So there are no hills in Essex then?

 

Well that's a statement Zora, I and 80 odd rather tired World class cross-country mountain bikers would argue with. We arrived at Hadleigh Farmi n Essex after leaving the car at the FREE park and ride onCanveyIslandand landed at the recently converted site in style atop a double-decker bus. With all the marshals having been on a very intensive "be nice to the visitors" course we were warmly welcomed and made ourselves familiar with the 6 km course, being able to walk around all of it in glorious sunshine and experience how steep some of the inclines really were for ourselves and check out some of the jumps and drops. This wasn't a tow path, as some had described it, by any means!....

 

 

There were basically 2 races, the Ladies first then in the afternoon the Mens, with riders from all over the world and the best in their classes it was promising to be quite an event. The course was well bedded into the countryside and had some great looking drop offs and technical sections such as "Deane's drop" and the "leap of faith" and also some hefty climbs one aptly named the "Breathtaker". With the ladies doing 6 laps and the men doing 8 on a mixture of Carbon Fiber 26 and 29ers mostly hard tails with short travel forks some full suspension bikes and even 1x10's there was something for everyone. (sorry no single-speeders Dan).  We were close enough that when the racers came past we were within touching distance of them and you could hear that even the pro riders cock up their gear changes every now and then. What struck me was the pace these guys ride at, it is relentless and even on the last lap they are pushing themselves one or two with flat tyres until they could get to the technical assistance area, get the wheel changed whilst having a quick splash and dash and be shouted encouragement to in whatever language you chose.

 

 

The ladies race was won by the Canadian Catherine Pendrel who led pretty much from the start and closely followed by American rider Georgia Gould. The Mens Race was won by a country mile (some one and a half minutes) by French rider Julian Absalon who also won the Olympic event in 2004 and 2008 so it wasn't a holy surprising result ,if your a betting man/lady i'd lay a few quid on Julian for 2012's gold. The top Brit was Lee Williams who came some way down the order after having a bit of an off, but got the biggest cheer of the day.

 

 

The whole event ran like clockwork and i'm sure it will tick the complete success box for the organisers, we both wish we had got tickets for the Olympic event in 2012 when there will be some 25,000 spectators to cheer on Team GB.

 

R4th.

 

pics by Zora

 

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