Category: Mountain Biking

Posted on

MTBO World Cup, Italy, Middle Race

Sunday morning dawned with bright sunshine and blue skies, such a contrast to the torrential rain of the day before. However the water had already done its worst on the clay claggy soils surrounding Teolo and we were all prepared for another day of mud plugging.

I had a very early start (6th person off) but saw this as an advantage as the ground wouldn’t have chance to get too cut up by the time I approached it.

I was steady through 1, got a good route choice to 2 but then totally fluffed number 3, losing approx 4 mins. I was never lost, just phaffed my way down a complicated path network before getting stuck on what on the map looked like a cross roads but was in fact two tracks with a 20ft overgrown bank between. I slipped and slithered my way down but continued to be very slow until eventually I got the control.

I got out on to a faster track and started to ride slightly better but never seemed to get into the zone reading the map and subsequently was continually stopping. We had some horrible climbs on muddy tracks in the vineyards, and I noticed some riders taking some very long route choice options to avoid them as mud seemed to ball up in no time on wheels frames and shoes.

We finished in Teolo town square but I had not had a good ride, the results confirming this with 53rd position.

Its hard to see where I went wrong other than number 3 as due to overlaps between the days we have not had the maps returned to us yet for a post mortem but splits show I am fairly consistently losing time.

I have decided to give my place in the relay to Ifor who had a much better ride today and instead tomorrow ride in the mass start middle public race and just try and enjoy myself to finish the season on a better note.

Posted on

World Cup MTBO – Italy, Sprint

The view from our hotel balcony on the morning of the World Cup MTBO sprint was shrouded in mist and fog but it started to clear by mid morning and as we descended to the event it cleared completely revealing the vineyards planted on every available piece of ground on which we would be racing later.

The finish area was in the town square of Vo, complete with large festival tent, it being the time of year for grape harvest and so a time for local celebration.

The pre start quarantine was at a vineyard tasting room next to the barns where the wine is produced. The whole place smelt a little like a pub in the morning, alcoholic! As the rain started to fall the worlds best riders huddled together surrounded by bottles of wine until their allotted start time.

After a strange start where we did not get the full minute with our maps (although everyone was in the same boat) I took a safe route to number 1 but the muddy conditions showed themselves straight away, the bike sliding all over the place on corners and whilst braking on the slippery tracks.

Number 2 involved a muddy slog uphill, where most riders were off and running, unable to gain any traction on the slime, the mud collecting on the bike in big dollops.

Every time I looked at the map, it seemed, it was covered in mud and water which meant judicious wiping with the back of the glove to be able to read it!

The mud also seemed to make my hand-grips very slippery, two or three times one of my hands slipped off the bars.

The technical course with lots of complex route finding wound its way around the terraced vined valleys descending most of the way. I made an error in the middle of the course losing perhaps a minute or so getting confused with the multitude of tracks but then quickly recovered and rode well through the last few until a small mistake missing a tiny opening in a wall lost me another minute on the last control (many missed this as it was not at all obvious).

I finished less muddy than most of the later riders, using my knowledge of mud avoidance tactics from the UK to ride around the worst bits and keep the gears working well but it is the first time I have ever had consistent traction problems in a race. Post race chat made it clear that everybody was having problems not matter the tyre choice.

The course I felt was more of a middle that a sprint, certainly in the early parts, with complex route finding and route choice meaning it was difficult to ride quickly but I enjoyed it and it would make a cracking area in dry conditions.
Given my mistakes I was very happy with 36th showing everybody was having a tough time with the conditions.

Note: WCup Results available at http://www.mtboitaly2010.it/download/result_sprint_wc.rtf

Open results at

http://www.mtboitaly2010.it/download/result_sprint_open.rtf

Photos available at http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/mark.stodgell/WorldCup2010ItalyTeolo?feat=directlink

Posted on

MTBO World Cup 2010, Teolo, Italy

Team GB arrived in Italy to overcast skies and the promise of torrential ran over the weekend. After frantic bike building and unpacking at our hotel it was off to try and tune into the model event terrain. After a fast descent to the valley floor from Teolo we were into the terraced vineyards the area is famous for, before we came to our start area: surprise, surprise, a farm that grew grapes.

The model area was all farmland with major grass tracks criss-crossing the terraces on the vineyards. However, we had been given permission to ride off track between the vines. This made route choice more interesting, and navigation more of a challenge. The vine rows can only be ridden in one direction, though, which tends to be with the contours. A mix of quiet country lanes and tracks, plus a healthy dose of climb, completed our recce of the area before the rain came down. Four hours later, following dinner and a team leaders meeting, the rain has still not not stopped meaning the sprint maybe particularly sticky tomorrow.

I have a fairly late start, which normally would be an advantage, but tomorrow, I’m not so sure.

