Neil Donoghue, it was on a course so he was more of the performing monkey for the day rather than riding shoulder to shoulder trying to out brake him into a berm or anything like that. His bike really was just an extension of his body, he clears doubles at about a quarter of the speed you think he’d need to do so with about as much difficulty as most people walk down the stairs.
Fastest Muggle rider was a Mate of some friends of mine, could ride anything on 2 wheels, anything. started as a kid on Trials Bikes (with Rob Warner) then raced Superbikes (not BSB, lower division, clubman stuff) and finally picked up MTBing in his mid-30s when the Motorbikes were going to bankrupt him. This was his ‘learning curve’.
At 35 he sits on his first MTB, 30 seconds later he’s bouncing on the back wheel, riding it like a pogo stick. It’s taken him another 60 seconds or so to learn to wheelie/manual as far as he likes.
First ride, Whites Level at Afan, he’s struggling with the gearing and climbing rocks, so he rides them like a trails rider, spends most of the climb either on the front wheel, or back, rarely both it seems.
Final Descent he follows me down, studying how I do it (I’m not great now, was worse then), chatting all the way whilst I try to hold onto my bike. He’s on a HT from memory, I’m on a 150mm FS bike.
Fairly quickly buys a little 4″ travel Kona Kikapu. He’s now the fastest rider in our group by some margin.
3-4 months after he first sits on a MTB we go to Morzine for the first time, we’ve all got new DH bikes, he rents a horrible condition Kona Stinky from Alpine Elements. Takes it back 2 hours later because the bearings are so shagged the back we steers as much as the front, they tell him “they all do that” they don’t, but he carries on anyway.
Day 2 and he’s having a ball riding with our ‘Guide’ who it stupid fast compared to us. Guide tells him about the unofficial Pleney DH run competition between the Guides and shows him the board with the times on, he borrows and ‘Tony Hawk Action Cam’ (terrible pre-GoPro action cam) from another friend and sets a new record.
Lives in New Zealand now, hope he still rides.