gravity enduro.. liaison stages

[bikeyoulongtime]

inspired by this poll on pinkbike: http://www.pinkbike.com/news/pinkbi...sfer-stages-be-as-tough-as-pro-xc-climbs.html

what do you reckon? I'm in the 'yep, liaison stages should make you work' camp. But I'm no race winner...

In a small nutshell, I reckon the liaison stages should affect the outcome of the 'race', since the liaison/transfer stages are really actually part of the adventure. The winner should be the rider who can handle some climbing, and have enough get go to smash the descents on the clock. Otherwise, what's the point - it's just a few easy DH races stuck together.

I make an exception for things like the buller brake burner - that's a lot of laps to ride back up.. but where you have maybe 3 or 4 timed stages with climbs in between - climb baby climb! rest, bomb...

 

[liam90]

Is this a poll referring to Australian Enduro stages or EWS stages as Pinkbikes' does?

I'm sure if they were holding EWS races in Aus transfer stages wouldn't be something they'd bring up as being difficult... after living in Whistler and riding last years EWS stages a few times then yeah... it is pretty intense, I'm no pro by a very long shot but great riders were struggling and there were a lot of crashes and missed start times. Having most of the transfer stages being long technical climbs as well opposed to spinning up fire road was pretty intense.

 

[foxpuppet]

I reckon it's way more fun riding to stages than being shuttled everywhere. Make you work for it to get to the start and then it will be more even across the Board.

 

[andy]

We have pedal up liaison stages in SEQ. We do an overall time to complete the race in, not just set start times. We also run a scatter format at most rounds where the riders can choose the order that they complete the 4 to 6 stages in.

I always find it amazing to see the amount of riders suffering major cramps after only 30km of total distance. A lot of them are regular marathon racers too.

 

[bikeyoulongtime]

Is this a poll referring to Australian Enduro stages or EWS stages as Pinkbikes' does?

I'd say both. I can appreciate how it'd be gutting to miss a start in a high-level series where actual cash and contracts are on the line - but you can equally flat on the way down, smash a rear mech, any number of things. But I'd expect a pro level race to be hard.. and pros to be up for it.

My favourite thing about them as a race format is the need to be a little strategic, a little gutsy, and look at the bigger picture. If the organiser throws in some crazy climbs on liaison stages, to me that needs to be incorporated into the race plan. Hell, Anne caro ran a manual-shift granny ring just for liaison stages - now there's strategy at work...

As for mere mortals, well, the couple of enduro races I've done have pretty friendly liaison terms... GESA was no time limit in 2013, CORC this year gave everyone half an hour. No need to get overly sweaty either way!

The SEQ format sounds fun! maybe one day I'll get north enough to have a ride in one

 

[marc.r]

Is this a poll referring to Australian Enduro stages or EWS stages as Pinkbikes' does?

I'm sure if they were holding EWS races in Aus transfer stages wouldn't be something they'd bring up as being difficult... after living in Whistler and riding last years EWS stages a few times then yeah... it is pretty intense, I'm no pro by a very long shot but great riders were struggling and there were a lot of crashes and missed start times. Having most of the transfer stages being long technical climbs as well opposed to spinning up fire road was pretty intense.

I was reading about this on pinkbike and one of this years competitors suggest 3 out out 124 male entrants didnt make the liason in time for the next time staged... that 124 contains many amateurs

apparently it was really difficult but it was not so difficult that it made the race impossible to all but jared graves style superheroes.

what is the DNF % at local races with much less arduous if any transfer or even XC races? sure as hell higher then 3 out of 124.


I think it comes down to the following idea..

the organizer included the huge liason in order to
A) access some awesome downhills that arnt easily accessible by any other means
B) make the race more aerobically challenging

If its A then fine
If its B then not very cool or fun.

 

[Steve-0]

The inbetween should be hard but shouldn't be made purposefully crazy because otherwise you've got yourself and XC race and not Enduro

 

[Beej1]

I should preface this with the fact that I'm just glad there's a racing discipline that suits 140-160mm AM/Trail/Enduro bikes the most, since DH and XC have had this for ages.

