Fat Tyre Navigator
Queen Elizabeth Country Park, December 2008
The weather turned suitably Christmassy for our Big Santa charity weekend at Queen Elizabeth Country Park. If not quite snowy, a deep frost and sharp sunshine blue skies greeted the Sunday Navigator, giving a good turn out some beautifully crispy trails to ride.
The South Downs course offered some unusual challenges; split into two halves by the A3 and with the hefty ridge of the Downs to consider, navigation may not be the most challenging but fitness and good route planning were crucial. The split course denied any chance of route consensus amongst the field, so it was everyone for themselves as teams scattered in all directions from the start.
Nick Calkin got back into winning ways, although not with a classic performance perhaps, scoring big points but then losing pretty big penalties too for coming in a full nine minutes late. It was still enough for a fairly comfortable win though, although an excellent category winning performance from Julian Hemsted in Super Vets clipped back Nicks winning margin in the overall. Mike Richman was another casualty of those late penalties, having to settle for third overall after losing the battle with the clock.
Single Men went to Richard Smith who had a 40 point margin from Warren Bates in the category. Warren in turn snatched second in the category with on time after tying on points with third placed... Richard Smith. Are you keeping up with this? Iwona Szmyd took the combined Womens categories, without the confusion of a similarly named competitor challenging for the minor placings, while Andy Prince and John Eggett claimed first in Mens Team. Mixed Team underlined the importance of timing your effort on this course; Jeremy Woodward and Annie Marson claimed the victory after Chris Porter and Abi Bromfield's higher score was whittled away by penalties. The final category, Vets Team went to Nick Harvey and Mike Yates who - you guessed it - won thanks to their opponents penalty deductions.
Many thanks to Red Planet Bikes for their invaluable help and prize contributions, to Cannondale & USE for supplying more prizes and to SIS for the energy drink. That's it for 2008. We'll see you in Shackleford in January for the first Navigator of a New Year!
Forthcoming Navigators
Princes Risborough Navigator Results
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