Had the course changed massively since 2006?

I remembered only the first climb and part of the slatey “moorland singletrack”

Rubber_Buccaneer – Member
Everyone complaining about the headphone users should be far more concerned that I could see next to bugger all due to all the muck getting in my eyes

I used just one of these for the first time at Dyfi, :

having previously always used a crud catcher and improvised fork crown/brace flap, and trying out an improvised Facefender last week.

It worked very well -I could see.

I saw some people finishing who’s faces were completely covered in mud. These people had no front mud protection…

xc-steve – Member

Superb photos

coppice – Member
So i’m being irresponsible for wearing headphones…

It just seems peculiar to do so, in my opinion

…I was riding on my own, I was still chatting to people but it helped ease the boredom on some of the climbs.

Boredom? I rode around on my own and never once felt any boredom. It is a great event, a great location and I enjoy riding bikes.

If an MTB enduro produces boredom, why didn’t you stay in the campsite or at home? You could have watched TV or read a book!

Were air traffic control concerned? 😉

Results are up

Dyfi Results[/url]

The long bit after the beer stall didn’t actually seem that long, although the downhill bit at the end would probably have been quite chewed up if everybody had ridden it.

I’m going to do it on a Yamaha 400 next year

Headphones???

As someone who doesn’t like to mince on the descents,even though it makes little differebdllnce to time, the bike wasn’t the ideal -especially having forgotten to unlock the fork on the first descent!

My first Dyfi (and probably my first race/XC/Enduro) in a decade.

I enjoyed it. I think I took about 3hr 30, which was ok, although I wished I’d been doing some longer rides to prepare for it.

It was almost nothing like I remembered it from the last time, other than the long, first fire road climb.

I used my new-to-me 29er XC hardtail, which started off well, but I discovered had the seat too far back (right forward on the layback post), so my hamstrings were cramping from about half-way around and my lower back was sore afterwards.

I was using inner tubes pumped up hard to avoid pinch flats -which I’m glad I did- as I’d not got around to doing tubeless.

It was brutal on the descents 🙂 I was hanging my delicate areas over the rear mudguard, literally resting my chest on the saddle and using Mindfullness to steer.

In summary:

I ordered an inline Reverb post this morning and I’ll be doing tubeless conversion this evening!

My wife thought it was interesting and recommended it to me.

I read it. To me, it just stated the obvious in many slightly different ways (as per a lot of such books).

It is isn’t a complex idea at all.

Maybe it just depends upon how much thought you have given these things yourself beforehand?

It’s ok, chaps, I’ve already got a bike now.

I’m going to start doing my Strava road bike rides on a BMW S1000RR

-it’s all bikes, innit.

The whole e-bike thing puzzles me a bit. They are MOTORbikes.

Quiet, and mostly low-powered (although some are multi kW and definitely not limited to 15mph) they may be, but they do not rely solely on human or gravity power.

Pedal cycles are human powered.

Does doing runs on a Segway count on Strava?

Would it be considered acceptable to ride around Llandegla on a small 50cc MX bike?

I have ended up with a 2014 Boardman Pro 29er with 100mm, rather than 120mm, fork.

it rolls noticeably better uup kerbs than my 26er 😉

Following the arrival of young children and a different job, I did less weekend riding and less bike commuting -my fitness took a big hit. I mothballed and then dismantled the original singlespeed mtb.

Having re-gained my fitness, I returned to singlespeed for muddy night rides.

An unexplained shin injury resulted in me blaming singlespeeding, and re-fitting the gears. This may have been a bit premature and the gears may be removed again soon.

Singlespeed has its place.

Thanks for the suggestions

I recently re-built my shonky singlespeed hardtail from old parts lying about in the garage.

I took it for a ride around Delamere last night.

I was amazed at how well the combination of a front Panaracer Cinder and a fairly ancient rear Conti Vertical (ask your Granddad, they used to be the tyre of choice on here…) worked on the old shed through the mud of Delamere. Rolling well and very good traction.

The answer is probably,

“anything that is narrow-medium-sized with an aggressive, but open tread, pumped to a suitably not-too-hard-not-too-soft pressure”

edhornby – Member

I have to say that was my first and last time there, no fault of the race organisers but the endless clag and slop made anything even halfway interesting a big slithering lottery.. the grass start was daft

my hub died at the end of lap two and I was not upset at having to stop

It was very much like a muddy cross-country running course, one that would have required spikes. It wasn’t really what I would normally consider mountain biking.

I assumed that riding along the grass section was to allow the surfaced track to remain mostly open to the public (other than the U-turn part), although might it not have been better to cross the track sooner and ride straight to the ‘singletrack’?

I was actually disappointed to have to stop, though.

