SITS camping area…

Weather is looking good 🙂
Not sure about the Thunderstorms 🙁
http://www.wunderground.com/cgi-bin/findweather/getForecast?hourly=1&query=zmw:00000.17.03418&yday=216&weekday=Saturday

Fri Aug 3 69°F/56°F
Partly Cloudy
Chance of rain: 20%
Wind: SSW at 10 mph

Sat Aug 4

65°/ 55°
Scattered T-Storms
Chance of rain: 60%
Wind: S at 11 mph

Sun Aug 5
64°/55°
Showers
Chance of rain: 30%
Wind: S at 9 mph

This ^^ I can deal with, as long as the trails aren’t churned up by 1000’s of riders. 😀

Is it too early to ask what tyres for Sleepless yet?

Well I’m going with a pair of race kings that don’t hold any air, and a set of RaRa’s that are nearly knackered. I’ll be the one in the air ambulance….

Official reply from Patrick and Provelo Support team.

Sorry for the delay on course updates and weather but we have been here on site for the last week and have no internet connection so knew nothing about this post until we had a call 🙂

we are not asking you to camp seperat from your cars, we are just asking you to park your cars faceing the road ways so if it gets wet you have an easy access out. To also try and park in lines when camping so we can fit more in if needed.

the only rain we have had here in the last 10 days is a light shower yesterday and one today. ground is hard under foot and for now camping is no problem at all but the forcast is due rain so. Some parts on course are muddy but much better than we expected and its holding up.

we have worked hard this week to put in new sections of course and also added the campsite b to add more trackside camping.

we look forward to seeing you all, friends old and new.

Thanks Rob 🙂

Cheers Rob.

Will you be there snapping as usual? Any chance of some night shots this year? I always get missed at night (and I do go out in the dark!!)

Cheers

Thanks for that Rob.

FYI spoken to mate who is on site and said it been raining heavily on and off throughout the day and is raining now, best get the mud tyres on me thinks

yep bring the mud tyres it could rain more but for now you dont need them and ive been around the course 3 times today.

oh also sorry forgot to mention the night shots, I dont like to blind people with flashes all over I used to hate that so I only do the shots without flash guns.

Latest report from STW via twitter is it’s dry and sunny 😀

One of our team headed over last night. He sent me a vid this morning and it looks bone dry! 😀
Bet it wont last though!

I’m hoping Sleepless will be as good this year as it was last year. My first lap was dry (about 5pm), although it started to rain towards the end of it, then it hammered it down and our teammates that had to ride had a fairly awful time – Mr Toast rubbed off a load of paint on his frame from the wheels collecting mud, and ended up posting a longer lap time than me!

By the time I had my second lap at 1am, it was dry again. \o/ So I’m hoping it’ll be similarly fast drying this year…

I thought that thuderstorm last year was really going to make the course harder, but didn’t seem to affect it that much.

I’ve got Racekings on, and i’m not changing them! 😆

Condition reports sound promising.
I’ve just wrestled a set of Aspens off my rims and slapped on some knobbly Beavers (phnaar).

I’m pondering whether to slap the Beavers on straight away, or to wait and see. Got a Captain on the rear, it’s not great in mud…

Official reply from Patrick and Provelo Support team.

Isn’t that verbatim the press release pre-Mayhem!?

Good luck to all, hope it is a dry one!

Not racing Nick?

twitter peeps now saying sections of the course being closed due to weather conditions 😐

i might take the kids for a run round tomorrow, teach ’em how to heckle at the downhill run at the end of the campsite

Short version: The heavy rain for about 30 mins at 4pm destroyed the excellent fast course & our times went from 50mins to 85mins a lap including about 50% unridable pushing thru mud so after 10 laps we stopped for the night at 10.30pm. Planning a lap each starting about 9am just to say we ‘finished’.

Shame!

Not racing Nick?

Nah! After Mayhem and 24/12 just couldn’t face another one! I reckon there’s only one dry endurance race a year, and Bristol got it this time!

Hope all enjoyed it though.

Pushing a bike round a muddy field isn’t racing.destoyed £400 of parts won’t be doing that again.

