southerndownhill.com - Forum

There was a poll on the NPS forum but only 5 ppl voted might have more luck here

hamsterly looks cool but is miiiiles away! think of the poor buggers on the south coast! it's 4hours away from me in the midlands!

Leamington as hamsterly is miles

i think it was in MBUK it said hamsterly so i think they may have decided but im up for it if its leaming really

cheers
paul

Theres a post on here another thread says they will make a decision by friday

leamington's a lot nearer to me, so that'll be my choice! ;D

Paul will you be going hamsterly if its there ?


 lemington would be ideal as all the other races are near to each other yet hamsterly is miles away from the south ( that makes sense when your an hour/2 away from all other venues)

I hope its leam, then I may be able to get a bit of sneaky praccy in. That said the track doesnt like me much, injury list from Leamington so far:

1x broken collar bone
1x shoulder dislocation
1x torn rotator cuff
5x broken ribs (done twice)
1x concussion
1x K.O.
2x (possible hairline fractures to wrists)

Man I hope its at leam!

hey fellas check this out it says round 3 in hamsterly

http://nps4x.dirtbikesupply.co.uk/RaceDates

no i wont be as i wont have the cash to travel that far really

cheers
paul

It does say hamsterly but you cant enter online yet still says TBC

rode leamington tonight... it's running soooo fast! needs a sweep but still is on top condition!

nice i heard leamington wasnt in good condition

 hope it is there as i would really like to complete the whole series

It will now be at chicksands  :)

just got the e mail too, chicky it is....i cant wait.....!!!!

yay chicky again, hope to see you guys there!

Better go this time I guess then! But bugger I better not break anything, racing rheola the week after!

my dad told me as he gets the email and i was so pleased

 will be able to do the whole series now  ;D

got the email,that has picked my day some what out of the gutter

Lets just hope the track will be changed prior to the race to spice it up a bit...............even though I live 5 mins from Chicky and it makes travelling to the race very easy I do think its a little unfair for all of the northern boys this year as pretty much all of the races are in the South of England.

Hatch

chicksands looks to be the venue!!!!!!!

Could say the same about the DH for us southerners

hell yeah!! Gotta love the chicky 4x! :)

does anyone know why it is such a huge and kind of random change ?

I'd hazard a guess at the other 2 either being in a bad state of repair or too far away for some people, either way, I'm glad it's back at chicky, defo gonna do some gate practise before this one :)

well i wont be there as im on the london to brighton ride :D wooohh

cheers
paul

Lol fair play mate, all good cause etc!! U doing it on the nicolai?

Sweet, well up for this again.

Chicky pulls in EPIC numbers, how many people were at the last chicky round, over 100 i think? You had to queue for 5 mins to do a full run of the track from the gate.

Locations good, tracks good and makes fun racing, tracks good in all weathers only bad thing is the limited parking.

sure does pull in the numbers....there were 200 motos or something like that? i raced my last moto in 183 and there were loads of races behind us, i think my last one from bridgnorth was 110 so gives an idea of the difference in rider numbers..... cant wait for chicky though, gonna be great!!!

unlucky paul although it is for a good cause, i was going to enter the london to ... but it was fully booked  :'(


  as for chicky i cant wait

 anyone up there tomorow ?  if so im on a spec p2 with the monster energy claws down the side of my helmet  ;D

 hoping to hit the triple tomoz, hmm  may well be a trip to a&e

yeah chicky will be awesome! doseage we will have to shout sandbagger at someone else as paul isnt going. :'(

i wouldn't really class paul as a sandbagger (no offence) that guy that was beating him on one of his motos at round one,that was a real bag of sand

I'll be shouting sandbagger at anyone who even looks remotely faster than me!  ;)

 haha lol

 

Ooh chicksands, cool, I'll be along to this one. Not racing - I'll be there to check out the pace and competition, and see whether I reckon I'm good enough to enter Novice next time around. Fingers crossed!

I'll try and get some photos too :)

the only way to find out is to ride, if you have a bike and can ride novice is made just for you to have a go.

Its all good fun and you can do gate practice on Saturday afternoon before the race to get use to it.

