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Day One:
the Merida TransWales A-Go-Go The first Merida TransWales is alive. The blood is flowing and the newest challenge in the British mountain biking quiver is well and truly underway, reports Matt Skinner in the first of his daily reports… Just after 9am on Sunday under somewhat overcast and dull skies with little sign that the looming cloud cover would break, 240 starters coming from as far a field as Japan and continental Europe, saddled up in the mid-Wales town of Builth Wells – the spiritual home of the Merida TransWales’ close relative, the Merida 100 MTB-Marathon Series – to get the inaugural event under way. Easing their legs into the first of the seven stages; riders settled into their pace early on, with many treating the first day as just another Merida 100 marathon, reserving their mental reserves for the long haul linking stages yet to come. The Merida TransWales is a mountain bike event with a difference: taking its cues from the epic Trans-Alps and Trans-Rockies point-to-point races that cross the Alps and the Canadian Rockies, it mixes marathon linking stages – varying from 33km to 90km – mixed in with a selection of special stages on the cream of Wales’ purpose built trail centres for singletrack speed shakes: Coed y Brenin, Nant-y-Arian, the Cli-Machx trail, and the new Cwm-y-Rhayader will all see riders taking on rally style time trials in pairs or in relay. All in all this uniquely epic challenge will demand riders complete a total of 543km (338miles) of riding with 15,990m (52,460m) of climbing; making the TransWales – on paper – tougher than the its Canadian namesake, the TransRockies. The opening linking stage’s course climbed up on-going moorland flanks before traversing lonesome singletrack and dropping into the flooded Elan Valley with a screech of brakes. 3 hours and 31km in after the pass taking them over Carnau at 537ft and over the top via some boggy hike-a-bike stints, the trail morphed into flowing singletrack and then fire road that dropped quickly into the beautiful flooded Elan Valley. From there it was like riding through a little Switzerland as the geography changed with every crank stroke, from glacial majesty to lush forested escarpments, and riddled with gnadgery and grin inducing singletrack that carved sinuously down the contours. As the pace settled, the field swept 80km through the heart of Wales to the first stop of the event just shy of Nant-y-Arian, near Aberystwyth. Day two: the competition begins in earnest  The
second day of the Merida TransWales challenge dawned, bringing with
it the first true test of speed, endurance and bike handling that
is the first special stage; the honour of which fell to Nant-y-Arian,
near Machynlleth. The course itself was a slightly modified version
of the Summit trail that would last for 16km total distance and would
rack up 600m of climbing, with much of that height gain coming in
one heady dose. Slated as a team relay time trial, the special stage saw the first rider of the team handing over to the second at the 8km mark. On the Summit trail that just happens to be after a generally downhill profile with gradual climbs to a mirror image reverse for the second rider and one long, grinder of a fire road climb before the final descent for some sweetly sweeping singletrack pay off. Some teams slotted their fittest (or most masochistic) rider into the second stint whilst other simply flipped a coin for it to let the Fates decide. The riders went off at 30 second intervals from 9.30am this morning, with riders averaging around 50 minutes to cover the full 16km course with its switchbacking and smooth singletrack.  Fitness
and finesse proved the order of the day as the pairing of Heather
Dawe and Kim Hurst of SheCycles.com took the lead in the Buff Women’s
Category; Ryan Bevis and Jonathon Pugh of Mojo Suspension blazed the
trail in the Hayes Disc Brake Men’s Category; Renell and Steven
Brennan of MTB-Marathon.co.uk stamping their early authority onto
the High5 Mixed Category; the pairing of Tony Gray and Mike Hayward
of X-Cumbria Cyclists riding solidly into the lead of Saris Veteran
Category; Sally Lee of Team Endurance leading the Mud Dock Women’s
Solo Category, and Phillip Spencer of Bikin’ Cyprus International
leading the men’s solo.After a spot of lunch at the eco-friendly Nant-y-Arian visitor centre the riders set off on the 33km linking stage from Nant-y-Arian to Machynlleth. Climbing out of the forest and onto the Plynlimon range, skirting the rocky drovers road along the Nant-y-Moch reservoir before kicking up steeply into the woods once more and high along the Creigiau Bwlch Hyddgen ridge with stunning views towards the River Dovey. The descent from this 529m high ridge dropped immediately down a steep and loose slate chute that was a test of tyres, tubeless systems, and both nerve and sphincter, dropping the riders skittering through the woods and into tonight’s home, the Machynlleth leisure centre. Machynlleth itself, once the capital of Wales, is the British capital of alternative technology. It isn’t short of a few pubs either, which the riders made full use of to calm nerves and soothe legs before the third linking stage on Tuesday morning. The riders will be riding out from theto the Coed-y-Brenin vistor centre72km and 2,300m of climbing away. After that behemoth is under the belts of the riders, the second special stage will kick off as a night team time trial to see if Monday’s special stage winners can retain their leaders jerseys or if a mechanical can put a spanner in the works. It’s anyone’s guess. Let battle commence.
