Pics by Joolze Dymond
Event Report: Marin Dusk till Dawn 2007
Sat 5th - Sunday 6th October 2007
Thetford Forest
Words and Pics by Joolze Dymond
Start: Close encounters of the MTB kind
Dusk Till Dawn started out in 2002 as a fun grass roots experience, no one else at that time had an enduro that started in the dark and ended just as the sun came up. Since those humble beginnings it's picked up a main sponsor in the form of Marin along with a few others such as Lumicycle, Torq and Singletrack, as well as picking up a near cult following.
Year after year this event has seen the number of competitors increase, with this year seeing an amazing 850 riders made up of soloists, teams and pairs getting ready on the start line, lights blazing.
The ethereal light of the start and finish village
Ahead them lay 11.5 miles of the sort of trails that Thetford is famous for, it may be known as being flat but easy is not a word that is ever uttered by those that have experienced the copious amount of flowing singletrack, back breaking bumps, relentless forest tracks with a few hidden gems such as the bomb holes that just keep you on your toes.
Another amazing thing about D2D is not only the fantastic laid back atmosphere you get here but also the fact that in the 6 years it's been running it has never rained. Something of a rare commodity this year! It might not have rained but at about 3 am it really felt like winter was finally on it's way, with frost and cold foggy spots making the experience other worldly at times.
Headlights and high concentration levels are de-rigeur at D2D
At 8 o'clock the race was on, with competitors being lead out of the brightly lit arena by the leading quad on a short starting loop to stop any bunching on the course itself, 10 mins later and the lead riders were through and the race was on proper as the crowds cheered them on.
One of the biggest increases in entries this year was in the solo men's category attracting riders from near and far. Probably the rider who travelled the furthest had to be Marin rider Yuri Hauswald, freshly flown in from California. Hauswald, a pro endurance rider ranking in the top 10 in the world, came over with a bit of light persuasion by friends and colleagues at the recent Interbike show in Las Vegas. As Marin sponsors the event it seemed a great opportunity and Yuri didn't need any second asking. Hauswald was delighted to be visiting England for the first time, even if it was a whistle stop trip involving 12 hours in a dark forest!
Up all night: Left: Is it dawn or dusk? Right: The end of the nightshift
Up against this strong rider was our own homegrown talent; with Mountain Mayhem solo champion Anthony White expected to feature, along with young enduro rider Matt Page.
Hauswald started off well, immersing himself fully in the D2D experience, loving the long stretches of fun singletrack, with Page close to his wheel. White started in his usual manner, or so it seemed with a puncture, something he's had for the last 3 years of entering D2D, so his race was a sprint to get back on terms with the 2 leaders. 3 laps in and it seemed that Page's challenge had come to an abrupt end, when a rider/tree interface found him sprawled on the track, lying motionless viewing more stars than were actually visible that night. Shaken but definitely not stirred he got back up and continued the chase with Hauswald now firmly in the lead.
A wave of riders blaze through the village
As the night progressed, Hauswald and Page had a ding-dong battle with the lead constantly changing, with White firmly on track behind them. Then nearly 10 hours into the race, Hauswald blew his doors off big style, his body not quite recovering from jet lag, leaving Page to carry on defending his position from the ever insistent White.
Just over 12 hours and with 13 laps to his name a bloodied and tired Matt Page came home to take the victory, with White settling for second. Close behind with just 11 secs separating them was 3rd placed Paul Errington, whose consistent pacing saw him pull back quite a few places on the final few laps.
Long exposure, something the competitors no doubt felt in the 12 hours of chilly forest action at this year's Dusk 2 Dawn.
In the women's solo race, it was promising to be a great battle with Kate Potter down to ride, with defending champ Jenn Hopkins keen to mix it with the friendly Aussie. However Potter decided to call an end to her long season early and bowed out of the event, leaving Jenn Hopkins to face a fresh challenge from Sally Bigham, Wendy Cashmore and Louise Staley to name a few of the girls ready to slog it out with the single speeder Minx rider.
Hopkins had a strong start, unlike Bigham, who admits to not being the best starter in the world. The smooth single speeder taking the trails of Thetford in her stride, Hopkins soon opened up an 8-minute lead.
Rider at the gates of dawn
However as the race ploughed on Bigham dug deep and by mid race had gained the lead and started to stretch her advantage. 12 laps later in just over 12 hours, Bigham got the win. After a season of disappointments and bad luck, she was delighted to take this one with a lap count that would have placed her 6th overall. 25 mins later Jenn Hopkins came home to take second place and was also first singlespeeder home. Wendy Cashmore, having a good first season of determined enduro riding, took 3rd with 11 laps.
