Thursday, August 14, 2014

Empire Cycles Enduro Round 2: The need for speed

Star date: 26-27 July 2014
Location: Crychan Forest, Mid Wales
Event: Empire Cycles Enduro Round 2
Weapon of choice: Rigid singlespeed on day 1, sensible bike on day 2
Greatest achievement: Stayin' alive (ah, ha, ha, ha)
Greatest weakness: Take a bow Captain Slow
Result: Mid-table

There’s something rather special that happens as you stand there on the start line, watching the previous rider sprint away into the distance and out of sight. Time slows down, the banter of the queue suddenly fades away, the lights dim, tunnel vision descends, the thousand-yard stare rules. Welcome to The Zone. You are transformed – now you are Steve Peat, Usain Bolt, maybe Eddie the Eagle in my case. Total focus. Nothing else matters. This is what it’s all been leading up to. A three-minute high-speed balls-out blast to the bottom of the hill. The descent ahead of you is not there to be merely enjoyed, or survived, but a sacrificial lamb waiting to be slaughtered. You are a riding god, you are the best, the daddy, you are going to fly down that track at warp speed. Nothing and nobody can stop you. This is your World Cup, your Olympic Final, your Big Moment. No second chances. No margin for error. No possibility of error. Final check – saddle, suspension, gearing, pads, helmet. Inch closer to the line. Clip in. Deep breath. Quick prayer perhaps.

5 – 4 – 3 – 2 – 1 – Blast Off!

Welcome to enduro, baby.

Great chest-cam video of the stages courtesy of James Scott from MTB Swindon. 
It was just like this, only steeper (and, in my case, slightly slower).

The pootle-and-plummet format of nu-skool enduro is a world away from what I usually do, but I’m finding those three-minute adrenaline shots horribly addictive.

On the surface, it’s like everyday trail riding. But it isn’t at all the same. You simply don’t push yourself as hard normally. When racing against the clock, you get carried away, you lose your inhibitions and relax into it, like being drunk but without the loss of control. Those rocks and roots that might normally have given you cause for concern? You just blast straight over them. Doing it as part of an event makes you feel safer and more confident, and not just because there’s an ambulance at the foot of the hill. That’s not to say you’re necessarily riding beyond your safe limits – your limits are completely redefined. At least, that’s how it was for me.

It really is a kind of DH lite. Downhill racing on everyday bikes on red-graded rather than black-graded tracks. Tracks that pretty much anyone can get down, at least slowly. You just decide what is stupid-fast for you – and go a bit faster. I was pretty slow by most people’s standards, but bloody quick by mine. I had no idea you could ride a bike that fast and live. What a rush.

My usual discipline of XC/endurance racing – my comfort zone – is like running a marathon. There’s always an element of pacing and self-preservation, and I take a relatively passive approach to descending. Having half-killed myself getting up a hill, the way back down is a chance for a breather before heading up the next climb. So I tend to freewheel and let gravity do the work, my main input being braking. Which is all a bit negative.

Enduro racing is more like doing the 100 metres, as you go hell for leather from start to finish. Here, descending is not an exercise in controlling your speed but a constant quest to go even faster. I learned this very quickly during practice. I tried following a couple of guys down the first stage, and while I would ordinarily stop pedalling after 50 yards once I've got to a decent speed and then pretty much coast from there, they just kept on pedalling even when the track started getting quite lumpy. In fact they only stopped pedalling when up in the air (which was quite a lot of the time) and when scraping the dirt on tight turns. For these guys, fast is never fast enough.

18-year-old Peter Lloyd shows how it’s done.
Cracking photo by Carol Cobbett at CAC Photography.

My more XC-oriented approach to the same little drop.
Photo by Carol Cobbett at CAC Photography.

While enduro is to some extent a retirement home for ex-downhill racers – think Radio 2 – there are some amazing kids out there too, and in this event they ruled the roost. But even the other wrinklies were absolutely mental and supremely skilled. And fit: even on the pedalliest stage, where I would have expected my fitness to make up for my inferior bike-handling skills, I was miles slower than the best riders.

With me, there comes a point where I start to worry about the consequences of getting things wrong and ease off. Crashing never seems to cross these guys’ minds, though, they're too busy looking ahead for ways of finding more speed. While I still tend to get sidetracked by obstacles right in front of me, they just let the bike do the work and pedal a bit more.