Just found the classic mud-covered bike pics on Twitter… Lovely looking SS Niner with a full clay chain device!

Surely it must be time to bin Catton and Eastnor as venues and have it somewhere properly all-weather.

GB

Surprised how little rain it actually took to destroy that course. Thought it was totally uninspiring even before it rained though. The second half sections across and along the fields were just awful, and that final wooded section was badly thought out imo.

agreed it was fun in a aggghhhh kind of way, it was just man against mud with a metal/carbon ball and chain at times

We were dicing for the lead in the mixed team until 1pm when we decided to call it quits. I’ve never ridden in mud like that, and I’ve done the last two d2d’s….

Any pics, glad I didn’t go

First two laps were brilliant and really quick, which meant I got a 43 with the run and then a 38. After the initial storm that rose to around high 40s then longest was a 1:12! I rode MM this year and whilst conditions were grim this was just as bad. Bikes became 50 plus pound weights and you couldn’t even stand let alone walk 😆 despite a broken bike I still very much enjoyed it, however have to agree a more all weather course would make more sense!

Also, very pleased they removed the half mile bit through the trees, great move.

This picture sums it up for me:

Terrible photo quality, obviously taken in the dark on the phone…

We were dicing for the lead in the mixed team until 1pm when we decided to call it quit

Was that not 1 hour to go?!

Looks grim, well done to all!

Finished at 12 this year, and I assume Flange meant 1am?

Just back from Sits and I really enjoyed it, all the singlespeeders and people that chose correct tyres were the winners .Surprised at how many wimped out @ 12am I binned it @ 1am as there was hardly anyone else to heckle,got my arse into gear and crawled out of my pit @5.50am to continue giving encouragemant!
Seems as though people are struggling with the concept of 24hr racing you ride for 24 hrs come rain or shine 🙄 well done to Pat loads of trackside camping which was not taken up .

Rich

didnt see many people on ss or with any mud tyres riding the off camber shit that they eventually closed,when peoples rear mechs are hanging off and no stalls have bothered to turn up that carry decent stock what chance have we got
in the end you have to ask yourself if its worth the damage to your bike imo

Yep, 1am we packed up. My team mate came in and looked like a broken man. I was one of the last to go through the off camber section before they closed it and it destroyed my bike

Postierich – i think it’s fairly easy to criticise those who pulled out but for most of us (my team included) we don’t do a lot of those sort of events – I raced on the bike I use for normal races and it just wasn’t the tool for the job. The option of either further wrecking my bike or dragging it as a dead weight round the course for another 12 hours wasn’t that difficult to make after I’d destroyed my mech, chain, cassette, brakes – I’ve not yet brought myself to add up the cost. You’re right, skinny mud tyres on a ss 29’er seemed to be the way to go and fair play to all those who finished, a fantastic effort.

For what it’s worth I really enjoyed the course, the single track through the trees was lovely and the last bit coming into the start/finish was ace. The course did cut up badly but I don’t think many courses would have stood up to that many bikes riding over it

After doing mayhem this year as a solo virgin and only just getting my bike back on the road after a £200 repair bill I couldn’t afford sits this year both mentally and financially. Pretty glad I didn’t do it after hearing about the conditions. These events are great in the dry but after the rain weve had this summer the course was always going to be horrendous. I did the wiggle 6 enduro in may and it was pretty tough course then and it’s rained a hell of a lot since then. You pays your money and takes your chances I’m afraid, I’m sure if we’d had a really dry run up to the event then it would have been booked up anyway.

“Cough” not being critical just an observation 😕

I did it last year and it was dry 99% of the time, Im quite glad I didnt do it this year. Bristol Bike Fest is good as the course is waterproof.

It is pretty hard to find somewhere that would work for a race that lasts 12 / 24 hours for hundreds of riders that will not turn to poo if it rains.

Apart from Bikefest, I dont know of any others.

I just wanna say thanks to the two girls who were Marshall’s at the top of the muddy wood trail. Who were the most cheery happy people from the whole event. It was a real pleasure to see you throwing so much into it in those conditions. I know a lot of riders who would like to thank you 🙂