SCOTT 24 hour 2010

[gixer7]

Swoosher,

Having a strong light on the handlebars is not cheating. They specify a minimum wattage only - if you have a mega lumen spotty on their it's not against the rules. I'd say it would be encouraged.

I'd definitely recommend a good light on helmet & bars.

Glad you enjoyed your introduction to 24hr racing.

 

[Swoosher]

Swoosher,

Having a strong light on the handlebars is not cheating. They specify a minimum wattage only - if you have a mega lumen spotty on their it's not against the rules. I'd say it would be encouraged.

I'd definitely recommend a good light on helmet & bars.

Glad you enjoyed your introduction to 24hr racing.

Lol - yeah I meant I needed to have one there (I thought that was in the rules?) and I didn't have anything good (borrowed the helment ones) so I just put on something I found in the garage)

will be back for more 24hr fun another time

 

[Swoosher]

Every time you go onto a new trail, on the sign in the bottom left hand corner there was a colour: Green: means easy trail, blue: medium, black: hard. They should have said that in the briefing. We only had greens and blues: Shadys, Blackhill climb and Seamores was blue, the rest were green i think.

I don't think there are too many places in Aust where the trails are this well signposted however. I was a bit disappointed that Pork Barrel is only a blue. I rode it all on Friday, including the A-lineover the left side of the rock, but that was the limit of my ability, so i'm not keen on attempting a Black trail.

That helps for next time - like skiing I guess. Thanks. No blacks for me!

 

[Big Wheels]

For lights I run 2 sets of Ayups, they are the business. One set on the bars, one on the helmet. I have tried some pretty bright lights in the past and I tend to think Ayups are the better. Reason being, there is such a thing as too bright in my opinion. Having the light blow out the shadows in the track making it all look flat is a bad thing, having the light be so bright that it lights up the dust in the air is also a bad thing... it makes it look 'foggy' if that makes sense.

Try and get another set of Ayups so that you are not only running some on your helmet. I would probably be unimpressed if I had one set too.

Hey, my first 24hr; actually my first race ever (possibly not the best idea but I'm sure everything else from here will seem easy!) and my first real hit up using lights at night. I've done a few social rides but while under the pump and suffering I really found it hard to focus. Sweat in eyes probably don't help either. I have ay-ups on helmet and bars. I turned the bars off at one point because all the flashing of lights across the track was distracting. Do other riders run just one set on the helmet or do more experienced/pro riders run both? or is it just preference, and I may have found mine?

Thanks for everyones posts. Most enlightening....shit, sorry.

 

[matt36415]

HID Technologies - I raced solo and used a 'Quad Lumin8r' on the helmet - supposed to be 1000lumen but the killer is that he makes a battery that powers that for 7+ hours on high. I also had a 700 lumen 'triple' on the bars and I didn't see any night on the course at all. People were pulling over 30 metres before I caught them to let me pass because they thought I was right on their tail.

The guy who makes them is in QLD - his service - making up extra batteries - bar mounts... even advice on the phone has been fantastic.

 

[dig2107]

i agree - i have HID lumin8rs as well... they were awesome.... what a top weekend....and for once it wasn't cold in Canberra Happy days

 

[WolfCreekPsycho]

I was also running just over 1800+ lumens between bar and helmet.... you simply cannot have too much light, especially with the prices the way they are at the moment.

Bigwheels, you can get away with either bar or helmet, but I think most people prefer both, I certainly do.
For me the key is having a good flood beam on the bars and then a spot beam on the helmet. Having a flood on the bars takes away that "flashing" you were finding annoying.

i agree - i have HID lumin8rs as well... they were awesome.... what a top weekend....and for once it wasn't cold in Canberra Happy days

Go on... you can boast a little about your achievements.... well done on your teams podium

 

[frensham]

I just wanted to add a big thumbs up to Mountain Biking Australia Magazine. To get the latest issue free in the showbag is great. To get one for each member of the team is simply awesome. Maybe AMB (the other magazine) might think twice about giving away a single copy (per team) of a year old magazine at the Mont......

 

[frensham]

Do other riders run just one set on the helmet or do more experienced/pro riders run both? or is it just preference, and I may have found mine?

Thanks for everyones posts. Most enlightening....shit, sorry.

I run bar and helmet. On my second night lap my helmet light ran out of batteries with about 3 km to go. The difference was huge. I could no longer look down the track to see what was coming up. This had the effect of forcing me to drop a little speed as some of the corners came at me real fast without the helmet light.

 

[Tacky Monster]

In our team of 6, we had 4 flats on bikes running tubed tyres and none with those running tubeless. Same last year. It would be great to know a collective figure for the hundreds who rode. In the overall event the time lost with tube changes came close to missing out on a first place.

Now I know tubeless are not invincible but having run them now for a couple of years we have only suffered 1 flat (with LUST tyre). This weekend ran Aspens on stans rims - fantastic.

Our team podiumed in the mixed sixes and flats cost us the win... One rider running tubes flatted the rear at the bottom of TV and then again later on the same lap costing him about 15 minutes. The other running tubeless with sealant lost approx 5-10 minutes while the sealant did its job (had to stop and pump up tyres 3 times). Those tyres did another full lap without incident.

 

[pinkbike]

I ran tubeless (Schwalbe UST tyres on mavic tubeless rims) for the first time, and also got my first ever mountain biking flat... put a tube in the rear at the bottom of terminal velocity (along with 50 million other people) and didn't have any more issues. Last year I ran tubes and everyone else on my team had tubeless ... I was the only person who didn't flat. With tubeless maybe I was running them too low for the rocks...

