This year we’re planing to go over to France and do the Megavalanche, there’s already 14 of us who’ve signed up (that’s a lie, we haven’t actually entered yet, but will be doing so really soon) and hopefully some others who’ll join in along the way.
Those who’ve done it before will know it as being epic; a race that puts you through almost every emotion and spits you out felling like you’ve been chased by (french) vikings down a mountain (starting somewhere nr the sun) over the course of some sort of weird 1hr period where the world has gone through all 4 seasons. Oddly, when you do get to the bottom you want to hug/high 5 everyone in sight (even those french people) because you’ve shared the same traumatising ordeal. That said, it’s amazing and will leave you smiling and talking about it for ages afterwards.
Here’s a pic from the 2008 (or is it 2007?) race, you can see Neil in the red circle (riding his old red V10 with white Boxxers), you’ll notice that just like at this years SPAM Winter Challenge, he’s about to take a wrong right turn.
Tuesday Night Riders!
We are planning to ride for the first time in 2010 as normal at 7pm from the Horse & Groom in East Woodlands. However, more heavy snow is predicted so I will post something here before 6pm in case we have to cancel, please do check back…
The first ever Tickertape Triple Crown event at the Allotment saw great success with the legendary BB King making a return to Wiltshire’s famous grounds to provide a performance that left many people in aw. There was no soothing blues to be heard, but the fluid sound of an orange Marin being ridden by one very chirpy chappy, my good friend Ben Batt (whom I now call BB King for becoming the King of the freelap TickerTape hill).
All hail the King, prostrate at his feet for where do thy conquered challengers compare to thy Tickertape King?
Well I’ll tell you, I used “maths” to work out peoples performances at the TickerTape triple Crown in terms of a percentage of the Kings speed over the 3 taped courses. Ben Batt’s time was 166.17 seconds, my time was 174.01 seconds. 166.17 / 174.01 gives a ratio of how fast I was against Ben Batt’s time, which is 0.9549, “multiplying” this by 100 gives a percentage of how fast I was against BB King (Ben Batt, we’ve covered that…); 95.5 %.
So, for all the people who completed all three legs of the Tickertape triple crown, these are you’re ratings in the order of the “alphabet”;
Bart – 98.8%
Ben Batt – 100%
Ben Irons – 95.5%
Ben Lovell – 82%
Burd – 90.7%
Burv – 90.8%
Charles – 64.8%
Charlie. E – 85.5%
Curtis – 79.6%
Denham – 95.4%
Keith – 83.3%
Nigel – 81.9%
[rob] – 99.9%
Robin – 89.5%
The Chedgy – 85.7%
Stacey – 45.9%
Take from it what you will, perhaps try to improve on your rating for the following TickerTape events, I know I will be…
I’ve just had an e-mail from Clare from Longhorn Western Riding, the horse riding school in Longhedge that use the neighbouring woodland.
Because of the extreme weather they’re unable to use their normal routes, so have asked if they can pass through the allotment. I’ve said yes as Clare has been very helpful and accommodating in the past and it’s only fair that we return the favour. The allotment is relatively un-rideable (on bikes) right now anyhow so it’s unlikely to affect any of us but if you are there over the next few snowy days please say hi to the horse riders in the knowledge that they are there with our permission.
With a team pit that was bigger than even the Charge Team (and their media crew) the atmosphere was great, especially when Marjory started setting fire to stuff and the keg had settled.
That’s right, the Somerset Standard has awarded the Frome leg of the Tour of Britain Cycle Race the honour of being Event of the Year 2009!
WINNER
TOUR OF BRITAIN CYCLE RACE
Up to 25,000 cycling enthusiasts converged on Frome for one of the biggest events in its recent history. The town took full advantage of the moment by organising its own cycle event in Catherine Hill called the Cobble Wobble, brewed a new beer and organised a family ride.
As the organisers of the Cobble Wobble we’re very proud of this, and are looking forward to seeing if it will become an annual fixture for Frome and the BCC. Neil Cousins (reining King of the Cobbles) is especially keen to defend his title; he’s been conditioning his legs by riding up heaven’s gate on a single speed with a cow on his back. We’re hoping that he’ll lose the cow for the actual event.
To find out more about the Cobble Wobble look here
Yesterday saw the very first TickerTape Triple Crown; an epic rally style DH event with no time for ‘dilly dally’ and the incremental search for that perfect run a fond but distant memory. That’s right, one run was all you got and time wasn’t on your side either; with 5 Freelap watches, 20 riders and little more than an hour to practice and get a timed run in on each trail, lets just say the last 15 minutes of each stage was pretty frantic!
Icy trails, frosty leaves, chilling air and numb hands were welcomed by comparison to the wet weather we were all hoping to avoid. That said the conditions were like a double edged sword; the hard trails meant incredibly fast rolling speed, but icy conditions made cornering really tricky, especially on those glass roots!