I have a bike, and can ride (and used to race DH, in Youth and Junior - well enough to not come last or be boo'd off the course) but i stopped riding for about 5 years after my DH rig was stolen. Since then i've lost some bottle and a whole load of confidence, and don't know if i'll be up to speed fully by Rd 3.

Also my current bike is a 2005 Specialized Rockhopper, which is totally XC biased. Its currently got some easton risers, a shorter stem and some flat pedals on it, but it doesnt jump well, drops its chain over the rough stuff (or if i dont land a jump perfectly smoothly) and has a truly attrocious fork that inspires no confidence whatsoever!

So basically i'm wimping out ;) but I will make it to Chicksands to ride soon, just not to race this time around. I'm also about to build a more 4x oriented bike, and then i'll have no excuses :)

go on, give it a go, ive done rounds one and two on a cove hustler xc rig, im no way near the fastest or gonna win anything but i give it a go cos i really enjoy it, everyone is really friendly and great fun to be around, chicky is a great track too, why not give it a go to see if you like it before you buy/build a 4x rig, thats the reason im doing it on my cove, thought i'd better check i like it before i spent good money,and guess what, next year im hoping to be back on a 4x orientated bike because im having a real good time out there :)

dude that guy had the track dialed doing the triple aswell i mean come on!!
i am by FAR no sandbagger im still tryin to get my confidence back :( lol

cheers
paul

It always does seem like a bit of a copout people in the novices completely nailing the triple... doesnt seem to novice to me  ::) hence why i cased it in every moto!

So if I come down to the 1st round, on a new bike, just back from injury to have a go at racing 4x for the first time at a track i've been to once, and do the triple as I did last time I rode there....

Am I gonna get a load of angry riders being, well, angry with me for being in Novice?  I was thinking about popping down to see what this 4x lark is all about, but im not up for people getting pi**ed off at me.

Rootes

I wouldn’t have thought so. If you then continued to race every round, won every moto and every final, and then did the same the following year THEN people may have reason to call you a sandbagger!

There’s a fine line. I mean, in my mind Novice is there for people to give it a go, and improve, then move on up when they’re fast enough (or not move on up if they never get fast enough). But that doesn’t mean that everyone in Novice has to totally suck. I mean, somebody has to win, right?

Sounds good to me.

I'm not sure yet, havent ridden a bike since my accident so I'll get out this weekend and see how it feels :)

Rootes

Lol I wouldn't go that far mate, but u can tell from a mile off the people who've ridden the track loads of times and are clearing the triple like it's childs play and who clearly should've moved up a long time ago!

Sod it, give it a go mate, it's a good laugh whatever happens, and if u can clear the triple u've kicked my arse already!! no matter how fast I seem to go I can never quite make the bloody thing!!  >:(

Cool, i'm gonna get up to aston hil on saturday and see how I feel on the bike then might bust to the gate practice the following saturday...never used a gate before so that coud be interesting.

Rootes

I think people are missing the point of novice, it's for people starting out or getting back into 4x, especially if they aren't sure if its worth paying £60 for a race license.

At the last round a lot of the people clearing the triple were dirt jumpers who can easily bost over jumps, doesn't mean they are quicker or are any good at the rest of the race. Hence they should still be in novice ;)

touchez(sp..), meaning I'm gonna go and improve my dirt jumping this weekend  :D

I'm with Keeny on this...

I won 4 motos at round 1 in Novice then came last in the 1/4s, plus couldn't do the triple!

i looked into a racing licence having podiumed at Bridgnorth but i'm not paying full price for a licence and only getting 6 months racing out of it!!! Pointless and a waste of money (if you're only going to race 4X anyway). We're not all made of money!

NPS4X should stop prizes for novices and give them races licences! Problem solved.

That’s a bloody good idea actually. Either after a couple of podiums, a win, or getting into the semi-finals a three or four times they could give away race licenses. Scrap Novice prizes (an incentive to move up a category) and you’d solve the sand bagging problem (if there is a problem – there may not be?).

