Photos Jon Brooke

After glorious weather at the first round of the 2007 series the weather forecast this year was less promising and, to cut a long story short, we managed again to get pretty much any weather you can expect in April – all cramped into one weekend.

The week leading up to the event was blessed with dry but cold conditions that made most of the trails dusty. Unfortunately on Friday morning the rain started to arrive and turned the super fast course into a more challenging ride. Luckily that didn’t stop almost 1,300 starters to make it to Builth Wells to get involved into one or both of the two rides on offer.

Normally the first event of the season would be the Exposure Lights Big Night Out Night Marathon, but this year everything would be different, with the new MTB Chariot race kicking off the weekend of events. The following hour was filled with crowd and rider entertainment, highlighting the success of the new addition. Expect to see this spectacle at other Marathon events this year.

Almost 300 riders (the biggest field since the event was introduced) made their way onto the hills surrounding Builth Wells for the Exposure Lights Big Night Out Night Marathon. Conditions were still dry and fast, and after only 1hr 39mins the first rider came over the line picking up the traditional Night Marathon BUFF. Once passed the finish line and rewarded with the special BUFF the riders warmed up in the marquee with tea, coffee and cake and getting themselves ready for Sunday.

The lights in the marquee finally went out at 2am which unfortunately also signalled the start of the rainfall. The short but hard outbursts of rain turned the course and campsite into a rather muddy affair but luckily did not impact on the riding fun and the amount of riders that lined up on Sunday morning.

With a new later start, 1,000 riders lined up to tackle one of the three courses on offer. This year the most popular distance was the 65km middle marathon, which would take the riders out towards last years new addition to the course – the single track sections around Llaneglwys Forest. The weather made the riders work extra hard and extended most riding times by one hour or more.

The event village was nice and busy with the newest and latest from most of our sponsors, including Merida Bicycles, High5, USE, Schwalbe, Ergon, CycleActive, Buff, CrankBrothers, What Mountain Bike, TheBikeChain.co.uk, Purple Extreme, Lizard Skin, CTC, Our Scottish Borders, Topeak, Fizik, Formula, Gore Bike Wear, Fibrax and last but not least Exposure Lights. Without their help and dedication the 2008 series would not be possible.

By now a fixture on the Marathon series the CycleActive guys had another great weekend with booked out skills courses on Saturday and lots of kids enjoying the excellent riding tuition on Sunday. The new addition to their event offers was the Cycle Active TT (Total Training). After training the young riders for 2 hours on Saturday the coaches take them out onto the 25km marathon where they look after them and make sure that they have a great 1st marathon experience.

Two photographers were out on the course, regular photographer Jon Brooke and his colleague Lauris Naglins – hopefully capturing everyone. Visit www.rightplacerighttime.co.uk to see your photos.

Next event – Ruthin 25 May

Round two is heading north to Ruthin, North Wales where the Merida Bikes MTB Marathon will be held on the Sunday and the GORE BIKE WEAR Road Sportive will be run on the Saturday. This is the first time that a road event will be run over the same weekend as the MTB Marathon. To find out more about the new addition to the event weekends please go to our Sportive page. Enter both events online.

Bad Goisern

With Easter out of the way and the first marathon under our belt the summer seems to be coming closer and closer. And summer means Bad Goisern time. If you haven’t been to the ‘Merida Marathon on holiday’ in your ‘marathon career’ maybe this is the year. Big mountains, clean air and thousands of other likeminded bikers from all over Europe – what a great combination. Check the Bad Goisern page for details.