Just sat in Richmond having a full English in the wetherspoons reminiscing on what a great weekend!
There was times out there yesterday where I was really struggling but we made it. What a great day. Didn’t quite get as high up the order as I wanted but hey sub 20 mins and still alive. Hope you all had as much fun!

Totally destroyed me. A week riding and walking in The Lakes probably wasn’t the ideal preparation.

Obvious they’re upped the tech over last year. First four stages definitely harder (‘arder?) than previously.

Ripped sidewall halfway down stage 3 put paid to beating even my previous mincetastic times. Lost about 15 minutes…

Loved it overall though, and the Rocket took its first competitive outing in its stride. Amazing bike.

After driving 2 hrs home it would appear my right thigh is not at all happy! I expect the aches for a few days….

In compression wear on the sofa, olympics on, contemplating accessorising with a cold beer! What a superb day out yesterday though, makes all the aches and pains worthwhile.

Absolutely loved it..probably the best days riding I’ve ever had!
Loved the timed sections, loved the climbs, loved the countryside!
Brilliant on the hardtail too 🙂
I would liked to have done better than 19.45 but dropped a chain on section 2, and rode the last half of 5 just on the rear rim after tearing out a nobble on the rear tyre..that made the off camber sections interesting!

Definitely need dual ply tyres next time!!

DrP

20:18 for me, several silly mistakes cost me time so will be back next year hopefully for a sub 20. Great event again, though they really need to have some more showers and general camping facilities IMO.

Hope everyone got round in one piece, I think I saw the air ambulance at least once though!

Air ambulance yesterday early evening g was for a roadie of all people who had rode into a wall 😯

Awesome weekend of riding, drinking and heckling. Got a time of 21.09.

Brilliant, a great event as a whole topped off with proper rocky trails and an amazing tour of Swaledale. Kept having to stop to take photos! 18:42.

Had to bail after S2. Front brake in the process of giving up making life interesting and riding partner bonking heavily and unlikely to complete.

There seemed to be a lot of hanging around apart from the obvious and understandable delays to let the Mountain Rescue do their thing for whoever crashed hard on s2.

23:25 for me – I knew I wasn’t going to do all that well. Just didn’t have the fitness for the short pedally bursts.

Still I really loved all of the stages. Will come back quicker next year (mind you I said that last year and I’m slower 🙂 )

Cracking event love the atmosphere

Did the Sport today. The wind was ridiculous. Did it in 26:00.03, so slower than you lot but still pleased that I made it around all 5 stages, first time ive done anything like that and the stages were miles harder than anything I’ve ever ridden before

Got eaten alive by the bastard midges Marshaling at the bottom of stage 2 on friday and my little helper needed some shade

burnt to a crisp at the top of stage 3 on saturday

and then very windswept today again at the top of 3

had a great weekend and happy the rain did not arrive

I also did the sport today. As mentioned above, the wind made it very difficult on both climbs and descents. Stage 2 & 3 were closed when we got to them because they were extracting broken people. Bizarrely they decided to let everyone leave at once when the stages reopened so we had to queue for some features which made for very slow times. A crash on stage 1 didn’t help either…

Cracking day out though

DNF Saturday. In fact hardly bloody started. 😳
Ongoing issue, with tendon. Made matters worse on S1 and S2 in Friday practice. Looks like very little serious riding for a while.
Hats off to all who completed.

Great weekend – quality atmosphere, nice people, great band and pretty cool stages

Punctured on stage 1 and dropped my chain twice. Dropped again on stage 2 and then learnt to keep it on the big ring at the back and keep my speed up!!

Stage 3 – 5 much better and set some good times but 21.28 was pretty woeful 🙁

My own fault for skimping on drivetrain costs 🙂

Will certainly be back next year!

I had a walk up stage 1 this morning to spectate. It was chaos. Loads of riders getting off at the top of steep sections and walking down and then getting in the way of people still on their bikes.
One poor bloke had to take avoiding action and went otb hard into the rocks when one pusher got back on his bike wobbled in front of him. Resulted in deep lacerations to his thigh and abdomen, but could’ve been much worse.

Myself and Mrs ws went up to watch stage 1 today and even she said there’s some people who are a bit sketchy out here today. I do think in parts some of it must be pretty daunting for the not so confident rider. Watched some great overtakes however where we were. Perhaps a bit of a grading system in place next year similar to when you do a half marathon and you give a rough idea of your expected time?????