If you have to complete a bunch of the same types of timed descents on the one bike, then I reckon:
- make sure an event at a bike park has some climbing liason stages as well as chairlift, so that having a DH bike is a disadvantage for the climbs
- make it so that most folk can make the climbing liason and have a short rest before beginning their timed descent, so that the focus is on enjoying the timed descents if you don't have a hope of winning them

Is it that broke the way it currently is? It seems like the right people at the pointy end are those with both the best overall descending skills along with the best fitness. I thought that was it was about. In which case it doesn't seem like there's anything to fix other than perhaps stretching the Whistler round out to 2 days.

 

[Stinky]

As Andy has mentioned we do all pedal liaison stages in our series. That is largely due to the terrain that we are riding in, where shuttles would end up being slower than the ride / push up the hill. Everyone seems pretty happy with this format, but we still try to mix things ups as much as we can with different stage combinations each time we visit a venue.

On the other hand when we head to Mt Buller in Feb for the Rockshox Enduro Challenge we will be offering a combination of assisted uplift and pedal liaisons, again the topography down there lends itself to helping out a bit.

As for the EWS model of set start times, I raced in Rd 4 at La Thuille in Italy and thought that it worked well. Stage 1 each day, included two chairlifts and then 45 - 60 minutes of climbing to get to the start. I made this with about 10 mins to spare each time. Due to the freezing temps and high winds, you didnt want to hang around any longer than that. Stage 2 then had another 60 minute climb. A combination of a slow stage 1 and me being unfit meant that I missed my start time for STage 2 by about 5 minutes. I think that this was a good reflection of my riding and fitness so would support this model.

Having said this the long climbs were predominantly road and fire trail with only a small hike a bike section. I understand that the Whistler climbs were much tougher than this. I know that Jared also mentioned in his Blog after Whistler that the stages had stepped over the line as far as tech goes.

 

[Jeffgre_6163]

My 16 year old son races in under 17 in the Cairns MTBC Enduro series in which he has won every round as well as placing 2nd OA twice, he also raced round three of the Townsville series this year [5th OA in Elite] and this weekend took out the under 17 class in the Rockytrail Australian Enduro series round 5 with a time good enough to get him 8th OA.
Apart from blatantly spruiking my sons achievement's this season My point is that we have been around enough races now to get a good feel for what we want to see and what other competitors want.

Both him and I are of the opinion that an Enduro should test not only descending ability but over all fitness.
He works bloody hard at his fitness, clocking up a couple of hundred road kms a week as well as gym sessions and MTB rides, what he gives away in physical strength and power [he's 58 kg] he makes up in fitness being fully recovered at the start of each stage after the climb while his competition is blowing hard and seeing stars.
Having an Enduro where you can shuttle to the top is bullshit, an event like that would not be an "Enduro" it would be a multi stage DH event and you may as well ride a full DH rig.

The races we have attended give tons of time between stages, too much time in my opinion considering in Cairns stage times only run to 4-5 minutes max.
If I had my way the format would be as follows:
Every rider is given a start order number I.E. if there are 100 entrants you are given a number between 1 and 100, this would also be your plate number
At the start of each stage riders leave at 30 second intervals.
Transition times between stages should be such that you need to put in a bit of effort to get there, not XC race pace but time enough to make an average rider blow a bit and not dawdle or hang out in the pits chilling for a half hour.
At the start of the next stage number one goes first, 30 secs, number two, 30 secs number 3 etc.
If you do not make your allocated numeric start slot you are penalised the number of 30 second increments you missed by - simple

In order to make the format of Enduro grow I also believe that the severity of the stages needs to decrease somewhat - at least in FNQ.
This weekends round of the Rockytrail Enduro series included the world cup DH as one stage as well as several other double black diamond stages.
Due to the small number of entries we believe the severity of the stages may have scared off a lot of the locals who would have liked to have had a crack at it.
This is just personal opinion though.

 

[nathanm]

I'm doing my first enduro next month and am really looking forward to it.

