Team Wideopenmag’s Chris Hutchens was flying the flag for us out in Manizales, Colombia for the second round of the 2018 Enduro World Series.
From the dry, baking heat and altitude of Chile, to the wet, humid jungle of Colombia, you’d be hard pushed to find two races more different on the same continent. Chris Hutchens was out in Colombia fighting the mud and the humidity.
Photos by Chris Hutchens. Feature image courtesy of Enduro World Series.
Narcos.
With Chile complete and the first round of the Enduro World Series behind us it was onward to Colombia for the 2nd round and to a new country for the series and a new venue. It was a country that for many, if not all, of the regular riders, was new. The country has a reputation, which is only reinforced by TV series such as Narcos. In fact the main actor from Narcos’ Juan Pablo Raba raced. How cool is that?
We had a few days to chill before the race kicked off. It was a little more mellow than Chile. We took these few days as a good time to relax and also see more of Colombia. All too often you visit these amazing places and all you see is a couple of tracks and the center of the city or local town – this can be amazing of course. With this time, James Hall – my travel buddy for the trip – and I met up with the group from Chile and headed up high. High into the Andes and the Parque Nacional Natural Los Nevados.
Into Thin Air.
Juan, our guide for the day, picked us up in his super carry. These are incredible vans! We climbed up the steep mountain roads hitting 3000m. The vegetation changed going from thick jungle to shrubs (including the unique Espeletia plant) and mosses until we were soon approaching the 4000m mark.
Beyond this as we climbed from 4200m to 4600m towards the volcanic area of the national park things soon became baron and the breathing tough. Nevado Del Ruiz is a monster, last erupting in 1985 killing an estimated 25,000 people and destroying the town of Armero. On our descent down we picked up some of the most incredible banana bread you could imagine. Kilos of the stuff. This fuelled the rest of the week.
Show time.
The EWS puts on a real show when it comes to town and the welcome and hospitality in Colombia was next level. People welcomed us with open arms. The prejudgments I had originally were soon eradicated. It’s a bike city and quickly we were spannering and servicing forks in a local shop. As many would say to us, ‘this is your home’. A truly endearing welcome.
Manizales is renowned for its coffee plantations. Its a huge exporter of the stuff and much of the local wealth comes from this black gold. Our trip out side of the city was one of the highlights. A full police escort paraded the vivid buses through the city center heading out of town. All eyes seemed to be on this group of ‘gringos’ off to ride some local trails through the coffee plantations.
Calm before the storm.
Sun, grippy trails and pristine corners. It was most welcome after a very contrasting race in Chile. The vegetation was full with banana trees sporadically spaced amongst the lines of coffee bushes which hold the little berries that fuel much of the western worlds caffeine addictions. The squids were out snapping photos while riders and marshals hung onto the buses each lap. Maybe this was why there were more medics and nurses on the hill than riders?
The race would follow a more unique format that other EWSs in the past. A Friday practice day followed by an Urban prologue on the Saturday. The race would then be settled on a further 7 stages on Sunday. A mammoth day and a mammoth practice day.
Level playing field.
This year, so far anyway, riders have only been allowed one practice run per stage and uplifting has been tightened. This is great in my opinion and helps, in some small way, to level the playing field between all riders. Logistically it’s still a mission if you don’t have a team manager or mechanic as there’s some road shuttling required getting to the pits and around some of the hill where permitted. Some riders still suffered from this.
Practice was incredible; the tracks were generally running great. It was a pretty big day out with almost 50km covered and around 2000 elevation gain. No lifts this week. You still felt it on the lungs up at that height. The tracks were cutting up and were really taking a battering in practice. Especially stage 4 and 6. I’m sure any keen fans will have seen the Instagram crash reels. A group of us spent quite some time drifting and sectioning the grassy turn on stage 6! Amazing! Most of the tracks were freshly cut or relatively new.
Urban EWS.
The racing kicked off. The streets become packed with locals, 20,000 strong. The atmosphere was electric and despite the short track it was the first time in years the butterflies erupted in my stomach. God, I’d not ridden a set of steps or concrete for years. No one wanted to hit the deck but everyone wanted to kick start the weekend in a solid position. The controversy soon began with a number of riders busted for jumping the hay bails. This was announced as a no-no.
I’ll leave the riders nameless on this occasion, I’m sure it’s clear on the results sheet but their names may be tainted, if they weren’t already, because of this. Further controversy came from practice with a number of the French riders penalised for shuttle up the long climb to stage 6. A measly 20 seconds was added to their time for this. I believe more stringent penalties for such obvious and deliberate infringements of the rules should be handed out considering Fabien Barel’s penalty for shuttling a few years back.
The storm before the storm.
Heavy, heavy rain poured down immediately after the street race. Rivers ran down the streets, the streams filled and the tracks became saturated. A late decision, and a very wise one, was made to remove stage 6. It was already a mess on Saturday.
Sunday would see dominance from Sam Hill. He’s on fire this year. His confidence must be sky high. Inside lines were being pulled out left, right and centre and he completely schooled the field on stage 2. This was a quagmire on Sunday. Bikes clogged, bodies were found everywhere. Riders were gasping for air, scraping mud off, clearing their tires and removing mudguards. It was a battle. I spent much of my run trying to pass people. I managed to pass almost fifteen riders, each one getting in the way, sliding about and stalling. What could you do though other than laugh and press on!
Sam Hill domination.
Things got a little better on stage 3, Sam extending his lead further. It would be the story of the day. My luck on this trip was poor. I started the stage well but hit a rut pretty hard, dropping in and with a shattering bang blew the tyre off the rim. I pushed on, still passing some riders and avoiding being caught. My time was slow though and I dropped a minute while cultivating the local soil with my rim and collecting kilos of the brown stuff within my tyre and rim.
The day began to fly by after that. Stage 4 was a mess again. Deep ruts but what a laugh. The bike would float under you in some bits while it would be stalling in other sections. It was a matter of hanging on tight, paddling, hanging a leg off and keeping your head above water…or mud in this case. It was gruelling.
Cool runnings.
Stage 5 would be a memorable one. The bobsleigh run. The smooth sides and bottom morphed into an inverse rail track that changed and pulled you around. Crashes were common in here before dropping into slick, steep turns. What were once loamy dry chutes were death slides now.
With stage 6 cancelled it was ‘plain’ sailing back to stage 7 and 8. For me stage 7 was, at last, a track I felt I could ride like I wanted to. There was more predictability and a good mix of descents and a number of climbs. Sam Hill would drop time here but he had almost a minute gap on the closest rider. This would be my best stage, a top 40. Respectable but not quite were I wanted to be.
It would be a victory stage for Sam as he cruised down stage 8 to claim the victory in the Mens category ahead of local Marcelo Cutierrez and Damien Oton. The same was true for Cecil Revanel who would claim yet another win ahead of Isabeau and our home-grown talent Katy Winton. Mops (Melissa Newell) and Ella Connelly would take the U21 and over 35 wins with Elliot Heap cleaning up in the U21 mens race.
The season is now well and truly underway and what a way to start things off. South America has been one of the best biking trips to date.