Even (or perhaps especially) at my level/age, the whole speed, speed and yet more speed thing is incredibly exciting. Liberating, even. And, as I've said before, it's so good to be able to stop at the bottom to whoop and grin like a Cheshire cat and exchange war stories rather than head straight up the next effing climb gurning XC-style. Which has left me questioning what I want out of mountain biking. I climb like a goat but I’d rather descend like an animal!

Uh-oh, I seem to be going through another mid-life crisis. I think I want to be a downhiller!

But can you teach an old dog new tricks? I’m not a natural daredevil, bungee-jumping and sky-diving and getting fired out of cannons. And having misspent my youth studying rather than hanging down the skate park doing skids and wheelies, I lack the natural balance, flow and confidence that marks out the best riders. They’re the ones who don’t look at their hands when playing the piano, who don’t need to remember the F-sharp. Hell, they probably never learned to read music. I’m descending better all the time, but I suspect it's like learning languages – it comes so much easier when you’re a kid. I imagine I’ll always ride with that telltale foreign accent.

But who cares as long as you’re having fun (and not in hospital)?

Me looking a bit more enduro on day 2.
Photo by Carol Cobbett at CAC Photography.

Enough navel-gazing, what were the stages like? Well, fantastic, really. Exhilarating and exhausting. An unprecedented spell of good weather meant the ground was dry as a bone, with almost infinite grip and only one foot-soaking puddle in the whole event. Many of the tracks were loose rocky affairs very reminiscent of the Dyfi Enduro (without the congestion) and familiar from previous endurance events in the Crychan, but the highlights for me were the twisty, rutted, rooty sections purpose-built for the event.

I was reasonably pleased with my performance. At times I missed having the Bionicon Alva 180mm full-susser I borrowed for round 1 of the series in April (as chronicled here). This time I opted on day 1 for a ready-made excuse for slow times in the form of a fully-rigid singlespeed XC bike, which would have been immeasurably cool if somehow I’d been able to put in some fast times, but ended up making me look a bit daft to be honest, especially when I punctured on the first timed run.

On day 2 I brought my very first mountain bike out of retirement, a shagged 2005-vintage budget Trek full-susser with a whopping 100mm suspension at the back and maybe 50mm at the front. This did make quite a difference to the feel of the tracks and encouraged a more devil-may-care attitude on the rough stuff, but in the end I made so many little mistakes that my times weren’t that much faster. I also managed to puncture again on stage 3, which made for a very long run carrying a very heavy bike.

I’d like to think I’d have done better on my 29er had it not still been out of action, but ultimately I have to accept that I was the limiting factor.

It was a long way down from here – and this wasn’t even the top of the climb!

Outside the actual stages, the Empire Cycles Enduro series is a very relaxed, friendly and inclusive affair. The format is practice and two timed stages on day 1, and five timed stages on day 2. Riders were even encouraged to drive up to the forest on day 1 to save their legs. Being a hard nut, I opted to ride up anyway and try to bag a KOM, only to find the hill in question wasn’t registered as a segment (it is now!). On day 2 everyone had to do the full 40km loop, which was pretty hilly, but you could take as long as you wanted on the transitions.

The après-ride consisted of a free beer at event HQ followed by a choice of pasta dishes at the Drovers’ Rest in town and an airing of the new Steve Peat film, which included some great archive footage of downhill racing on rigid bikes in the 1990s – see, it’s not just me! Some of us watched the video out on the balcony above the river; the Midlands crew just got drunk (which didn’t seem to affect them unduly the next day); others had an early night. In the end I chose not to camp this time, but to relax and breakfast in en-suite luxury at the Drovers’ Rest for a very reasonable £30.

Waiting to ride the lumpy, loamy first stage. I must have ridden this section seven or eight times over the two days and loved it every time.

What an amazing weekend of riding it was! I loved the first round back in April, but this time was even better. The weather was better, the descents were better, the transitions were better. But more than anything, there were twice as many competitors, so I got to spend more time watching other people ride and/or failing to keep up with them. It was truly inspiring to be among so many talented riders who are just so damned fast.

