Round 2 of the Welsh Enduro Series took place at Machynlleth over the weekend. Here’s Aran’s second report of his enduro race season.
Housing the Athertons and Pivot Factory Racing along with Dyfi Bikepark, Machynlleth is a hub for British mountain biking. Even a quiet pint in the White Lion in the town will feel like you’ve entered the Lion’s Den of Downhill. A-list status.
Coming into round 2 the expectations for a race deep in the heart of the UK’s downhill hotspot were high. For those who raced the first round at Llandegla, this second round felt like a whole different sport; the long, physical, trail centre stages having been benched in favour of rough, rooty off-pisters.
Shakeycam
GoPros were allowed, providing they were mounted in line with British Cycling rules, and for practice only, not for racing. I have attempted to provide some video proof of how good the stages really were. A few misadventures on my part to mention as a disclaimer however. First of all the GoPro was left in portrait for Stage 1 (rookie error).
Anyway, I have put together a highlight reel of stages 2-5 for your viewing pleasure…
The day kicked off with what felt like a fairly long transition out of Machynlleth town centre up into the hills and woods towards of white rocks for those familiar. The first two stages implemented these white rocks trails, rough, rooty and steep enough to catch you out.
Stage 1
Started fairly flat, but what it lacked in gradient it made up for in sheer roughness. ‘Gnadgery’ would be my word to sum this stage up. ‘Challenging’ would be a more direct summary. The stage didn’t stay flat for long, dropping into some chunky steep sections with rutty corners.
Stage 1 had a fairly unclear main line, so plenty of options for line choice for most of the track. With a collection of tight trees, roots and tree stumps littering the lines, flow was hard to come by.
For many riders (myself included) the feeling at the bottom of this track was relief that it was over. However, as the longest stage of the day, if you could find some flow or just fight your way down this stage, the time rewards were considerable.
It was then back up the last part of the first transition to Stage 2.
Stage 2
Stage 2 began to showcase some more natural flow. Although it began with a punchy flat start, the line choosing began almost immediately. The top section was fast and flat out with plenty of chances to sneak in some creative lines, before dropping steeply into some spicy technical rock drops and rooty sections. These rooty sections remained steep but evolved into loose shaley corners allowing riders to get a bit of steer-with-the rear action going on.
The transition from stage 2 out of the white rock area towards the off-piste tracks behind the town was the longest but definitely the prettiest of the day. A long fireroad proved to be no small task in the sun, but riders were rewarded with a panoramic view looking over Machynlleth, Dyfi Bike Park and what felt like the rest of mid-Wales.
Stage 3
Stage 3 kicked off with a downhill crank over grass into the woods, where riders were met with dusty but rough singletrack containing some rutty and flat corners. Holding speed through corners and avoiding the temptation to brake was crucial here. Stalling out of corners punished riders with otherwise good speed, proving difficult to recover on many sections of the stage.
The most pedally stage of the day but it still kept a good balance of technical and pedally which in turn demanded a good blend of fitness and skill.
Stage 4
A tough, steep but thankfully much shorter climb took riders to Stage 4. A scenic start on top of a free-standing grassy summit. The top of 4 began with a flat-out speed-tuck over grass. The key here was bravery over blind crests, trusting the track would still be there and importantly pointing the same way you were. A slight kink after the first crest caught many riders (again myself included) out.
Stage 4 then dropped you into a wood section running parallel to stage 3, giving a duel-slalom feel to a few corners as the tracks converged.
Stage 4 then hit riders with a punchy climb, enough to catch out riders who had forgotten to downshift. Both of Stages 3 and 4 were fairly ‘one line’ but the lack of line choice did not mean riders could let off on their sense of direction. A good memory of where these tracks were going proved a serious advantage over riders who hadn’t been revising on Saturday.
Stage 5
After finishing right next to Stage 3, riders were routed back up the short punchy climb to the top of the final stage. For me this stage was the favourite.
Flat out and flowy but gnarly enough to catch riders out. Riding this blind in practice was a personal highlight for the weekend and in hindsight some of the gaps I pulled for were a little unwise. However, this track featured heaps of line choice, more than is possible to learn in the pub even. However, thankfully, excluding a few high line set ups, the main line did seem to be the quickest for the most part. The track built speed nicely. By the bottom you were motoring over roots into a widely-taped finish straight.
Line of the day
A tough choice with heaps of options across all five stages, some more ethically dubious than others and some so unethical the taping was reconsidered for race day.
To me my personal favourites were on Stage 5. Firstly, a pull out of a corner towards the bottom of the stage would gap you over a small rock drop providing some entertainment for the photographers when inevitably you landed in an odd position with a regrettable facial expression.
Another Stage 5 line involved using a pretty square edge rock to bump you up a small rise on the inside of a corner was another favourite.
Line of the day: Stage 5 inside left to set up a high, sweeping, no brakes corner into the finish
However, also on Stage 5, the Line Of The Day was a simple inside high line at the bottom of the stage which really opened up the last corner and crucially kept speed high into the finish straight.
