Although I’ve raced in the 12 hours singlespeed solo in previous years, this year at the last moment a friend had to drop out of a team place, so I stepped in to race as part of a four man team on the Saturday. After a few laps of the short but brutal course I was quite happy not to be facing another ten hours alone on a fully rigid mountain bike. Racing as one of four was still demanding, but much more sociable than going it alone.
As I’ve always been a rather better photographer than racer, I’m more than happy with our team result of 98th (closer to the bottom of our category than the top), but it was good to see some friends from the Welsh mountain bike scene taking some of the top honours, such as endurance specialist Dave Buchanan (http://www.davebuchanan.co.uk/) taking 3rd in the 12 hour solo event, despite riding with a nasty chest infection, and Mark and Andrew from the Bike Mechanic team (http://www.thebikemechanic.co.uk/) taking top spot in the singlespeed pairs. Sunday’s race equally saw a good fight from the Welsh contingent, with Jo and Kate taking top spot in the female pairs. Rich and Dom from the Bikeshed Wales (http://www.bikeshedwales.com/) team sadly lost out on a podium place following a protracted puncture problem.
As usual for the Bikefest I spent Sunday wandering around taking a few photos, although not as many as previous years. I like the challenge of creating innovative images at an event like this, although it can be hard to break the mould.
On that note I spotted that the event photographers this year were not only using a tripod mounted camera with remote release (as in previous years) but they had actually invested in a light beam trigger, ensuring identical shots of every single rider to pass their position... I’m sure it’s very efficient for their purposes, but seems to have more in common with photocopying than photography!
A few more photos of the event (along with a lot of other mountain biking pictures) are available here (http://mcope.photoshelter.com/gallery/MTB-inc-Bikefest-2010/G0000Lhnoa1rgxIE) in my Photoshelter archive. These images are all available for personal use downloads, or commercial use on a rights managed basis - and I also work to commission if you have a specific project in mind. You can see more of my work or contact me through my adventure sports photography website mattcope.co.uk
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