Blazing Saddles is proud to be sponsoring Ben Clayton.
Here’s his roundup of the latest stage of racing in the PMBA Enduro Series!
Last weekend it was time for round 4 of the PMBA Enduro Series which I’m taking part in this year. It was held in the grounds of Graithwaite hall, a stunning location worthy of the Northern championships. It was nice to get back to a more grass roots event and I was really looking forward to riding the much hyped stages with the other lads. The weather played ball all weekend and the stages were dry and dusty, a good thing as any sort of rain would have created chaos on the root infested stages. Riding around Hebden Bridge in West Yorkshire set me in good stead for the event, as it was very similar to the trails we ride at home, day in day out. Practice was Saturday and couldn’t have been any better! After a pretty sweaty ride we loaded the bikes up and walked down to lake Windermere where we couldn’t resist jumping in for a refreshing swim and a wash.
Sunday was race day and the sun was out in force, practice was good albeit a little warm for my liking. I was wearing fresh race kit that I’d picked up earlier in the week and the Specialized Drirelease jersey was a life saver, keeping the sweat off me all the way round. I’d had a couple of crashes at the last two events so for my race runs I decided to just back off a little and go for clean runs. This seemed to do the trick as I finished the event in 6th place and secured good points for the championships. I have a bit of time off till the next round up at kirroughtree in July now, so more Hebden tech and some trail centre visits should get me ready.