A couple of minor caveats to the advertorial above: there were a few timing-related hold-ups, some of the marshals’ radios couldn’t get reception, the ambulance driver should have had a map, and the absence of a podium (however unattainable for me) made the finish something of an anticlimax. But on balance it was a well-organised event.

Once again, thanks to all the lovely people at Red Kite Events and their merry band of marshals, all the lovely people at the Drovers’ Rest for great food and accommodation, all the lovely Carol Cobbett for the photos, all my lovely family for the weekend pass, and all my lovely fellow enduroists for the company and inspiration. I had a blast.


The top 30:

First name Last name No Gender Stage 1 Finish Split Time Day 1 Stage 2 Finish Split Time Day 1 Stage 1 Finish Split Time Day 2 Stage 2 Finish Split Time Day 2 stage 3 Finish Split Time Day 2 Stage 4 Finish Split Time Day 2 Stage 5 Finish Split Time Day 2 Day 1 Time Day 1 Pos Day 2 Time Day 2 Pos Combined Time Overal Position
Heathcote Paul 29 Male 00:01:43 00:01:40 00:01:35 00:01:35 00:02:10 00:02:41 00:02:09 00:03:23 4 00:10:10 1 00:13:33 1
Goodey Nick 32 Male 00:01:40 00:01:54 00:01:36 00:01:37 00:02:08 00:02:37 00:02:16 00:03:34 8 00:10:15 2 00:13:49 2
Baldock Steven 16 Male 00:01:43 00:01:38 00:01:35 00:01:38 00:02:15 00:02:45 00:02:21 00:03:21 3 00:10:34 3 00:13:55 3
Sutton Rhys 8 Male 00:01:43 00:01:36 00:01:41 00:01:39 00:02:18 00:02:42 00:02:21 00:03:19 1 00:10:41 4 00:14:00 4
Lloyd Peter 6 Male 00:01:41 00:01:38 00:01:36 00:01:39 00:02:16 00:02:46 00:02:42 00:03:19 2 00:11:00 7 00:14:19 5
Love Matt 22 Male 00:01:50 00:01:49 00:01:42 00:01:47 00:02:16 00:02:38 00:02:31 00:03:39 10 00:10:53 6 00:14:32 6
Bolton Joe 26 Male 00:01:43 00:01:41 00:01:40 00:02:08 00:02:16 00:02:42 00:02:26 00:03:24 5 00:11:11 10 00:14:35 7
Kay Christopher 37 Male 00:01:50 00:01:46 00:01:51 00:01:51 00:02:18 00:02:40 00:02:29 00:03:36 9 00:11:08 9 00:14:44 8
Phil Allum 42 Male 00:02:02 00:01:50 00:01:45 00:01:48 00:02:22 00:02:44 00:02:22 00:03:52 18 00:11:01 8 00:14:53 9
Allen Gary 28 Male 00:01:56 00:01:48 00:01:48 00:01:54 00:02:21 00:02:51 00:02:27 00:03:44 16 00:11:21 13 00:15:05 10
James Scott 43 Male 00:01:54 00:02:00 00:01:47 00:01:53 00:02:19 00:02:49 00:02:24 00:03:54 19 00:11:12 11 00:15:06 11
Aucock Ste 7 Male 00:01:57 00:01:51 00:01:56 00:01:52 00:02:22 00:02:47 00:02:31 00:03:48 17 00:11:28 15 00:15:16 12
Heathcote Jamie 31 Male 00:01:47 00:01:54 00:01:49 00:01:47 00:02:38 00:02:51 00:02:37 00:03:41 12 00:11:42 16 00:15:23 13
Walker Sean 18 Male 00:01:59 00:01:43 00:01:41 00:01:41 00:02:18 00:03:47 00:02:18 00:03:42 13 00:11:45 17 00:15:27 14
Salmon TOM 11 Male 00:01:56 00:01:35 00:01:49 00:01:49 00:03:10 00:02:54 00:02:33 00:03:31 7 00:12:15 18 00:15:46 15
Eve Bradley 35 Male 00:02:05 00:02:02 00:01:52 00:02:01 00:02:44 00:03:03 00:02:56 00:04:07 23 00:12:37 19 00:16:44 16
Richards Eif 38 Male 00:02:04 00:01:59 00:02:02 00:02:04 00:02:53 00:03:04 00:02:45 00:04:03 22 00:12:49 20 00:16:52 17
Taylor Conrad 10 Male 00:02:21 00:01:23 00:02:15 00:02:07 00:02:49 00:03:10 00:02:53 00:03:44 15 00:13:14 24 00:16:58 18
Woods Mike 27 Male 00:02:06 00:02:03 00:01:56 00:02:10 00:02:41 00:03:15 00:02:57 00:04:09 25 00:13:00 22 00:17:09 19
Hawkins Will 17 Male 00:02:10 00:02:11 00:02:01 00:02:07 00:02:41 00:02:58 00:03:16 00:04:21 28 00:13:03 23 00:17:24 20
Houldsworth Ben 33 Male 00:02:15 00:02:00 00:02:09 00:02:09 00:03:00 00:03:19 00:03:08 00:04:15 26 00:13:45 25 00:18:00 21
Hill Rob W 14 Male 00:02:07 00:02:01 00:02:06 00:02:10 00:02:50 00:04:09 00:02:49 00:04:08 24 00:14:04 29 00:18:12 22
Mutlow Tom 15 Male 00:02:14 00:02:17 00:02:14 00:02:13 00:02:54 00:03:22 00:03:14 00:04:31 30 00:13:56 27 00:18:27 23
Schroder Chris 4 Male 00:02:20 00:02:14 00:02:11 00:02:07 00:03:37 00:03:05 00:02:54 00:04:34 32 00:13:54 26 00:18:28 24
Lee Gary 40 Male 00:02:11 00:02:12 00:02:09 00:02:26 00:02:57 00:03:17 00:03:23 00:04:23 29 00:14:11 30 00:18:34 25
Stockton Ashley 36 Male 00:02:07 00:01:54 00:01:50 00:02:20 00:05:22 00:03:08 00:02:41 00:04:01 20 00:15:20 33 00:19:21 26
Seymour Nathan 9 Male 00:03:40 00:02:20 00:02:30 00:02:19 00:02:58 00:03:16 00:02:56 00:06:00 35 00:13:59 28 00:19:59 27
Crametz Jerome 39 Male 00:02:37 00:02:29 00:02:39 00:02:28 00:03:02 00:03:20 00:04:11 00:05:06 33 00:15:39 36 00:20:45 28
Jenkins Tomas 19 Male 00:02:44 00:02:37 00:02:28 00:02:08 00:03:13 00:03:29 00:04:14 00:05:21 34 00:15:32 35 00:20:53 29
John Calvert 44 Male 00:02:21 00:01:55 00:02:32 00:02:28 00:03:55 00:04:00 00:04:00 00:04:16 27 00:16:55 38 00:21:11 30
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Friday, June 20, 2014

