It is also worth getting the support bush, to protect the hub while you knock out the old bearings.

I don’t think its supposed to be a balanced article putting across all points of view. Its more of an opinion piece from passionate mountain bikers (I assume – have never met them, and I don’t think they are part of TAG).

Hopefully a compromise can be reached on the issues we have locally that gives all parties some of what they want, time will tell.

MBR

TAG[/url]

I was there, also in Vets. Great result for your 3rd outing!

Was certainly relentless, not exactly anything difficult in isolation, but constant little bumps and twists to stop you getting any kind of rhythm. Also got increasingly loose as traffic turned the bends to dust!

Took me half the race to start riding properly, by which time I’d wasted most of my energy regaining the speed I was failing to carry through corners.

Never mind, I rode much better at the previous round, even though the result was the same. And it was still riding bikes in the sun :-)

That’s pretty much what I like about them too. I also do plenty of endurance stuff, and also some short XC, but MTBO is a bit different. Good to use the brain, and the 3 hours just flies by (not that 3 hours were needed last weekend).

Not got a camera to hand. Definitely not travel spacers though, much too small. I think they might be crush washers for the nuts/bolts at the bottom of the legs.

No matter, I’ll see if the air spring fix holds before I take them apart again to do the damper, and see if I can match them up to anything. Need to buy some 5wt oil too.

That certainly makes a difference. Still don’t get it perfect though!

Trailbreak used to run navigation events in the south, and although you got the map and checkpoint locations beforehand, you only got the checkpoint values once the clock was ticking.

There were always several checkpoints that were worth zero (dummies, in effect), so even if you were expecting a clearance you still couldn’t completely determine your route beforehand.

That also gave the organisers some flexibility with course difficulty once the CPs were laid out; if the weather was good the dummies would be nearby, and if it turned nasty overnight then some of the farthest flung might be scratched.

They used dibbers too, so you could see everyone else’s route and intermediate times. Sadly numbers gradually fell away and they stopped a couple of years ago. Well done Gorrick and Sid for sticking with the format, they keep it low-key, low-budget and family friendly.

Would love to go and do some on big hills up north. One day…

Thanks again chaps, ordered the O ring set as suggested and fitted the air spring side ones yesterday. Seems to have solved the problem although not had a chance to test-ride yet.

One question: The damper side rings come with a couple of washers and spacers. Any idea what they are for? They aren’t mentioned on the otherwise excellent diagram that comes with the kit.

Ta.

No matter how good I think my route is before I start I always manage to find improvements when I’m safely home in front of the PC! Have to smash the pedals pretty hard to make up for the extra miles. Luckily for me, the south’s MTBO virtuoso wasn’t there to hand me another lesson this time :-)

Ian, have you found any changes you’d have made to your route in hindsight?

Yes a few people got round much faster than expected and then went back for checkpoints they’d ignored earlier!

Saw you at the prizegiving and was going to say hi after it was over, but did something else first and then you’d gone.

Yes I went south out of Kingsclere from 16 to 4, but that’s because I was originally intending to go to 11. Changed my mind whilst I was on the road climb! Not sure it made much difference in the end.

You’re right about the climbing, its quite a balancing act weighing up distance vs elevation and taking terrain surface into account. Sometimes ease of navigation is a factor too. Like you, I prefer steeper climbs to shallow.

Which two checkpoints did you miss Ormondroyd?

Yes, my route was a bit long in a couple of places although I traded some distance for mud avoidance. Didn’t realise we could head south from 5, if I had I’d have done 20 first, that cost me a km or so. Was also planning to do 11 between 16 and 4 but left it to last instead, still not sure if that paid off or not, probably not much in it.

Good to compare routes as I can usually learn something! Always room for improvement :-)

Nice one Ian :-)

I went anticlockwise too, and I thought most people were going the same way – funny how perceptions differ!

Always interesting to see what decisions other people make. My route was 2 7 8 3 16 4 19 15 17 5 20 10 9 14 13 1 18 6 12 11, so not actually that similar to yours.

Any idea how much distance and elevation you covered? I did just over 49km with 750m of climbing. Managed to avoid all the mud!

It was a great day out even if the weather made the course a bit easy, good effort for getting round so fast even with a broken mech.

Aidan is a bit daft though ;)

I don’t know of anyone that goes for longer training rides than about 7 hours max, MAYBE 8 hours. Theres not much to be gained after that long.

I’d dispute that. What you gain is the mental side of the training. Ride away from your house for 6 hours, then turn round and ride back, by the same route.

You’ll wish you could stop long before you get home, and you won’t even have the novelty of new terrain to maintain morale. If you can handle that without finding a way of bailing out, then you’ve got one of the key psychological tools for keeping plugging away at at solo.

If so, ride at a specific cadence in a specific gear and in a specific HR zone for a set amount of time and see how far you get.

Won’t a specific cadence in a specific gear for a set amount of time result in exactly the same distance every time? Or did you mean gradually change to a taller gear over time as your HR zone allows?

Cheers guys, most helpful.

Haha no wasn’t suggesting you take yours to bits. I was merely hijacking your thread to ask about mine :)

I’ve got much the same problem with my Rebas, which are a long way out of warranty. Quite happy taking them to bits, but do you know which seal is the likely culprit, and can it be replaced easily enough?

I had no problems buying some Tracklogs V3 maps off someone else and installing them on my PC. You have to register them, but the registration key is on the packaging and doesn’t seem to be limited to one machine.

This was several years ago.

Why are there often only 30-40 masters racers compared to 100+ in open?

