Niki wins first round of Thetford Winter series

Niki had a blinding start with a 4 minute lead over Trek sponsored Debbie Burton. Niki continued a fast pace to win, anyone want to sponsor her?? Joe was first through on lap 1 but as usual he went off too fast and finished a respectable 16th. John came 27th in his race without the aid of energy gels, well done John ;)

Dusk Til Dawn 2007

With the biggest team entry in the whole event Fig Rolls were well placed to do well. That said no one expected Killer to come 9th in the Mens Solo especially considering he didn't feel like doing it beforehand...

Another amazing result was Duncans 17th in the same Solo category, nothing special you might think but out of 127 riders and on a SINGLESPEED! surley one of the performances of his life. Matthew was 70th in Solo on his old rigid Klein despite his tyre rolling off the rim on the first lap



Niki and Joe were 2nd in the Mixed Pairs so held up the long standing tradition of Fig Rolls Racing making the podium at Dusk Til Dawn.



Our other teams (Yes - there are lots of us Fig Roll Nutters) were 44th in mens pairs and 38th in mens Team categories - well done to all and Bring on the Thetford Winter series!

Results

Race report

Sleepless In The Saddle 2007 - Fig Rolls just miss out on podium

After a close race where we swapped positions with the Salsa MTB team and Banjo Cycles Race Team, Fig Rolls eventually finished in 4th place. Lying in 5th by 6 mins with 4 laps to go Joe and Killer rode one on, one off to close the gap and eventually take Banjo cycles on the last lap. We missed out on the podium by only 8 minutes in the end. A return to form for Killer saw him take Joe's fastest lap time crown and special mention to Duncan who's eppy at Joe for missing the handover nearly woke the entire campsite at 3.30am!



Fig Rolls "B" team were 50th out of the 83 teams in the Mixed category after one of the their riders pulled out at short notice.

results

Pictures and full report here

Killer talks us through how he cut up the Banjo cycles rider half way around the last lap.

Apparently the belly is something to do with enhanced lung capacity pushing the stomach out... at least that's what my cousin used to say!

Fig Rolls Dominate Mixed Team Podium at 24/12

With 16 riders (Plus Griff the dog) in total it was the largest turnout for the Fig Rolls racing team ever.
Mixed Team A (Niki, Killer, Duncan and Joe) set the pace up front after a storming first few laps before being overwhelmed by the Endura team to finish 2nd with 22 laps after 24 hours. Mixed Team B were not far behind and took 3rd overall with 20 laps. The "Just for Fun" team managed a good result - 10 laps and rode through the night despite a few problems with broken lights and spirits...

Race results and Report here

For more photos see the Fig Rolls Racing Group on facebook

Bring on SITS! 2 Teams confirmed so far!

Mountain Mayhem 2007 - Eastnor Park - UK

An now, in complete contrast to the Canadian sun and dust, Figrolls Racing (UK) attended the 10th Mountain Mayhem 24 Hour race at Eastnor Deer park, Malvern Hills....

Killer rode solo and Duncan, Joe, Niki, Matthew and newcomer Steve rode as a mixed 5.

After getting there early we managed to bag a camping spot next to the course, handy for quick pit stops. Killer arrived with promised marquee which when combined with mats gazebo made for a great base. It was soon filled with junk (sorry Killer - spare parts/incomplete bikes)

Duncan soon arrived and began the last minute process of building his bike while the rest of us ate loads of pasta and watched the fireworks.


Breakfast Duncan style - something to do with sardines containing lots of salt to stop cramp... sounds fishy to me



In the race Steve got us off to a great one in the Le mans style start and the team settled in to the regular routine of taking turns at the laps. Some fast laps were got in and Killer was doing well (up to the top 20/ 130) but then the rain set in... The course soon deteriorated into a mud bath in places but despite the rain was fun to ride apart from the monster Kenda climb.



Come morning the rain had dried out but the mud had become stickier and by now the lap times had increased from 45 mins to over an hour.



By the end the mixed team had come 18th out of 127 teams and Killer was 13th!



All in all, very tiring... but great fun!

Ride the Whitehorse

At the weekend Paul and I flew up to Whitehorse in the Yukon Territory to race bikes in 24 daylight... sounds pretty good eh? First, I need to thank some people. Dave - who took all the photos, Andrea - who not only raced but let us mess up her house and eat all her food for four days, Mike - who joined a team for a 24 hour race with two wierdo English guys from Vancouver who he'd never met and wanted to call the team "Fig Rolls Racing", Robin and everyone else who played a part in looking after us on race day.

So, mountain bike racing in the Canadian Arctic... that's got to be a bad idea, right? You'd be surprised how much of a good idea it really is. First, forget the polar bears and the icebergs. It's summer time so were're talking dry, dusty trails and sunshine to midnight. It got a bit gloomy for a couple of hours from about 3am, but lights are banned anyway... so who cares? When I came out to start my 2am lap there was a pretty enthusiastic party in full swing in the timing area with lycra-clad XC racers dancing around. You really can't argue with that.

Racing machinery ranged from boutique singlespeed 29ers (brought in by Alaskans mainly) to a guy on a Specialized Demo 9... which I imagine would have been lucky to weigh in at much under 50 pounds. The best bike was the organiser-provided "Vomit Comet", a pink spray painted Miyata shopping bike, converted to singlespeed with an inflatable man attached to the back. The privilege for piloting this vehicle around the 17km course was each lap counting double. I got chased by it on the singletrack for a while, there's not much better motivation than that to pedal harder.

Lap times ranged from 36 minutes for the XC superheroes to 1 hour plus, the course gave plenty of opportunities for big-ring enthusiasts to blast along fire road and equally a long stretch of twisty-turny singletrack that was honestly more fun than should be allowed. Mechanicals were few, Mike got a puncture and I had a comedy crash overcooking a dusty berm... but otherwise the gear and the bodies all held together.

The rules for finishing were a little different to the UK events like Sleepless... if you didn't make it back through the line by 24:00, you lap didn't count. The guy who came through at 24:00:46 could have been said to be a little disappointed... but he got a big cheer at least.

We got a total of 26 laps, putting us 4 laps behind the winners of the (surprisingly competitive) mixed 4 person team category. We would have got a better overall position if we had entered the 8 person team category (with just the 4 of us). Them's the breaks I guess. The winning team of 8 guys got something ridiculous like 34 laps but 26 was just fine for us.

Results will allegedly be published on the icycle sport website at some point. You can read about the event on the 24 hours of light website. If you happen to be swinging by Canada's great white north around solstice time next year, I recommend you check it out.