The best caption can have extra sweets on Tuesday or Thursday.

Carl is the judge – not me.

http://www.thebicycleacademy.org/2012/04/20/exposure-24-a-race-report/

Update – Rich ran in 3 hours 44 minutes – fantastic!

Well it’s now less than 7 days until Marathon day and I’m hoping my training will pay off.

I hung up my Five Tens in exchange for a pair of running shoes at the end of November and started my training schedule for the Brighton Marathon.

Its my first attempt at a Marathon and with very little running experience it has been an eye opener. I started running gently through November, a few miles here and there and also joined a run club meeting twice a week for an hour. On boxing day I attempted my first ‘long’ run this was a 6 mile loop starting and finishing at my parents house in Melton Mowbray where I was spending Christmas. It didn’t go well at all and due to a horrible pain in my left knee I ended up walking the last mile and a half! I gave it a rest for a week and then started again, putting it down to “to much too soon”.

Through January and with proper instruction from the run club I started to be able to manage more miles and at the end of Jan I did my first successful ‘long’ run of 10 miles. This was from my house in hove to the marina and back, and I have to say I loved it and felt a real sense of achievement that I have not had for a long time. With my new found running confidence I entered the Brighton Half Marathon. I felt I should do it as a training aid for the full Marathon and also to get some experience of a race situation. Two weeks before the Half I decided to run the distance in practice, 13.1 Miles, which took me from my house to Shoreham and back, and it actually went quite well, although my knee pain, which I now know to be tendonitis, was continuing to cause me grief. Having ran the distance already I was confident on race day and luckily the weather was great. Overall it was a great experience although I started too close to the front of the field and as a result spent the first 5 miles being overtaken! This was off putting, demotivating and made it hard for me to pace myself. On the plus side it may of helped me to run faster as I finished in a respectable 1 Hour 40 mins, not bad when I think back to boxing day!

From then until now it has been a steady increase of mileage week by week, mixed with the odd bit of time off due to injuries, mainly the tendonitis, shin splints and a weird pain in my toes which comes and goes, probably my body just saying “what the hell are you doing to me!!”

I had been advised that prior to the Marathon you should never actually run the full 26 Miles in training and really the most should be 21, sticking to this advise I did my longest training run on the 18th of march in Stanmer Park of all places. It was and organised training run using a 5.2 Mile loop off road around the park. To me it felt like I was being tortured, not the running, but the fact that I was doing it in my mountain bike playground, surrounded by you lot on the trails, some of you may have seen us running around in our yellow bibs! yes that was me.

The weather that day was perfect and I managed 4 laps of the course in just over three hours which I was pleased with especially as each lap included the rocky climb from the tea rooms!

So with 5 Months of training under my belt, Im half a stone heavier and supposedly the fittest I have ever been, although my legs now hurt even when walking around the house!

Apart from my own sense of achievement, the reason for entering the Brighton Marathon was to raise money for a great local charity, Rockinghorse.

My older brother, Edward, was born severely disabled and as a family over the years we have benefited first hand from the amazing help and support of such charities. Rockinghorse in particular support local respite homes that give families a much needed break from caring for disabled children, this was a massive help to my parents when I was growing up that gave us rare opportunities to do normal family things that others may take for granted.

For more info about Rockinghorse visit: http://www.rockinghorse.org.uk/

If you would like to sponsor me you can do so at:

http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/richjustfeltlikerunning

Any donation you can make, no matter how small, will be much appreciated. Thank you

If you are around next Sunday and fancy giving me a cheer you can follow me using the brighton Marathon App, available on ipnones only. Enter my number (4718) to find me.

See you all again soon on the trails, whether all this running will have improved my cycling remains to be see!

Rich

All the photos were taken by Russ Gillespie and if you visit the site you can order the full size canvas to hang on your garage wall. Smaller photographs are also available and he has offered some small sizes for free. http://russgillespie.com/

There is an additional selection of photographs at the end of the report.

If you would like to add your own race report then email me at the usual address info@brightonmtb.org. If I have omitted any report then my apologies and re-send it please.

