[Closed] Gravity Enduro's- First Timer

Anyone can enter - not sure about the world series yet though.

There are a few series to look at all are a bit different ranging from mini DH with a slog round to more tough XC and a few other bits so depends where and who marks it.

As for before maybe ride the area, sort your bike out to make it reliable and get fitter. Practice riding longer sections of technical trail and maybe try riding with a FF if they are going for that.

i entered 3 of the UK gravity enduro series this year, the first competitive events that I have done.

the standard is pretty high and I was consistently in the bottom 3rd of my class. It didn't matter too much though as the main day is seeded so I found myself racing people of a similar ability. I tried to warn people behind me on the seeding runs that I wasn't that fast and I hope I made a decent job of just letting people past when I held them up. In summary if you are reasonably competent I think you can give it a go.

re: advice, you need to be fit enough to ride a 40 k loop on 2 successive days and still have enough energy to go for it on the descents. some uplift days helped me get my eye in on the more technical stuff as well.

a dropper post is pretty much essential if you want to be competitive as some timed stages have fire road sprints in them.

don't go too lightweight on tyres, i saw a lot of people whose race was ruined by punctures and in the last race I was glad I opted for 2.5 USTs to give a bit more security on the sharp rocks.

Make sure you arrive on the Saturday in plenty of time to do the full loop as a practice, riding stages blind while racing was a disaster for me.

enjoy ! maybe see you at a race in 2013

As Nosedive has highlighted, you will need to able to ride up to 40k a day, this includes you sectioning parts of stages, so a certain level of fitness is required.
Transitions times are the bit everyone will talk about, these are set by myself with, usually with a rag tag bunch of riders of all abilities, the secret to them is to just keep spinning! If you stop for a 10 minute chat with your new best mate, you will be late for your start time, so keep going, but talk to Him whilst your riding 😉
Stages will be a mix of trail centre and the now famous "off piste" we put in, these are there to take you out of your comfort zone, you won't find big jumps or drops in the stages but you will find roots, rocks and some uphills.
Try 1, if you hate it don't do another 1, but if you love it, best get a good credit card 🙂
The futures bright, the futures Gravity Enduro
Cheers
Steve

Most important thing- it's still fun if you're a knobber, you're not just there to pay for the top guys to do the actual racing 😉

My first, and only, was AE last year. My first go at the timed qualifying run was my first go down it... Not a great idea and quite an eye-opener! That and the rain psyched me a bit to the point where I nearly didn't ride on the Sunday. In the end I thought ****it with 20 minutes to go and went for it. It was great, loved it. Did much better on the second time than the first 🙂
Due to being broken couldn't do one this year, but will next.

I've be hovering over the entry button for the king of the hill next year. I can get down most stuff, but the thought of mincing down brown trout with Chris Ball stuck on my wheel fills me with dread

I guess someone has to come last however 🙂

Parr - transfer times this year at coed-y-brenin, eastridge and dyfi were spot on for me! please don't make them any shorter.

There won't be any *big* drops or jumps but there could be little ones, if you're happy with 2/3ft drops then you're good to go. This is stage 5 from dyfi which had some drops in it.

The GE's this year were some of the best fun I've had on a bike ever.

tpbiker - Member

I've be hovering over the entry button for the king of the hill next year. I can get down most stuff, but the thought of mincing down brown trout with Chris Ball stuck on my wheel fills me with dread

It's not a problem- no seeding and a nice long day so the fast boys went off quick and got ahead of us dobbers (Chris and Andy were getting ready to come down the last descent as I got to near the top of stage 3)

And then you can sort out most other conflicts at the trailhead, civilised like. "You look keen, would you like to go in front of me" sort of thing. May not have gone as smoothly for everyone but I got held up only once all day. Passed maybe 6 or 7 folks and never saw anyone in the rearview. Perfick.

No guarantee it'll be the same route though.

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/queen-elizabeth-country-park-qecp-to-host-a-gravity-enduro

The Gravity enduro we are holding should be good for all abilities, I think we are going to have a 'Fun' category for first time riders/racers with Prizes 😉

We will make the stages as Fun as possible with chicken runs with around and large features (jumps, Drops etc...)