Final thoughts
Overall then, Machynlleth and white rocks met the high expectations. Fairly short and punchy tracks yet a really good mix of riding. The race catered for those who enjoy roots, steeps, ruts, fast open trails and even the psychos that enjoy a little sprint. Overall the race was fairly short, an epic day but 5 fast paced stages produced finish times at the sharp end of the field around the 7:30 to 8 minute mark. As a result consistency was key with no real leeway in the times for mistakes. Once again, a big thank you to Adrian and the Welsh Enduro Team for hosting an excellent event.
Results
Peter Carpenter of the U21 took his Forbidden Dreadnought onto the top step of his category and took fastest of the day overall. Innes Graham (21-29) followed closely, taking the second fastest time of the day just over 0.3 seconds shy of Carpenter and winning the senior male category. Another youngster, Charlotte Kay of the Under 21s, was the fastest woman of the day aboard her Hope HB916 with a much more dominant 20 second gap to Hollie Vayro (U21). Other standout performances included: Joe Carpenter of the Under 18s won his category with a blistering time just under 7 seconds shy of the fastest time of the day set by his brother. Becci Skelton once again won her category (35-44) dominating the competition by over a minute and placing 3rd overall behind the youngsters. The male Under 21 proved once again the most competitive category of the day and the only category to see the whole top 5 finish in sub 8 minute times. Peter Carpenter shared this competitive U21 podium with James Nixon in second and Oli Poulter in 3rd. As the opener of the British National Series at such an infamous venue some big names were attracted including Josh Brycleand who placed 2nd in his category and 11th overall but claiming an overall stage win on stage 4. As for myself, a lacking sense of direction and too much caution put me in a frustrating 16th in category. Overall, a good day of racing with some tight times on varied and fun tracks.
My race bike and setup
Same as Llandegla but a crash earlier in the week and no time to find a bolt left a shifter held on with zip ties (semi-permanent fix)
I was racing the same Giant Reign I used for Round 1 at Llandegla albeit with a bodged shifter from a crash earlier in the week. Aside from this self-inflicted shifter issue, the bike performed really well as before.
I put a new Schwalbe Albert Gravity Radial on the front and found the extra grip to be extremely handy in the dusty(!) conditions. The Maxxis Minion DHR II DoubleDown on the rear seemed to cope well with some harsh treatment (even with a tube in) which was a relief as a puncture at this event would have put a swift end to any hopes of a result.
On ther whole, the bike carried speed really well over the rough stuff – for example at the bottom of stage 5 or at the top of 2. However, I was finding the rear suspension a bit soft and sluggish, especially at the top of Stage 1 and in flatter bits throughout the day on Saturday. Probably due to drier, faster conditions than am used to! So a bit more pressure in the rear shock and dialling off some damping seemed to do the trick for Sunday.
One thing I did regret was running 780mm bars, with tight trees leaving some marks on my forearms in places. I was finding it a little hard to persuade the bike round tighter sections, however some narrower bars and some more thoughtful riding should hopefully remedy this for Round 3 at Llanfyllin on June 7/8th.
Bring it on!
Replies (14)
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Enjoyed that, thanks Aran. The tracks sound like they’d be fun to ride, but I don’t think I have any desire to muster the level of energy needed to race them!
The Carpenter boys are proper fast. They’re playing in DH now too and regularly on the podium.
great review
10 minutes of racing though….. thats a long way for me to travel , bitd the ftd on those courses were 5minutes each stage!
dyfi has epic trails i love racing there its just a shame that the good old ukge days with huge courses and long challenging stages are gone
That looks fantastic (and representative of what we all know as typical UK enduro stages) but yes, 10 minutes total time for a national level race? I did a ‘funduro’ this weekend and totalled more than 25 minutes, over 30 for many riders and I dont think anyone dipped much below 22 or so.
10 minutes of ‘race’ time inb a weekend is what put a lot of people off investing so much time and money into DH racing!
The problem of race times is that how do you increase it without putting lots of climbing in the day or adding unpopular climbs or long pedally sections in the middle of stages?
Fair shout, but IMO Enduro shouldn’t be a mini-DH race, so should have stages which are 2-3 x longer and require pedalling in the middle or transitioning across hills rather than just a straight downhill.
However, i doubt many would agree as most want a multi stage DH race.
There are plenty of trails around Dyfi forest that could be linked together, which would easily make a 3/4 minute stages.
If I’m riding good trails, I’ll happy pedal a big loop, that was the whole point of racing Enduro for me, and my view was you could & probably should be able to put together a 20/30 second pedal in the middle of a stage, otherwise you might as well go & race DH instead. Of course that is on the proviso the stage is more than a minute & a half long.
I’m like a stuck record on this though, an enduro is not riding the same way up the same hillside to ride 5 different trails all starting & finishing within a couple of hundred meters of each other over 5 minutes of racing.
