Wentwood 50 Enduro

After last weeks race in the hail, sleet, snow and mud, this weekend saw a complete contrast as the sun was blazing out with temperatures around 15degrees. The course was taken around the great wentwood forest offering muddy singletrack and plenty of fireroad to transfer over to the next part of the forest.

We started off on the road with 400 odd Entries and continued on the uphill road climb until we eventually turned left into the muddy, rocky and rooty singletrack. Since I didn’t have the best start I played catch up weaving in and out of people to catch my fellow team-mate (also brother) and Simon who was a 12 hr enduro specialist who finished 1st with Jonny Pugh last year.

After just short of 20km Anthony had a mechanical, snapping his chain. After a quick stop and check I was told to crack on and he would try and chase back providing he got his chain sorted. By this time Simon had left us and I had to go off in pursuit to chase him down. After catching him up we stayed together just before the 25km break point.

With gaining my first tag and stopping for some vital fluid, Simon caught me up again and off we went for a further 25km. After a few overshot corners I overtook Simon on the climbs and powered my way up them opening up a decent gap!

Again after some confusion with directions and which was the correct way, my lead was lost and back to square 1 as Simon caught me while waiting at the marshall point for them to point us in the right direction.
We rode together until the next fireroad climb where I was able to power away leaving Simon behind all the way to the finish.
However it didn’t go without a few hiccups as my freehub was playing up and I got a bit of chain-suck which caused it to wrap into my wheel and snap a spoke with 8km to go. However I managed to nurse it home and crossed the line as 1st rider home in the 50km in a time of 2hrs40!

Next race now is the 1st round of the National series at Sherwood pines in 2 weeks time!