World Cup Mountain Bike Orienteering  http://www.mtboitaly2010.it/

Posted on

Preview – World Cup MTBO 2010 – Italy

Friday will see a  team of British riders arriving in Teolo, near Venice for the last rounds of this years IOF Mountain Bike Orienteering World Cup series.
The organisers have had problems with storm damaged forests forcing them to reschedule some of the events in new areas, but the races are:

Saturday – Sprint
Sunday – Middle distance
Monday – Mixed relays.

The British team for the event contains some new blood, Ifor Powell and Steph Fountain. Steph and Ifor are both endurance specialists, Ifor getting a good position at this years British 24hr MTB champs and Steph ‘fresh’ from trans Wales:

Men
Mark Stodgell, Ifor Powell (debut), Andrew Windrum & Mark Hayman
Women
Emily Benham, Helen Clayton, Lucy Harris, Steph Fountain (debut)

keep up to date here or at http://www.mtboitaly2010.it/

Posted on

Woodbury Common – MTBO

Woodbury Common near Exeter, famous for its Royal Marine Commando training grounds, is quite a hike down from Staffordshire, but not so far from my roots in Taunton so I decided to take trip south for Devon’s first MTBO event.

The area is already famous locally for  mountain biking and has some great trails.

Covering most of a piece of A3 at 1:15000, the area is a huge with a good path network criss-crossing a rolling landscape of open heathland and woods.

I had decided on a strategy of really attacking the climbs but to concentrate on technique and make as few mistakes as possible. I had to avoid several camouflaged, gun-carrying Marines on the way to number 1, and a couple of them seemed quite intimidated with me piling down the track towards them which seemed quite strange with them being the ones carrying the SA8Os!

The first few controls criss-crossed the same area a few times before a very fast descent off the heathland and into the forest where we had our first encounters with some of the commando course, calling for bike on shoulder climbing up slippery banks.

Unfortunately, a misplaced and a stolen control at this point interrupted my flow some what as I phaffed around, eventually finding one on an unmarked junction a bit further along, but the missing one seemed to have just disappeared. Some more climbs followed before we came back across the map for the sting in the tail to the last control. The route choice was a up and round or a short dash across a difficult to ride track. I felt even if I had to run with the bike the shorter route would be better, but how wrong I was!

The difficult to ride track was actually a part of the Marine Commando challenge course. Battling through a muddy stream in a 6ft ditch, bike above my head, I opted to climb over the tunnel I came across as the bike wouldn’t fit. Eventually, I was faced with the exit and daylight above through a great big prickly gorse bush. I shoved the bike ahead of me, got it stuck and then head down just pushed my way through, dragging the bike after me.

I punched the last control and shouldered the bike up the steep climb towards the finish, where, after downloading, I pulled a big bit of gorse out of my helmet vents and my forehead!

Woodbury Common, although having a few too many bridleways to make course planning easy, is a great new addition to MTBO and other than the couple of misplaced controls I had a great time, with some really technical riding and route choices which made me think.

Thanks to Nigel Benham and Devon for their first foray into MTBO, lets hope QO and BOK can now follow in their footsteps to create a SW league with Wim, WSX and SARUM clubs.

note: although the results are now published they are a little misleading as indicated in the planners and organisers comments. I didn’t mispunch, just didn’t find a control that was in the wrong place as did most of the other mp’s except for two mechanical retirees mixed in ! Ive had a good peruse of the splits and was very pleased with most of the times, difficult to say how much time people lost on the controls in the wrong place/stolen but I think I had a lead of about 20 mins. A good day at the office ! 
http://www.orienteeringindevon.org.uk/devonoc/woodburyMTBO10.html

Posted on

Gorsey prickles !

Without a bike on holiday in Brittany I wet off for a run around the coastal cliff path from our cottage. The trail barrelled up and down the various headlands with ocean views, golden sandy beaches and glorious blue skies reflected in the gentle waves far below. The track was very rocky in places and I tweaked my ankle several times, trying to keep up a good pace. Dotted all along the headlands were gun emplacements and bunkers, left over from the ‘Atlantic wall’ of WW2 together with the ruins of long forgotten grand houses.

After about 40 mins I stumbled again (probably looking at another view) but this time failed to hold it and started to fall. In a split second I made the decision to crash down into the ‘soft’ gorse to my left rather than hit the deck onto the rocky track. I made it, taking the fall on my forearms and hands and rolled over once before standing. For about 10 seconds I thought ‘that wasn’t too bad I thought gorse hurt more than that’ but then the tingling started as the hundreds of prickle holes plus salty sweat did there thing. I turned for home cutting it a little short pondering whether I would have been better falling on the rocky trail as my arms got sorer and more itchy. In fact in the two days since as I have squeezed out countless gorsey spines from red spots appearing all over my hands and lower arms I have wondered the same!

