ft in seven and a half miles really tested the legs, but for brief moments where the contour lines spread out, the ridgeline singletrack was some of the best I’ve ridden. Scott makes moves back towards the car and the promise of a fish supper.

Pete – Singletrack World Reader Awards Photographer Of The Year 2022

Mirror Mirror by Anders Engberg

It feels like we often get caught up in ourselves and our self fulfilment projects these days. We spend so much time and effort staring at our own reflection that we tend to miss the bigger picture. With this painting I was hoping to illustrate one of those spots along the trail where we can disconnect and step away from ourselves for a little while. This is acrylic/oils on illustration board, roughly 25x40cm and I’m 100% stoked to be on the cover.

Anders

Port Hills Dust

• Cover Photographer: Tony Hutcheson
• Rider: Wiremu Piercey
• Location: Port Hills, Christchurch, New Zealand

Mu and I catch up for an after work skid once or twice a week. We were chasing the evening autumn light on our local trails in the Port Hills of Christchurch, NZ. I’d taken a few shots with the sun to my back to capture the mad shadows created by the trees and trail. I turned around and noticed the light through the Monty Python shrubbery in the foreground and thought “ha, that looks nice”. Mu doesn’t need much encouragement to have another go so I took one last shot before heading home. In my head it was a throw away but once I opened the images it became my favourite from the day.

Tony

Amaury Pierron World Cup Race Run

• Cover Photographer: James Vincent
• Rider: Amaury Pierron
• Location: Fort William WC Track

Nice and wide at 16mm, 1/40 second exposure, f/13 to keep as much in focus as possible without pushing the ISO too far. I’m crouched down in the dark, barely any room to move, my face inches from the near vertical wooden slats of the wall ride. Further up the track, the marshals whistle and cheers from the crowd let me know a rider is coming. With no visual of the track, I’m working solely on instinct and listen for the moment’s silence as they clear the river gap followed by the rumble of tyres, before panning my camera and firing off a burst.

James

Red Bull Formation

• Cover Photographer: Katie Lozancich
• Rider: Casey Brown
• Location: Virgin, Utah, Red Bull Formation

I caught this shot during the warm-up session for the final day of riding at Red Bull Formation. Casey Brown, Hannah Bergemann, Georgia Astle, and Veronique Sandler were practicing their line when I noticed this cool pocket of light on one of their drops. This was before the mayhem of their top-to-bottom runs, and I was the only photographer up on the ridge taking photos. Aside from the sound of spinning hubs and tyres making contact with landings, I savoured the stillness and photographed as they gained confidence on this feature. When Casey Brown styled it out for this shot I knew I had captured something special.

Katie

Joe Barnes

• Cover Photographer: Pete Scullion 
• Rider: Joe Barnes
• Location: Fort William, Scotland

This photo sums up why I opt to shoot with Joe Barnes more than any other rider. The Top Chief has the body English to make the photos sing, has a bike lurid enough to pop even in one of Lochaber’s gloomy plantation forests and if you’re willing to get close enough, you can spend the rest of the day happy you got ‘the shot’ whilst picking Fort William’s version of loam out of your eyebrows, camera and pockets.

Pete

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