Red Kite Devil's Challenge 130km: It's wonderful out there

Star date: 8 June 2014
Location: Cambrian Mountains
Event: Red Kite Devil's Challenge 130km
Weapon of choice: Victim of diabolical warranty service
Weapon of necessity: Rigid 26" singlespeed
Greatest strength: Climbing and descending well
Greatest weakness: Quiche?
Result: First back FWIW

The idea was to do something a bit mental, a bit extreme. A stress-busting factory reset to counter the pressures of work and my offspring's occasional lapses in realising their angelic potential. So why not ride further than you've ever ridden before, in a very hilly place, at race pace, in bad weather, without gears or suspension?

It didn't turn out quite like that.

With even mountain biking now having to bow to health & safety extremism, typically overblown weather warnings (Britain to be blitzed by worst hailstorms since 1843, warned the Daily Bollox) led to the route being cut to a trifling 70 miles and four Snowdons of climbing.

Clashes with other events also meant a very disappointing turnout, so I had nobody at my level to race against, and in the end it was sunny all day, dammit.

The only part of the original plan not to fall through was riding what most would consider an inappropriate bike. Discuss.

I manage to out-camp Drovers’ Rest owner and feed station supply supremo Peter James OBE.
Photo: Carol Corbett at CAC Photography.

With the pressure off and the sun out, I ended up taking it (relatively) easy and discovering a whole new facet of mountain biking. Without the usual head-down-arse-up sweat-in-the-eyes lactic-in-the-legs verge-of-collapse joys of a race, the high-octane heart-in-mouth non-stop thrills-and-spills rollercoaster of the trail centre, or even the nagging where-the-****-am-I the-weather's-closing-in semi-panic of a solo upland exploration, the whole thing was altogether more laid back, with the emphasis on just enjoying being out there. Right out in the middle of nowhere.

