Get Cross - cx skills course

Thinking of riding the Peaks this year? Already riding but want to go faster? Wanting to get into cross? Myself and Dave Haygarth are teaming up with MTB legend Ed Oxley to help you brush up on those cross skills - Get Cross:

Get Cross: A one day course to improve your cyclocross skills

Ed Oxley brings his extensive knowledge from countless mountain bike skills courses to teach betterbike handling.  Ed has taught hundreds of riders better bike handling and brings out the best in everyone.

“The best money I’ve spent on a mountain bike was learning to ride it properly. By the end of the morning I was riding stuff properly that I would previously have balked at. Highly recommended”

Alan Dorrington and Dave Haygarth join Ed to look at applying those skills to a race day.  Shaving seconds off every bend, climb and descent is not just about being the fittest. This part of the course will look at the recce, the race line, and how to apply Ed’s flowing riding skills when under the pressure of a race. Shaving five or ten seconds per lap in a ten lap race is worth a great deal, so put the turbo down and let’s learn to ride smart.

To book please contact Ed ed@great-rock.co.uk or 07939 205563

Saturday 10th September at Lee Quarry, Bacup

Cost £70 

3 Peaks - we came, we rode, we were photographed

The 2010 3 Peaks race is well documented on honourary Belgian Dave Haygarth's (seen below) seminal Peaks blog so I won't repeat anything here. My own take on the whole rocky affair can be found here too.



Suffice to say there were lots of photographers and spectators out on Sunday, and lots of shots aimed at, shouts shouted toward and general love for, the Belgians. Dunc would have been proud to hear it all.....

So here is my own little selection of piccies of me (Alan), Rich Allen, G, Richard Knowles and Simon Fox - missing in the thick of it are Winkie who shunned a Belgian strip for some reason (tut tut) and Simon Nurse who rode in green but rocked the team windjacket after. We were aided and abetted by Mark Turner, Jo Hanglebads and Mark Bradley and Gemma Nurse. And probably others whom I didnt get to see on the day. A massive thank you to all the helpers as it really makes all the difference on a logistically complex event like this.

Going back to the images, superb shots in particular can be found from the Belgian friendly Cheryl King and Richard Seipp both of whom are represented below.

As he did in the race, winner Rob Jebb (1st shot below) leads us up the impossibly steep first climb and into the fun:

3 Peaks Cyclocross Preview - 26 September

In case you hadn't noticed, at the heart of 'Belgian' identity is the winter discipline of cyclocross. If, as a new Belgian you aren't already riding cross, then you will be soon, by osmosis, peer pressure or sheer curiousity down to the fact that the rest of us bang on about it so much. As an old hand, then you know what you are in for already.

However, masquerading less as the Cinderella, and more the Ugly Sister of the cyclocross world is the 3 Peaks Cyclocross, a unique annual event occupying a very Northern (as in England) niche and representing a very different part of the cross world. It is staged in the Yorkshire Dales National Park every year at the end of September and so they say, is the toughest and biggest Cyclo-Cross event in the UK. I wouldn't argue with that as such.

Here are the stats:
Total distance: 61kms (38 miles)
Road: 28kms (45mins - 1hr 5mins)
Unsurfaced: 33kms (2hrs 15mins - 4hrs 40mins)
Unrideable: 6kms - 8kms (dependent on individual ability & prevailing conditions)
Total climbing: 1524m (5000ft)

Hidden in there is some scary and rocky terrain, an allegedly neutralised bunch start of 500 riders on narrow roads behind a car, and a whole world of pain. Oh and 3 bloody great mountains, not Peaks - Ingleborough, Whernside Penyghent.

Yes it is that steep! (Pic:Wig Worland)

There is of course a merry, nay select, band of Belgians competing this year - Alan (Crossjunkie), Winkie Thin, Richard Knowles, Richard Allen and Simon Fox. Jez Hastings is also riding as his Team Wiggle alter ego but we all know he is Belgian through and through.... Most have ridden before, none I suspect are undertaking it lightly. Spare a thought too for their pit crews who face a GB rally style driving experience hotfooting from rendezvous to rendezvous with spare bikes, wheels and bottles. This is a cross race after all......

Rich descending Penyghent, the big dark lump in the background (pic: Wig Worland)



Alan in original black kit ascending Simon Fell/Ingleborough (pic:Wig Worland)


Heightened anticipation, nervousness and obsession are common traits among all Peaks entrants at this time of year, with just a week and a half to go till what is usually for most the biggest race of the year. And probably the hardest too. Most do Peaks specific training which often involves variations on a theme of carrying a bike up rough 45 degree slopes for endless periods of time.

Friend and honorary Belgian, Dave Haygarth runs a great 3 Peaks blog with all things Peak related contained within. Check it out for more insights into this unique race even if you have no intention of riding, just marvelling at the stupidity of riding up and down mountains on cross bikes. Better still, come along on that last Sunday in September and support your intrepid band of Belgians at Ribblehead or even better, half way up Penyghent when a friendly shout or bottle of water won't go amiss. That said, by that point we will probably all be looking for a wandering Vetinary with a bolt gun to end our suffering........

penyghent track

Photo: Wig Worland

Peaks pics

Above: There's a tall lanky Belgian in there somewhere.....

Above: Winkie finds a smoother line

Above and below: Rich up and down Penyghent

Photos: Wig Worland and Ian McVety

3 Peaks Belgian style

3 Peaks, 3 Belgians, 3 finishers.

Rich led the way with a 'need to come back next year and try harder' - 4hrs 1 min. So close to that elusive sub 4hr time.......

Winkie came in seeing double after bonking with 4hrs 5 min - get the pies in next time......

Alan ' oh not cramp again on Whernside' with 4hrs 18 min. Need some tonic water or something to avoid lock leg......

Big thanks to Mark and Jo(Belgianette) for helping out on the day with soothing words, bikes and food. Plus beer.

Report and photos anyone?

interlude

I was about to comment that it had all gone a bit quiet in terms of posting on the Belgian front, and then what do you know? The proverbial threesome of public transport....... welcome Jez from Outer Hebrideecestershire!

We Belgians may have been quiet on the racing front (except a for mechanically challenged Rich) but preparations are at fever pitch for this coming weekend for a good chunk of us.

Only cave dwellers will have failed to notice it is 3 Peaks weekend - my own build up was looking good a fortnight ago but has degenerated into cold avoidance on 3 tactical fronts (1 work, 2 at home) and the usual ill-timed domestic crisis. Taper week? More like splutter to a halt week. No matter, the form is in their somewhere, if the viruses don't get to it first..........



Anyways, my secret weapon for Penyghent, the final Peak, was unveiled this week - big fat 34mm FMB tubs, all wrapped in lurvely latex and puncture proofed by yet more kinky rubber, glued on 36 hole trad alloy rims with a dinner plate cassette. They are my only hope against a brutally rocky track and a very suspect and timid downhill technique. Penyghent is a puncture paradise (for tube manufacturers at least) so I hope to avoid being a hapless victim and make it down with a modicum of speed and style.

There are 3 of us riding - Winkie, Rich and myself with Mark SportsArt and possibly Duncan and Gee(?) aiding and abetting. Spare a thought though for Gary who won't be toeing the startline due to an unco-operative back.

Come up and cheer us on - it's a great day out in cracking countryside. The running Belgian will be run ragged on Sunday..........

life on foot aka Peaks training

Travelling incognito, it was the bike that gave this Belgian away.....