The next MTBO is on Woodbury Common near Exeter, Devon on Sat 11th Sept. I seem to remember from X-Country and orienteering races as a teenager that the gorse there also produced intense itching….
http://www.bmbo.org.uk/calendar/details.php?event_id=118

Posted on

Riding from Romesy.

 We always tend to ride with friends John and Nicky at our place on Cannock Chase and do kiddy things down in Romsey (near Southampton) where they live, swimming, beaches or The New Forest.

I had brought a road bike down with me to do a few hill sessions but John persuaded me to borrow Nicky’s Cannondale so he could come out as well and show me the area. As I wanted some hills, John said he would shout when one started, I’d put a rep in and then come down again to scoop him up. We started out through the lovely village of Braishfield climbing all the way until eventually I crested the hill on a steeper gravel track in a forest. Picking up John we turned left down through Parnholt Wood before 180ing back up the same track from the bottom giving me another good 100m effort.

Looking at the time, we decided there wasn’t time for another hill but there was time for a view! We rode along the ridge to the top of Beacon Hill to spectacular views North before turning to Farley Mount and panoramic views in all directions, The Isle of White clearly visible to the South..

A prickly stingy decent down a narrow bridleway brought us back to Braishfield and in to Romsey.

The area was much better than I realised for off road riding, nothing technical but lots of great views along pleasant tracks. The fairly dense bridleway and lanes would make a good MTB Orienteering score area in fact……….

Posted on

Suckley Hills MBO Score (and trailquest)

Three days of uncharacteristic summer down pours had left much of the Midlands very soggy. During a ride on Saturday with friends near Abergavenny I had reached that point where it is not possible to become any more wet and muddy trails soon became quagmires.

Sunday however dawned with blue skies and bright sunshine as I travelled up to the village of Suckley, nestling in beautiful Herefordshire countryside to the west of the Malvern Hills.

The Suckley MBO score was partnered with a Midlands Trailquest, Colin Palmer doing his best to try to bring these two organisations together since their split several years ago.
With the event proceeds going to Pakistan flood relief and a well organised event centre in Suckley village hall approx 70 happy riders lined up to get their start times in the morning sun.

As this was mainly a Midlands Trailquest event we unfortunately were back to pin punches. I spent a while deciding the best way to carry the control card before setting off, wearing it pinned to my arm, and grabbed the pre marked 1:25 thousand OS map.

As the area had a multitude of footpaths Colin had opted to show where we could ride with an over print rather than mark what we could not ride with OOBs symbols to keep the map clearer. This was also done to avoid confusion as he had negotiated access from some landowners to ride on some footpaths.  I decided I would try and clear the course so headed out first into the more complex and hilly area to the South East of the map leaving the faster lanes to the West for the end. Unfortunately fairly quickly I discovered due to the detail on the 1:25000, two layers of plastic and the over printing I was struggling to read more than major road junctions whilst riding. I would normally expect only to stop the bike to read the map if I made an error. I made a couple of scraggy mistakes picking my way through the complex Bridleway network through the first few controls but then coming out of number 11 simply could not make the map fit what was on the ground and could not find the entrance to a bridleway to do an in and out on number 4.  After about 5 mins I gave up looking and headed down the overgrown route to 15, but although I think I now know where the control was, left it after again not being able to fit the ground to the map and carried on.

At this point I realised there was no way I was going to clear them all and that a clockwise route going West first would have gained far more points so decided to just enjoy the riding.

I struggled a little to find some of the controls once I got to locations as they were hidden from view to avoid vandalism and the thick red circles did obscure some of the detail but this didn’t detract from the beautiful villages and some great skitty slippery descents off road.

As I curved north hovering up the controls playing cat and mouse with Jason Howell we started to encounter more and more mud. The route from 9 to 17 was absolutely minging with huge puddles of standing muddy water. I met a very large group of ramblers here. Expecting some grief as normal I slowed right down but for a change was met with cheerful comments, which was a nice surprise.

On the way to number 5 I went south and round rather than riding off the map and back on again as I always assume that you are only allowed to ride on the competition map, and this cost me a bit of time as others didn’t and cut across.  After 5 I was on a mission to get in on time so started to ride faster managing to pick up a few but eventually binning number 14 due to time, before racing for home, getting in exactly on 3 hours.

So a bit of disappointment in the standard of the 1:25000 clarity but the area has fantastic potential going forward with a few map corrections. The variety of terrain and such a dense path network which, if Colin can continue to get permission for some of more of the footpaths, will be great, and would make a good adventure racing venue too.

No results available at present – they should be available soon at :
http://www.midlandtrailquests.co.uk/index.php  and http://www.bmbo.org.uk/results/