It took a fair bit of brushing, ‘Pound-shop Muc-off‘ and hosing to get the mud out of the rear triangle, transmission, bash-ring and chain device yesterday.

On the plus side, I have already begun building what was a pile of old parts and my old singlespeed into a budget XC machine.

I agree, it reminded me why I’d not done any XC for a decade! the last one I did was at Leisure Lakes and the sand killed my bike. The Mountain Mayhems were similar quagmires to yesterday.

Haigh XC was well organised and the officials were all friendly, but the course, in those conditions, wasn’t good. I would never normally choose to ride around the bushes in a muddy park!

For me, it was a good early season learning experience. My fitness was ok, if not quite used to the getting off and running bits, but my equipment was totally unsuited to it.

As above, I do think it worth having a narrow tyred, light bike with a short fork (possibly singlespeed) specifically for such riding. XC racing isn’t really “mountain trail biking”.

nikxl – Member
Well they said on the bc website MTB only and it’s beyond me why anyone would want to round there unless they were just intending to jog 5 laps

As I said last week, my ‘cross bike’ is a Crosslight frame and carbon fork, with Mary Bars (and a long stem, although I might have used a shorter, higher one) and V-brakes (The V brakes might have suffered a bit though…)

I think it might have been more suitable for that course than the bike I used today.

Ah yes, but I was requested not to ride my hybrid. In the events, there wasn’t any obvious scrutineering anyway!

It does make a difference, if your wheels won’t go round because of the clogging! 2.5″ tyres left almost no gap for the mud. -my problem, of course. I will be sourcing some XC tyres and fitting them to my old Hardtail.

As I pointed out earlier, though, my transmission and chain device was also clogged, which probably led to the chain lunching itself -and my monster powerrrr

With hindsight, I should have taken the stinger off.

Or I should have ridden my CX bike, like the other people that did!

As I suggested earlier, narrow spiky mud tyres would have made a massive difference, especially if your frame has big clearances.

I’m a bit disappointed that I was stopped by a mechanical though. I was hoping for 5 laps at the start.

Is that course typical of modern XC? I do much prefer rocky, technical terrain to quagmire.

I’ve just got back.

Well, it was a quagmire for the most part. I quite liked the technical parts, many of which saw a lot of people walking them.

I put in a lot of effort and was passing people on the downhills, but my tyres were initially all over the place and would then hardly turn when the whole bike was clogged with mud. Pushing the bike was difficult too. I was heaving hard on the bars and pedals then my chain snapped on lap 3.

Whilst a chain device and 2.5″ tyres are good for my more usual gritstone riding, there isn’t enough mud clearance or grip for a muddy park.

I think I’m going to build up an XC machine, although as a reintroduction to XC, I’m not convinced that I enjoyed it as much a good trail ride. I’ll give it another go, though.

Having read the British Cycling rules for races, I couldn’t find anything to define what was or wasn’t a mountain bike for the purposes of an XC race either.

The subject seems oddly ‘political’ at times, a bit like the 3 Peaks Cyclocross being definitely not a ‘Mountain bike’ race -due to historical landowner concerns(?) about mountain bikes, although that is run under different rules to XCO.

In the case of an XC race, frame geometry and top tube angles don’t really seem that important in the grand scheme of things, especially as they are not defined anywhere -It’s not as if they offer an unfair advantage, disadvantage or safety concern either. If the course is relatively technical, then there probably is no advantage.

In this case, it looks as if I’ll be trying to spin fast on my chunky hardtail with its fat tyres and hoping that it isn’t too muddy.

I’m sure it will be fun anyway.

Right, I’m not trying to win, cheat or push the limits!

As there are no clear definitions of the types of bikes (or possibly any real need for definitions), it does seem fairly arbitrary.

I’m not intending to buy a 29er XC machine for my first race in years. My 26″ bikes have fairly fat tubeless tyres which may not be ideal for a muddy Haigh Hall park and riding my “hybrid” bike might make sense.

Ok, so they can be different in some details and subjectively one could be set up better than the other for some things, but who declares what the objective definition of a “29er” or a “cyclocross” frame is?

Is a 29er with a cross-bike like geometry a cyclocross bike or a 29er? Is a cyclocross bike with mtb-like geometry an mtb?

The points of rider contact could be in exactly the same positions.

Is it about aesthetics?

I’m not disgruntled, just genuinely confused.

I don’t blame the organiser, he normally arranges cyclocross races, but is running this race under different rules.

The name on the frame is the only thing to objectively distinguish a lightweight XC 29er from a “cyclocross” bike -What about a frame with no name?

I can just imagine a “cycling official from headquarters” in a blazer turning up and rejecting some bikes for subjective reasons.

The organiser does seem helpful and I am not trying to be awkward at all.

