Tuesday 2 April 2013

Enduro?! That's not what I normally do...


Innerleithen enduro #2 - 3rd March

Enduro is a rapidly growing, fairly new part of cycling, and having recently taken the almighty step of buying myself a “play” bike I was keen to get a shot at it.

The format is pretty much make your way to the top of the hill at whatever pace you want (as long as your inside the time limit!) then get timed on a fairly long, mostly downhill descent. Simple!

This particular round though was a “day and night” enduro meaning there was two different tracks, each raced once in the day and once at night. This was pretty cool as it added a whole new element to the racing. The tracks that we were racing on were so much fun! But having not done any downhill racing in the past I was having to learn fast and try to stick to the wheels of the more experienced riders.

My race runs went surprisingly well, probably due to the fact that I felt no pressure to do well, so was just having fun on the bike. With each run lasting around 10 minutes at full speed, it was almost impossible not to make any mistakes, but I got to the bottom feeling happy with my performance and most importantly having had so much fun! Even in the night stages where my lights weren’t very good, I was still loving it! I finished 6th in the Under-20 category which I was pleased with for my first proper enduro.

This is definitely a great form of racing as riding to the top of the hill is a good laugh as your just chatting away then the actual racing down is so exciting and fun to take part in! Pretty much the type of riding you would go out and do for fun, but you get to prove your faster on the descents that your mates! All in all a GOOD DAY!

Some photos of me from the race can be found HERE

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