Maybe this is the reason :-)

i’m thinking about going masters but my age is not far of vet and not too fast so would come near the back in masters.

Don’t forget that there is also the SuperMasters category at the Gorricks, same age group but an extra lap. That dilutes the entry for Masters.

Open has always been pretty much the biggest category at Gorricks. No age restriction so far more people are eligible for Open than for Masters.

My map board is a 50p plastic chopping board, with holes poked through it so I can zip-tie it to the bars in either landscape or portrait orientation, depending on which way round the map is. Map is attached with 6 bulldog clips. Total cost about £2 :-)

To navigate fast, you need to be looking at the map very regularly, so map on the bars makes a big difference.

Was a bit of sport relief slalom on parts of that bridleway, lucky I’d remembered my bell!

Lots of clearances today. Just like round 1 last year, unseasonably dry trails made it very fast going. Had it been muddy, it would have been tough for anyone to clear.

Glad you enjoyed it, nice to use the brain as well as the legs :-)

Yep was absolutely fantastic, you’re right about Watership Down!

I did spot you and your IF at the prize-giving, then after it was finished I popped into the pub and then came back out and said hello. Unfortunately I’d already forgotten what you looked like, and picked the tallest person remaining, who didn’t have an IF and looked somewhat baffled…

I’ll be there, on a dark green Superlight.

Good luck, remember that’s its not all about who’s the fittest! Planning and navigating matter just as much as lungs and legs :-)

Going to be a fantastic day for it!

I’m sure you’ll enjoy it, no danger of getting all the checkpoints in 2 hours so you can ignore some of the most distant ones!

Have only ever ridden over that way once, nearly a decade ago, so looking forward to exploring a bit. Is the Wayfarers Walk good going, or is it badly rutted on the byway sections?

I must remember that the start finish is at the top of a big hill, so it’s going to be a lot slower coming back than going out!

I’ll be riding a short-travel full-suss because that’s what I have, but any bike will be fine.

Other tips, if you’re feeling competitive:

Get there early enough to allow a decent amount of time to plan your route, half of the skill is in planning.

Bring a compass and some kind of mapboard to go on the bars. As its all on rights of way, and its likely to be a nice day, there will probably be plenty of walkers and horse riders out, so its pretty useful to have a bell too.

Try and work out how far you can realistically ride in 3 hours. Getting all the checkpoints usually involves riding 30+ miles, although it varies a bit from event to event. You can do a rough tot-up of your planned route distance by counting how many of the kilometre squares on the map you are crossing.

Its quite a hilly area, so the most direct route between checkpoints won’t always be the fastest. And a direct off-road route may be slower than a less direct bit of tarmac.

Have a bail-out decision point somewhere around the 1h30 to 2hr mark, so that if you’ve made slower progress than anticipated you’ve got a plan B that ignores some of the lower-valued checkpoints but still gets you back on time with a decent score.

And above all, keep looking at the map all the way round, looking out for landmarks. It is really easy to overshoot, or get disorientated!

I’m sure there’s plenty more, there’s quite a learning curve on these things. If you aren’t feeling competitive, just treat it as a pleasant ride in the countryside with a bit of a treasure-hunt thrown in!

Good luck, see you there :)

:)

Ride them anyway. If the landowner asks you to leave, then leave.

They aren’t rights of way, so in England and Wales legality depends on the attitude of the landowner.

There’s a pic of one on Anne Dickins’ blog from last year’s Exposure 24 here.

I came across several junctions with bridleways leading out into every direction. None of which I could see on the map.

Permissive bridleways maybe? They usually don’t appear on the OS maps. Can be confusing!

Which version of GPSBabel are you using?

I’ve got v0.2.22.0, and the simplify function is there. Click on the Filter button and simplify is halfway down the pop-up.

Nice to be appreciated! :) But the Trailbreak team did all the marking the day before, so I only replaced what had been sabotaged in the meantime (which happens at many events unfortunately, even on closed XC courses).

Yes a good mix of terrain types, there’s quite a complex mix across the N Downs escarpment and the Weald basin. Not much point asking what tyres for…

Enjoy the training! I had a proper day out, set off shortly before 8 with a friend, we parted at the first split point. He did the full 40k route, while I did the 50k extension, rejoined, and then took the 25k short cut. That way we got everything covered well before the first riders were back (at Shackleford it was just me and I only just got back in front!).

Then I went back out backwards along the 25k to the Blackheath split point, met my girlfriend who was riding the 50k route, and rode the rest of the course with her. That meant I got to do the Shere and St Martha’s section I’d missed first time round. The post-ride chilli and cake didn’t touch the sides! Add on 5 miles each way riding to the venue, and it came out at 50+ miles done by 2pm.

Did the Gorrick race at Swinley the next day too, was a bit jaded for that :)

I’m not part of Trailbreak, but I did help them out as a volunteer at Shalford (and Shackleford last month) by pre-riding the course ahead of everyone else to check that all the marking was still in place. Good endurance training for me as I have to make sure I stay in front of the pack :-)

Glad you enjoyed it even though you got round quicker than expected. The predicted times on the website have to take into account the possible conditions, obviously it was unseasonably good going nearly everywhere on Saturday so ride times were fast. Could easily have been a mudbath in February!

The Trailbreak rider times have been posted here.

Yep I stood at the Coombe Lane hairpin to watch the test event, and we definitely saw a large peleton go through! Was planning to do the same on the big day.

I could see how they might have had some feedback from the riders about it, but haven’t heard of any plans to change it…

Apparently Coombe Bottom descent is too steep for the olympics and they are going over Newlands Corner instead.

servo – where did you hear about this?