So this was my first Big Dog and although I hope it will be the first of many, especially if the organisers can bring that weather again. The course was brilliant, but really tough, the first half just seem to be a relentless ascent, although it was worth if for the descents. I would like to say that my ‘local knowledge’ meant that I was able to shred the singletrack but to be honest I had nothing left in the tank so it was a matter of just sending the bike in the right direction. I really did struggle on those hills! Fortunately my partner was an animal and as result we, as a pair came a respectable 31^st. Regardless of the pain and cramp it really was a great day and every one, on and off the course were really friendly and helpful, some pretty good prizes up for grabs as well. I could have sworn my name was on that green Decade Virsa, was just my size.

I don’t think I was firing on all cylinders but nonetheless I am determined to smash my time next year and now that my legs have stopped screaming it seems like there is no time like the present to start ‘training’ for next year so I am off out. However I couldn’t help but notice that most of the quick riders (overtaking me like I was standing still) were on hardtails with clipless pedals, so just before I go out I think might have a quick nose around the internet to see what I can buy to make me quicker, besides it has just started raining!!

Thanks to all involved in the organisation and anyone who cheered me on as I looked like I might self combust up the hills.
Tom Jackson (231)

What a cracking race! The weather was very kind, sunny but not crazy hot. This is the way it went for me:

I volunteered to do the out lap, and had a pretty good one. after starting fairly far back on the grid I gave it some welly up the grass climb and managed to pass lots of folk presumably saving themselves for the rest of the hill. The rest of the first lap was spent in a fair amount of pain, but I managed to go fast through the singletrack and gain some more places. Lost a few places when I managed a painful cartwheel going up that nasty singletrack uphill on the other side of the road getting my front wheel caught in the roots (witnessed by Paul Sydney Street). I recovered from my eye-watering collision with my unforgiving square top-tube enough to enjoy the rest of my lap, popping back out into the arena in 40.33, rather surprising Tad, who wasn’t ready at the changeover point.

My second lap was quicker (sub 40) with less ‘traffic’ through the singletrack, but those climbs didn’t get easier. Legs were OK until the Brighton Big Log, when I hopped it my calves cramped in a major way! I struggled up the last fireroad climb issuing expletives at my legs, which did the trick. Cramp under control I had a lovely blast down that last downhill run, passing 4 riders in the twisty singletrack before the bomb hole!

The next two laps were progressively slower (42.09, then 43.04) with those punishing climbs taking their toll on my legs, and having to slow down a bit where the the course got bumpier with braking ruts not agreeing with my rrrigid set-up. I wasn’t pushing too hard, as we had a comfortable lead but when I saw that my Tad wasn’t ready as I went through the arena on my fourth lap I headed out for another, before realising that there was no way the 2nd place team could catch us! We won the Retro Pairs by a comfortable lap and 3 minutes!
Bryan K

For me, the Big Dog has become one of the highlights of the Summer months. This was my third Big Dog and once again I teamed up with Pete (Woodsman). One thing I’ve enjoyed from previous years is getting out for some training rides with Pete and this was year was no exception. I’m still haunted by the memories of a 50 mile loop we did, where I was completely destroyed at the half way point until I discovered the recovery powers of onion bhajis at Tulley’s Farm.

Anyway, back to the race …

Pete and I have been happy with our results from the past 2 years (15^th and 10^th) and as the start approached I was feeling really nervous. I knew that Pete was faster than me through the singletrack (he is faster that most of us mere mortals) and had been pushing me hard during our training rides but I didn’t want to put in slower times than someone with 7 years on me!!!

As normal, I was down for the first lap. Pete claims this allows him a gentle warm up whilst I’m fighting the crowds in the singletrack. I suspect that it’s all down to the possibility of me having to ride the extra lap but wouldn’t ever suggest this to Pete – I’m sure this thought also gives his extra motivation during the race.

As midday approached, I was sat on the “grid” next to Paul from Sydney Street Bikes. Him and Mark C were going to be a tough pair to beat. Both are fast riders with good bike handling skills.

The first lap wasn’t too bad, I got slowed up a fair bit on the singletrack and struggled to pass too many people on the fireroads. I only saw a couple of off’s and buzzed a couple of rear tyres. The second lap also went fairly smoothly but by the third I was having to blast the singletrack to compensate for struggling on the climbs.

By the end of his third lap, Pete looked knackered and on the fourth my legs were cramping big time. We finished 12^th in the pairs, one place behind the Sydney Street team. Pete beat my times every lap and the 9^th lap was still elusive but getting closer as we finished with 31 minutes to spare. I still can’t comprehend how the first two teams managed to put 10 laps in.

