Enduro specialist James Shirley has been racking up the road miles recently with a trip out to Europe for the Megavalanche, The Mountain of Hell and some French enduro races.
James is kept looking good by IXS Sports Division and steering straight with Answer Pro Taper bars, stems and grips.
Here's Jamesey Boy's round up of events as they happened:
I set off from the croft with my friend Emma Holgate whose father lived up the hill in Inverroy. There was only enough space in the van for one bike each so I took my Five which is the perfect all round cycling machine. In my bag I had a helmet, passport, phone, wallet and enough Bawbags to see me through the next two and a half weeks. We trucked down to Dover and just managed to catch our ferry to Dunkirk.
The journey was going smoothly until halfway between Dijon and Lyon when the fan belt snapped off. Luckily I had a spare and fitted it without too much hassle. In the process I noticed that the water pump pulley bearings were a bit shoogly so I didn’t know how long the new belt would last before it got spat off as well… Turns out it wasn’t long at all. About 30 seconds in total. Balls. We were on the side of the motorway and it was getting dark. Soon enough a highway security van pulled up and phoned a recovery truck for us. We got picked up and towed through a little gate off the highway to a garage in some random little farming town.
Still not totally sure where we were we bedded down for the night and got up the next day to find that the guys in the garage didn’t speak English and we didn’t speak very good French. It transpired that the van would take about 5 days to fix so we arranged with the breakdown insurance people for us to hire out a van and continue with our journey. On arrival at the hire place we discovered that our so called hire van turned out to be a Renault Modus: a tiny little matchbox car. Half the contents of the van were squeezed into the boot of the midget mobile and we were on our way again.
By the time we arrived in Alpe d’huez it was late and we had nowhere to sleep so we started trying to break into the abandoned lifty sheds that were dotted across the hill side. Eventually we got lucky with a little shed, or chalet as I liked to call it, next to the bins on the edge of the village. We lay down the foam bedding and made ourselves a wee home that any real hobo would be proud of. At 7am we were woken by the laughter of a delivery man who had found us in the shed. He dropped off some cheese and meat for a local business and left us to snooze as he closed the door behind him.
When we woke up for real, the sun was shining and it was time to get our lift passes and get some practice done for the Vaujany Enduro in 2 days time. The course was awesome. Four hours of proper alpine adventure along walkers’ paths, over open hillside and down a few flowing sections of bike specific trails.
Seeding took place on Sunday afternoon on a stage which was to be used as the last stage for Monday’s race. It started above town and took riders along a rocky, wall lined path between some fields and down into Vaujany itself across closed roads to the finish in the village square. Joe Barnes took 3rd place and I was just 0.3 seconds back in 4th.
That night, the landship crew of Joe, Liam and Ruari joined us down in Vaujany. Emma and I decided to sleep, this time, in the tourist info hallway in a corner next to some cupboard doors. The next morning we were rudely awoken by an angry looking cleaning lady who wanted access to her equipment inside said cupboard. Up bright and early we were ready for some serious racing action.
The start of stage one was at the mid-station of the only gondola out of Vaujany. It was a fast section that made use of a long downhill fire road with bits of bike track that cut off and rejoined again. The 2nd stage started off quite flat and then dropped steeply down the hill side with some tight switchbacks at the end. Riders cycled back to the gondola where they ascended to the very top this time. It was a long traverse to the start of stage 3 and due to bad timing with the gondola most people missed their start times and the stage was cancelled. It would have been a good one though because the course was set so that you could pick any line you wanted across a rocky open hillside.
Avalanche Enduro 2011
The results can be found on the following link:
www.avalanchecup.com/photos/pdf/675.pdf
I finished 1st place senior and 2nd overall behind Joe. Liam had a big crash in the first stage and came 11th. Ruari should have been 7th but he managed to pick up a mysterious 1 minute time penalty which dropped him down to 15th. Emma rode well beating Lyndsey Carson to first place.
After a successful day it was time for rest. We set up our beds underneath Joe’s easy up outside his van and got some shut eye. The next day we got a phone call from the garage and the van was ready to be collected.
That evening we set off in high spirits looking forward to a good night’s sleep in the van. When we arrived, some 3 or 4 hours later, we found the van locked up inside the garage compound. With no way in we were forced to find some temporary accommodation for yet another night! It was a warm, clear night so we drove out of town and found a nice little field. Sleeping under the stars was a unique experience. I think Emma was pretty fed up with recent sleeping arrangements by now but I rather enjoyed it. I slept really well until the rain woke me up at 5am! Luckily, the rain wasn’t heavy and I continued to doze until opening time at the garage. We transferred our stuff back into the van, dropped off the car and headed back for the Alps.
On Thursday, all five of us did a team practice of the full Mega track. In the scree at the top, I got a bit out of shape and ended up riding with a foot unclipped and with my bum sitting on the top tube. The front wheel then found a conveniently shaped hole which sent me flying over the bars and put an end to my riding for the day.After a healthy dose of painkillers I set off for my qualifying run on Friday morning. I was in one of the early races and I set off in good time. Unfortunately I was greeted at the bottom of the lift by an enormous queue of super keen idiots who weren’t due at the top of the hill for another few hours! I pushed my way past the majority of the crowd but still ended up missing my spot on the front row. My bad start was made even worse by the fact that everyone else seemed to jump the gun by a good 3 seconds or so. Never the less, I pressed on and worked my way to 6th place which put me on the 2nd row for the real thing.
Sunday soon came and my ribs were still a bit sore. The girls told me that the snow was soft for their race on Saturday so I lined up for the race on the rocks on the right hand side of the track. However, the sun was hidden behind the clouds on Sunday morning which meant the snow stayed hard and fast. Therefore, my tactics didn’t pay off and I got a bad start. I also rode on the cautious side because I didn’t fancy having another crash. After the first few corners I had already lost a whole load of positions and found myself stuck behind a queue of traffic on the single track traverse. All the way along I could see Liam on his bright yellow bike not far in front. He had also had a bad start with someone taking him out in the first 5 seconds of racing. It was pretty good fun following him down as we cut our way back up through the pack. Although the race didn’t go according to plan, I still enjoyed it and finished 47th out of approximately 1800 male entrants.On Tuesday I hung out with Mark, Lyndsey (who came 17th with a broken arm) and Emma by the lake in Allemont. Emma was standing in the water up to her knees but was complaining about the water being too cold for a swim. Being the comedy genius that I am, I thought it would be funny to try and splash her with a big stone. As I let go of the rock, some of the muscles in/around my ribs also let go with a satisfying pop. With my freshly acquired cripple status it was a good time to move up the valley to Les Deux Alpes. For the rest of the week I hung out by the lake whilst the others played on their bikes and raced the Mountain of Hell.
I am now back at home writing this ridiculously long report/story as I wait for things to fix. I might go for a gentle road ride tomorrow and hopefully I’ll be back on the trails again soon…
Till the next time,
James
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