Pretend Pro MTBer: Some Classic Scottish Enduro Racing

Scottish Enduro Series Round 4 - Innerleithen

The last couple of weeks saw the end of the mid-season break for me. Six weeks off since the French EWS left me with a lot of time to ride pump track, pretend to be good at skateboarding and generally just relax, but I was mad keen to get back racing again. It was to be two weekends back to back racing in Innerleithen, first up being the fourth round of the Scottish Enduro Series followed up by the last round of the Tweedlove Triple Crown series.


The weather leading up to the SES was looking great and it looked like we were going to see a bone dry weekend and with many of the fast boys away, I was looking to repeat my podium performance I managed in Dunoon. However, the drive down to the borders was one of hefty downpours, so the dust was gone. Besides the faff involved with a wet race, I was pretty stoked cause I had the Magic Marys on and was ready to take the Trek Monster Truck (Slash 29er) down some of the Innerleithen’s finest.

The stages were a good mix of inners classics and some newer stuff, with minimal pedalling involved, which I knew was going to suit me. I waited for the rain to calm down before heading out for practice. It was a pretty uneventful day cruising about the valley besides a massive crash on one of the stages and with six big climbs I was goosed. Straight back to Edinburgh it was to wash the bikes and get some sleep for the big day tomorrow.


Race day was a great day with good weather and all the elites riding round together it was great day out as usual. I managed to ride pretty clean all day, which is what I find the 29er is great for – keeping everything under control. I've really been finding the line between riding smooth and aggressive, which has been awesome as someone who really doesn't attack the trail it's nice to have it feel well within my control now.

It was a massive day on the hill. I think we were out for 6 hours, albeit at a slow pace up the hills (they were steep as), fortunately my Stoats bars kept me fuelled up nicely and by the end of the day I felt fairly fresh still. We all handed in our dibbers and the top 4 elites were separated by just 10 seconds. At the end of the day beating Gary Forrest was never going to be easy and he got me by just 3 seconds and I was super pleased to come away with second, my best Scottish Enduro result yet.



Tweedlove Triple Crown Round 3 - Innerleithen

After a week back at work, riding more pump track and enjoying a bit of the Edinburgh Festival it was back to Innerleithen for another weekend of racing. With the previous weekend being pretty much gravity focussed and Tweedlove events having a reputation for being quite pedally, I knew it was going to be tough to match the previous weekend's result, especially with a few more fast folk at the race back from the Whistler EWS.

There had been a fair bit of rain on the Friday night, so practice was a lot wetter than the previous week, but the freshly reopened Lone Wolf trail was running awesome and I had a great time riding the sloppy ruts.


My bike was running great all weekend and with the Magic Marys on again – I was loving the wet trails. After practice I knew I was going to be able to probably do best on stages 1 and 5, so I made sure I really gave them a good effort in the race and I was right and came third overall on both those stages.


Once the race was all done, I wasn’t wildly confident about a podium place, but I think it was just the nature of stages 2 and 3 being tight and twisty you don’t get the same ‘feel good’ feeling you get on a track with lots of flow or is flat out. Once we all handed in our dibbers I’d come away with 2nd senior and 3rd overall behind probably the tweed valleys fastest enduro racers at the moment (although I can hardly say I’m not a local), so I was pretty stoked with that despite the sizable chunks of time put into me on a couple of stages. You can’t have it go well every weekend, so I learned a lot from the weekend will put it to practice next time.


It’s a couple of weeks off now until the Fort William SDA where I’ll be seeing what the 29er can really handle whilst getting some arm pump training in for the final round of the EWS in Finale Ligure at the end of September.

Sponsors

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About Christo

I am 23 years old and have been racing for the best part of 10 years now with a 3 year break due to shoulder problems. I work full time in IT with a little bit of mountain bike coaching on the side. I've been a "pretend pro mountain biker" for four or five years now, trying to race at the top level. Other than the fact if I'm not at work or at a race then I'll be at the pumptrack in Edinburgh, that's probably all there is to know.

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