It could be a restricted license too – just for 4x – to stop experienced people entering Novice 4x and using it as a cheap way of gaining a licence for 4x and downhill.

very true... hadn't considered downhill. part of the reason why i don't have a licence- haven't ridden in years and don't ride downhill.

to be honest after the podium i was all up for moving category for more of a challange, but due to the cost didn't see a lot of point doing it yet!

think people with racing licences who ride novice 4X are the true sandbaggers!

I think all this could be an incentive for them to supply licenses bespoke to 4x, only 6months of racing and a view to keep the novice category fresh means there should be different licenses!

I really cant see BC doing that, they generally arent too bothered about anything except road, xc and bmx

Another race at chicky on the same day as a pearce race....  gutted!

I'm probably being blind...but I can't find the race day schedule on the NPS 4x website?  Anyone tell me where to find it?  Just wanna know what time practice is & when registration opens/closes.
Thanks.

Well if it was like the last one at chicky
10am open practise
11am gate practise (i think novices were 11-11.30)
12pm motos
then it sort of just gets played by ear from there I think, as last time there were so many motos it all started getting behind, i think they aim to finish the motos by about 2 or so!

Going to be running spd's for the first time at this one as my 5050's fell apart on me yesterday, could be interesting!!  :-\

Not sure about this one.  I can't get down there on the saturday for the gate practice so if I come down to race it'll be blind having never used a gate and only ridden at the track twice.  Who knows...

Rootes

Still worth doing, spend your 30 mins of gate practice doing the gate and first straight over and over then spend the rest of practice doing the rest of the track. ;)

Too right, I dont the gate blind last time, it aint that hard, just make sure u get the right gear to start in!!

any tips for trackstands on the gate, i almost got the hang of it at chicky last time but then at bridgnorth i was pants!!! cant seem to get to grips with it!

rest your front wheel on the gate, put a bit of power down if your a bit loose and loosen your grip

and dont put your brakes on it doesnt help! ;)

cheers folks!  will give it a go ;D

Practise trackstands on a slight downhill gradient, once you get good balance they're easy, then u just gotta worry about blasting out of the gate! ;D

does anyone have a contact for the b&b down the road?

sure do... 01234 381381

I'm stopping in the Holiday Inn Express Elstow, which is 10mins away and only 10mins from bedford for decent food at night!

Paid £40 for a mint room and breakfast that sleeps 4 back at the first round but it's gone up to £55 now.

So who's up there tomorro for some practise?

i'll be there tomorrow with sepi and jim.... come to think about it... we've each got a krisis! one black, one white, one red! what a bunch of losers!

Lol!! Well I'll be on a red DMR sidekick w/black argyles... probably wondering around on my own as all my mates have given up biking!! This must be turning into some sort of loser competition!!  :D :D

dude cool people ride bikes, losers dont lol

ill be up there this weekend on my norco 125

I will be floating around at some point during the day for a bit of a play.

Hatch

ill join you doseage!!! lol all my mates cba to race as refuse to pay 21 quid. its worth it for the fun.

 not quite true liam

 we couldnt get there plus i have no money and well stuarts, stuart

 

    tips to all theyve changed the track again and tbh its cack watch out as they changed the hairpin and one of the jumps which had the little hump before it
 

Yep that new lip they've made was catching loads of people out, big improvement imo!!

Doesnt look like I'l be there...

I'm lidless.  It was supposed to arrive on thursday but shops will be shops.

Rootes

pmed you rootes. ill take the spare helmet and ill be riding a purple charge blender with white e 13 so just approach and say   ' oi helmet bitch' or something along those lines

Well, I'll be first to post up about the day, great days racing!! Didnt do too great myself, 3 3rd places and a 2nd, could be worse, still kicking myself that I cased right before the finish line in an attempt to grab first!! all in all was a good crack though!

what a day!!!!!! i podiumed 3rd. i really am happy. i really had a good day and would like to give a big hand to the organisers. great race.  BIG UP CHRIS ROBERTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! P.S well done everyone especially alex jackson (supersize and doseage my great friends lol oh and mop head you blasted pirate arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!!!!!!

Nice one mate!!!  ;D

i didnt see you go doseage, but i assume the car was moved.

how did alex do?? i was gonna go watch but couldn't be arsed in the end, kinda wish i had now, cos i done crap all, all day. sounds like it was a good event

alex was top spot on podium!!!!!!!!

what a bum! lol

well done to him !!!

