The winner of this year’s UK 24hr Mountain Bike Championships totalled 319km. Ouch.

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The renowned Relentless Exposure 24 hosted the UK 24hr Mountain Bike Championships 2016 at the weekend. Mathew Jones is the new British Champion, covering 29 laps of an 11km course of singletrack on a mixture of man made and natural trails mixed in with some stinging climbs.

On 29th and 30th October 2016 Fort William’s No Fuss Events hosted the UK 24hr Mountain Bike Championships as part of their Relentless Exposure 24 event at the Nevis Range in the Outdoor Capital of the UK.

Ever since hosting the WEMBO (World Endurance Mountain Bike Organisation) Championships in 2014, Relentless 24 has showcased plenty of high-level endurance racing in Scotland.

The start list for this year’s World Champs contained a veritable who’s who of British and International 24hr racers. With a field of almost 100 solo riders it is clear that the interest in 24hr racing shows little sign of waning.

No Fuss: “The atmosphere on Saturday morning was amazing; riders were clearly excited by the course, one more than worthy of the Championship status. The fact that every rider had trackside pits and that the weather gods appeared to be playing ball”.

“It was clear from the outset that racing was going to be fierce and at the four hour stage of the race there was a little over 4 minutes separating the top 10 riders, at eight hours that was extended to a very close 15 mins. There were whisperings of concerns around the pit area ‘they’ll never sustain this’ and ‘who is going to crack first’.”

Mathew Jones, Michael McCutcheon and Peter Nadin were the eventual top three solos with Mathew completing 29 laps in a time of 24hr and 10 minutes. Michael was 15 minutes behind after an astonishing 29 laps, a little under the 200-mile mark.

In the ladies’ race Lee Craigie and Sally Buckworth tussled all day and night with Lee taking the victory with a creditable 23 laps.

In the team categories it was Stefan Macina and Bob Addey from Aurelius Cycles who took the men’s pairs with 32 laps and the girls from Sandy Wallace Cycles taking the win with 23 laps. The quads and the eights categories were dominated by the boys and girls from Dunoon with the Benmore winning the eights and Team Pin it Ya Fairy taking the fours with a monstrous 32 laps.

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Frazer Coupland from No Fuss Events, said: “The standard of racing over the weekend has been exceptional. We have been delighted with the numbers who attended and as usual the team at Nevis range are a pleasure to work with.”