It was good to see Mark B and Deadly out on the course marshalling and Russ on photographer duties I got high-fived by Mark, abused by Deadly and photographed by Russ.

The Hophead tasted great at the end and it was good to see a couple of the Tuesday night riders on the podium (well done to Paul into the Onederdog and Bryan in the Retro pairs).

The great trail conditions, atmosphere and lack of rain made it a perfect day.

I think there’s still some work to do on Pete to get him to “pair up” (or is that man up) again next year.

Brian L (234)

I only did a onederlap but I was pleased to beat 40 minutes (which was my goal) at 39.16. I couldn’t breathe for about 15 minutes, but two cups of tea and a bit of cake sorted me out. Definitely going to do a pairs team next year.

Adam Manning-Jones (529)

I was the sub in Simon’s team and not very fit. Simon ran first lap quicker than I expected in the crush but he probably did not get pushed much. I set my heart monitor limit to “less than death” and pedalled off and immediately got overtaken. Not the start I had hoped for but Badger’s was seemingly unexpected as everyone in front seemed to walk. With some complaints they made space so that I could ride up and then fluked the rise into Sting in the Tail. Local singletrack knowledge stole time on every trail but the uphills suit the young and lithe. Cheering at the top from Mark B found me an extra gear each lap and I managed to ride everything every time as I was never blocked. Enthusuastic cheering on my last lap saw the rider slowing me in front forced to move and allow me to pass. Expecting a younger rider he seemed annoyed and chased behind trying to regain the advantage all the way to a narrow gap between two trees in the last singletrack section. As we all know trees hurt. Simon rode his heart out and I tried but failed to have time for a double lap. Maybe next time.

Great lap times produced by  many riders (still available on timelaps) and some great overall results.

Chris Noble who used to ride with us when he lived in Brighton came 5th overall. He now has sponsorship and his own racing website but will be back to ride  this year. He normally manages a ride or two with us during the year which normally makes more a slightly faster paced ride than usual.

Lights will be needed and the whole section is probably around an hour at Thursday pace.For this spare tubes, multitools, first aid kits, sweets and directions and perhaps some encouraging words may be required

Quest Adventure have asked for a little help as Jimbo was meant to be doing this but his serious accident (see forum) will mean he will be out of the saddle for ages.  Hopefully  he makes a speedy recovery and is back out with us before too long.

A topic will be started on the forum for this.

Yeti, IBIS, Dekerf, Santa Cruz, Baum, Zerode

A new bike shop has sprung up in deepest Hove and has easy access to the South Downs National Park with its miles of cycle friendly bridleways and mtb routes. We had a brief chat with the owner Stephen Roache at the 2011 Big Dog and he lent a couple of the gang demo Yeti’s for the day.  Although a new shop the owner Steve brings with him over 20 years of experience in the cycle trade and a vast knowledge of both road, mountain and tri bikes (check out the brands below – he knows his onions!). Prestige Cycles have already embraced the local scene with sponsorship of the 2011 Big Dog and weekly shop rides on the mtb trails around Brighton and Hove. Over to Steve.
The Concept
 
Prestige Cycles will cater for all levels of rider, whether they want to buy a run around bike or are requiring full racing specification.  Prestige will be offering a unique top class fitting service using the impressive Serotta International Cycling Institute Machine enabling Prestige to supply custom made or stock sized frames.   The shop concept is to be the up and coming hub for cycling enthusiasts and to act as a one stop shop for cyclists across the board, promoting cycling to all.  Prestige are very pleased to announce they are working in partnership with Baum, De Kerf and Zerode; we are the sole UK importer for these brands.  The other brands we will be stocking are listed below:
 
•         Marin
•         Wilier
•         Yeti
.         Dekerf
.         Baum
.         Zerode
•         Ibis
•         Santa cruz
.         Fixie inc
.         Argon
.         Neil Pryde 
          Guru
•         Surly
       
 
Shop rides are on Wednesday evening from 6.00pm at Stanmer park (more details to follow, check our ride calendar and link on right). Shop rides are not a race but a nice steady ride for about 2-3 hours and provide opportunity for anyone to try a demo bike or riding gear free of charge - (contact Steve at Prestige Cycles first so he can bring what you want to try!)  As well as free demo rides we also offer free loan out lights for the evening; we have some great offers on at the moment for Exposure lights:
 
Exposure Joystick MK4 £90.00 (special offer price)
Exposure Strada  £135.00 (special offer price)

Since this was written a couple of our YETI owners have had their bikes serviced by Steve and have given glowing recommendations. Following a demo ride one of the gang has also purchased a YETI ASR5, personal service and lack of pressure selling were the reasons he gave for spending the money locally.

