British Cycling will not back Enduro for 2015

 While Riders in the UK continue to go out and build our own tracks, we'll continue to be the best in the world at DH, and will be at the top of Enduro very soon. World Cup tracks might be getting easier, but local tracks keep getting steeper, harder, and rougher whether they are Enduro 'trails' or Downhill tracks

Edit - this was meant to be in reply to @bigburd

 Talking about Britain, why isn't there an option to choose England from the list of countries in your profile but theres Wales and Scotland ?

 I've unliked BC on FB. Let that be a lesson to them. Mwahahahaha....

 I find it a bit backward that Brittish Cycling does not fully embrace Enduro. In the UK, mountain biking, whether that be Cross Countty, Enduro or indeed DH, is still essentially an underground sport compaired to any main stream sport like football, rugby, cricket, tennis etc. The UK is a fairly small place, compared to our European cousins, yet from Wales to Scotland and everywhere in between, we have some of the best enduro style territory to offer. Mountain biking ( and in this context Enduro ) is a sport that is growing, we should be taking hold of this in the UK and pressing on. We have a well established DH circuit in the UK and we are fortunate enough to have a stop on the world cup circuit in the form of Fort William. But I feel we are missing out on promoting our ability as a country to host other international series, such as the Enduro World Series. In 2014 the EWS came to Scotland during Tweed Love and it was by all accounts a huge success. So I don't understand why BC don't want to be involved in sanctioning any kind of UK Enduro series. Our DH experience has proven that we can turn out world class riders, so why not follow suit with Enduro. The UK is full of people who spend a lot of money ( probably averaging £2k/£3k ) on buying mountain bikes and all the equipment ( compare this to the cost of going for a game of football ) and we get out most weekends, sometimes more, to blast our local trails in all weather. This is what directly leads to and develops our world class DH guys, so why not open this up for us to become a nation of world class Enduro riders.

 Continued from previous comment. Any kind of official MTB organisation we have in the UK should be backing everything we can. We should be a country to offer European style MTB holidays and equally Eurooean style MTB race events. The current trend of local Enduro races makes racing more open and attainable to the average rider, it may not be on the scale of EWS events but gives us a chance to experience a race event. Most people probably don't have the skill or bravery to attempt a full on DH event. So Enduro in the UK opens the doors to talent that might other wise be missed. The UK has all the fundimental components to develop a thriving Enduro scene, on par with that of the BDS, thus leading to the UK having as many leading Enduro riders as we have world class DH riders.

 Well if this all boils down to insurance then lets look at the basics; has anyone ever seen anything negligent at a UKGE round? Nope. If a rider crashes and injures themselves then guess what, it is a dangerous sport. Anyone who goes immediately suing a race organiser is contributing to the death of competative sport and increased costs, and is therefore a tw@t. Both competitors and spectators have exactly the same level of responsibility as the organsier to ensure our sport continues to thrive. ENDURO!

 BC have recently announced that for 2015 they will not be insuring Enduro events here in the UK.

In Spring this year BC stated that they would not allow any new Enduro events to appear on the BC calendar under their insurance. Those with a crystal ball would have realised at that exact point that there was 'Trouble at mill'.

No matter how much you dress up Enduro, bottom line is that it's racing a number of timed stages on courses that are predominately downhill. This is exactly what the insurers, lawyers, health and safety and any Judge or Coroner in the land will class the event as, "Downhill". You start at the top and finish at the bottom with a bit of pedalling in the middle. Especially when they find out that a number of tracks used in Enduro events were similar if not the same to those used for downhill races several years ago.

Therefore they will expect all organisers to follow the guidelines laid down by the National governing body that is British Cycling.

BC we can guess would wholly agree with the above paragraph. After all if you are asking BC to insure your event you will have to abide by their rules and regs. If not the insurance would be null and void.
You can only imagine how much BCs insurance has increased in recent years with this sue culture it seems we are adopting.
If they open themselves up to litigation then at some point in time they will be no more.

Please do not think that Downhill and the BDS is getting off lightly.
We are increasingly under the microscope and will have to ensure we go above and beyond the regulations.

I wholly believe Steve Parr and the UKGE team are leading the way for Enduro here in the UK and I wish them every success next year.

In the meantime, please don't blame or attack British Cycling on this decision. They are wholly supportive of all forms of cycling. I guess we just have to understand their hands are tied on this matter for now.

