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that’s what I was hoping, hopefully doesn’t rain enough to require knobbles.
Can’t imagine enough rain can ever fall to combat the conditions. Ride stage 2 and 7 today and 2 especially was so loose and dusty. It’s so much steeper than on POVs (no surprise there).
I walked down some of it; it was a wake up call for me!
Did the Epic today, super dusty so lots of sliding but biggest issue I think is trail is more blown out and rough than previous years. This dry weather doesn't do the trails and favours.
The new stage 3 starts even higher this year that's an additional climb I could do without, like the event needed more climbing. Really enjoyed the stage though.
I've just got back home after doing some of the Epic yesterday. Not pleased at all. We set off late, due to the long queues at Registration, so 10 minutes lost there. Then waited just over a hour at the start of Stage 1. Just as myself and other Epic riders got within 20 feet of the front of the queue, we were told to get to the front, as we were behind time, so needed to get down ASAP. One Marshal told us then that there's no way we would get all 7 stages finished, as we were too late. FFS. 32 minutes of riding to the top, 1 hour waiting, then told that. Our start time was 11.45, we got away at 11.55 (not our fault, just huge queues for sign in), 32 minutes to the top, then waiting. Finally set off down Stage 1 at 1.25pm, when, with 5 minutes of waiting time, should have been around 12.20pm.
Then the slog up to Stage 2, which again was a big queue, but we didn't wait there too long, as a Marshall said all Epic riders to the front , bypassing the 100 or so Enduro riders out for a practice. Halfway down Stage 2, my mate got a puncture. Took us 15 minutes or so to sort it. As we were fixing it, the two Sweepers came down, told us to get back on the trail, or we were out of the race, as the course was closed behind them. Great. We got to the bottom, told in no uncertain terms to get on the bikes immediately and get to Stage 3. We said we were just stopping for a drink and a quick snack, that wasn't good enough, the course was closing in 5 minutes, so get on now. So we said f it, and went back down. Out of 24 riders of our bunch, only 3 did the 7 stages. 5 were caught by the Sweepers, the rest couldnt do Stage 6 for an unspecified reason, which was likely the Organisers realised 100+ riders had ran out of time, so didnt want to disqualify them all, so said to the Marshall at Stage 6 to redirect them directly to Stage 7. 3 of our guys got a DNF, despite doing all of the course available to them, yet the others did the same route, and did get a time.
The postmortem concluded that an accident on Stage 1 had slowed things down a bit, but there must have been 300+ riders waiting there, and they were all going down when we were there, rather than waiting for the course to open. The Enduro riders were let out too early, or maybe that was planned, so the Enduro and the Epic all converged on Stage one together, making the queues far too long. That happened again on Stage 2, but the Epic got priority there, so someone had realised the balls up that was happening. I asked the Sweepers why they were coming round so early, as we were not really hanging around up till the puncture, it was the late start, then queue on Stage one that put us behind, nothing to do with us hanging around, they just said they have to close the course, by 5.30pm I think, and we'd never make it as it was gone 2pm then.
As the rest of our group came in, they all told a similar story, one of the faster guys was also caught by the sweepers, which astounded him, as he is the fastest of our group on a pedal bike, but they did let him finish stage 7.
Wow that sounds like a right shambles. I have experienced a bit of a wait once when there had been an accident, but mostly the queues move quick, although I only ever do the Sunday so I think they're a bit looser on letting people go in groups and with less gap between riders.
I've ridden the two practice stages today, bugger me I found it hard. Back on a non E bike after mine was stolen, it's a shock to the system! The wind is punishing today as well, hopefully calmer tomorrow but forecast looks similar.
Puncture as well so I'm going to put spare tyre on and keep it rock hard!
Trails still bone dry