Can’t have mountain bikers climbing up hills…
It’s a tricky balance, more is generally more but I’d (mostly) rather have excellent 3 minute stages than pointlessly pedally long stages. Or routes that make sense but give a little less racing, compared to meandering overall routes that end up 50km long but don’t really add much. But the problem is I think literally every rider would have a different opinion on what is perfect.Like, for me a really good race loop feels a lot like a really good ride. It mostly avoids the whole “now we ride to a second location" thing or even “now we ride to another down", that was fun for special events like EWS where it just couldn’t really fit in one place and it works some places like Laggan or innerleithen/golfy but for things like a normal tweedlove weekend it just got to be a drag for me, you’d leave a location that could host another 3 or 4 stages just to ride miles to a different one and not always for better riding. That seemed to get more and more common, the length of the routes always seemed to grow but the quality of the descending doesn’t always. And that was also really offputting for a lot of people, at a time when enduro racing was starting to struggle for numbers we also had these enormous loops that people just struggled to ride. But equally someone else could ride one of those and get the “this is just normal riding but with a timer" feeling off it and lose the sense of event… I mean in the end the Mega has road climbs and pedally shite in it, by my logic they’d make it 5 stages, and it’d suck 😛 But the absolute worst races I ever did, the ones I just walked away from and did something more fun instead, always it was at least partly because the full loop felt like bullshit. But I never once quit a race that I thought was crap because it was too short and focused.
There’s probably a limit before it ends up being dangerous as tired riders are much more likely to make mistakes. I’m doing Boltby at weekend which feels reasonable with 27km and 850m of climbing each day. Riding it previously I’ve not had to worry about fatigue on the stages in comparison with Ardrock were I had to really back off for stage 7 as I was knackered. Boltby certainly wouldn’t be improved for me with additional pedally sections just to make the stages longer.
Seems like this is always going to be a problem for a race discipline with such a vague description.
Everyone has a differing opinion on what they want, and a different ratio of fitness and skill.
I’m in agreement with Hobnob, although reaslising that anything local to me in the SE is likely going to involve laps of 1 or 2 hills due to geography and land ownership.
Making it Multi stage downhill I think does the sport a disservice and seems to move away from the original intent which was
a) “trail/AM bike" (that we all already own) racing
b) combining the attributes of DH and XC with a middle ground event to determine the “best all round rider".
To my mind, the day out should be big enough that overall fitness plays a role, and stages long and or pedally enough that managing your effort comes into play.
Anyone listening to me however should be aware that I’ll enter one or two races a year on a whim, aiming for top half overall or top 2/3rd in my category – so people shouldnt cater for me, but should listen to those racing regularly and troubling the scoreboard a bit more.
Im not sure thats true, the guys at the back like me! are the essential to keep the show rolling & the cash coming in
I think thats where the problem comes in, you need to make it as attractive as possible to all , so nothing too challenging, yet at the same time , at least for a national series- last weeks race was Round 1 of the BEMBA – it needs to be tough, it doesnt need to be mini DH courses but for reference the EWS (or whatever its called) this week was 60 km on day1 and 40km on day 2
thats after 2 days of practice!!
A national race should be a stepping stone to this, the crime is that Dyfi has long descents and plenty of trails to link up, maybe a bit of pedally fireroad in some stages linking sections, but well worth it ,the 2016 UKGE BES race there was 50k 1700m climbing!
and it should be doable on a trail bike, rather than a mini DH bike
for a national series it should be long, hard and challenging, Dyfi has some fantastic trails and routes that tick all the boxes <20k? with under 10minutes of racing just seems a waste
Thing is, sure a national series should be a step towards the world level but at the same time it has to be only a reasonable step forwards from the baseline events. At the moment, UK enduro racing is so hollowed out and the world level so high that this is, basically, impossible, a lot of people’s first ever event will be a national level race and there’s just not the breadth of events to allow a true progression and stratification. There pretty much never has been here but it’s worse than it was.No I don’t have a solution, it’s a genuinely difficult situation and it’s only ever got worse in recent years. But if one single group of riders has to be left behind, it should always be the pros. The national series needs to be positioned for the nation it was in and if that means it can’t be close enough to the international series to be a good feeder, too bad. It just doesn’t work any other way, you can’t run an enduro for the 20 elites at the expense of the 2-300 weekend warriors that actually fund it and make it possible, and every time a series has erred in that direction it’s crashed and burned. But 2-300 weekend warriors with disposable incomes and time and interest are hard to find, and one of the ways you keep them intrested is high level racing and pros. It’s a paradox.The solution as ever is to abduct and clone Aaron Muckmedden.
Sounds like a great day out, and awesome trails.
It does seem short though.
I live in the Midwest of the USA, so no mountains, only hills, yet our regional enduro series usually has winning times around 18-25 minutes. Granted, this race being a national series might have faster racers than we have, but still 8 minutes seems very short.
Why were there only 5 stages? We often have 7 stages, because they are short, 300-600 feet/ 90-180m vert. So even if they wanted to keep the stages short, to keep them high quality, why not add more of them?