Now even in pootle mode I'm not really your stop-to-take-a-photo kinda guy, so you'll have to use your imagination or Google your own pics. But what a stunningly beautiful place Wales can be! Epic may be an overused word these days, but it's the one that keeps springing to mind. Thing is, I live here, I see this landscape every day, and it still took my breath away at times. I can't imagine what city-dwellers must make of it. But I can see why so many travel so far to ride here.

Same place, different event, for an idea of the sheer epicness of the ride. That's me in my enduro clobber by the way, taking a full-bouncer from the lovely people at Bionicon on a recce run at the first round of the Red Kite Events/Empire Cycles Enduro (see my report here). Next round is on 26/27 July. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Photo: Carol Corbett at CAC Photography.

It was like stepping into a tourist information film, with the course managing to cram in pretty much everything mid-Wales has to offer:
  • Britain's smallest town? Check.
  • Magnificent views throughout? Check.
  • Moorland wilderness? Check.
  • Burbling brooks and rocky rivers? Check.
  • Aryan ranks of telegraph pole monoculture? Check.
  • Proper bluebell-infested broadleaf woodland? Check.
  • Post-apocalyptic clearfell? Check.
  • Crystal-clear reservoir? Check.
  • Empty roads? Check.
  • Languidly soaring red kites? Check.
  • Lots of sheep? Duh!
All interspersed, of course, with some thrilling descents. It's hard to pick favourites, but those that stand out in my mind were an exhilarating and scary-in-places Dyfi-style bedrock cracker in the Irfon Forest, the always-entertaining rough 'n' ready black descent at Coed Trallwm, a superquick dry grassy moorland blast dodging woolly bullets above Llyn Brianne, and a PB on the familiar rooty (but not so muddy for once) multiple lines dropping down onto the road in the Crychan Forest.

But these had to be earned. Boy, did they have to be earned. There was an awful lot of climbing. With descents in this part of the world tending to be steepish plummets rather than sinuous singletrack, I guess it's the price you have to pay. Rarely have I been so grateful for long flattish linking sections where you could just about catch your breath.

Start of the big fireroad climb over to Llyn Brianne reservoir.
Photo: Carol Corbett at CAC Photography.

Fortunately most of the climbs offered plenty to occupy your mind (mud, ruts, rocks, steps, views, often all at the same time). In the middle, though, were two monster fireroad slogs out of Abergwesyn that were a real test of character. The second had so many false summits that I came very close to quitting and settling for the short route! The first was probably just as hard, but followed a lengthy pit stop and was broken up nicely by snapper Carol Corbett from CAC Photography a little way up and then, near the top, a serious Springwatch moment as I rounded a corner to find four tiny fox cubs playing on the track in the sun. Even younger and less foxy than in the photo below, they were half puppy half teddy, and my daughter would've wanted to take them home and keep them (probably with the teenage hens she found in the woods a fortnight ago). Having been a part-time Good Life wannabe until the cycling bug bit me, I've lost a fair few chickens and ducks to Mr Fox over the years, so I'm not his biggest fan, but I have to say those babies were just sooo cute...

If anything, mine were even cuter.
Cracking photo by John Morris.

And it was still cooing like a teenage girl that I then contrived to take my only wrong turning of the day. I blame the organiser. I mean, fancy attaching a straight-on arrow to a big tree?! Did he not consider that it might subsequently get blown over so the arrow ended up pointing right?! Seriously, though, the waymarking was very good. It must be hard work marking out a 70 mile offroad course - but not as hard as riding it...

Luckily the second half of the course was easier than the first. Once you get up there, the Crychan Forest is a case of less pain, more gain. The climbs are shorter yet the descents feel longer, and the whole experience is a little more playful, ideal for those with a short attention span - or tired legs. The loop was largely a dry run of the somewhat moister Little Devil event back in April (see my report here), only with the killer hill moved from the beginning to the end and leading onto a great last singletrack descent down into the remotest of valleys for a lingering final taste of the wilds just a mile or so from town.

All in all, it was the usual well-organised, laid-back, no-frills, grass-roots affair we've come to expect from Red Kite Events. A cracking course in a wonderful part of the world.

