Disappointed by the news also. Had signed up to Rnd 1 and had full intention of doing the full series, just couldn’t afford to drop cash on it all up front, so was going to sign up to a race each pay day.

Was going to be a hell of a lot of travelling for me from the southwest but was up for it. Southern Enduro Series is the closest now but it’s still a lot of travelling for only a one-day race. From my perspective, a south Wales/Southwest series is needed…maybe Charlie Williams and the Cornish Trail Pixies can team up next year!

clockarockin – Member

In my opinion, the best solution would be for two or more of the smaller series to team up to offer a national series. We could just have a national body (BEMBA?) which cherry picks existing races to make up a national series. Similar to what the EWS are doing with their events.

I think this is the only way we’ll get a ‘National Series’ now. UKES and BES both failed and I don’t see how Steve Parr can resurrect UKGE and make it any more successful. As Kimbers says, it’s a saturated market now.

What Jambo said

Ha…slippery buggers!

But it is a bit unnerving when you go over one through a turn and for a split second, the steering suddenly lightens and catches as you go over it. Never had that with any other car but presume it’s down to the lack of give in the sidewalls meaning the grip breaks away more suddenly with the change in surface grip.

We’ve got run flats on our One. They give a very harsh ride and, not sure whether it’s the run flats or a Mini trait, but they slide badly on manhole covers.

That said, without realising, I a 50 mile dual carriageway round trip earlier in the year on a flat front. A normal tyre would’ve blown…though I might have realised sooner!

+1 for A Tribe Called Quest – ‘We Got It From Here…Thank You For Your Service’.

Can’t stop listening to it

The Mondraker Vantage is a huge amount of fun on the downs, I had a test ride on one recently…review on my blog.[/url]

For something a bit more ‘all day’, the Mondraker Prime R+ is a nice bike and one I’m considering for the future

It’s even better when you realise the evenings actually start getting lighter nearly a week before the solstice 🙂

Did 3745 miles last year and aimed for 4000 this year, but as of the end of today I’ll be at 3703 miles. Will be beat last year’s total, but only just!

Also, if he starts dunking on it, being attached to a backboard will help absorb some energy. Mine attached to the house did start to pull out after a while!

Not really a problem without, just that the ball will rebound off much faster – a backboard will absorb the energy a bit more.

I used learnt initially on a rim bolted to my house and it was fine.

I picked up one of the last Mk3 26ers when Cotic were selling them off. Despite being built up with some mid-range and second hand parts, I do love it – I wrote a bit about why it means something to me on my blog earlier in the year[/url].

I do however keep getting the itch to change it though – I test rode a 27.5 plus Mondraker hardtail recently which would actually be more suited to my style of riding and as I could get one quite cheap, it would be cheaper than upgrading the Soul to a spec I want.

But…it’s a Soul. And it’s such a great frame!

That proper sucks 🙁 Hope somehow you get everything back.

Do you have another bike you can ride or was that your only one?

Is that the Haldon Heroic? 3 (mtber) mates did the longest option last year. I was sort of intending on doing it but bailed out early! It was quite hard going in places I think but they enjoyed it, and think they might do it again.

I will think of doing it…and then decide against it again!

It originally mentioned summer, date TBC

Southern Enduro Series and Champs entries are live this morning.

Was intending on doing the Champs but it’s down as April now, in between BES Rnd 1 and PMBA National Champs.

3 races in 4 weekends, around Easter holidays time is not good from a family perspective, so looks like I won’t be doing that. 🙁

kimbers – Member
Its a good way to make new friends!

This.

I remember riding up behind some dude with dreads at Grizedale last year, and was like “I’m sure I recognise him from STW”…”are you Kimbers from Singletrack?!” 😆

If you do the whole series, you end up riding around and racing with roughly the same people every time, so it’s a good way to meet new riders and share your racing balls-ups with!

Still saying £75 for the full 2 day event on the BES website. Though the info on there isn’t necessarily up to date!

kimbers – Member
cool andy see you there

not sure i can commit to any others

riding cwmcarn on saturday though plus a bit of dh at another venue down the road if u fancy it

Would love to but Cwmcarn’s a fair old drive for a ride! Thanks anyway 😀

Nice one Kimbers 😀

National Champs entries have gone live…I’m in!

