TrailMasters

Details

access_time Friday 17th August 2012 to Sunday 19th August 2012

place Llanwrtyd Wells

supervised_user_circle Hosted by John Lloyd

linkwww.trailmasters.cc

The TrailMasters will take place over a long weekend in August (17-19th) and will be based in Llanwrtyd Wells (Central Wales).

Llanwrtyd Wells is one of the most famous mountain bike locations in the UK which has seen the birth of lots of world renown events (Man vs. Horse, Real Ale Wobble, Bog Snorkelling World Champs…) as well as the 1st UK mountain bike centre which was opened more than 25 years ago.

Llanwrtyd Wells is also the place where event co-organiser and course designer John Lloyd was first introduced to mountain bikes - a relationship which has been growing stronger and stronger over almost twenty years of racing them, selling them and organising some of the best UK mountain bike events (MTB Marathon Series, NPS events and the TransWales). He also lives just a few miles down the road and calls the greater area around Llanwrtyd Wells his "mountain biking back yard". So in short you can expect some mind-blowing trails over the three days. It goes without saying the courses on the three days will be completely different.

Riders will start the day with breakfast followed by the rider briefing before heading out onto the trail in the marathon typical mass start. Each day will have one extended loop (between 50-85km long) to complete in which the riders will come across two special stages which also have to be completed. Once riders come over the finish line at the event village the rest of the day is then there for chilling out, testing the latest equipment, enjoying some live music or simply hanging out with all the other riders.

We call the long distance rides which will fill the majority of your riding time - linking stages. These linking stages are not competitive but we will give you a time frame (most of the time based on 12km/h) in which we expect you to complete them. This will give you the chance to ride as fast or as slow as you like so that you can enjoy the company of your fellow riders, stop and take a picture or event sit in the grass for a few minutes and enjoy the view. If you come over the finish line before the allocated riding time you will not gain any time advantage on your over all time but if you come over the line too late you will be penalised according to how late you are.

Here is where it counts and where the clock is ticking. The special stages are held within the linking stages (except the night stage) and are clearly marked as such. Riders will ride up to the start of the special stages and will get going when they are ready/instructed to do so. The specials stages are on some of the best bits of the days ride and can be a climb, a single track descent or even a trail centre type loop - expect the unexpected. On these sections concentration and speed will be the order of the day. Riders compete against each other but as it’s a time trial, they go off at set intervals and are timed on their efforts. We’ll see riders battle Enduro