The day kicked off with OneFourThree, our roller-coaster trail packed full of jumps, drops and berms. No-one had ever been timed down OneFourThree as riding it is almost always more about super tweaks, air time and style than balls out speed. With some tight course markings and teasing straight line options there was plenty who were gambling for the odd time advantage, some successfully and others, well, they just concentrated on their super tweaks.
Some late comers meant we extended the timing window for this first stage, but then some very last minute timing glitches meant that Neil Cousins didn’t get a time which was gutting as he was in with a shot of the fastest over all, there just wasn’t time to try again though – we had to move on…
Spoons next, and some big crashes too. Sulky, Robin and Stacey binned it on the same S-bend, but all managed to walk away smiling, sort of. This ‘Stace Plant’ shows just how hard and icy it was (sorry Stace), he took it like man though soldiering on to finish his run.
Many had near misses, while others looked like they were on rails; Rob lewis managed to hold the high line setting him up nicely for the tricky rock garden, something most struggle with in the dry. Ben Batt rode out one of the most impressive front wheeled crotch-to-stem grinds I’ve ever seen, all whilst cornering off camber on roots too; the man’s got beans (we just hope that they’re still intact)! Simon ‘Big Burd’ Truelove was doing what he does best when at TickerTape’s – trash talking his way into mini battles with other riders, in this case Robin Liquorice and Stacey, who had both already slammed pretty hard – Burd was on to a winner!
Now on to BBMS which saw some very tired riders, and some pretty silly crashes too, most had adopted the half practice run (down to the start of moron, the bottom section that all the trails shared) then went straight into their timed run to conserve energy and finish what had become an epic test of bike pushing fitness. Yet again Mr Batt was somehow riding like it was dry, but then overcooked it on his timed run. Charlie Evens had a similar misfortune but got straight up like a champ to finish his run in style.
Loads of spectators made it out, which was pretty awesome, adding to the atmosphere with shouts and squeals (I might hand out cowbells next time). A rouge lead-less dog caused a bit of commotion at one point but then having just seen three grown men dressed as Santa and his elves I’m not surprised. That’s right; Nige, Burv and Bart came dressed in the gear they used to record their debut dance video , seeing them come tearing down OneFourThree like some sort of freeride MTB Santa train was beautiful and troubling in equal measures.
With everyone done and all the times in, all that was left was to work out who was fastest and who’d won the Transition Revolution 32 Wheels. After some pretty embarrassing attempts at adding up all became clear: Ben Batt took the overall fastest time (by 0.14 seconds from Rob Lewis) despite his crash, winning the coveted tickerTape sticker along with the respect of everyone there. As for the wheels, well Curtis Saunders won them after it turned out that Sulky hadn’t done his required three runs due to his Tango-man hand (crash induced) leaving him incapable of holding the bars. That’s a double dose of bad luck!
Everyone had an awesome time, and despite some haggard faces and pathetic whimpers (mostly from me) we’re all looking forward to the next Triple Crown some time in the summer.
Finally a big THANK YOU to Transition bikes for hooking us up with some great prizes, and to all those who helped set up and pack away.
Now you will have noticed that this event hasn’t had quite the same fanfare build up (poster etc…) as I usually do, but this was deliberate as we don’t currently have enough freelap watches to cater for members and their mates. Tomorrow’s event is for members only.
That said, tomorrow is going to be awesome!
Neil, Garry, Will, and I made it out to prep the trails today, and they look super fast; the ground is very hard and will be tomorrow too, so don’t put spikes on as you’ll just end up crashing!
The event will start at 11:00 sharp, all trails will be pre-marked (OneFourThree, Spoons and BBMS , all running into Moron) but each will only be ridable for 70 minutes, (starting with OneFourThree) in that 70 minutes each person can practice as many times as they like, but will get just one timed run. When the 70 minutes is up the trail will be closed and we’ll move on to the next (Spoons, then BBMS) until we have all posted one timed run on each.
The rider with the fastest accumulative time will be awarded the special TickerTape sticker.
Winning the wheels will be a little different; at the beginning of the day each rider will have to guess what the fastest accumulative time will be, and write it down on their entry form, the rider whose guess is closest to the fastest time will win the wheels. Only riders who complete all three timed runs will be able to win the wheels. In the event of a draw the drawing riders will have to play scissor paper stone (best of three) until we have a winner.
No one has ever timed themselves down OneFourThree so we’ll all be just as clueless about this.
Please be ready to begin at 11:00, as once each trail is closed it won’t be possible to get a time on it.
That’s it I think, make sure you bring your full face helmet, food, drink, and plenty of beans!
For those of you who follow World DH racing, you’ll be excited to learn that Transition have just launched a World Cup DH race team! Transition have been great to us, supporting our TickerTape events with great prizes and a real interest in what we do, it’s really exciting to see them on the World Cup circuit . Full press release details are here
(..don’t know about you but I reckon Bryn Atkinson will be in my BCC FANTASY DH lineup for the 2010 season.)
