Raider Rally
Venue:- Cwymthig Hill, Nr. Rhayader, Wales.
Class:- Sportsman
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NOTE, The course taken involved private land and can't normaly be ridden by trail riders. The map is ONLY to show the route taken and NOT to be used without written consent from the land owners

Report

After a 6 hour trip we finally arrived at the start line around midnight on Friday (9th Aug) to be beckoned into the site by a flashing amber light on top of Barry's transit. We were the last to arrive on the Friday and joined the clump of 4 tents that were already there. One guy, Kelvyn, had initially started to pitch his tent on what he thought was an ideal spot nice and flat etc. He then noticed a nearby sign saying 'Scrutineering' and decided, wisely, to move some distance away. A wise move as on the Saturday around 150 bikes and sidecars passed over the spot that would have been his tent.

Saturday saw the arrival of Ieuan in the burger van at 8am. Cass and I bought a 'burger and coffee' breakfast but that was all the trade Ieuan saw for a few hours. The other campers had brought along their own brekkie and nobody else was due to arrive till around midday.

Scrutennering went OK for myself with only a small comment that my hat would not be acceptable next year due to a change in the ACU regs. My hat is rather old and it was someone else's cast off. Sadly a few (quite a lot I thought) failed scrutenering. Loose spokes, sloppy wheel/swing arm bearings caused some to dig out their tools, nip to the local town in search of parts or in some cases turn round and go home!

I spent some time in the afternoon working out a way to tie my rucksack to the rear mudguard. As the event was to be a long single loop I'd need to carry far more tools that normal, there'd be no easy way to get to the pits during the event. I had arranged for Cass to meet me at the fuel stops with my fuel but there was no guarantee that she'd get there in reasonable time as she would be taking a totally different route. With a combination of knots and using all the rucksacks straps I was ready to rumble. The Saturday afternoon saw the MX track opened up for play time and a nearby field or two had a track laid out on it also for playing on, Woops sorry, practicing on ;o). I had a quick go on the field track just for fun really and trying not to push it too hard as I didn't want to break anything before the real event on Sunday. My rucksack came in handy as I first collected a rouge tail lamp that someone had broken off and then an exhaust silencer! Yep, my rucksack contained a whole silencer at one point. On picking it up I returned to the pits and set about reattaching to my bike, Yep, it was my own silencer! Someone kindly lent me a couple of nuts bolts and washers, Cass dug out the small vegetable patch that had been pushed into it when it fell and it was soon back on and, once again, fairly silenced.

There were a few problems encountered during the practice session. At least one puncture and Pike, Spicer & Co and their outfit was seen to be pushed back to the pits. A few others were seen to fall but the ambulance was not called upon so I guess everyone had a good time.

With Sunday came the rain, not much, more of a constant drizzle but enough to make the roads and track slippy and goggles steamed up. One person accidentally dropped their stationary bike before starting resulting in a broken gear change and instant retirement. Allyson Spicer's Ossa (No.6) broke down ¼ mile from the start and was seen pushing her bike back to the start but in general most seemed to get away OK. The first really tricky bit came in the form of a steep decent down a muddy, slatey, rocky incline. I arrived to see a collection of bikes at all sorts of odd angles scattered down the hill. Knowing this was an un-timed section I waited at the top with another guy watching the mayhem below. Finally it all cleared and I set off, lemming like, down the cliff. It was steep and slippery but with a little care I navigated it with no real problems. The bike did stall part way down but I just left it dead engine till the bottom and then restarted. I heard later in the day that an outfit had attempted it, rather than the alternative 'easy route', only to bowl it over and tumble to the bottom! Not my idea of fun but I believe they and the chair were OK.

At the first fuel stop I met up with Kelvyn who's bike was suffering. The oil feed to the head had expired finishing his race for the day. Cass, the pit crew, arrived with my premix fuel, drinks and smokes and before long I was under way once more. I should, according to the original time keeping plan, have been refuelling around 50 minutes after starting but an hour had passed and I wasn't alone at the stop. It looked like the times were going to be some what tighter than anticipated.

The next forest section was to be ridden in a loop twice with two special tests along the route to be completed on the second lap. The end of the first lap was our first 3 hour time check. By this time the rain had gotten into my onboard clock so I had no idea how I was doing. Lots of fire roads covered in slate, shale, stones meant that being overtaken made for a very painful roosting with small boulders bouncing off of the helmet, body armour and gloves. No. 119 (Mark Tilbury) overtook me at one point and got me a good one with a large stone hitting a part of my glove that had no armour. He did also get my goggles, helmet and body armour which all made good thwacking sounds but caused no real pain. I'm sure it was not intentional as he was a good guy when I'd chatted to him earlier but it still made my hand smart for a while. I guess I did the same to a few people also so would like to take this oppertunity to say sorry.