While an emotional Lorraine Staley burst into tears of delight as she finished in a fantastic 4th spot after chasing hard in 5th spot all night.
Climb on Bikes duo Luke Moseley and Ben Dale rode a balanced race to rack up a strong 15 laps, despite a less than tiptop fit Dale. Dale however buried himself in making sure he didn't let his teammate down and both celebrated with a great end of season win. 2nd spot went to the Aircom international pairing of Paul Davies and Brent Collyer, who conceded a lap to Dale and Moseley, with Team PorkPie, consisting of Dennis Andrews and Chris Wheatley picking up 3rd.
Debbie Burton continued her run of good form this season with a win in the women's pairs. This time ably assisted by teammate Linda Broom, in the aptly named 2 Activ Babes, the two women racked up 12 laps. A somersault over the handlebars in one of the bomb holes did nothing to deter Burton and rumours have it that the team success was purely down to their red wine consumption.
The Flying Blind partnership of Julia Richardson and Emma Bradley also racked up 12 laps to take 2nd just 25 mins down, while 'What a Nice Pair', Claire Taylor and Kirsty Eastwood took 3rd.
Solo marathon specialist Jenn O'Connor took the decision to include her coach and partner Andy Patterson in a race and with this in mind entered the mixed pairs category.
The duo matched each other perfectly and despite thinking it would be a push over, soon realised that it was anything but. They pushed out a strong 14 laps to take the win, happy to have finished.
1 lap down were 2nd placed Fig Rolls racing; Joe Bedingfield/Niki Humphrey, with Norwood Paragon pairing of Marc Ravetto/Kaye Patton picking up 3rd.
For the second year on the trot the Whyte Racing team of Luke Smith, Billy Joe Whenman, James Taylor and Steve Heading took command of the 4 man team race, racking up 16 laps to take the win over Fat Birds Don't Fly, with Salsa Factory racing picking up 3rd all with 15 laps.
Salsa racing did better with their women's team of 4, taking the top spot once more with 12 laps. On lap 1 Salsa were down in 3rd spot and spent the rest of the race fighting to get back on terms.
They soon took the lead and stayed there, taking the win 1 lap clear of 2nd placed Red Planet Extreme Endurance. I'm sure Bob was proud when his Dirty Girls took 3rd.
One of the tightest races of the night was in the Mixed team; this included both 3 and 4 man/woman teams. XCRacer.com have had a great season with a strong team picking up podiums wherever they go. They started as they meant to go on stringing their competitors out behind them, then disaster struck, a puncture put the XCRacer team on the back foot and let rivals Team Spanky take the lead. Undeterred XCRacer deployed fast man Phil Morris, who punched out some feisty laps to regain the lead. 14 laps later and with less than 2 minutes to spare they finally came home with the win, with Team Spanky close behind in 2nd.
Cambridge CC fielding a 3-man/woman team managed an exhausting 14 laps too to take a well earned 3rd. Another close matched race at least early on was the Men's Team of 3, with Torq racing taking the early lead ahead of the RAFCC1. However a puncture on lap 8 saw Torq drop 20 important minutes a gap they never recovered from. RAFCC1 took the advantage and never diminished their lead taking the win with 14 laps, while Torq took 2nd 26mins apart. Climb On Bikes took their second podium of the day (or night) with Michael Stephens/David Gale/Paul Gibbons, racking up 13 laps to take 3rd.
So another year, another great event with nearly everyone enthusing about what a marvellous experience Dusk 2 Dawn continues to be. There were a few dampeners where some people indulged in bad karma by helping themselves to a few things that weren't theirs. Hopefully karma will win out and they will suffer the consequences.
Meanwhile many thanks to organisers Paul and Frank whose commitment to the sport is virtually un-paralled. The event has that lovely warm fuzzy feeling that you get when you're having a great time with your mates. In fact you don't mind staying up all night to make sure you don't miss any of the fun.