My idea of an enduro is that it's not XC nor DH but is definitely gravity oriented. Liaison stages IMO should be just to get you from A-B but not allow enough time for people to service bikes, or duck off for lunch.

However the actual course should define enduro. It should be much longer than your average DH stage say 5-10 minutes and be a mix of descent heavy trail but without the technical jumps etc. It should reward riders with good technical ability as well as skill, with some fitness mixed in. If you've got full time XC or DH guys winning the course then you've got the balance wrong.

 

[outtacontrol]

In order to make the format of Enduro grow I also believe that the severity of the stages needs to decrease somewhat - at least in FNQ.
This weekends round of the Rockytrail Enduro series included the world cup DH as one stage as well as several other double black diamond stages.
Due to the small number of entries we believe the severity of the stages may have scared off a lot of the locals who would have liked to have had a crack at it.
This is just personal opinion though.

This is definitely subjective. We heard similar whispers after the final Townsville round, when we used the new double black diamond World Trail track. I think it is hard to offer a course that is harder and more technical than XC without being Downhill, without people criticizing the course for swaying too close one way or the other.
One mans XC is another mans Enduro or even Downhill. Part of the problem is what the majority of locals ride eg: Townsville is predominantly Xc, whereas Cairns is founded on Downhill, so probably reflect locals attitudes.

For the record, what were your thoughts on the Townsville round for course technicality and transitions?

 

[Yippee_Ki_YayMF]

I don't particularly agree with the poll options, so I'm not selecting any. Strikes me that the OP is from a XC background and is bias.

Anyway, the races I have competed in in Victoria have actually had small climbing parts on the actual race track. Maybe 80% DH and 20% climbing or pedaling. For the most part, it makes dedicated DH or XC bikes not the appropriate weapon of choice.

In saying that, I still like the idea of liaison stages riding to the top of the next stage. I don't want to see that timed though and become part of your overall result. You stand to make far more time on a climb that you do on a decent, and will unfairly favour XC riders. Hell, a fit roadie could borrow a mtb bike for a weekend and make enough time on everyone on the climb to still have the slowest time on the decent and take the overall win.

I do like the idea of reasonable cut of times for racers to make it to the start of the stage. A time that will require you to ride hard enough to fatigue yourself and demonstrate your overall fitness, but does NOT count towards your overall race time. However, if you do fall outside the required time, you don't get DSQ, but rather you get time penalties. If you are 5 minutes late for your start time, that 5 minutes is added to your overall.

Someone mentioned it earlier, but the format can not be unfairly geared towards only DH or XC racers.

 

[bikeyoulongtime]

This is definitely subjective.

Aye.

I've only done a couple of these races, I hope to do more...

In my eyes, the buller brakeburner is an XC race that starts higher than it finishes. It would be an awesome introduction to the idea of racing down hills. The next race I did was at Fox Creek in Adelaide. To me, this was an awesome mix of terrains, a stage for technical magicians, a stage for flat out high speed bombers who are not afraid to turn bumps into airtime, and a stage for those with big legs and lungs. The uphill was a mix of easy cruise and 'holy shit there goes a lung', so definitely would have (IMO) influenced the race, if there had been even a generous time limit on climbs. One climb was up a fire road, but it was bloody tough. No way around it. The last race was at Stromlo in Canberra - which was quite XC oriented, and in this case the climbs, or choice of routes up, definitely had potential to affect race outcomes. there was a 30 minute limit on stage to stage transitions, but no set route to the top. I would have loved to do the national series round at Stromlo as well, but had the kids for a couple of weeks while my wife was off on a well earned break.

My favourite of those three, quite different races was the fox creek event, it hit a lot of the buttons being discussed here - long-ish stages, and reasonably tough climbs. It didn't have a time limit of any kind - which I think contributed to a few folks on big bikes sweating it up hills on foot.

On the use of full on DH tracks in enduro races - I haven't seen the cairns WC track, but even racing on the full DH track at Stromlo would get my brakes pretty damn hot. I'd still race it, but definitely hit mostly c lines! I guess a convenient thing here is that we have a DH track which can be picked apart and sewn together with more or less technical bits in in.

