Hammers 8 MTB, 20 Nov 2022

Last Sunday I took a bit of a step into the unknown. I'd entered 'Hammers 8' - an eight hour MTB race contested over a seven mile lap from 8.00am till 4.00pm. The winner was whoever completed the most laps with only laps completed before 4.00pm counting. I can't remember ever riding my bike for eight hours at a time, let alone off road so it was definitely going to be a learning experience. Having had a little look at last year's results I had in my head that I wanted to do 8 laps.

It was going to be a wet and cold day and as the race got underway it gave me my first look at the course. It had a bit of everything, a fire road climb, fast flowing singletrack descent, steep technical climb and a rooty descent.

At the end of my first lap I was about 30 seconds behind the leading woman. I caught her on the second lap and we were still together at the end of the 3rd lap, 2 hours and 15 minutes into the race. It was at this point I decided to make a pit stop. My hand had started to give me a little trouble so stopping and taping it seemed like a better option than trying to carry on and get to the point where I couldn't physically finish. I also took this opportunity to change my clothing on my top half which was rather wet, dirty and heavy.

The next three laps were pretty steady and my lap times were still pretty well matched to the leading rider, with just the time I lost stopping being between us.

Lap seven was where my body started to tell me no. I pulled in again at the end of that lap and declared I thought I could manage one more. Another quick change of top half clothing and I somehow managed to set off again for lap number 8.

At the end of lap 8 as I pulled into the pits I was given the facts. I had an hour and 13 minutes until 4 o'clock to do another lap and for it to count. The leading woman had gone out again, so whilst there wasn't much chance of catching her, if I could do another lap it would only be time between us and we'd be equal on distance. Before I knew it I was off again and managed to cross the finish line with 15 minutes to spare, ending my race having completed 9 laps, 100km and 3011m of climbing, finishing 2nd solo woman and 21st solo overall.

I was asked at the finish if I'd do it again. I told them to ask me again in a few days 🤣. And if you asked me now? My answer would definitely be yes!

Kim Baptista