MuddyMike

That just makes me look bad......the above usually happens the night before we leave! hahaha

Just about perfect, wouldn't you say? · Fri 0%, 0mm 14° / 29°C Sat 0%, 0mm 13° / 27°C Sun 0%, 0mm 14° / 27°C

you can also add in "Grumpy Middle Aged Men" to the race (only grumpy if we cant ride our bikes)

For those of you doing your 1st stage race and wondering what to pack, this was my packing list for this years Epic. It all fitted into my Epic bag, so cut accordingly for shorter races. I also packed all my supplement per day into small ziplock bags so there was no measuring out each day, just grab the days pack and go, which means no huge supplement containers to drag along. The meds list is just in case. One other tip, start taking a probiotic NOW ( I start a week before a stage race) and for the duration of the race. The stomach is one area of your body you want to have in 100% condition comes race day, plus its key to keeping your immune system strong. You will be eating different food from normal and drinking water from a different source so take those probiotics. GENERAL Sleeping bag Pillow Garmin Charger Ear Plugs Headlamp Water Bottle Phone & Charger Camera Sunglasses I-pod 2 x combo locks (Tent & Bag) CLOTHES Salamon Trail Shoes Slops 4 x Underwear Tracksuit pants 2 x Shorts Swimming Costume 4 x T-shirts 1Long T-shirt Cap & beanie PJ’s Windbreaker 2 Casual Socks Jeans Belt CYCLING KIT 4 Pairs cycle kit 4 Pairs Bike Socks 2 Pairs Gloves WATERPROOF Rain Jacket (not water resistant, they are just useless if it rains) 1 Thermal Under shirt FOOD & DRINK Oat Energy bars Fruit sticks Super C Biogen Recovergen x 16 servings Bigen Cytogen Race mix x 48 servings Biogen Gels x 48 MEDS Vitamins Cal c vita Probiotics Myprodol Panado Immodium Buscopan Arnica massage Vaseline Fissan Paste Tea Tree Oil Bactroban Corenza C Rehydrate Transact pads Xysal Airmune Cotton Wool ADMIN ID Money Wallet Air Tickets & Car Hire Accomodation Details Toiletries Shower Gel Razor Shaving Cream Toothpaste Toothbrush Sunblock F50 Labello Lip F30 Towel Chamois Cream (Milking Cream works a charm) BIKE STUFF Bike shoes Helmet 2 x water bottles Garmin hrm & strap Oakleys UV Sleeves Camelback (if required) 10 sp chain link Multi-tool incl chain breaker Spare tube x 1 Rear drop out 4 x Cytogen refills CO2 adaptor & 2 x Bombs Valve core and tool Sunblock Pump Mini Leatherman Zip Ties & Duct Tape Phone Credit Card Small Lube Puncture Repair kit / Gators Tyre Liners

For everyone doing their 1st B&B, relax, its one hell of a fun event. Really a chilled vibe and the food... well lets just say you will go home heavier than you arrived. The 1st day is one of my favourite days ever on a mtb. Dropping over the escarpment down Solly's Folly is just toooooo much fun. Day 2 has the famed Spioenkop climb maxing out at 25%, buts its on paving so just dont stop. Coming down Spioenkop via "Princess Margaret Drive" is also brilliant single track. If you love downhills this singletrack will put a smile on your face. Day 3 around the dam is also nice and Puffaddder pass is great (even if I landed up in the bushes last year when skill levels were below that of speed levels). The tracks are great and nothing too technical but there are some tough climbs. Its still a long ride but if you've done the training you will have a fun time. To get your car from the start on day 1 to Winterton just book a transfer on the website (word of warning - dont leave any valuables in your car. A mates car was relieved of a few items last year, but this was an isolated case). Bags will be transferred from the start to Emseni at the start of stage 1. Just go drop it off at the truck allocated to your race # and pick it up when you get to Emseni. An "epic" size bag works just fine, after all its just 3 days not a week. I for one am counting down the minutes to the Fedgroup Berg and Bush 2012.

Thanks Richard for a great event again, and a storm again! Looks like it gonna be part of the event! great course, wow, it had everything and it made you work hard for every lap. Best vibe at any MTB event in the country. Fun and friends is what its all about. Everyone had time to say hi and the racing snakes never seemed stressed when behind slower riders. This is what sport is all about. see you next year for #4!