The second special test looked like it was going to be interesting. During the sighting lap one slippery uphill section became something of an obstacle course with an outfit and a couple of bikes obviously stuck. With a bit of momentum and route picking I succeeded in getting up it fairly cleanly and easily.

Finally arrived at the first time check. I arrived at almost exactly 3 hours for a three hour check, initially we'd been told that the times were easy and we should get half hour or so time in hand. Apparently the time checks had been slightly miscalculated and in order to correct it the time allowed was moved to 4 hours for which I was very grateful as were all the persons who arrived after me. One outfit, No.2, piloted by Neil Stittle and Patrick James still arrived late even with the 4 hours allowed. Apparently a couple of direction arrows had not been put out and people were missing a turning and subsequently getting totally lost. As one of the later starters by the time I got there all the arrows were out and I had no problems. One hour of refuelling, drinks, snacks and fags later I was off again to do the same loop but with the timed sections in operation.

During the first special test I was over taken by no less than 3 bikes! Some of the guys out there were very fast on these fire roads. The second and shorter special saw nobody overtaking me partly because of it's length and, I like to think, because it was more technical, which is what I prefer. Then we were out of the woods an onto a very long road and fire road section.

When the rain eased (not often) the scenery was awesome, rolling hills, mountains and valleys, streams and rivers as far as the eye could see. Some either got bored with just pottering along these tiny lanes or thought they might time out, and pushed it quite hard, too hard in some cases. I spotted two bikes down where their knobblie tyres had lost grip on the wet tarmac roads. All reported to be OK and had assistance with them already. We also had to navigate a byway with some mega puddles. I hit a few (possibly too fast) to have the water go well over my head. I followed a Boxer 1000cc BMW for a while and he was doing very well even with both cylinder submerged! I happened to follow another guy who got caught out by a sharp rocky decent and was catapulted into the undergrowth but was OK, just a little embarrassed I think.

Finally I arrived at the last time check. Again this was meant to be a three hour check but it seemed to have been reduced to two hours! I was OK with 15miniutes in hand but there were a LOT of people behind me and I had been one of the later persons starting originally. It looked like there were going to be a large number of persons timing out if the rules were going to be adhered to (one hour or more late over the whole event and you would be regarded as not finishing). This final check was at the beginning of the third special, timed test. it was a fairly steep climb up the side of a hill covered in slippery mud, a couple of twisty bits, a steep decent over cross rutted land and finally a sharp right hander.

The guy to go before me was on a large trail bike (750cc?) and as he left I could see he was in trouble. The backend was obviously all over the place and it seemed inevitable that he'd fall fairly soon. I was to follow 30 seconds behind him on my lightweight 250 enduro machine, it was bound to get messy. Needless to say I caught him up in a matter of moments and I give the guy his due, given his bike and the conditions he was doing very well. Eventually though the back end slipped out just too far and he was laying on the track looking VERY tired. He quickly got up and indicated that I should pass. There wasn't the space to pass easily and I wasn't about to abuse the guy by passing where I couldn't do so happily so just shouted back that he shouldn't panic, I'd happily wait. After all, Even if I were to win it's only a small trophy and not worth endangering anyone for. Finally he got back up and allowed plenty of space for me to pass so I did. I did, of course, do exactly what he'd done just a few moments later. I'd taken the left hand of two ruts only to find that I couldn't get back to the main path without negotiating a small lip, the back spun out and I was down. Three bikes passed while I was there (loads of space for them) and No.8 (Alison Buckland) happily waited when I was trying to sort myself out and was blocking the track. Finally on the move again I went fairly quick down the bumpy slope in order to make up some time only to stall it at the bottom as I tried to slow for the last corner. Alison caught me up and with loads of room passed me. However, she seemed not to see the right turn arrow, negotiated around it and some tape and vanished off into the ferns! I later heard that a few persons had done this.

The last special test was to be a hill decent and climb using the MX track at the start/finish, due to limited marshals and terrible rain this couldn't be timed and was made optional. I did do it and crossed the finish line to be cheered home by the three or four people there.

We packed up, dismantled the tent etc and an hour later started the trip home. Our route took us past the start of the last, running, special test. Given that it had taken us the best part of an hour to pack up we were amazed to see a large queue still waiting to do this stage!

A good weekend event with a good crowd of people and no real problems. It was interesting to do a Rally for the first time and to experience a fair amount of fast road work.