Do You Even Enduro?

It is upon us not only the final round of the Enduro World Series but the final race of the season for myself with this comes not just a massive amount of excitement but also a little sadness that the race seasons come to a close.


I've never been to Finale Ligure before but chatting to different people it almost seems to have some kind of legend like status on the endure scene for its incredible trails, sweet night life and the fact that you can shred then jump in the med.

On the long drive down with a couple buddies the levels of excitement were quickly rising as the temperature was still mid 20's and 4 days of riding in wife beaters and shorts in October were enough to get any brit going that coupled with receiving my new KTM Lycan 271 LT endure bike a couple weeks before I was chomping at the bit to get going.


The beauty I found with Finale is that despite them trying to kill us with a total of 95km of racing and about a billion feet of climbing you can shuttle on the Thursday and Friday which makes practice a whole lot more fun and once we'd found where the trails start and stop shuttling was in full effect and HOLY MOLY! The trails are sweet a great mixture of real tight, twisty rocky switchbacks of stages 1 and 3 to the lung buster of 6 and the flowing trail of 5. I was having a mint time and really enjoying the more tech stuff as it kind of reminded me of home.

With practice done and feeling pretty good my only concerns were the insane liason stages especially on the Sunday with the first liaison of the day a 3000ft climb to start the day and having to do this on a 6 inch travel bike with tacky tires wasn't going to be enjoyable by any stretch of the imagination. After a little chat with Enrico on the star stage it was hammer time and of I set, cruising my way to stage 1 with a rough game plan in my head of just staying on for the weekend as the standard was ridiculously high i thought this would help my result.

So here's kind of how my race went.

Stage 1: Over the bars down a rocky tight switch back - not quite the start I was after but was still mid 80's.
stage 2: Kept it relatively smooth and drama free and just enjoyed myself with only a small punchy climb in the middle I felt good.
Stage 3: Another super tech stage, not particularly fast but time could be gained by keeping it smooth. Another mid 80's finish.
Stage 4: One of my favourite stages with a fast flawy top and a crazy rocky bottom section which annoyingly bit me and i binned it pretty hard on a corner with the front end washing out.
Stage 5: Just off the pace...
Stage 6: The longest stage at about 8.5 km long it was a real leg burning lung buster. On my way down I was feeling good there weren't too much in the legs as the liaison had killed me but i was feeling smooth and steady then all of a sudden smash I was over the bars like a sack of potatoes. You don't realise how tired you are until you hit a massive compression and your upper bodes so tired it can't hold itself up on impact.


So that was it game over in a way I was placing pretty good overall but just too many mistakes and crashes through out the weekend really damaged my result and I ended up 105th overall which was way off where I wanted to be however some promising times on the new bike and getting to grips with it I was pleased overall.

That's it then the season is over and I can honestly say its been my best and most memorable in a long time. Top 5's at every round of the UK Gravity Enduro Series, 73rd at La Thuile EWS and a clean sweep of wins at all of Jerseys Domestic events its been emotional and i've met some amazing people along the way.

Massive thanks Have to go to allmountainstyle.com the Caeserean cycling club Jersey KTM bike Industries UK, All my buddies who have helped and supported me throughout the season and most importantly the my girlfriend for constantly being there for me during the highs and lows of racing.

Roll on 2015.

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