The race gets interesting as
the second special stage takes place at night on the legendary Red
Bull and Karrimor trails at Coed y Brenin, reports Matt Skinner
in the third of his daily reports…
It may have rained, and it may
have been the toughest day yet but it’s also been received
as the best linking stage so far, says Matt Skinner in the fourth
of his daily reports… Rider Profile Fellowship of the Granny Ring Martin Zeppler and his Rocky Mountain ETSX-70 Kimberly Hills and her Specialized Stumpjumper FSR Mixed team  The
Fellowship of the Granny Ring don’t hail from any far flung
fantasy world filled with orcs and a wizard wielding immense gravitas.
Instead they come from Poole in Dorset and are attacking the Merida
TransWales for the shear hell of it; by their own admission, Martin
and Kim, are here “just to see if we can do it.” They’ve
been battling through the worst the weather has been throwing at them,
not to mention the gruelling 3,000m climbing of today’s stage,
and have emerged grinning from ear to mud covered ear. “Today’s
stage was brilliant because it was so challenging,” said Martin,
“it’s real mountain biking: physically and technically
tough. You want it challenging and it’s been that today. We’re
loving it.”The whole Merida TransWales idea was put into their minds whilst at the Ruthin Merida 100 last year – where the concept of the Merida TransWales itself was announced – and after a few hesitations they were set. “We initially said no way,” Martin remembers, “but then when we thought about it we thought it was do-able challenge so we formed the Fellowship of the Granny Ring.” The fellowship has been enduring hardships and seemingly never ending hardship and, despite not yet making it back on the linking stages in time for the cut offs, they’ve always made it back in time for bed and a well-earned rest although, as Kim notes, “We’re coming in and we’ve got something left – we haven’t yet finished knackered at all.” But it’s a marathon, not a sprint and they’re both here for the fun times – it’s a holiday, not a gruelling period of torture, and with the sun bursting out to banish the rains their spirits are already lifting to the weekend and the journeys end when there will be, “a massive celebration – a massive party.” Although tonight Kim may very well be suffering from “nappy rash,” spirits remain high and buoyed enough to joke that next year, “we might just about get into the Herd of the Middle Ring…” Rider Profile Matt Carr and his Trek 9.8 OCLV singlespeed Solo Singlespeeder  Matt
Carr is heavily into the Merida TransWales: to some degree that’s
only natural being the manager of Mud Dock Cycleworks who sponsor
the event’s Solo Category, but it’s more because he’s
tackling the whole event solo himself, but with added spice: by doing
the whole knee popping, shoulder wrenching, lung crushing lot on a
singlespeed. Today alone he has climbed the equivalent of three Munroes
on a 32/16 (2:1) set up.“I like the simplicity of singlespeeding,” he says of his penchant for the perverse, “and I can’t tell the difference between left and right, so shifting’s a bit of nightmare [laughs], but the extra challenge is in the climbs: every one is like a weight session at the gym.” But Matt is no stranger to endurance riding: a hardened 24hr soloist and endurance racer, Matt has served a four year stint as a domestique for a French road team before returning to the UK to manage Mud Dock. “I’m really enjoying the event,” he says speaking at the end of Wednesday’s linking stage, “it’s completely different to any kind of event I’ve done before.” But he is enjoying it thoroughly: “I think this is really good and better than the TransAlps,” he says: “I like the way that it’s not racing everyday as it means you can have some jars in the evening.” Although he’s sponsoring the solo category, dishing out kegs of beer for stage winners and reserving a “special prize” for the leading solo singlespeeder – a title that he’s keen to point out he has no designs on. Liar – he admits that the short sprint time trials “don’t really suit me in the slightest being a 24hr solo guy: it’s like trying to make Linford Christie run a marathon.” But that’s merely because bad luck has been dogging him in the short haul stages: failing lights weren’t the recipe for success on the night time trial, especially for a seasoned 24hr soloist who really should know better. Which goes some way to explain why he’s been enjoying the linking stages so much, particularly today’s epic: “it’s just been a nice long stage: we’ve had heat, lashing down rain, great climbs and views and really wet technical descent where you had to be on the ball the whole time.” And the food hasn’t been half bad either: “compared to other events tat I’ve done before the food is amazing.” Unlike his tent packing skills that have been nothing short of beautifully abysmal. Rider Profile Epic Adventure/What Mountain Bike reader team Fi Spotswood and her Merida TransMission Gary Bridgeman and his Giant Anthem Mixed team  Gary
and Fi are each two halves of a long standing adventure racing partnership
