Original Source

Rachel Stainer : Original Source Mountain Mayhem Competition Winner

Team: Helen, Sinead, Rachel, James and Nick

Here’s the blog the lovely Rachel wrote after competing with Original Source at Mountain Mayhem this year...

Up until 2 weeks ago, I considered the words “bike” and “race” to be a very unlikely combination, and definitely a foreign concept in terms of my own riding experience. Some basic off-road, long-distance touring or just pottering around on the bike were well within my comfort zone, but in terms of narrow single track and night riding, I was a mere beginner.

I’ll be honest, up until the moment the competition email ended up in my inbox, I had never even heard of the event. I’d always known that 24hr races existed, but in my naivety has assumed these took place on flat floodlit courses. How wrong was I!! But as with any competition, you have to be in it to win it, and so just sent off the email thinking nothing more of it. That was however until just 11 days before the event I received an email to say I was part of the team!

So that was it, I now had 11 days to find a tent to borrow, a bike to borrow, and a lift up from London. A quick facebook status update was all that was needed, and I soon had 7 bikes, 3 tents and a life, and so it was game on!

Hoping that I wasn’t expected to be any good, I arrived at OSMM 2010 excited but also apprehensive about the whole event; but I needn’t have been worried, the team I was joining were all just there to take part. Our aim was just to have someone out on the course for the full 24hrs. The race just couldn’t begin soon enough in my mind!

It wasn’t long before our first 2 rides were back and I had started on my lap. Halfway up the first climb I realised I was missing my 2nd cog! Maybe I should have checked the bike first, but it didn’t matter, I still had plenty of other gears to choose from! 89 mins later and after some serious amounts of concentration and some exhilarating cycling, I was handing over to James. But I had loved it; it was pushing my limits on the technical side, but I had still enjoyed every minute.

11.30pm, lap 2. Paul and I headed off for our first lap by bike light, and it was incredible. Even an over the handlebars crash on a steep bit of single track wasn’t going to ruin it. Feeling a bit battered from the tumble, managed to get up and continued on the course and was soon back into the rhythm. Completed the lap and handed back over to James, only later to find out that the lap had cost me 3 cracked ribs and some concussion. You have got to love a bit of adrenaline as a painkiller!

All in all a fantastic event where I was part of an equally fantastic Original Source team. Thoroughly enjoyed the atmosphere and the riding, and am looking forwards to getting back on the bike as soon as these ribs are fixed, and certainly intend to be back at OSMM 2011 if 2010 is anything to go by!