Yes and not a clue. I see we have two seeding stages which is piquing my curiosity, then off up the gondola and quad for the mass start. I reckon a squint at an OS map is in order.

I imagine the seeding stage will be the Top Chief from beyond the main boardwalk. The other may be the bottom of the DH from the road gap.

The stage from the quad will be mental. They put a stage in there at the SES a few years ago, and it was a horrible bog full of holes. On a mass start, it'll be carnage. I'm guessing they'll then send everyone down the WC track. That'll be even more carnage

Well non of us have ever done any of them trails so it’s going to be interesting doing it all blind. Presuming your right, I’ll watch some videos of what you’ve said so I can see what we’re up against.

Thanks for the heads up, any more info would be appreciated

And dig out my body armour haha

Yep. Doing it blind too. Looking to make and not pushing for places.

Yeah make it down alive haha

Where are you travelling from?

I'm doing it.
No clue on the trail they'll use but there 3 uplifted tracks and 2 seeding runs and a race run😁

Hawick and riding with some lads from Cumbria.

Well it looks like the Pitch with Boxxers may be the sensible middle ground, don't fancy a cross country trek on the DH bike 😬

I'm travelling up from Largs so staying over the night before.

Yeah we've got two nights booked in a hotel.

Sounds good. 4 of us are travelling up from Oldham area and staying in the fortwilliam for a piss up afterwards.

See you there

I'm heading out for some scran if anyone is going to be in town. No idea where I'm going yet mind...

AFAIK they never rebuilt McTavishes so at least I'm safe from that.

So, how did we do?

Didn't fall off.
Didn't come last.
Made it to the end.

All in I achieved everything I was aiming for.

Best of luck to all the entrants. I hope theres plenty of snow, always makes for a funny race people taking an initial tumble then sliding down much of it.

Bit late, the race was long done when I posted. 🤣😉

The snow section was hard going, I managed to fly past a load of folk on it but lost all the ground on the trails as my legs had completely given up by that point. Not so much Mountain of Hell as opposed to Crust Pit of Hell, dry, fairly thick but too crusty to just plough through unless you picked up a lot of speed.

Crashed in the snow and buggered my drivetrain so had half a pedal stroke all the way down. Was fun but I'm pissed off as I'd had gone quicker if I hadn't channeled a shit Aaron gwinn

That's half a pedal stroke more than I had in me, I was finished by the time we hit the bottom of the quad.

I actually remember smelling my brake pads overheating somewhere just above the bog, mostly from trying not to run into the back of folk. Should probably check them now I think about it as it was a proper burnt clutch stink.

Yeah but I put in about 1000 half pedal strokes. Right leg did a lot of work.

From the BBC new In pictures: Mountain bikers descend snowy peak

I'm in that twice!

😀

Looked like a fun day out. Quality BBC pics as always.

Bit late, the race was long done when I posted. 🤣😉

Shocking, bumping a 2 week old thread instead of starting a new one with with a race report and plenty of pictures and video.

.

There are pictures and video isn't there ?. Apparently pics or it didn't happen 😉

Some pics on Roots and Rain, not even going there, you can see I'm utterly spent!

Guess the OP didn't win then.

OTB twice near the start and another little tumble trying to avoid someone a little after the top of the quad lift and then it went quite well the rest of the way down. ended up 43nd overall and 6th in catagory.

starting about 60th was bad enough in the snow, it must have been really hard work starting much further back.

starting about 60th was bad enough in the snow, it must have been really hard work starting much further back.

It was, you can see the on the vids how long it took to even get going. Getting by folk wasn't actually all that difficult but mostly the congestion was too much to get by.

I thought I hadn't crashed, turns out I flopped over pathetically somewhere in the snow, spotted that on a vid last night 😂

someones video caught both my OTB's. first was before the first turn, second was coming back onto the snow after taking the rocky inside of that first turn and i would put both of them down to the congestion. my mate started near the front and had a nice clean run, i think a lot of luck involed unless your close to the front.