Anyone else?

I’ll be trying to enter myself along with 3 mates

😯

All being well…

[list][*]Full BES series[/*]
[*]PMBA National Champs[/*]
[*]Southern Enduro Champs[/*]
[*]Southwest Gravity Enduro[/*]
[/list]
Having said that, PMBA National Champs and BES Dyfi are possibly too close together time wise for me so may not do Dyfi, which would be a big shame. May squeeze in a Mini Enduro sometime too!

Of course, this is early days, and money and family commitments may have a larger say in what I can do than what I’d like to think right now!

Southern Enduro is still lots of travelling for me so much of a muchness ha!

Did a quick few calculations and Google Maps plotting earlier. Turns out the furthest Southern Enduro round is as close to me as the closest BES round, so they’re not as far away as I thought..

Dr P – know what ya mean (I’m in Cornwall!). I did have a tip a few weeks ago that there was going to be a Southwest round, but looks like that’s changed which is a shame. Southern Enduro is still lots of travelling for me so much of a muchness ha!

Nice one Kimbers, would be good to see ya at a couple.

Yeah April’s looking like a busy month. A fair bit of travelling from the SW!

Intending, at the moment, of doing BES, PMBA National Champs and Southern Champs, seeing as that’s down this way.

Cheers Weeksy.

Nothing in the south? That’s a shame oldtalent.

The southwest is well catered for with the Woodlands series and 661 Mini DH at FoD fortunately. There must be some other series around?

Lemmy died last year.
And where’s Phife Dawg in this?

I took a demo bike out at the weekend [/url] and punctured. My 650b spare tube went in and was fine for the rest of the ride.

Had mine for a week or so. I like the design, I like the sound (as far as bells go), but agree that it’s not very loud and that the strike hammer doesn’t have much oomph.

Thanks mattjg. Yeah that’s how it was looking for me. Anyway, opted for a simpler look now so grateful for any feedback from those looking 🙂

Sorry spev, no idea re 29×2.4″. Thanks for the feedback though on the layout.. maybe it’s a browser thing or something. If I go back to a simple theme, should cause less issues hopefully.

Cheers mattjg. Grateful to hear if anyone else isn’t keen on the current layout (or does like it), though I might have a play around tonight with some other templates.

The Crafty Plus must feel pretty invincible pointed down I’d imagine! Might see about trying it out at some point to see.

Thanks for the layout feedback mattjg. I only changed it last week after having a simpler one for a while. The 2 pane article layout seems easy enough to me and I felt it showed off photos better but if it’s annoying for folk then I’ll change it 🙂

It’s aluminium with a brass finish. Mine arrived this week to go on my CdF and very happy with it.

Did it for the first time this year and loved the riding on offer! Was intending on doing it again next year but looks like the date might clash with my chance to go riding abroad, and I don’t want to risk losing money by not being able to get a refund.

Speaking of, two riding mates signed up for the 2016 race but couldn’t make it due to unforeseen circumstances and have no intention of signing up again thanks to the no refund/no swap policy. Completely understand such a massive event needs to make sure costs are covered but the inflexibility of even just being able to swap names on an entry at all, does leave a sour taste. A lot can change in the 10 months between signing up to the race and actually getting there!

Cheers mboy. Good effort on your part too, was quite easy to lose time on the low line on Stage 3 if you got stuck in it!

Typical. Trails are looking mint today going by the Mini Enduro Instagram feed!

Anyway, just banged my race report up on my blog[/url]. 😀

Yep, had good fun today…nice mix of stages – although the pedalfest to start Stage 1 seemed neverending!

@orena45

“Some kind of Lycra knee sock…”

Would wearing a buff under each knee protector work?

Possibly. Would get a bit sweaty though in the summer.

chakaping – Member
Those of you having rub problems, try putting a bit of chamois cream round your knees before a ride.

No idea why that hadn’t occurred to me! I’ll try that next ride 🙂

The problem is, it’s such a personal choice that recommendations are pretty useless. Loads of people recommend Dainese Trail Skins, so I bought a pair last year and they are good for riding in…except that the left pad rubs my knee raw after an hour and a half or so of riding no matter how I position it. 😥

Not sure if there’s anything that has a sort of lycra knee sock that the pad ‘floats’ over?…maybe that’d be good for me!