Congratulations to John F who does not really deserve them but his wife does.

Mother and baby, Florence Beatrice, are doing fine.

BBQ rain dance!

Thanks to everyone who came to the BBQ and donated money and time, especially Matt and Alec who provided the food.

£80-00 was raised on the day and this will be donated to the Mary How Trust in Pulborough. If anyone would like to make a donation to this charity you can do so by following this link.

Total consumption; 12 burgers, 30 sausages, 6 chinese pork steaks, 6 marinated pork ribs, 4 minted lamb steaks, 2 bags of fresh prawns, 7 mackerel fillets, 20 rolls and 5 french sticks, 24 cans of beer and 2 bottles of soft drinks.

Initially we spent some time around Scotland and punished ourselves by walking to the summit of Ben Nevis on Saturday. 2h:07m is certainly not the best time in the world, but I overtook most of the people going up and managed to do it without one single stop – it is shame I can’t pedal up hills with the same enthusiasm. Then we celebrated our existence with a couple of litres of vodka, gin, vine and others….

Sunday – the big day!

Arriving at World Cup village at around 11am, we started cruising around the exhibition stands.
One thing that has caught my eye – an all mountain bike frame machined out of single block of alloy – no welds! (see picture A). The complete bike is around 14kg and the price of the frame is around £2500. The guy told me that it takes 25 hours of machining to make the main part of the frame – what a job!

This year I decided to do it opposite way – walk up the hill and take the gondola down for the descent (saving painful knees from the day before). Good idea it was – no queueing for gondola at the bottom and no sliding down on extremely messy and muddy paths around the course.

Immediately after the race started I realized that racing times were longer (+15secs) than the last year and I wondered why….
The course went through few changes just before the World Cup and those changes made it quite brutal. Seeing the course last year and being riding for the whole year, I was under impression I might be able to do it, but…

NO mate! NO way!

There are a few additions at the second half of the course like a 2m high ramp going over a fire road with 45 degree steep landing immediately followed by two crazy berms (all on gravel surface, pict.B) and a few other drops going straight into steep, very rooty and rocky sections (pict. C) This helped to change my opinion very quickly – no Fort William course for Martin this year!

The top section of the course is where real rock garden is and that’s where bikes strength comes to the test (pict. D, E)! The sounds coming out of these racing machines when riders flew through there were quite – hmm..scary I would say..
There were some light crashes this year – 3 or 4 in exactly the same place, but nothing serious – all riders always picked themselves up and finish the run.

At the top we saw a few of the top riders warming up and preparing for the final. The view from gondola cabin on the way down gave us once again a good overview of the whole course and after 10 minutes we joined a massive crowd at the village just in time to see the ten best riders bombing down (on the big screen too).

Fantastic atmosphere! Lots of noise and some really nice girls and yeah – Greg Minnaar nailed it! Flying through the course like a mad dragon he took 1st. place.

To sum it all up, it was one of the best events this year me and my friends attended and we will be definitely going back next year.

When I got back home and still full of enthusiasm from the event I jumped on my blue Orange yesterday afternoon and didn’t realize that I am just me (old, heavy and slow Martin). Jumped, flew, crashed! Got hit to the bottom three ribs and stomach. Couldn’t breath all night…hopefully will see you in couple of weeks folks!

Martin(CZ)

Innerleithen trail hill

A couple of days after our return from Scotland and reflection reflection on the trip and trails. To summarise; not all trail centres offer the same riding experience, pick one that suits you and a great time can be had, on the other hand one that doesn’t tick your boxes isn’t really going to enthuse you or your riding.

The weather during our trip was hot – mid 20 degC – with absolutely no wind and the trails were bone dry, lovely.

Innerleithen

From the centre of Innerleithen the trails could be seen snaking down the hillside above the town. We asked at the two bike shops in town for hints to the riding and came away with a plan – ride the red trail and take in some of the black options that loop off it.

