#32 is Tony Edmund and he's a damn good rider-he almost won the series last year but for a few broken bits(himself not the bike).In the end,despite those few issues,he only finished 7 min down after 2 hrs of the winner,Steve Parkinson,another good rider and 2 time isde silver medalist.Tony was simply worn out.It's the first race of the season here so no one is yet in biking shape I suspect.Regardless,as sachs says,this is good training for anything.I find it to be the most physically exhausting activity I've ever done in my life.While it looks funny,and is,I've been in that state many times when I couldn't lift my leg up on the bike,or stand,or work the controls etc.Basically just drooling and cursing and stumbling toward the finish.But it's,er,um,fun
As for that section,you're right coop,the vid doesn't do it justice-nor does the pic for that matter.
This pic is before it got all chewed up and is partway through the way the rider approaches it.The camera man was standing at what would be the top of the picture.The problem here is the roots.The ground is a clay type base and if you look close you'll see various roots with a 1-2 foot or better hole in front of them.Anyone that's ridden this sort of thing knows what it's like when you can't get your front wheel up over the one with the hole in front of it because your rear is sliding on another sideways root.Naturally,the more get stuck the worse it gets.Once I cleared a section like this,I spent the rest of the lap dreading it until it came up again
BTW Jetzcorp,that little bit of razzing will never hurt a properly tuned bike unless it's an extended period of time.Besides,unlike a trail ride where you may take care of your machine,in a race situation with the guy ahead of you getting away and the guy behind you catching up it becomes sort of a "she'll go or she'll blow" mentality.
