Innerleithen Enduro: Just gotta wing it...
...believe me, after sprinting (well, trying to) through a ridiculously sloggy boggy mudfest, getting overly friendly with a tree and JUST managing to hold on to the handle bars to make it to the bottom of this CRAZY descent being able to wing it comes in very handy!
The Innerleithen 'XC' enduro. What. A. Weekend!! Though, I must say, I think they need to change the name to 'Xtreme' Enduro rather than XC... It was MENTAL! This 'XC' enduro consisted of 3 stages of timed sections of descents, each of which were separated by climbs back to the top to start the following stage (these were not timed thus being the beauty of enduro racing - chilled climbing).
After Saturday practice I was buzzing! Newly aquanted with an XS Pivot Mach 5.7 the vedict was: AMAZING!! If you've not seen it already check out the wee video I put together of it's first ride:
I've ridden similar crazy descents on my hardtail and had fun but, your on the limit the whole way down and it feels like at any given moment you may die! The extra travel and perfect tiny size of the Pivot eliminated this feeling and I was left hurtling down the hill knowing that the only reason I wasn't going faster was because of me and not the limitations of the bike. I was no longer on the verge of death... this, was going to make for a VERY exciting weekend!!
Sunday came and we headed up the hill. After a great nights sleep I was feeling ready to hit the descents full pelt. My dibber dibbed and I was off on stage one. This trail was natural, steep in places and slippy. It was, by far, my favourite of them all! On my hardtail I would have been on the edge of survival, loving it but on edge! Instead I was experiencing the solid ride of the pivot as we flew down the hill! By the bottom I was hungry for stage two, this was SO much fun!!
Stage two required mental preparation. Mainly for the bog. That energy sapping, strength killing, bike sinking bog. Oh my, it was hard!! I made a couple of mistakes before I hit the middle section and by then I was pooped! This high intensity, seat down sprinting business was really hard work! Then Iain Paton, who was on an XC hardtrail nipped past me making things look so easy! Where was my hardtail?? Once on to the steep section I was NOT longing for my hardtail and was LOVING the pivot as it took me flying down the hill over taking Iain again then into a tree... brilliant! Scrambling back up to grab my bike I found a suitable place to mount my bike without rolling down the hill again. However my back break was pointing to the ground which meant no slowing down for the rest of the stage. Jeez oh, winging it to the max! I was buzzing by the end of that stage to: 1. still be alive and 2. be having such a ridiculous amount of fun!!
Before stage three we foze our butts off waiting for poor Stuart who's chain had got completely stuck in his chain gard... We then had to face the HUGE climb back up to the top. The Pivot excelled in stage 3: it took ever dip, bump, jump and corner in it's stride and I was absolutely loving it!! Even though by this point my arms, legs, and whole body were pretty tired I managed to hold on!Seeing stars at the top of the sneaky climb in the middle of this stage I carfully descended until my brain and body reengaged and pushed on until my dibber was dibbed for the finally time.
By the bottom I was dead but so happy! Usually after a race I am happy if I win and not so happy if I don't. But, at this point I had no idea how I'd done and, to be fair, wasn't too fussed! I had had such an insane amount of fun that over ruled everything :D
It was an amazing weekend of riding!!! Chilling on the climbs then smashing it as fast as you could down the hills! That's just a dream format of racing, I loved it!
Here is the bit of paper I got given at the bottom with my times:
That time saw me win the women's race! That was the icing on the cake to a fantastic weekend! Big shout to everyone who raced here is a link to a great wee round up on Descent World click here.
A nice wee picture of me on the Pivot!
Also massive thanks to Innerleithen mtb racing, alpine bikes and all the marshals for a great event!!
Now, back to training! Keep riding people,
Win tin tin
Posted by Morvélo