The climb to the top of Minch Moor where descent starts was tough and we were all de-layering after 20 metres. The technical climbing sections were tough and mainly consisted of rocks large and small fixed across the trail, one of these wasn’t too difficult however they came in series of 6 or 7 placed very close together which greatly increased the difficulty. There were also a few sections of fun on the way up including a gravel quarry play area with a number of steep drops and bridge jump into a steep descent.

Minch Moor was a desolate hill-top with a triangle of stones built by folks adding their own rocks, this heap of stones was the only shelter and was the obvious gathering place of groups riding up the climb. After regrouping and refuelling it was time for the descent which for me was the highlight of the whole trip. Difficult to describe but it was a ribbon of singletrack about 30cm wide with small berms and rock drops. The first rock drops were just a couple of inches high and the bike skimmed off them without any drama; however as the trail progressed the drops became increasingly bigger until the final ones were a couple of feet high landing into a downward sloping

Pete on Caddon Bank

berm. We rode this trail twice and with familiarity came increased confidence, smoothness and speed, (although I got a flat trying to jump across two water barrier channels which on hindsight was never going to happen!). From here it was into a very narrow twisty singletrack, second time around I was going so fast trying to catch Pete that much to Rich’s’ amusement I lost the trail and ended up blatting across rocks and boulders before hitting the exit gate.

Caddon Bank was next up. It started well with a warning to check everything before riding and instructions to use the easy lines on the left. The descent started with a series of drops offs all of which had an easy option to the left. The first couple were fine and we all despatched them with ease; however as they increased in size we walked down the trail to check them out rather than just ‘going for it’. After the drops the trail had a switchback and was straight into a series of big roller coasters with steep roll-ins and lovely roll-outs that seemed to go on forever, we were whooping along and laughing out loud. A steep rock face was a little scary but we were in the zone and just rolled it without a care or incident (more than can be said for others we saw!).

Rich’s seat post bent on a descent which gave Pete the opportunity to demonstrate his famed trail-side repairs. After twisting it for a while a small log was brought into play soon followed by hitting it with rock, Pete was full of pride as his rock hammer did the trick, the seat post was completely broken.

All in all Innerleithen Red was fantastic.

Glentress

Rich on Spooky Wood

We rode along a river bank to Glentress and after a coffee started on the climb of the red and blue trails. The first part of the climb was via gentle switchbacks and we gained height without too much effort. Rich was dancing up effortlessly and waited for the rest of us every couple of hundred metres. The climb had some added interest with cut trees set in the ground to ride along. After the singletrack climb we popped out onto a fireroad and again headed up. A rest and pretzel break under the trees was followed by the first descent on blue graded singletrack – the berms were too tight and the section only lasted about 30 metres before dumping us back on the fireroad we had just climbed, again it was up. After consulting the map we opted to follow the red signs to the top and check out the famed Spooky Wood descent. Another warning on rock drops etc sparked our interest and we set off. Spooky Wood was a series of manicured berms and table tops, it was fast and good fun but was over far too quickly for me, on the other hand Rich loved it and thought it was the highlight of the whole trip. We dropped out onto the fireroad again to be faced with the same climb we had just completed twice. At this point the novelty was wearing a bit thin for me and Pete.

Another map check and we saw a long section of what was marked as downhill singletrack 50 metres ahead. We went in full of enthusiasm but within 15 metres the trail began to climb parallel to the fireroad. After 50 metres I gave up, the climb wasn’t steep but my mojo / flow / fun factor was at zero. I walked up and then down the other side and was looking the quickest way back to the cafe. The others rode a couple of downhill sections which I would usually be lapping up but in my fed-up-ness I walked down. At this point we decided that we should head for the cafe, we had been riding for about 4 hours for what seemed like a couple of short bits of singletrack. The final section of singletrack was probably the longest and most flowing of all the bits we did at Glentress, it was good fun but our fun was interupted by folks riding and pushing their bikes up the trail in an effort to escape the long climbs.

Rich rated Glentress an 8/9 out of 10 just for the Spooky Wood descent, Pete gave it 6 and I gave it 1. On the other hand I rated Innerleithen 9 out of 10 while Rich gave it 5 and Pete came in at 7.

More photos here