Looking forward to it. I wonder how many laps I am gonna go for.....maybe 18.... = 150km. yeah sounds about right. Lets hope it stays dry.

And the SLYDER 275 is available in both XS and S so getting a proper fit should be a breeze.

This should be within your budget. Top specced 650B machine and looks the business too! http://www.silverbacklab.com/2011_website_SILVERBACK/2013/images/slider275.jpg

DO NOT try GEAX ust tyres on stans rims. they just dont work due to the stans profile. Even if you get them on you will never get them off on the trails, so its a pointless excercise. However they do fit other rims fine. Great tyre for stage races where you dont want to worry about punctures is the Conti Protecttion x-king. But with more protection comes more weight - cant get away from that.

If you want to use spraycans to recoat your bike look at the Rustoleum range. The best in a can by far.

I have an Elite 29er and I am very satisfied with the bike. I rode this years Epic and the bike was flawless and the 2012 XT didnt skip a beat the whole way. Suspension was great and really saved my body from the terrain. I have ridden the Anthem as well and it's also a great bike, the biggest difference I found is that the Elite is definately more agressive with the front end setup (which I love) and the Anthem is more layed back - so ride them both before you decide. You will have to a long way to find a better specced bike than the Elite for the money. You get 2012 XT (SLX ispec brakes), through axle Stans ZTR wheelset, Rockshox Reba dual air and Fox RL. To top it all off the after sales service is the best I have ever experienced. So in summary ride the competitors and go for what feels best for you, oh yes also check out the Momsen Dual Link 7.

This stuff works so well the paint falls off in places, a normal garden hosepipe will work fine. Just remember it takes time so coat it nice and thick (2 thinner coats 10 minutes aparts helps to build up a nice thick film) and come back the next day. Your direct effort to strip the frame is most probably 30 minutes. Your best bet to find it is at Builders Warehouse. A 1L is about R80 and enough to strip a frame.

As far as the stripper is concerned the best by a country mile is one from Plascon called RemovALL. There is nothing else like it on the market. The brilliance of it is that it does all the work. I stripped a hardtail and it was the easiest thing ever. It is a gel that takes days to dry so all you need to do is slop it on nice and thick, it must be as even as possible to work properly. Leave it overnight (its works slower than conventional strippers) and hit it with a high pressure cleaner and there you have it. I had to re-apply some small sections which I didnt get a thick enough coat on. It cleaned the welds out so well it looked like it had never been painted. The guy who powder coated the frame couldnt believe I stripped the frame myself. It's also eco friendly.The usual paint strippers also dry very quickly so if you dont scrape it all off before it dries youve got some serious trouble. Another thing you should be aware of when stripping an aluminium frame is that the conventional paint strippers may cause hydrogen embrittllement of the frame = potential weak point / frame failure. BE CARFEUL what you strip with. So if you dont feel like sitting for hours trying scrape off all the paint, this is the answer. More riding time

I think for R450 you could do much worse than this event. Day 1 was a good test and a combination of lots of different surfaces. As it wasnt seeded, I really enjoyed the first few km's of tar to get the field a bit spread out before heading off road. Day 2 was very fast and parts of day 1 in reverse. I am sure they could find some different track to the east of Maropeng. I think a 20km night ride on Friday to seed the event is a great idea. I hated the prizegiving. An hour of crappy fines was just too much and the organisers must of had half a bottle of tequila by themselves - not a great for a healthy lifestyle event? As for the lucky draw what a joke. When you are giving away over R40,000 worth of bikes the very least you can do is do it fairly with everyone having a statistically fair shot at winning. The food was also way over priced! R100 for a wors / chicken roll and salad? I took the family down to Maropeng take aways which was 200m away and we had nice burgers and chips for R38. But overall a worthwhile 2 days of riding - thats the main reason we go to these events.

I see there is a new KIA mtb ranking for all events sanctioned by CSA? Now how will this compare to the current SA Seeding index...this is all too confusing.....Will the big series like Nisaan submit to both SA Seeding and KIA Rankings...........maybe I should just go for a ride on my bike....