Freshly refuelled on quiche and boiled potatoes washed down with a selection of great cakes. (It was lunchtime, I was hungry.)
Photo: Carol Corbett at CAC Photography.

And how did I fare on the inappropriate bike? Well, with no suspension I had to go a little more gently on some descents to avoid the road-drill effect, and with no gears I probably hurt a little more on the very steepest climbs, but it weighs 10lb less than your average loadsagears full-suspension trail bike (and after training on it so do I!) so the rest of the ride will have been a great deal easier. There's no doubt in my mind which one I'd rather take up (and down) four Snowdons. #righttoolforthejob

Update: You can ride a similar monster MTB loop on 9 August as part of a whole weekend of mountain biking shenanigans in Llanwrtyd Wells under the umbrella of the World Alternative Games, also home to bog snorkelling and other assorted nuttiness.


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Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Dyfi Enduro: I must be the luckiest man alive

Star date: 4 May 2014
Location: Deepest daftest Wales
Event: Dyfi Enduro
Weapon of choice: Carbon 29er with way too many gears
Greatest achievement: Timely deployment of airbags
Greatest weakness: For once, excessive speed
Result: 20th

Warning: 
I haven't exercised much editorial control on this one,
so do feel free just to look at the pictures.

Last year my race effectively ended 20 feet into the first rocky descent. This year it effectively ended about 200 yards later. Oops.

Last year the cause was as mundane as a flat tyre. This year it was a pretty spectacular crash from which I was very lucky to limp away.

Last year I went on to cruise round with the weekend warriors. This year I was still among the fast boys and the whole thing was brutal.

Both years it was absolutely fantastic.

And my wife says I never look like I'm trying...
Great photo by St Peter Jones, co-organiser of the always enjoyable Dyfi Winter Warm Up (which uses some of the same trails, generally in a slightly moister setting - see my reports on 2014 and 2013) and roving marshal extraordinaire, who also found time not only to take hundreds of photos of the event but also to look after me following my crash and, half an hour later, catch me on the quadbike to check I was OK. And men can't multitask?

Learning from last year's mistakes (see here if you're really keen), I not only doubled up on tubes and tools (hoping Sod's law would mean I wouldn't need them - and I didn't) but also got to the start really early - like 40 minutes early - to make sure I didn't get stuck at the back again. Like at concerts where there are always these man-mountains with f***-off tattoos and disproportionately hot girlfriends who push through to the front just before the band come on, I did end up a couple of rows back once the pros arrived, but still in a good position.

The ride out to the forest behind the pace car was four miles of hell - constant testosterone-fuelled jockeying for position as 1,000 riders all tried to push through and get to the front for when we hit the forest. Like on a busy motorway, you leave a safe gap to the person in front and someone will pull into it. And if you don't leave a gap it just takes one clash of knobbly tyres when somebody misses a gear to send the whole set of dominos toppling over. Not my idea of fun at all - I much prefer mountain biking as a non-contact sport, it's hard enough coping with the terrain!

For once I didn't enjoy the first long fireroad climb either (although the bewigged shenanigans near the top helped). Sometimes climbing comes easy and sometimes it doesn't. This time it hurt. But I hit the top in around about 10th place and had loads of space for the first descent, which was fast, fun, dry and relatively easy, and I managed to hammer down it without mishap (see photo above).

This was followed by another big climb onto open moorland. It's lovely out there, all fantastic views and little bedrock ups and downs. The pain of the ascent forgotten, I was feeling good now as we headed back down again, my confidence boosted by my first stab at a gravity-style enduro event at round 1 of the Empire Cycles Enduro the previous weekend (report here). So it was that I launched myself down the descent with a sense of invincibility and a determination not to lose Gareth Jones ahead of me.

This first rocky downhill section of the day is one that will forever command my respect. It's not overly steep or uneven to start with, but last year it ripped my tyre in seconds. Putting this to the back of my mind I opted to test the theory of the faster, the better. The idea being that by the time a sharp bit of slate thinks about slicing through your tyre, you're long gone. And in that respect, speed was indeed my friend. No punctures this year!

