Shimano Sleepless in the Saddle 24hour, 9th and 10th August 2003
Results can be found here and some photos here
I think the 8 CUCC folk who went to the Shimano Sleepless in the Saddle
24hour MTB race this weekend would concur with Rob that it indeed was
*very* hot this weekend!
8 of us comprising 3 teams trekked up to Trentham Gardens on Friday
evening/saturady morning for the 2003 SitS, a 24 hour endurance event in
which the remit is to do as many laps of the climby/singletracky course as
possible in 24hours.
Our 4 man team consisted of Steve Block, Jon Ellis,
Howard Lam and Chris Pedder, a pairs team consisting of Andrew Cockburn
and myself and Chris Jones and Shane Slater appearing in the Specialized
Happy Starfish team along with members of, well, Specialized! Many thanks
to Carol from Specialized at this juncture for the organisation and free
kit!!
The event kicked off with a Le Mans start (3-7 min run depending how fast
you were) and then consecutive laps until 24 hours was up. Our 4 man team
(I think) had everyone doing a lap each until night time and then doubling
up whereas myself and Andy elected to do 4 laps on and 4 laps off. Each
lap was 8 miles long and had 1500ft of climbing. The course started off
quite flat alongside a pleasant lake an then got significantly more hilly
for the latter half with three interesting climbs, some fantastic
singletrack and quite a sketchy downhill. Certainly enough to keep one
entertained for a while! The whole course became a touch more challenging
through the night - good lights (thanks Chris!) a must.
To cut a long story short, our four-up team did pretty well (results are
going to be posted soon) with 29 laps and Andrew and
myself came 5th in the pairs category with 31 laps, which was quite a
suprise. Many thanks must go to Andrew here for doing 3 extra laps
bringing his total to 17 when my right knee failed to work in the closing
hours of the race.
A gruelling, hot, fun event very aptly summed up for a change by this
years event T-shirt 'It's a dirty 24hour, pain, love, hate, joy bicycle
thing.'
See you there next year?
Bart Hallmark
|