Apparently, in order for the race to qualify for the XC racing series, it is for “mountain bikes”, but there appears to be no clear definition of what that means, even from British Cycling.

Rigid 29ers etc. are allowed, but “cyclocross bikes” are not.

I’m still unsure whether I can ride my hack bike:

A 700c(or “29er”)-wheeled, rigid bike with its mountain bike handlebar, v-brakes and ~1.5″ off-road tyres. A bike which I use on all kinds of terrain and I believe will be more suited to Haigh Hall than my 26″ bikes.

If not, it does seem ever so slightly arbitrary…

I’m genuinely not sure where the line is drawn between 29ers and cyclocross bikes, other than in the name on the side of the down-tube.

Cheers. I’ve asked the organiser (who seems like a very reasonable chap) for some clarification.

I’ve entered this and looking forward to it. What is the course likely to be like? I can’t imagine that it will be rocky.

Having not done an XC race in over 10 years, what is the score with the rules for bikes? It was once simple: 26″.

As 29ers and 650b(?) are common, you can presumably use those, but what about flat-barred “cyclocross” bikes, which are, to all intents and purposes, rigid 29ers? -is it up to the discretion of the organiser, like the 3 Peaks CX?

15 miles each way. 2-3 miles/week.

I tend to spin it out on the way in and similar or fartlek/speed intervals on the way home.

Nothing fancy for me. Another Casio. It should take a few years of abuse.

Analogue only this time. Alarms and the like are better even on my fairly old phone.

Clear and easily read.

I was wondering about the tyres too.

I suspect that kevlar-banded ‘tough’ street tyres would cope with a short 100mph ride or two.

They might or might not cope with very many heat cycles. It wouldn’t be difficult to do some testing, though.

Cantis on cx bikes are great when set up properly …for the first 5 minutes, after which they are garbage.

Full-size v-brakes (with suitable levers) are far, far better.

Which Loch Lomond did you ride up? The first bit’s lovely, yes, but once you get past the ferry it’s a 3+ hour carry over rocks and tree trunks. Not pushing, proper awkward carrying on your back, for ages and ages, it is a right ballache. And the few bits you can ride have stupid **** square-edged wheeleating water-bars every few yards.

It sounds like the same place, but with a much more difficult description! It really didn’t seem to take that long.

Ah, water-bar dismounting would have made a big difference -I managed to ride almost all them on my hardtail (pedal hard, pop up the front wheel, hop the rear). A couple of them did defeat me, but I just heaved the front over whilst straddling the bike.

FWIW, I rarely carried my bike on the WHW. I pushed it almost every time I had to dismount and mostly ‘lifted’ it by the bars (or top) tube when I found an obstacle. It seemed unnecessary and uncomfortable to carry the weight of the bike when it could be rolled/heaved over most obstacles and it was easier to re-mount for a short section if I was walking alongside it. It does work quite effectively for me. I’m probably better at “hike-a-bike” than I am at “bike” 😉

I may be unusual, though, my friends did carry their bikes a lot more.

Nothing could induce me to ever go back there with a bike again, it’s horrible.

I’d do it again. Some of Loch Lomond had me in that zen-like state, with the feeling that I was on the road to total enlightenment, with The Proclaimers singing the WHW anthem, “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)” in my head.

cozz – Member

not many places really only

mud
rocks
marshland
sand
snow
bogs
gravel
soil
stubble fields

and anywhere that suits your skinny tyred mountain bike too

Given that a cyclocross bike could also be ridden on most of those surfaces, and quite quickly on some, would a balloon-tyred bike be preferable to a 2-2.5″-tyred bike on anything other than sand or deep snow?

Before we did the WHW, we were expecting the northern east side of Loch Lomond to be extremely gnarly, difficult and long.

In the dry weather we had, it wasn’t anywhere near as difficult as expected -Although it may well have been had we been carrying full camping gear!

It was about an hour and a half(?) of enjoyable technical and non-technical riding interspersed with hike-a-bike and we caught up with quite a few walkers.

If you’re only used to trail centres then it might come as a shock, but if you’ve done any riding in the mountains or over rocky moorland then it probably won’t.

We did it in September. We decided to do it south to north with 2 stops (2.5 days riding) -at The Drovers’ and The King’s House.

We has fantastic weather for the first 2 days. The final day was a biblical deluge.

The east side of Loch Lomond is good and nowhere near as difficult as many people make out.

Between Loch Lomond and Rannoch Moor is good.

Rannoch Moor is good.

The Devil’s Staircase is a push, but not particularly long or much of a climb.

The descent to Kinlochleven is good.

The climb from Kinlochleven is good.

I suspect that walking the route over 1 week+ would be a bit dull to be honest. Running it might be better.

I’d recommend doing it on a bike. Great stuff.