Its a tricky balance and sure to get someone unhappy about trail choices. I think the key element is to mix up trail styles in each race, and maybe hope that the growth of this format leads to more 'inbetween' trails, a good example being the FAME/fox steep track at fox creek, or sticks and stones (down) at craigburn farm (again SA), and to a lesser extent pork barrel in Canberra... all do-able on an XC bike, but holler-worthy and quite different/fun experiences on a 140/160mm travel trail machine.

In short, you *have* to be a decently technical rider to get in the hot seat.

...and make the climbs a proper mountain bike ride. I personally think, at elite/pro level, the liaison stages should have an impact on the race - otherwise it is a multi-stage DH event. At amateur level, yeah, normal people need to be challenged but not frightened off. It's not so easy logistically, but there could always be a race class specific liaison time limit.

Anyway, that's what floats my particular boat. Thanks for the conversation, and answering my slightly inane survey

 

[noddy]

This is definitely subjective. We heard similar whispers after the final Townsville round, when we used the new double black diamond World Trail track. I think it is hard to offer a course that is harder and more technical than XC without being Downhill, without people criticizing the course for swaying too close one way or the other.
One mans XC is another mans Enduro or even Downhill. Part of the problem is what the majority of locals ride eg: Townsville is predominantly Xc, whereas Cairns is founded on Downhill, so probably reflect locals attitudes.

For the record, what were your thoughts on the Townsville round for course technicality and transitions?

Too right, I think tracks should be as mad as possible and I don't really have fun unless I have the fear of death somewhere in my ride, but I'm in the minority. My only gripe dags is that considering the 'qualifier' was in the tsv enduro, the drop should've been aswell.

 

[Rider_of_Bikes]

I personally think the current format is great. Local punters are getting out and having fun without needing to have a dietician, personal trainer, riding coach and a 5G + rig.
To all the people behind the Australian enduro race scene I tip my helmet to you. You're killing it!

 

[Gripo]

I'd prefer to ride a mtnbike "Enduro" event that was based around the good old motorcycle enduro.....and let's face it the bikes for this category are the most capable of any in mtnbiking to be able to do this.

Testing "ups" as well as downs, special test over a variety of terrain types situations .... and "transport sections" that are used for recovery not racing but have a reasonable "time limit"

All timing of sections/special tests are done on a tight average speed, the sport needs to sit down and figure this out....

Why does mtnbiking have to reinvent the term ffs.

Gravity enduro is like an event for retired DHers

 

[andy]

I'd prefer to ride a mtnbike "Enduro" event that was based around the good old motorcycle enduro.....and let's face it the bikes for this category are the most capable of any in mtnbiking to be able to do this.

Testing "ups" as well as downs, special test over a variety of terrain types situations .... and "transport sections" that are used for recovery not racing but have a reasonable "time limit"

All timing of sections/special tests are done on a tight average speed, the sport needs to sit down and figure this out....

Why does mtnbiking have to reinvent the term ffs.

Gravity enduro is like an event for retired DHers

Funny thing is you described the event that happens at your local riding area. The stage from Cheese burger all the way to Reaper has everything you described. Then the "transport" stage to Calibre etc.

Certainly not of retired Dhers, Unless they are bloody fit.

Our top 5 is usually made up of riders that would place in the top 5-10 at National level races in DH or XC depending on their bent.

You should come along and give the SRAM enduro challenge event 2 a go since it will be happening in T-bar. :third:

 

[Pete_10]

I think taking Andy's advice might change your mind here Gripo. The SEQ series had excellent variety and DH only or retired riders would definitely not have done well.

Might pay to check one out?

 

[Earlysport]

I think I'm a bit average in that I ride for fun. Not to get fit. I prefer going down, and I'm fit enough to get back to the top at a slow pace. I have never had any desire to XC race. I have a slight desire to race a DH, but then I prefer to have one bike and the risk associated with DH racing is probably too high for me.

Hence enduro sounds great, but if I have to get stupid fit to make the climbs I'm now disinterested and will continue to ride for fun.

Cheers