Trouble is, my XC bike is not a slack-angled 180 mm full-susser like I borrowed for the gravity event. You tear over rocks at speed and it doesn't stay glued to the ground but skips around like a frisky lamb. As the track grew rougher, it became very clear that I was going too fast. With my new-found DH confidence, though, I managed to stay (relatively) relaxed, riding out a couple of nasty dips and regaining control. Result.

Only then it gets steeper. And I'm still going too fast. Apply brakes. Nothing. I'm not spending enough time on the ground for them to work. Instead I start to accelerate under the pull of gravity. Help, what do I do now? I remember telling myself out loud to drop my heels, get my weight back, drive the bike into the ground. Only the ground is now all flat, loose stones. The bike just skids over most of them, and when the tyres do bite they simply send the top layer of stones skittering over those below.

By now I'm officially bricking it. I'm out of control. I can't slow down. It's getting very bumpy. But wait, there's a corner coming up, maybe I can use the bank to scrub off speed. Yeah, if I was Gee Atherton. But even as I grab at this hint of an impression of a straw, I suddenly realise with horror that I'm never going to make it that far. I'm closing on Gareth Jones at an alarming rate and will almost certainly smack into the back of him first.

I hear this primal scream: SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!! (It never gets as far as the T.) It appears to be coming from my mouth. Part warning cry, part plea for divine intervention. I'm long past the relaxed stage now, I'm tense as piano wire, my body position all wrong, and the bike has turned into a bucking broncho. The front wheel slams into a dip, I fly forward over the bars.

At which point things often go into slow motion. And on this occasion it would probably have been in order for my whole life to flash before me. Only there isn't time. I just go BANG!

But here's the cool bit. My feet are still clipped into the pedals and pull the bike over the top of me as I somersault forward, before releasing the bike and launching it like a Scud missile - straight into the back of Gareth. A bit like this:


Top skills all round! Not only a breathtakingly audacious attempt to take out one of your main rivals for the crown of "Second Fastest XC Racer in Ceredigion behind Gareth Payne", but the perfect soft landing for all that shiny XTR bling on your newish bike. Talk about a double whammy. It's a tragedy nobody managed to capture my effort on film for posterity.

Meanwhile I'm lying in the foetal position right across the trail feeling somewhat discombobulated. A marshal scuttles over and shouts "Don't move!" I have an idea where he's coming from - you go over the bars at over 20 mph on a rocky descent and a spinal injury is a distinct possibility - but oxymoronically I don't feel paralysed. I'm more concerned about lying in the path of 1,000 onrushing riders, and rather than put their bunnyhopping skills to the test I crawl off the line for a little sit down.

Time to count how many fingers, have a nice sweet cup of tea, that kind of thing. I'm a little dazed to be sure, my back feels grated, but... basically I'm OK. So after a minute or two I untwist the bars, hop back on the bike and carry on. Gingerly.

The post-event shirt-off post-mortem reveals (other than what looks suspiciously like a bullet hole) that I managed to land on nature's airbags, the only soft bit on the body that won't snap in a high-speed rocky impact (yes, my arse), before skidding along a bit, roughing up my back and shoulder, and generally having a very lucky escape.

The only downside of landing on my backside was an element of numbness/malfunction in the right leg. Fellow XC racer Alan Colville had a run-in with a lorry a few years ago which resulted in him losing part of one buttock - he blogs as the half-arsed racer (you gotta love it!) - and he had to relearn pedalling a bike. I may now have a vague inkling of what he went through. For the rest of the race I felt like I had wonky wheels on the right-hand pedal stroke. This may also explain why I was battling with cramp from about half-way through. And I hate cramp. Well, everyone hates cramp. But I wouldn't normally have problems so early on. This in turn meant that I couldn't stand up on the climbs like I usually do, so I had to sit down, robbing me of any real power.

So, let's take stock. Overcrowded road section, painful climb, big crash, cramp. You're probably wondering how I managed to enjoy myself. Well, this is the Dyfi, the stuff of legend, must-do bucket-list event famed for its relaxed vibe and zany entertainment (including on this occasion a brass band deep in the forest and all manner of random camp nuttiness elsewhere). It's far from perfect, though. For a start, there are way too many riders - and this year the organisers let in an extra couple of hundred due to a computer error, when really they should have been looking at congestion charging. Let's do the math(s): even at get-outta-my-space 10-second intervals you're looking at three hours to get 1,000 riders down the first descent. So unless you have the fitness to get a wriggle on up that first big hill, the early descents are going to be all Alton Towers - endless queuing for just a couple of minutes of regimented fun liable to be spoilt by the other sardines crammed in all around you. Surely an event like this should be akin to cruising down an empty Route 66 in an open-top Mustang, not taking your Yank-tank for a lap of the M25 in rush hour. And don't get me started on the fireroad climbs - fireroad climb after fireroad climb after fireroad climb, it's the ultimate fireroad hillfest.