Dam i wish my collarbone was fixed !

How could you lot let alex win !!! :D

whaaaat alex....on the podium.....in a race? did he sneak on again.......



yes, i know im in no position to make jokes about things like this!

wicked wicked day, got my first podium ever, was 3rd but hey, i am sooo happy with that you wouldnt believe!!! had a crash in me second moto and thought it was going to be another bridgnorth but carried on and glad i did now, was some real good racing going on,had to push it today, immense, big up chris indeed,the bloke is a legend!!!!
well done everyone who raced!!!

Brilliant days racing, was really chuffed with 2nd place especially as I thought I'd got 3rd!
Thanks for another fab day to Chris and all the others! You guys rock! ;D

Some pics here.............

http://www.englishbayphotography.co.uk/portfolio33799p1.html

he's still uploading though.

Was a good days racing props to the Chicky crew and Chris Roberts

Hatch

I dropped by to do some spectating, and saw lots of good racing  (but man, even Novice classes looked quick!)

I got some photos, if any came out i'll post them up but it was my first attempt at bike photography (with a borrowed camera) so don't expect too much!

race pics and review now on www.britishcycling.org.uk

Because its full of trophy hunting "sand baggers" who wont man up and race in their proper cats for fear of being owned!!!

Hatch

for the record... i'm looking forward to racing seniors but as i've pointed out we're not all made of money so paying full price for only 6 months worth of racing licence is stupid (particularly when you don't ride any other discipline). and the fact that you'll then be renewing licence and BCF member out of sync just becomes a ball-ache.

still reckon there should be no prizes or trophies for novices and they should be awarded a licence! sounds fair????

Not aimed at you Scruby as i know its your first year racing NPS 4X, etc, etc.............but you can see where im coming from having raced in novice this year yourself.

Hatch

yeah fully agree.

some "novices" last weekend actually spoke as though they were going to continue riding novice again next year too!!!

think you benefit more by moving up anyway- have to push yourself to compete with the fast guys...

don't get me wrong... i do feel like a fraud! think they need to tighten up on the novice entry criteria

i've got it.....

licence (ignoring bcf membership) is what.. £36? roughly one race entry fee.

so... prizes for novices could be a free race entry in the appropriate category at the next round they race?!

I'm definitely staying in novice, wayy too slow for masters!! ;D

I agree.  I raced one race in novice and made it into the semi finals so decided it was time to move up.  The last few races in Senior has been very hard work but that's the point in racing! 

Doseage, the man is right... and the only reason why the master cat is so fast is because people don't move up.

i reckon larger categories would make for much better racing- race different people all the time, occasionally some quicker riders could be then taken out early by other quick riders and guaranteed quarter finals every time.

sod it... i'm going to sell my sister to fund a race licence

Does seem tempting, and I suppose you'll HAVE to improve pretty sharpish if you're racing proper fast people, but at the same time, there's nothing more demoralising than coming last by a long way in every moto! I'm gonna see what happens at redhill first, ride the track blind and if I make it through to semis as solomanda says then I'll think about moving up next year....

i dont class myself as fast atall but i know at least half of the people in novive 17+ are faster than me so it seems an apropriate catagory for me. however i raced this year in novice 12-16 so where do i go next year?

It's hard to say what to do, but honeslty a lot of the time I wasn't sure what category I was watching. A lot of quick novices, and a lot of quick Juniors too.


There really does need to be a reshuffling of prizes, forced promotion, or being awarded licences as novice prizes. There also needs to be more women - that category was so small they raced the same people each time.

If you want to improve then the only way to do that is to go into Juniors (your cat.) and ride/race against people that are faster than yourself.........yeah you might not do so great to start off with, but the learning curve would be massive and you will soon be climbing up through the ranks if you stick at it.

I think giving the winner of Novice a race licence instead of a prize would be spot-on plus it will encourage/make them to race in their respective cats.

Hatch

But talking about it on here wont solve it alone... action needs to be taken!!