I thought the organisation this year lacked somewhat. The change of briefing time, failure to mention in briefing the fact that we merged with the solo course at a couple of points and were required to give way (instead there was an excited vollie yelling "slow down, give way" at the bottom of the down hill track and I had no idea what was going on), failure to mention vehicle access and none of the vollies seemed to know when we would be able to get vehicles in after the event. It was pretty crap no being able to drive even remotely close to camp on Friday afternoon... When we turned up we asked at rego for course maps and info on transition - as the earlier maps had team transition wrong - and no one knew where we could get that info... turns out it was in the bag but no one could tell us that - just gave us Mullets phone number but I'm sure he had more important things to do than help us decide where to put up our tent so we didn't ring him . Sign posting on the track lacked a bit, a few more bits of bunting and some reflective stuff would help. Especially as some larger teams you get riders doing their first lap at night and reflective warning about corners coming down through camp at high speed would have been good.

But on the upside I thought the track was pretty awesome during the day (although punishing at night - definitely much harder than last year), definitely techy and hard for a 24 hour but I really enjoyed it even if I did leave skin behind. Most volunteers were awesome (a few were a bit worked up and militant - esp the ones slowing ppl down on the crit track because of the injured rider and ambulance... chill guys!), overall the event was pretty awesome, thumbs up for the designated camping by team size - pairs and threes need to be closer to transition and it worked well.

Overall I thought the track was probably a bit hard for night riding, even if you could ride it, chances were the person in front if you would stop and so you'd have to stop too. Lots of large rocks seemed to come loose and end up in the middle of the track too.

 

[Neon]

i picked up about 20 tubes, 4 tyre levers, and a pair of lights of stromlo today.
what a heist!

 

[Hooch]

from the course director mullet.
for stromlo 36psi is the best pressure to run.

 

[Jackstack]

from the course director mullet.
for stromlo 36psi is the best pressure to run.

That must be why I didn't get any flats, that's exactly what pressure I was running. That or the solo's course wasn't as rough as the team's course.

 

[frensham]

I thought the organisation this year lacked somewhat. The change of briefing time, failure to mention in briefing the fact that we merged with the solo course at a couple of points and were required to give way (instead there was an excited vollie yelling "slow down, give way" at the bottom of the down hill track and I had no idea what was going on), failure to mention vehicle access and none of the vollies seemed to know when we would be able to get vehicles in after the event. It was pretty crap no being able to drive even remotely close to camp on Friday afternoon... When we turned up we asked at rego for course maps and info on transition - as the earlier maps had team transition wrong - and no one knew where we could get that info... turns out it was in the bag but no one could tell us that - just gave us Mullets phone number but I'm sure he had more important things to do than help us decide where to put up our tent so we didn't ring him .

I think it is quite obvious that the regular Scott 24 Hour came well behind the Solo World Champs in priority. I agree with your comments on organisation. I arrived for the team briefing at 10:55 only to find the briefing at an end. No-one had a clue as to why it was changed and when I asked how we were supposed to know, the answer was "we announced it over the PA". When I said that 80% of the camping area cannot hear the PA, I simply got a shrug of the shoulders..... The camping area signage bore little resemblance to the maps, we set up camp in a 4 to 6 person teams area according to the map only to then see a sign stating Solo Riders Only, that someone had to break the lock on the gate to let us out, the ridiculous cut-off time of 2:00pm on Friday (why???) to get your gear into the campsite, the portaloos that lasted 30 minutes before becoming unusable etc etc, I could go on. None of this really matters though because we all had a great time riding our bikes.

 

[Hooch]

the lock wasn't broken, mullet opened the back gate after the sweeps finished the course and officially closed the race, about 1410 to allow people out. the official brief said 4pm but talking to him at 1330 they had sent the sweeps out at 1230 to make sure all riders where in, once that was done people could leave.
So be nice to the officials, Mullet bent over backwards to help everyone and was running around most of the night dealing with all the shite that went on. I chatted to him a couple of times both in the afternoon and near midnight and he was still going making sure the course was safe and that problem areas where dealt with, as well as making sure that injured riders where taken care off.
as course director he had one hell of a job to do and I think from the feedback he did it well.

 

[ozdirtboy]

as course director he had one hell of a job to do and I think from the feedback he did it well.

absolutely! another awesome event

 

[rangie]

res as my handlebar light, and my 14 year old son had three. For my second night lap I pinched one of his Trustfires, so I had a back to back comparison between the two. Both my son and I did fine on our night laps with just two trustfires each. If I can't fix my Light & Motion, I'm just going to buy a couple more Trustfires. For $15 each you just cant go wrong with these things.

this is a good option for occasional riding, and works just as well as ayus and others for single laps, commuting.

 

[ozdirtboy]

Finally – the thing I was most afraid of was being past by faster (angry) riders. I should have had no fear as they were totally professional and friendly at all times. Most passed with ease and were patient. I only held one person up down a really technical part and then the climb up afterwards. He probably had to sit behind me for 2 minutes or so and then when he finally sped past at lightning speed said thanks and good luck rather than cursing – so I think that was a good introduction to the sport. I also managed to pass people with ease...but then again I was happy to get a rest and wait for a good spot!

was that sunday mid morning over the back of the mtn where you go down a techy narrow part to a left hander over a wooden bridge at the bottom then hard climb up the rocks?? if so that was me

 

[ozdirtboy]

Anyone top 60?

Garmin says 60.1 as a top speed on my own, but i did get a draft assisted 67 on my 3rd lap! doesn't take long to blast down there, but you still have plenty of time to ponder your bikes "reliability" lol