 It is probably for the best that while the sport is developing it's identity and it's own way of doing things that they have as little big corporation stuff as possible. It just makes it harder to change and improvise. It will make it a lot harder for the organisers of events as the costs will be much higher without outside insurance being provided.

 Good, fuck em last years uk gravity tracks were wild and them numptys would only sanitize it, hail hail steve parr!

 Good. f*ck british cycling. Enduro doesn't need to be associated with such a bunch of stuffy old men. It's only a matter of time until they ditch DH just as they did 4X and now enduro.
If it doesn't involve lycra; they ain't interested.

 Dear BC, please let us know exactly what this really means because it certainly doesn't seem to translate into any real input to DH that I have ever seen: "MTB Downhill and its future development and sustainability is something that we are committed to. It is an area that requires continued and substantial support and through that support we aim to raise standards and in doing that improving the quality of the racing environment for all."

 here we go again. i've been racing mountain bikes since 1987 in the uk and BC(BCF) as it was known then have never taken our sport seriously, its always playing second fiddle to the tarmac/wooden events. This is partly down to money i would imagine and the fact road/track came along first.
So many fantastic athletes get no recognition in xc/downhill/4X and now Enduro its such a shame. for as long as i can remember riders have complained about the "Governing body" but nothing comes about to change things, its a shame a like minded group of riders and organisors cant get together and sort an offroad cycling body to sort this crap out. Just need someone with some balls to get things going.

 Look how much attention downhill will always have of other organizations,there's no need for them to go with it anymore.Enduro is the next up and coming sport for Britain.

 mtb whatever flavour you choose is evolving all the time, surely we dont need these sensible old farts, uci, bc,controlling it ,
keep it dynamic youth based
look what uci have done for road bike devepment , don;t let them loose on mtb inovations

 quite surprised as British cycling wants to get people riding but have just turned away a huge proportion of us mountain bikers.... stupid decision

 hmmm, not sure what it means...does it mean the enduro race organisers have to find another insurer to avoid getting sued if someone crashes after having only one practice run?....could be more expensive than the current BC insurance. what about support. Ive recently got super lucky and secured a sponsorship with Bianchi bikes for Enduro racing for next year i was asked about getting a UCI race licence...which I don't think I can get as the EWS isn't UCI sanctioned, but on the back of that if there's not even a BCF backing in my country for the event will new companies to the sport shy away....hopefully not as the participants will vote with their feet showing where the passion and spending is happening.

good things of course are freedom to do what the organiser wishes for their enduro race. making things much more fun hopefully allowing this niche aspect of bike racing to flower in its own retarded way.....more crazy ass tracks hopefully

 Check this link out for British Cycling's third party liability cover:

www.britishcycling.org.uk/membership/article/memst-Third-Party-Liability-Insurance-0

It is my understanding that this means that as a competitor at an enduro event (because they are not run by any of the recognised organisations) you are not covered by their insurance, and member to member claims are excluded anyway.

I suppose what they are worried about is someone walking on to a course and get seriously hurt/ killed by a racer on a time stage. But that is the very reason why enduro racers need BC's support.

Come on BC have a rethink and support enduro.

 I will be interested to see how this news will effect the position of the Forestry Commission who have a very significant role, certainly here in Scotland, as the landowner at a large number of race venues.

 This could well be the kick that EMBA need in order to set up a ranking system like in Snowboarding.

www.worldsnowboardtour.com/rankings/ranking-information

General idea is that you have world class events and regional events. They all come under the same governing body but the lower events act as feeders to the world stage.

Hopefully Chris Ball will already be planning his winter around putting in something like this. It'd be a shame to see the UKGE races disappear.

 BC membership will not be getting renewed 2015...

 Good to see that yer all makin' some mega points here.
The Isle of Man will host it's first national enduro series next year, but the mainland can't?!

 Good... Maybe the bike parks will stop trying to make the DH tracks More "Enduro" PEDALLY..
And maybe novices will where proper full faces on the downhill tracks instead of trying to emmulate the pros in all those "enduro" videos where they where open faces.

 So, what does it mean to us riders that they won't insure enduro events? Without BC will it make races any different? The cost to race?

 Seems like a weird decision not back enduro but it has its place, like 4x so enduro does not need BC ?

 Possibly a good thing in some ways

 Read Colin Oldens words for a check on reality.

 Just read the title!!! Paaaaahahahaha. Suckers

 bell ends

 Screw us...

 Glad they are investing in dh over something else. Enduro bore off!