Ah, but talking about it on here is a good way to test the water as to the response that would be received if that way forward was taken by the organisers. We've seen fairly broad support on here, which means we're not too wide of the mark, and adds weight to the argument. As it is a hard argument to counter, as ultimately it will help the sport develop. The best way to get faster is to ride against faster people. Rather than the current situation where people stay in Novice too long, it'd be nice to see this evolve into one where people aspire to progress from Novice and to be competitive in their rightful category (rather than being like "Hooray, I won in Novice. Oh wait, this is my 3rd year in this cat, and most people here haven't even done 3 races yet...but nevermind, I still won!")

So, the way forward: Ideally somebody who knows the guys in charge and has their respect should propose this idea and see what they say.

side note: Hatch, saw you at chicksands, looking quick! The bike looks lovely :D I'll have to bring my blender up there for a play ASAP!

:D You, me and Cooper in the same cat at redhill? Thats going to be good ;D

Lol!!! I bet some of the podiums do have that running through their head when the win aswell!! ;D
It's definitely a worthwhile idea, will also make the masters category seem slightly more accessible imo...

what's the turn around time on bcf membership and racing licence applications?

a few days dude.


I dont need to take any action as I race in my proper cat...........the people who regularly race/do well in novice need to get in touch with Chris Roberts and get things sorted, all im saying is that it would be a good idea and would get rid of the "Sand baggers" that continually race in the novice Cats making it unfair for the true novices out there.


Cheers mate, you should have come over and said hello. Yeah the Blender Ti is pretty sweet.......im just waiting on delivery of my new Blender Steel for a play/training/hack/winter dh bike..........will have to let me know when your heading to Chicky next for a Blender session.

Hatch

I didn't wanna bother you when you're racing  :). Some people want alone time before their runs to focus and prepare.

I adore my steel blender. I started to feel at home on it after about 5 minutes, and find it pretty confidence inspiring for a hardtail. I'm just starting to shed some weight off the build now (and have dropped a whole pound just changing pedals :D)

As of next year if i want to still race 4x im gonna have to go in 17+ novice as im having to give up work to look after my son ;D and won't be able to afford bc mambership and all that. I dont realy want to go in novice as paddy and fuy others will give me s**t for it.
I think it would be a good idea if chris and the bc would let you race in your age cat if your fast enough, but you go with novice scoring. I.e if i won a masters race (if only) the actual
points and first place would go to the guy in second, assuming that guy has membership what do you think?

Probably sounds a bit too confusing, could cause a load of agro with people claiming points which they dont deserve etc... just do a couple of novice races mate, who gives a monkeys what anyone else thinks!! :)

Novice is a bit of a problem

We want new riders to come and try out the sport, but we also don't want to lose any riders.

The unwritten rule is if you win a novice race then you should move up into a series category.

After doing a year in novice the following year you should move up into a series category.

You will also then have a chance of winning a series prize.
This year the winners of a series category will win a pair of the latest Manitou Forks  ;D

Also if you need a race licence now its half price, if your under 16 its free with your membership to BC. ;)

could there be an on-the-day licence?

 i probably won't renew my licence next year, but still want to race the 4xtracks local to me-not the whole series, though i certainly don't really want to enter novice cat and be a complete sandbagger, i appreciate that dh has a closed shop licence only entry system, but then they are pulling in easy 300 riders-plus  so i suppose they can be picky, i'm not interested in downhill much but i would still do small dh races like aston, bikeparkuk etc as they can be entered easy and not be serious,  it would be good if 4x could be a bit like that(i feel myself that it is like that now, just has the licence problem)

 like db76 says, race your age cat and not get points maybe, its fun to race and not take it serious, if your serious then having a licence won't be a problem

what about changing the categories:

Open- no points, no licences, restricted prizes?
Novice- first timers, then keep the age split to 17+, 16- as it already is? or even combine the them?

The problem with too many categories is you end up with too few people in each, and then you end up racing the same people several times. If the NPS4X pulled more people it could work, but if it was more popular then it'd be easier for them to enforce rules about moving up from Novice (with the attitude "If you dont like paying for a race licence, then dont race. Somebody else will take your spot")

Hmm 'tis a tricky problem for sure!