from the south west: attracted to anything challenging of the endurance
persuasion – “I just like a challenge,” explains
Fi, “endurance challenges really: anything long and hard,”
– the Merida TransWales proved an ignorable carrot and it’s
proving an uplifting and inspirational experience for them both. However, to begin with it was looking as though Gary would be without his team mate for financial reasons as Fi is an impoverished Masters marketing and communications student at Bristol. But then What Mountain Bike magazine’s Merida TransWales Reader Competition came up, in they went with their entry, and out they came the other side two weeks before the event with a free ticket to the Merida TransWales, plus a host of goodies from Montane, Fizik, Topeak, USE custom etched personalised stems and seatposts, Exposure lights support and a perhaps a few magazines to go with them. “What Mountain Bike have been brilliant and really supportive,” said Fi, “and they’ve given us loads of tips and advice.” It may not be all smooth sailing for the team as for Fi at least, this is only her fifth ever mountain bike event and the technical singletrack sections of the time trials and on the linking stages have proved something of an eye opener. “I wish I was a bit faster on the wiggly singletrack,” she says, “but there’s been nothing I haven’t been able to ride it: even today [on what has been described as the hardest of all the linking stages yet]. I’ve loved it, it’s all new and I’m not scared of it.” But she admits, on this multi-day stage challenge, caution sometimes has to be reigned back in from the wind: “There’s also a balance that needs to be struck between hurtling down a wicked descent and thinking I’ve got four more days of this and I don’t want to do this with only one leg.” Although the event’s ethos is mutually supportive, where “You get a lot of help and everybody is really positive,” both Gary and Fi agree that although “to begin with it’s be easy but by the end of the week people will be fried: to survive it you need to know your own body and to be able to recognise the signs of needing more food, more sleep, and more energy.” But what they’ll both take home from this event is more than worth this effort: “Just the experience of riding these brilliant trails that I’ve never ridden before,” says Fi, “It’s also been a really good laugh just sitting down after the riding and meeting loads of great characters in the evening.” And with beer being espoused by some as the world’s greatest ever recover drink – rather than the official energy food and drinks sponsor, High5 – it’s often being put to the test of an evening. Something that both Gay and Fi will no doubt be drinking too. With three special stages down
and one remaining, things are really hotting up in the quest for
glory in the Merida TransWales, reports Matt Skinner in the fifth
of his daily reports…
Download overall standings (Microsoft Excel
Format): The final day of competition
also becomes the day of reckoning and the day of revelation as the
greatest stretches of trail on the event finally reveal themselves,
reports Matt Skinner in the sixth of his daily reports…
Download overall standings (Microsoft Excel
Format): The final linking stage brings
the Merida TransWales full circle to bring an end to the behemoth
mountain bike challenge, and with it time to discover the first
Merida TransWales Champions, to celebrate and to say a fond farewell
to new-found friends, reports Matt Skinner in the seventh and final
of his daily reports…
Download overall standings (Microsoft Excel
Format): |
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| MTB Trans Wales 2010 |
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Latest News Mini TransWales 12.07.10:
Coed
y Brenin is arguably the most important single place in the annals
of British mountain biking: it is the pioneering centre that first
developed purpose built trails – built by the internationally
respected Dafydd Davis, OBE – that have since become a defining
feature of modern mountain biking in the British Isles; it is fitting
that the first ever Merida TransWales should include a pilgrimage
here. Day three would see the very first of these trails –
the Red Bull and the Karrimor – laid bare under the blinding
spot lights of 250 pairs of high powered halogen, halide and Super-LED
bulbs in the event’s most special stage: the night time team
time trial. But first the riders had to cover the 68km and 2,100m
from Machynlleth to Coed y Brenin…
The
10km special stage featured 280m of climbing and kicked off at 9pm
following an amalgamation of the old visitor centre side of the
Karrimor (now called the Beast) and the Red Bull loops on part of
what is now known as the Tawr trail: climbing out as usual up fire
road to the heads of Snap, Crackle, and Pop singletrack sections
and their rocky blend of drop offs, slots, cambered turns, and culvert
bridges, the course then spat riders out onto the old Karrimor route
to thrash down the singletrack once again. The course then climbed
gradually to the top of the singletrack and dual slalom course for
the final floodlit blast to the finish. 
