HALDON XC = 2 on the box

Two of the Ride -All team were in action at the first round of Haldon forests 2012 XC series. James Davey wins juniors, Elbry Sandland gets third in Masters. Good work boys!

RiderRunCo's Oli and Doms adventures from Rd 1 of the Fetish UK Gravity Enduro Series at Innerleithen, Scotland.

Roots, rocks, a smattering of skill and more than a fair share of pear shaped moments, all held together with a heavy dose of pure and unadulterated speed is what the RiderRunCo's team members first full-on Gravity Enduro experience consisted of!

It didn't take long for things to take an adventurous turn when disaster struck for the first time before they had even made it across the border.
Oli's gear hanger fell victim to the new B-Line trail at Coed Llandegla where the boys had stopped for a night ride to stretch their legs on the long drive from Cornwall to Innerleithen in the Scottish Borders.
A quick razz around the woods soon turned into a four hour epic with more pinch flats than patches and a mangled rear mech, meaning that when the boys eventually did set foot on Scottish soil, it certainly wasn't with fresh legs and well fettled bikes!

With just one rideable bike between them, Dom set off to check out the stages while Oli set about tracking down a replacement gear hanger, rear mech and chain guide for his Proflex.. Not an easy task when over 500 miles from home in a random carpark with no phone reception.

Dom: My first impressions of the course were how natural and technichal the trails were compared the groomed trail centre fare of the Frostbite 40 event at Brechfa during the winter. The course was of similar length but with around 2000m of climbing and five top to bottom descents it was much more demanding both physically and mentally.




Thanks to BETD for a super speedy saturday delivery, Oli's bike was ready to go with just minutes to spare before qualifying! Riding blind in true Enduro style, Oli made a wrong turn through some dubious course marking costing him dearly with a 45th place qualifier with a time of 6mins 49secs. Dom made it down in 34th with a time of 6mins 33secs.

Race Day.

A rare hot and sunny Innerleithen greeted the boys on race day morning as the boys set about preparing their bikes for the day ahead.

Dropping into stage 1 after a steady 45 minute climb, the course had clearly dried out a bit overnight, providing slightly more grip on the steep root sections and rocky jumps and steps that made up the stage. However, on a now dry and loose tight turn Dom came unstuck with a small spill costing him vital seconds.

After a bad qualifying round, Oli quickly passed 2 riders despite the 30 second starting intervals before being cut up and crashing into a third, the first of several mid run tussels for position!

Stage 1: Dom: 3mins 08secs Oli: 3mins 20secs

Getting to the start line of stage 2 meant repeating the long time to stage 1 before heading up a further section of steep switchbacks. The transition time limits were quite tight and missing your start time meant incurring time penalties. Despite the warm weather, sheltered parts of the hill had not yet dried out, leaving the smooth boulders at the beginning on stage 2 coated in a layer of slick mud.. a dab of the brakes here and its straight out the front door! After a couple of inital stalls on the tight turns of slick rock section, Dom got down without further incident and Oli managed to pass the same 3 riders without doing too much damage!

Stage 2: Dom: 5mins 53 secs Oli: 6mins 03secs

400m of climbing later, stage 3 was all about holding your line on ultra steep, rutted, off-camber turns interspersed with lung-busting pedal sections and a horrible right hander onto a flat out fire road sprint in the middle. Only a few pedal strokes in and Dom was picking himself up off the floor and attempting to straighten out his controls after going OTB on a stump and bending a pedal making it impossible to clip in properly for the rest of the race! A similar fate befell Oli as he became entanlged whilst overtaking yet another rider. Fortunately for Oli this spelt the end of the day for the the offending rider leaving Oli with a bit of breathing space for the following stages but not before costing him more precious seconds.

Stage 3: Dom: 5mins 46secs Oli: 5mins 38secs

Another tight transition and on to stage 4, this was by far the longest stage full of very tight switchbacks and enormous rock gardens making it essential but extremely difficult to carry speed from one section to the next. Unable to clip in due to crash damage from the previous stage, Dom had to fight to stay on the bike on the steepest and most technichal sections of the race so far. Oli on the other hand finally had room to get into his stride, floating over roots and rock gardens and smashing out his best time of the day!

Stage 4: Dom: 7mins 36secs Oli: 7mins 00secs

After a particularly gruelling climb back up the mountain, both riders only just made their start times and without a chance to catch thier breath, were straiht into the big jumps, flowing berms and drops that made up stage 5. Keen to finish the race on a high they put the the power down and left nothing on the hill, dropping into the finish arena and over the line with identical times!

Stage 5: Dom: 6mins 27secs Oli:6mins 27 secs

At the end of the day Oli's times amounted to 36th in Senior with 35mins 17secs Closely followed by Dom in 38th with 35mins 23secs.

Megavalanche winner Jerome Clementz took the win in Elite and World champ Tracely Mosely won the Womens.

The boys will now be working hard to improve on those times at Rd 2 Coed y Brenin, Wales.

RIDER RUN COMPANY "RIDE - ALL" team, supported by Trail Head coaching and FreestylExtreme.com .

photo blog from : XC round 2 in Cornwall

Elbry : 10th in Masters

Oli : 3rd in sport.


Dom : DNF
rider run company RIDE - ALL team, supported by Trail Head skills coaching and Freestyle Xtreme. Thanks to snapper chick for the photos.

Elbry update

Elbry may race some xc and enduro, but he is still a freerider first.