Not long back after a weekend of marshalling did not see much of the action as I was start marshal on The BOOZER stage . Volunteered for the furthest point so I got to ride my bike and rode most of the stages good crowd, was expecting lots of egos but everyone was cool.Got hammered in the evening and had a rocking headache to ride out with to be battered by winds all day. Shout out to the Shimano crew for giving ma free xt mech so I could keep going Sunday.
Will ride it next year hopefully.

Rich

Enjoyed it, even if I was far too unfit for it. 18:36 in the end.

Fantastic day out. V pleased not to have died… thought that the wind might achieve this on a number of occasions where the bike stopped moving in a forwardly direction and started moving in a sidewaysly way.

Lack of sleep (battered by sides of tent being blown into face all night!) and a cock up / misheard start time meant we did stages one and two whilst still half asleep and without coffee. Stopped at the pub for instant coffee and bacon frazzles. The breakfast of champions…

Had a great day on Saturday, pretty much an identical time to last year to within a few seconds. Pretty happy with that since I almost backed out after the flu meant I’d managed a full 10 miles riding in the last month. Went up to stage 1 this morning to provide moral support (AKA heckling) and had a great time too. Some proper sketchy riding from people who I think we’re shocked by the tech level, god help them when they got to Stage 2! Marshals radio was super busy with calls for broken riders, must have been manic for the medics and mountain rescue. Saw air ambulance arrive again, maybe to stage 2 just before I left at at 14:00.

Were any of the photographers official? Will you be able to purchase shots? … Asumming I look Enduro enough in them

wind made it very hard today, blew me into a marker post just into stage 5 which then got tangled in the mech so had to stop and rip it out. had a little off in stage 2 trying to pass a slower rider. apart from a wait at the top of stage 1 didn’t have any hold ups on the others.
didn’t think there was anything very technical in the stages, just a few sections that needed a bit of commitment so was quite surprised by the amount of people stopping at features and pushing down steep bits.

considering the amount of time i lost catching other riders at bad points of the stages i was reasonably happy to be just over 20 minutes.

Were any of the photographers official? Will you be able to purchase shots?

should be up on roots and rain website

Photos up on roots and rain now..
Some cracking ones too!

Me pink sockin’ it up!

DrP

Really enjoyed the stages but made a few silly mistakes on most of them…
Had a small crash on stage 3, and got held up by riders on a couple of stages. Ended up with a time of 18:37 on the Saturday.

14 mins 25 in the sprint, like others had issues with people dismounting and general traffic on the trail, was a bit like the Mega in that respect. Had to take completely the wrong line at almost a standstill on the bit on stage 2 with the catch fence due to traffic and stop on stage 3 for an injured rider, hope they were OK. Great event though

Rode the sport enduro on Sunday, the wind was horrendous. All of the stages were excellent, although with the high winds it was very much a wheels on the ground day!

Big thanks to Troutie and Postie marshalling on stages 3 and 4. Had a brief but pleasant chat with both of you.

The Mrs had a big off on Stage 3, which ended her day though 🙁

Did the Saturday event. First stage, third corner in I spot a bloke fixing a puncture – ‘christ, thats unluckly’ I think to myself as I then hit the same rock he had and nailed the tyre and wheel. Then punctured the now inner-tubed rear wheel again on stage 3 which meant a walk pretty much from top to bottom. Which was annoying as it easily looked the best stage of them all. 29.something for me which is obviously bobbins, if I look at the time my brother did, I was quicker on the three stages I completed than him and he did a 20.52.

Really really good event though, excellent atmosphere and the heckling on the last corner of stage 5 was awesome! I also wish I had shares in Santa Cruz…

I also wish I had shares in Santa Cruz…

Chuckle..it was the bike du jour!

Stage 3 was puncture carnage – I made it down fine, my riding buddy had to pop a tube in, and about 20% of riders coming down (for the time i was there) rolled in on a flat rear!!

I agree – it was my favourite stage.

I actually rode the ‘unpracticed’ stages better than the practice stages – my time on 1, 2, and 5 were faster on Friday!!

DrP

had a blast on the 30km sprint, stood in lastminute.com for a mates missus who bailed. the stages way were may more techy than I imagined and had a fair a few 5p-10p moments but got down everything without incident on my old skool yeti 26r…. echo the sentiments about santa cruz, bronsons and nomads…theyre the omnipresent ride of choice it seems.. loved the pub stop between stage 2-3, so much so we managed two visits for a recovery cider. lots of folk wondering round with slings and leg bandages on too

From the marshals POV big thanks to everyone for good humour, cooperation and patience during delays.

