The racing was ultra close at last weekend’s Polaris Challenge, but the bikes at the front couldn’t have been more different.

Riding Whyte PRST-1 linkage forked floaters, Aidan Leheup and Steve Heading managed to overturn an overnight points defecit to take overall victory by just one point on the Sunday. The man they edged out was Glaswegian Gary Tompsett, who still took the inaugaral solo category win on his big wheeled Gary Fisher 29er. As well as running skinny cyclocross tyres for extra speed, Gary managed to cram tent, sleeping bag,
food and stove and gas etc etc into a Karrimor Bike Rush Lite 15 litre sac.

Gary’s longtime friendly rival and occasional event partner John Houlihan was leading on Saturday until a late return cost him 90 hard won points. Despite thrashing his Santa Cruz Superlight round more checkpoints than anyone else on Sunday, he still couldn’t catch Gary or the Whytemen and had to settle for third. His only consolation being that the 160gm rucksack he home made for the event survived both race days and the dance round it at the disco afterwards.

For a full set of Polaris results, here’s a download, but be warned, it takes a couple of minutes.