Whyte Enduro R3 - Grizedale

Despite the hungry midges encountered the previous night, a couple of hundred riders turned up on Sunday to take part in the third Whyte Enduro of 2008. For riders who had competed in the previous day's XC racing the course laid before them was all so familiar, with an extra loop of climbing added on for good luck and with it a few more kms to make each lap up to 12.5 km.

For those experiencing the course for the first time, the long climb was rewarded by spectacular views before they hurtled downwards through some awesome singletrack, sliding and whooping as they went through beautiful trees, backlit with sunlight filtering through. It was again a day littered with punctures, broken bikes but fortunately no broken bodies or spirits!

Ian Wilkinson - 75km winner
“It was nice to pull my new National jersey, it's amazing how many friends you have on course when they see you coming round with that jersey on. It was quite good fun, there was about 6 of us going round, then it kinda split down a bit a few punctures and stuff.
I was a bit annoyed after yesterday, I was quite confident of taking the win, I was quite gutted really. I put some massive tyres on last night for today to try not to puncture again and it worked, but you couldn't have raced XC with them on. It's not really a race out there but it is a race, it's a cracking workout and lots of fun. I rode quite a bit with Billy Joe Whenman: he loves it, he's a plucky youngster and for a first year elite he'll go far. He's not afraid of attacking, he's happy to put his neck on the line he hasn't won a race yet off road but he will do no doubt. He's a good lad. It started raining on lap 5 I dropped an attack in on the feed zone, best place to do that as if you get caught in the singletrack behind riders you'll get caught up again. From the feed zone you've got the whole of the lap to make it count”.

If you’d like to read more about this race click on the British Cycling link above.