Dusk, dawn and a lot in between

BY: Paddy Atkinson

Published: 6th October, 2014

While I’ve only done a small handful of endurance events before, I’d wanted to do more, push myself to longer and longer races. So that’s how I ended up at Thetford forest at 4 in the morning, wrapped in an old sleeping bag to fend off the cold, trying not to fall asleep so I could head out into the dark again. This might not sound particularly fun, and occasionally it wasn’t, but it came together pretty well in the end.

In case you hadn’t worked it out already, I’m talking about the race that has been held annually in Thetford forest for at least 10 years – Dusk ‘til Dawn. I had planned to race Torq 12:12 in a pair with George Budd, but because I’d already committed to the team race we had to re-plan. So D2D it was, which was actually convenient as it’s reasonably local to me.

So it was only a short journey to go and have a look at the course with a couple of mates – it was a course of two halves. The first (after you’d got past the grassy start loop) was fast, flowing, mostly downhill and fun. The second was mostly uphill, sometimes draggy, and with a couple of nasty bumpy sections. On the whole it wasn’t bad though, taking in some of the best sections on the Brandon side of the forest, and the draggy bits did the job of sorting the fast from the slow.

On showing up, it was looking like it’d be a bit of a grim night. It was pissing it down, to put it bluntly. I had planned to do a practice lap, to see if the rain had changed it much, but I didn’t really want to start the event already cold and miserable. Soon enough the rain stopped and the sun came up. It was a lovely evening, until it got dark.

We decided that George should go first, as he’s got a lot more experience with these things, so would probably better be able to pace himself.

So I spent an hour or so huddling in the Ison gazebo (thanks for letting me make a small camp in there!), waiting until I’d have to start warming up to go out on my pair of laps. As we were planning on doing 2 laps each before swapping, we had about an hour and a quarter between riding – enough time to rest a bit, at least compared to doing single laps before swapping.

As predicted, George blasted his way around and put us in a firm first place within the initial hour of the race.

So it was time for me to head out into the cold, and I was looking forward to it really! After a bit of a wait in the transition zone I was off, trying to keep a hold on my pace, mindful of the 11 hours left. I can’t really remember much of what happened while I was riding, it all blurred together, but I recall seeing Richard Jones (who was racing the mixed team event) coming past, and having a bit of a chat as he did so. Around this time Tom Ward (one half of our main competition in the pairs race) came back up to my wheel, but I latched on to Richard for the rest of the lap, and Tom dropped off the back (by way of a tangle with a backmarker), leaving me and George up by about 30 seconds.

George went out for his second set of laps, and I sat down after a quick warm down. That was when the cold really hit me. Even when I was wrapped up in a sleeping bag and wearing a coat, I was still shivering and shaking. Still, I wasn’t particularly tired at this point, and I had plenty of food to keep me going.

GB then pulled out a flying pair of laps, getting our gap over second up to over a minute – not enough to get complacent mind.
While the idea of going out again wasn’t top on my list of favourite things to do, it was what had to be done. I was feeling good still, and went out into the cold (or colder anyway) night. I managed a couple of laps that were not much slower than the first two, which I mostly achieved by being slightly too enthusiastic on the downhills, which resulted in a couple of tree-shoulder connections. Despite these, I finished my two laps with a three and a half minute lead over Andrew and Tom.

Around this time my Dad came out from the comfort of the campervan to have a look at how we were doing. He seemed to enjoy the atmosphere, which is quite a special thing at night events. He also didn’t seem to mind the cold too much, probably because of the sips of Calvados! There wasn’t long until I had to dash off though, as GB’s fast laps gave little time to rest. He’d pulled the gap out to 4 minutes (not an easy task against Andrew), and I was off into the dark again.

So it was out into the fog and dark again, which had gotten eerie because of the classical music and coloured lighting in parts of the forest - enough to send sleep deprived minds spinning. I managed to put another couple of minutes into Tom on my two laps, again with the help of trying to chase Rich as he blasted past.

I sat down in the tent as George went out again, and that was when the tiredness really hit me for the first time, my dad’s vigilance being the only thing that stopped me sleeping through the next changeover.

The impossible then happened – GB rode a pair of laps that were a fair bit slower than his previous ones. Shock! I’m not actually sure if it was fatigue or some kind of problem, I forgot to ask! He wasn’t alone though, everyone slowed down in a 4/5AM dip.

As did I, when I put out my slowest pair of laps. This wasn’t helped by my knee hurting so much I couldn’t stand up and pedal. I got so miserable over the 42 painful minutes that lap took me I told GB that I couldn’t do another one. He wasn’t especially happy with that idea, which was completely fair – an additional lap was the last thing either of us would have wanted to do!

So I sucked it up and gave my knee a good massage, hoping to warm it up enough to avoid any damage. This seemed to work, and by the time GB came round from a storming final lap (distancing Andrew and Tom by another 2:20), I was more or less ready to get going (as ready as you can be after 11 hours of a bizarre endurance interval session).

I headed out to try and smash out as fast a lap as I could, and the knee pain stayed away for the first part of the lap, leaving me able to go as hard as I could. Unfortunately, the pain returned, and I had to stay seated for the second half wherever I could.
Still, I'd just about managed to knock out a sub 40 minute lap, and our buffer to 2nd was still at five and a half minutes.
In short, we’d won!

I was both elated, and more tired and cold than I can ever remember being. So I shared a few words with friends, family and my teammate through the night, before heading to the car and sitting with the heater on. I stayed like this for about half an hour before I could muster up the energy to get changed. Once I emerged from the warmth of the car, I made a beeline for the burger van, in an attempt to consume as many calories as I could before the podium ceremony.

Fully fed and almost no longer cold, we went to make the final effort of the night – getting up onto the top step of the podium.

Thanks to everyone who helped out and gave support, encouragement, and competition; to the Ison distribution guys who let me crash in their gazebo and helped out through the night; to the Thetford MTB Racing guys for putting on such a great event; to my parents who were so helpful and supportive (as they always are when I decide to do silly things like this); and to George, whose speed put us on the top step.

And thanks to the XCracer/Scimitar sponsors: Scimitar for keeping me warm; Mt Zoom for making the bike that bit easier to haul around the circuit; Accelerade for keeping me going; and Exposure for lighting the way.

Click any of the images below for a larger view / slideshow

Bit tired George?

Fend off the cold

More on the Exposure Lights Dusk til Dawn 2014:

Event Calendar Listing

Blogger Info:

Paddy Atkinson

I've only been racing since early 2012, but been mountain biking since the age of 10. I try to balance training and A-level studies, then you get to read about it on here!
Thanks to XCracer, Scimitar, MtZoom, Accelerade and Exposure for all the help.

Exposure Lights Dusk til Dawn 2014 Report

Dusk, dawn and a lot in between

BY: Paddy Atkinson

More on the Exposure Lights Dusk til Dawn 2014:

Blogger Info:

Paddy Atkinson

What's New In The Shop:

Mt ZOOM ceramic Sram Eagle 12 spd pulleys 14t/12t