Was glad to get off that hill yesterday once we’d finally got everything packed up though!

I was disappointing to only get entered into the Sprint Enduro but I have to say, it was a great event. I would have liked to have done the whole loop but having chance to ‘session’ the two open stages on Friday and then a leisurely 13:15 set off time made it a pretty chilled weekend for me. Big crash in practice meant a bar and lever swap on Saturday morning but everything else was spot on.

Getting past slower riders or out of the way of faster ones is all part of the game and I doubt anyone gets a perfect run in that sense. So long as it’s all friendly and considerate passing, everyone should be happy.

Oh, and chuffed to bits with 11:42 and a 4th place in the Masters category! Bring on ‘Ard Moors – although I think I’m doing the whole loop so will be back to my mid pack troubling ways, I would think.

Punctures on 1 and 2 meant no chance of putting in a decent time but the rest of the day went well. Had a great weekend, and chatted to lots of friendly people as I spent most of the day riding alone.

I think the organisers would benefit from emphasising how difficult the stages are and how long the loop is, there were a lot of people that were well out of their depth.

Big thanks to the marshalls, it’s a long old day to be sat on a remote hill on your own!

they’re upped the tech over last year

+1

I did last years’ event and this year’s one was definitely far more techy, especially stage 2. Not complaining – but one of the reasons I did the event again this year, was that the course last year was (comparatively to other Enduros) not mega-techy and a fun ride for those of us of lesser skills 🙂

Minced my way round, happy to finish still feeling ok. Found my fitness was ok, but I really need to get better leg strength and body position for next year, as my legs were giving out on me half way down some of the stages and sitting down ain’t an option.

Kudos to those who did well, many thanks to Marshals and organisers. Great event, fabby atmosphere, lots of friendly people having a great time. Hope to be back in 2017!

The wind on Sunday was just silly!
Stage 2 became a bit of a joke as because of an injury and rescue, it was shortened then delayed, so they sent everyone off with tiny gaps which resulted in a big queue down the hill!

All good apart from that though. Crossed the finish line and then my rear tyre went flat 🙂

29th In Sport Vets – 21.04

[img]https://a.rootsandrain.com/f/mjp/20160806-swaledale/run5/jdp_5111_t.jpg[/img]

It was really windy saturday night so was pretty happy to have raced saturday!

Courses were good although not a lot of stage time for 5 hours on the bike?

Good ride, amazing place but shit race. Punctures and constantly stuck behind people meant a result was impossible sadly.

So as my first go at something “enduro” that was a bit interesting. I must say the best thing about it was how friendly people were though. Had an awesome time.

I was a bit worried when we got up there on the Saturday afternoon to see mountain rescue and air ambulance taking people off to the hospital, one chap with his leg in pot and a couple with slings. We bumped into one of the chaps from ritz rebbles (nice chaps) and he told us how we were probably going to die. Knowing that im a bit of a crap / unfit rider and all. Tales of woe, death and fun also followed into the night where potentially I had a few more beers than I should have.

9am start and it was all go. A nice gentle climb to start and a que for the first stage. I had no idea what to expect really. I set off and it all went downhill literally. It wasn’t the steepness that worried me but there were some pretty scarily looking sharp rocks all over the place. 2 guys in front of me stopped and had me stood on one of the drops for a while as they sorted themselves out. I wasn’t going to be barging past anyone on this as it just seemed too dangerous for a novice like myself so I stood about for a bit. This happened on nearly every stage but it didn’t bother me one bit. I was there just to have a bit of fun. I did feel sorry for the guys on stage 3 and 4 though as the marshals were shouting at them to get out of the way. It wasn’t me honest!

It was great to have such a positive response from the guys at the start of the stages and my the guys marshaling. I had guys at the start saying it was good to see guys from calderdale up here! And even people shouting well done as I ride through the stages. This was probably because of the amount of foul language and screaming like a girl I was doing though.

Totally great day. Took it easy but it still pushed my limits significantly. You could see some folks were clearly in their element and some of the riding was just majestic. Some folks were also clearly out of their depth and I just hope they got home ok. Made for a great day though. Still buzzing and will be for a few days I think.

So much fun and made so by all the people that were there. No egos or anything. Just a fab day out with some good friends and we amazingly made it back in one piece!

But oh my god those transitions! 45mph winds didn’t help at all!