+1

They got stock on Monday. Pretty much all gone already. Maybe some mediums left. The demand must mean something......

@AndreZA and Sammajoor ,there are 100 Dogma lookalikes from Chines catalouges, does that mean Pinarello Dogma's are cheap imports from China? Your argument doesnt hold up. Look carefully, those frame are not the same. The Silverback Storm one is a proprientry Silverback mould. This bike is gonna kick ass all over SA at the price point. A mate just picked one up for R20500, Full carbon, Stans ZTR Crest, SID, Full XT. Its a steal at that price. they got stock in on Monday and its already almost gone.

As a 1st time Epic rider (and finisher), I obviously cant comment on previous races. I did however have the best week of my life riding the 2012 version. Yes it was tough, its the Epic, so if you expected anything less youre a fool. Having done some decent preparation for the race over the last 6 months, I was very lucky to never hit the wall or have a day that I wanted to quit. What was amazing is that each day seemed to get tougher (with the exception of the fast Tuesday stage) and I wouldnt of had it any other way. The spirit amongst the riders was superb and to ride alongside riders from around the globe was brilliant. Every consecutive day you were challenged to conquer a tougher stage than before and that made the acheivement more valuable for me. The argument that it's expensive is a mute point for me. It's a one of a kind event in SA and is on the majority of SA MTB's bucket lists. Once you have been there and seen what it takes to put an event like this together you will understand the costs. Yes you can go ride overseas...blah blah blah, but thats not riding an Epic. Will I rush back to the Epic? I dont know, but I am sure our paths will cross again, for now there are new trails to ride in other magnificent parts of our country.

This topic has interesting comments.... 2012 will be my 1st Epic and I cannot wait! Yes it is a lot of money in anyones language, but we have to understand that this is THE mtb stage race in the world, no ther race comes close. Any mountain biker out there who says they would never want to do it is either a liar or in denial (take the money issue out of that choice). I agree with a comment made by live2ride earlier, there are so many entries out there now simply because too many guy's eyes (and wallets) are bigger than their balls and determination to see their decision, through to crossing the finish at Lourensford. Imagine if the entry fee was half the price, every Joe and their dog would enter, only to find out in Feb that they are way under trained and guess what, the market would be flooded with unwanted entries. The high price of the entry helps to keep riders focussed on their "investement" and get the required training done, cause they know if they dont they are in for a big financial loss come Feb when they try to flog their entry. Maybe an idea to keep Epic entries open for riders who are serious about the challenge and the commitment is to introduce some kind of qualifying criteria. (I can hear the howls of objection to that already). I dont agree that the Epic is all about racing. Look at the cutoff times per stage, between 8-11.5hrs - Not exactly racing speeds is it? Epic is what you make of it, no-one is putting a gun to your head to force you to race it. You are given the leeway with the cut off times to make it into an adventure and not a race if you so choose. As for the earlier comment that anyone who can afford the cost can ride - Total BS!! You can buy an entry, but you earn your finish. Will I be back again after 2012? Probably not as there are many rides out there I want to do, But I will never regret my 2012 entry.

Awesome Awesome Awesome. If you were not there you really missed out BIG TIME. 220km of perfectly marshalled and signposted trails incl warnings of obstacles. Some of the best singletrack you will ever ride. Fantastic weather, great people. Is there anything more to say?? Only down side is that the field is getting smaller each year and the Pro's dont seem to show up to this one. Be There next year!

Unless youre a sponsored pro, who really gives a rats backside?? Yes a 29er is most probably a little faster, just like the new Taylor Made driver hits a golf ball little further, does it make you better?? NO, you cannot buy performance with equipment or supps - no replacement for TITS. If you need a new bike buy a 29er, if you got a good 26er, ride more.

Not bad for a road bike, where is the rear suspension...... just kidding. Looks wickedly fast

You find lots of 2nd hand options, but being new to teh sport and not knowing what to look for in a 2nd hand bike could turn out to be expensive. Road bikes dont get beaten like MTB's so take someone along who knows what to look at. If you looking at new, Silverbacks are just unbeatable, but there are some other options. For around R7000.00 you really have some nice new bike options. Shop around.