And yet... And yet...

Well, it's all about the descents, innit?

Oh, the descents. O... M... G...

There's rocky and there's puddly and there's flowy and there's scary. Proper nowt-taken-out descents, techy or fast or both. No prisoners taken. I've always had a thing for Goshawk, a fun technical climb leading into a swoopy rollercoaster descent that goes on forever - and then some. And of course there's the steep and exposed rough bedrock ridge of the infamous World Cup, not to mention the smoother slipperier rock of Caban Coch just before it. And my new favourite: a short, easy section that doesn't even have a name but where you clatter over these big flat rounded stones that make this amazing racket, clinking and clunking away like a million broken dinnerplates (Greek Alley anyone?). Pure magic.


The good, the bad and the ugly - carnage on the Caban Coch descent. I made a hash of this bit myself, although I didn't fall off and luckily there was nobody there to see it. 
Great video courtesy of Shem Llewellyn.

Right, time for bed, said Zebedee. Anyone making it this far will probably assume that the title of this piece refers to the crash. To some extent it does, but actually it's stumbling into mountain biking and getting to ride the Dyfi (rather than spending the day down B&Q or watching telly) that makes me the luckiest man alive. And long may it continue!


And for the record:

Gareth Jones wasn't hurt and didn't come off his bike despite my best efforts. In fact he didn't even stop - until struck by a couple of punctures later on which enabled me to pip him to the post - ha! However, the title of "Second Fastest XC Racer in Ceredigion behind Gareth Payne" went to Dylan Stephens on this occasion. Amazingly the three of us finished within one minute of each other in 19th, 20th and 21st places. We could see Dylan up ahead on the final painful, interminable climb that was the surprise sting in the tail after the free bar, but just couldn't close the gap. Gareth Payne finished seven minutes ahead in 10th. The winning time is astonishing, even for a pro.

I missed a sign half a mile from the end (I blame the concussion) and went shooting down the Builth descent rather than a new muddy descent through the trees, thus cutting out a couple of minutes and officially finishing 14th. Oops. I was 20th really. Either way I'm pretty pleased with that, especially in the circumstances. But ultimately I don't care about the result. It was all about the journey, man.


1 Dan Evans 2hr 35min 52sec
2 Neal Crampton 2hr 40min 29sec
3 Sean Grosvenor 2hr 45min 5sec
4 Phil Holwell 2hr 45min 50sec
5 Nic Smith 2hr 46min 29sec
6 Tom Ward 2hr 50min 38sec
7 Scot Easter 2hr 51min 6sec
8 Jon Roberts 2hr 51min 53sec
9 James Thompson 2hr 52min 25sec
10 Gareth Payne 2hr 53min 39sec
11 Mark  Fidller 2hr 54min 57sec
12 Chris Metcalfe 2hr 56min 5sec
13 Ian Palmer 2hr 59min 5sec
14 Chris Schroder 2hr 59min 12sec
15 James  Green 2hr 59min 21sec
16 Dafydd Roberts 2hr 59min 46sec
17 John Buchan 3hr 0min 19sec
18 Huw Thomas 3hr 0min 39sec
19 Russell Hall 3hr 0min 59sec
20 Dylan Stephens 3hr 1min 16sec
21 Gareth Jones 3hr 2min 16sec
22 Daniel Godwin 3hr 3min 16sec
23 robert jones 3hr 3min 45sec
24 Aled Roberts 3hr 4min 5sec
25 Matthew Jones 3hr 5min 53sec
26 Rich Holmes 3hr 8min 39sec
27 Matt Mountford 3hr 9min 0sec
28 rashad sadat 3hr 9min 5sec
29 Ben Gadley 3hr 9min 36sec
30 Mike Harper 3hr 11min 35sec

Strava:

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