Photos © Jon Brooke

Six down, one to go. The Merida MTB Marathon Series 2007 is slowly coming to an end but the events are still going from strength to strength. Nearly 1,100 riders made their way to the normally sunny Selkirk. For the first time the riders had to experience the rocky course in anything but summery conditions….luckily the weather didn’t spoil the fun.

The weather forecast leading up to the event was still looking positive and when the riders started to arrive at the Rugby Club in Selkirk the sun was out again greeting them with a promising smile. With almost 900 riders on the pre-entry list (before the registration opened for business) it looked once again that Selkirk would be one of the biggest event of the season. Unfortunately when the activities on Saturday evening came to a close the rain started to set in and would not ease up till Sunday lunchtime. The course turned over night from perfect dry conditions to a bit of a mud bath.

1,100 riders set off on Sunday morning tackling one of the four courses on offer. After approximately 1h 34min the first rider came over the line finishing the 25km course. The flow of riders finishing their ride then carried on till 6.20pm when the last full marathon rider crossed the line under the red High5 dome. Lots of mud covered faces came over the line throughout the day decorated with big smiles.

Selkirk was introduced to the Merida Bikes MTB Marathon Series four seasons ago and turned itself more or less instantly into the most liked marathon location of the series. The combination of an extensive trail networked paired with some of the best man made trails the UK has to offer gives this event unique flavour.

Austria event

Before we headed up to Selkirk our ‘holiday’ event in Bad Goisern, Austria took part and managed at its 10th anniversary to attract more than 3000 riders. As in the years before a group of Merida marathon riders went over to challenge one of the many courses on offer. We have heard only good stories so far and will put up a detailed review on our website in the near future.

Photos and website updates

Our event photographer Jon Brooke was out on the hills in and around Selkirk taking pics of everybody. Pics of (nearly) every rider – searchable by rider number are available from. Jon took lots and lots of images so have a look and see if you can find yourself on there. Although most of the photos are searchable by rider number there were a higher number than usual of photos with no number visible because of the mud, but riders who can’t find their pic can browse through just the pics with no number showing. Please keep in mind that the photos have a limited amount of time on the website – in particular the Cumbria pictures are only available for one more week. We will also make some further updates to the www.mtb-marathon.co.uk site once our web master is back in the country so keep an eye on the news in the top left hand corner.

Next and final round

Ruthin, North Wales 15-16th September 2007

Now with 6 of the 7 events being over and done with we will enjoy a little break and start working on the 2008 dates (expect some exciting changes) before we head up to Ruthin for the final 2007 round of the series. Our team on the ground the North Wales Mountain Bike Association have been working on the four courses all year round and have paid particular attention to the 50km ride which we felt was in desperate need of freshening up. We will give you some more details on the fruits of their labour in the next few newsletters and press releases but be assured the guys have created something for everybody.

Entries

The entry for the Ruthin event is open and there are places available for all four courses. Find out more about the upcoming Ruthin round.