The
women’s is becoming a run away by the She Cycles team who
are putting in consistent and convincing times, with the men’s
solo still being led out in dominating fashion by Phil Spencer although
the top three are separated by just 7 minutes after two special
stages with two yet to run. Either second placed Rob Lee of Extreme
Endurance or third placed Charlie Eustace could close this gap.
Similarly, things are tight in the High5 Mixed Category with the
MTB Marathon team of Renell & Steven Brennan still leading but
only by a very slim 1min 44secs ahead of the new second placed Pembroke
Pedallers (Maggie Bichard & Max Jeffries), with the Epic Adventure/What
Mountain Bike team of Fiona Spotswood & Gary Bridgeman slipping
into third 22mins and 25secs down overall. Elsewhere, Sally Lee
is still leading the women’s solo ahead of Tatiana Troll at
12 mins 52secs down, with the Saris Veterans Category now being
led by the pairing of Bernard Wragge-Morley & Nick Perceval.
It’s clear that at the halfway stage everything is still up
for grabs, and all will be decided in the next few days.
The
rain in Spain may stay mainly on the plain but that’s not
true in Wales. It generally stays wherever you are, moves in directly
above and turns the stereo up to full. 
The
fifth day of the Merida TransWales began wet after a heavy downpour
early in the wee hours but the extra moisture on the trails didn’t
succeed in slowing down the third relay stage. Riders blasted the
15km Clim-Machx trail with its 9km of sinlgetrack in relay: the
strongest climbing amassing the majority of the 340m vertical gain
in the first leg before handing over to their team mate for the
downhill second leg, finishing on the smoothly flat out 4km final
descent with its whoops, drops and compressions. 
But
it was in the High5 Mixed Category where the biggest change occurred:
MTB Marathon had been leading this for the past two special stages
but a quick time of 46mins 32secs by the Pembroke Pedallers –
Maggie Bichard & Max Jeffries – claimed both the day’s
stage and the overall lead. MTB Marathon – Renell & Steven
Brennan – held on to second place in the day’s stage
in a time of 48mins 38 secs, which was enough to ensure they only
slipped as far as second in the overall with just 22secs separating
them from the Pembroke Pedallers. 
Endurance
is an oft over used word, but the inaugural Merida TransWales has
been a tough test of both mental and physical endurance through
some truly breathtaking scenery, adrenalin overloaded trails, and
through the elements themselves. 
The
long, rugged descent from the top of the Bryn Llyn Egnant at around
480m, with its snaking single and double track continuously dropped
away across river crossings and carving singletrack, was merely
the warm up act to the headline trail of the entire event: things
were getting progressively sweeter despite the soaking that the
heavy rains had doused the riders with in the first few hours of
the day. Next on the billing, following a quick drinks stop outside
the ruins of the Strata Florida abbey, was the snaking valley of
river crossings hidden in the midst of the Tywi Forest. 
The
final leg of the day gave the riders the quick once over of the
new community project trail at Cwm-Rhyiadr that would be the 7km
special stage later in the evening. With one almighty fire road
climb that hurt the singlespeeders in an act of surgically precise
sadism, the trail then dragged riders downwards on pumping singletrack
laced with tyre and skin shedding razor flint: an off here would
hurt. A lot. 
The
final day and the final linking stage of the Merida TransWales slowly
eased itself into the saddle just after 9am on Saturday morning.
But things weren’t going to run entirely smoothly: not, that
is, if the rains had anything to do with it.
Unlike
the other special stages where the team rider’s times were
combined, Cym y Rhiadr would be a time trial where only the fastest
rider’s time would count, although both would set off together,
theoretically allowing pacing tactics to be employed, the final
singletrack showdown was an out-and-out sprint for the line. 
Mike
and John would also like to thank the event’s sponsors for
whose generosity and support have made possible the newest and best
mountain bike event in the UK with a truly global pedigree: Hayes
Brakes, Buff headwear, High5, Saris bike racks, Mud Dock Cycleworks,
Schwalbe tyres, Exposure Lights, What Mountain Bike magazine, Bikemagic.com
and especially Merida for believing in and backing the concept of
the event. It could also not have been the success it is if it were
without the hard and dedicated work of the massage, medical, catering,
site and marshalling teams; the British Cycling Commissaires, and
Summit Cycles for their invaluable tech support; all were a pleasure
to work with and without them the wheels of the event would simply
fall off. Consider this a huge heartfelt thank you to you all.
