The Danbury Bike Festival: "Mud, Sweat and Gears"

Sunday 20 July saw the inaugural Mud, Sweat and Gears Enduro held as part of the Danbury Mountain Bike Festival at Danbury Outdoors Activity Centre near Chelmsford, Essex.

Mountain Bike Enduro Event

 Sunday 20 July 08  -  Danbury Outdoors (near Danbury Park)

 Click here for Results [315kb]

With the torrential rain that made an unwelcome appearance at the previous day's charity fundraising ride absent, the scene was set for a good afternoons racing on a new fast flowing course which tapped into much of what the Danbury Outdoors' elevated position above Chelmsford has to offer.

Staff of the Outdoor Activity centre had worked hard in recent weeks to create a course consisting of twisting woodland single track, fast hard-packed trails, tough lonely climbs and a bomb-hole section to test the nerve. There was even a section through their BMX circuit to test the riders' high-speed manoeuvring skills.

Racing began at one o'clock with an under-12 race on a shortened lap around the start/finish field. Tristan Price surged into an early lead and stayed there for the whole race to win by a large margin, whilst Charlotte Porter dominated the girls' event. More importantly, everyone enjoyed themselves and all deserved the prizes they received for finishing.

At two o'clock all other categories started with senior and junior entrants choosing between a one or two hour enduro. The one hour enduro was open to everyone aged 12 or over and saw Peter Cowen and David Nicholls both completing five laps but with Peter crossing the line with a two-minute lead. Christine Lyons won the women's category, and Juvenile, Youth and Junior events were won respectively by Hector Lyons, Adam Lines and Edward Starr. Hopefully we'll have some girls taking part in the younger divisions next year.

The two-hour enduro saw a race long battle develop between five riders who quickly pulled out quite a lead over the rest of the field. Sigma Sports' Anthony Shippard, who looked very strong, took on the pace in a group that included Shaun Hurrell (Glendene CC) and Richard Craven (Ford CC) closely followed by Rob Purcell (unattached) and James Price (PCA Ciclos Uno). The at times punishing nature of the course took its toll on Anthony who retired around the halfway mark leaving Shaun Hurrell to set the pace. Behind Shaun, James overtook Rob and managed to open up a small gap in his attempt to stay in touch with the leaders. Things stayed this way until the penultimate lap when a strong late surge by Rob saw him retake third position. At about this time Shaun Hurrell who had led for most of the race sadly began to suffer with back spasms and could only limit the damage as he slipped back into second then third and fourth positions allowing Richard Craven to take the well deserved win with Rob and James second and third respectively. Elaine Unsworth rode strongly to take first place in the women's division and other award winners were John Cordery (1^st Male Vet) and Stephanie Wyer (1^st Female Vet).

Basildon Timber won the Team Challenge Trophy closely followed by Danbury Elite.  The stage looks set for an exciting rematch in 2009!

The event was organised Danbury Outdoors, Chelmsford Borough Council and Little Havens Hospice with support from Geoff Fletcher of Trailnet, founder of the Havoc on the Hill race, a similar event that takes place this year on Sunday 21 September 2008.