I can’t say I have done it. But I have done the dune run a few times while it was on at Noordwijk and saw many of the competitors and chatted with a few. Didn’t look anywhere near 10kph. Mind you; all of them had fat tire, hard tails and monster gearing. They said it was crazy hard but a blast. I reckon the time cut off would be for fun-riders, riding on a normal ATB.
With my 3.8 w/kg I won’t be competing for the prices but I would like to finish the race and not be taken out of it due to the cut-off.
Think I might incorporate a few beach practices with a friend of mine, just go to the lakes nearby and make a course ourselves and just go hard on the sand.
Way, way faster than 10kmph. However I guess there would be a tide state to factor in. If you can ride on the hardstuff versus the dry stuff. Going down at high tide I can see 10kmph being a realistic cut off. I have to say it did look fun but since I am a pure roadie it would be an N + 1 gig for me so alas no. If I was going there I would get the fattest tyres if my horse wasn’t a beach cruiser.
I’ve done this event a couple of times, can’t recommend these types of races enough, so much fun!
Don’t forget the cut-off times may be fairly conservative depending on the range of abilities entering.
Giant xtc will be great. You might consider some less aggressive tyres if you’re currently using knobbly mtb ones. Riding on damp sand on the beach itself is like riding on tarmac, pretty darn fast! And riding on soft dry loose sand, the knobbly tyres don’t offer much extra grip anyway.
Haha great, more variables to take into consideration next to nutrition, fluids, wind, tactics and training .
I was thinking about that too, I am inclined to do any major investments as these beach races aren’t near me and I am not sure if I am going to do a lot of them. But I might talk to my LBS and see if I can use my gravel bike tires on my MTB for this race.
I spoke briefly with my LBS regarding the race he said the salt and the fine sand is really hard on the bike, especially on the ‘joints’ and bearings, do you clean your bike in a special way after these races?
The LBS did offer me to lend an older MTB for this particular race, but rather just do it on my own bike.
Yeah, a gravel tyre would be ideal! Something like a panaracer gravelking would be my choice.
I didn’t do any special cleaning other than to be thorough. I’d just aim to spend as much time as possible getting in to all the hard-to-get areas and moving parts. If you haven’t done this sort of cleaning for a while then it’s a good opportunity to actually strip as many parts off as you dare and give them a bit of attention.
Also, I’d recommend using a dry chain for the race. Sticky lube will attract dust and sand and cause more noise/wear on the drivechain than not using lube.
Mainly the salt I’d imagine, apart from when they throw salt on the roads I wouldn’t encounter that much salt during my normal riding.
He was just trying to be helpful in making me aware of it, not so much so that he could profit from it.
I mean he offered me to use one of his bike without any charge so I wouldn’t have to use my own.
Was being a bit light hearted about it there. I can see all LBS saying that about beach riding in general. It is a bit like asking a doc if drinking a few beertjes is alright…
Since I moved to the Netherlands I have chewed through chains, wheelsets and BBs far faster than anywhere else that I have lived. So the fine sand is pretty ubiquitous round this neck of the woods. The salt is easy to flush off. I have taken to using waxed chains now too. Not sure how much of difference they can make yet.
Not complaining, mind you, I regarded it all as a fair tax for such a fantastic cycling infrastructure. Just pointing out that running your XTC on the beach may in theory consume some more of the life than usual but you would be hard pressed to notice it over the longer term. Just flush the bike off as soon as you get home to get any salt out of there. Detailed clean as and when.
I haven’t used it before. I’d say any lube that stays wet has the potential of being sticky. A dry lube, such as Muc Off dry lube, would probably work ok but I’d be tempted to make sure I have a very clean chain and then not use any lube.
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