D2D used to traditionally mark the end of the enduro season, though these days there are plenty of events in the depth of winter for those hardy and keen enough to get stuck in. However for the majority of riders, now is the time to hang up the enduro wheels, stick the minty butt lard back on the shelf, and take time out to do some winter riding ready for the season to come. In some ways it's a sad time, saying goodbye to friends you've made over the season and probably won't see until you're in another muddy field again next year, but what a way to say goodbye. If you only ride one enduro next year make sure it's this one - you won't be disappointed
Rider Comments:
Matt Page - Solo men's winner
It was good racing with Yuri till about 3/4 O' clock when he dropped off the pace. I'm not sure what happened to him. I then heard that Anthony White was coming up fast behind me so I put my foot down a bit to stay ahead and luckily I did. On the 3rd lap I head butted a tree; I was lying out on the floor for a few seconds seeing a few more stars than were actually out in the night! It's a real war of attrition. I came close to giving up a few times, especially when I hit that tree. But I kept going and enjoyed it.
Whyte Team - 4 man team winners
Brilliant to take the win for the 2nd year in a row. The course is great too, much more interesting, the straights are a little bit longer, I'm not sure how they do it but they keep finding lots more room for the course in the forest, it was brilliant we really enjoyed it. It seems to really suit us here, it's good to do a good ride for our sponsors and take the victory. The team worked well together, we've been working together at various events so we know each other's strengths and weaknesses.
Xcracer.com - 4 person mixed team winners
Fantastic result for the team. Great end to the season, which has been really good for the team, we've had in total throughout the season something like 40 podiums, we've had two bronze medals and 2 bronze medals at various national and regional championships and this result is just a fitting end to our season really. The team rode really well, we had James (Hampshire) the ringer in. Everything went okay we had a good strategy, single laps all the way through, the only problem we had was a puncture that Charlie had that lost us a couple of minutes. I think right from the outset we were leading and then the puncture dropped us back to second, then Phil, who was blasting around about 5 mins faster than the rest of us, pulled us back into the lead. So most of the credit goes to Phil for his incredibly quick laps and the rest of the team for keeping it going. Shame about the generator though, Phil does seem to be making a habit of this! First he lost his lights at 24/12 and now someone has walked off with his generator here.
Climb On Bikes - Men's pairs
Luke Moseley - Yeah a nice end of season win for us, very satisfying.
It was nice to race with Ben (Dale) a bit sad that 'P' (Paula
Moseley) couldn't be involved as well but it was really nice to come away with the win. We both worked hard, we suffered and we worked hard. So to win is fantastic. I think both of us thought we didn't want to let the other down, so you always drive it on thinking I bet Ben's going quicker than me.
Ben Dale - Yeah I'm quite pleased with that, I haven't done too much this season what with one thing or another so I was pleased to at least get round. It was a good bit of training! It was emergency training as well after the last couple of weeks. It was alright in the end. I had a bit of a bad patch, Luke sorted me out, gave me a bit of a rest and I got out for one more lap. I think I started a bit fast.
Sally Bigham - Ladies Solo
Very happy with that, thrilled to get the win. I didn't actually feel the cold out there I just suffered from a numb foot. I had a really bad start and thought I really need to learn to get a good start, I do it all the time just sort of end up at the back and spend all my time making my way up the field. Yeah it was tough and yeah I'm speechless really, my luck's changed, I've had a lot of bad luck lately, but this one came good for me.
2 Activ Babes - Ladies pairs
Debbie Burton - This was better than the marathon I did at Coed-y- Brenin the other week, having someone to ride with made it much better. I had a horrible bomb hole incident early on but that didn't stop us. It was really good getting the win, I couldn't have done it without Linda though she's good at distances.
Linda Broom - Debs has been doing a lot more racing than me, mountain bike racing, I've been doing adventure racing. I have been riding with her all year, so it was great to pair up and for us to get the win.
Patterson Training - Mixed pairs
Jenn O'Connor - That was good fun, gave Andy a chance to get out and do some racing rather than passing up bottles for a change. I thought it was going to be a walk in the park; 6 hours of riding with rests in-between, but it was actually really hard work.
We did the same number laps each and we were lapping roughly the same time, Andy might have been a minute or 2 faster than me but we did pretty well.
Andy Patterson - I was wrecked by my 3rd lap I was in a world of pain, God bless Ibuprofen that's all I can say! I don't think we'll be making a habit of this pairs racing lark, it's a bit of fun but it's too long for me, I just like 2 hours tops.
RAFCC1 - 3 Man Team
That was really good, a really cool course, really good fun but pretty hard work all the way round but yes we kept a steady 50 mins all the way round so it went well. It was won on the energy products our rivals Torq sold us!
Salsa Factory Team - 4 Women's team
Yeah we're all very happy we all had a great race and everyone did really well. It was a good course a really good course, we all enjoyed it. At the end of the 1st lap we were in 3rd so we fought our way back. We just went out and rode every lap like a time trial, it seemed to work!