Another Polaris is upon us this weekend. This time in the Lake district.

Weather forecast  is looking pretty awful, with rain all weekend, and even some sleet forecast for friday night. As spring and summer Polaris were both pretty rainy, this will make it a hat trick of traditional muddy UK long off roading.

However Lake district should prove a stunning old school mountain biking location.

The format will be same as last Autumn, with a night stage. Last year it was great, so if you are at a lose end i would recommend having a go.

http://www.dirtyweekendadventure.com/ 

Anyone else taking part?

I will be there.  Managed to break the driver on my home made led light last week though so I have been busy cobeling together some replacment illumination, it's a bit experimantal though so I hope it holds together. 

Forcast for Saturday looks terible, not so bad Sunday.

 Ifor

My teamMate discovered last night that he has lost the charger to his lights. So trying to sort that out today.

I also hope my lumicycle HIDs turn on, the bulb is getting pretty old! We could end up doing the night stage with nowt but petzel LED head torches.

Thank the Lord I gave up doing base camp Polaris events after DE took over. The parking debacle they have organised will indeed become an organised debacle! Drop off your kit, drive 2km up  a dead end track with bugger all turning space and leave your car there - don't do this, only do that? Christ on a bike!! You'd think that we'd never had to drive onto a wet field before at an MTB event?! And to tell you not to drive a large car there - WTF?! Any consideration to those who wish to bring their camper vans to camp in?

The sooner PC Autumn returns to proper remote camp format the better!

Not happy!

Why am I here writing this and not taking part in the second day of the Polaris?

The weather was as bad as expected. it rained from friday night non stop.So in real terms there is no way that cars would have got in and out of the field chosen to camp in. the 2 mile trek to car and back was pretty much necessary, or each car would have needed to be tractored out.

After 6 hours riding in torrential wind and rain we arrive back to base camp. Expecting to get into dry kit before the night ride. instead we find that someones enormous tent, laden down with boxes full of kit and cookers etc has managed to become airborne and take out two tents, included ours. After moving the offending tent from ours we find that our tent has been badly ripped. This allowed the heavy rain to soak all of our dry kit for the rest of the weekend, including our sleeping bags and sleeping area. No where dry to sleep and nothing dry to put on. With more rain p1ssing through the gaping holes in tent  We had to reluctantly bin the event.  an evening of riding in the rain, would have been fine, it doesnt matter if you are wet when riding.  but a night shivering in a puddle of mud! it would not have been comfortable, and may have led to illness.

As we left much of the field was under water and many competitors were leaving anyway. If our tent was intact, we would certainly have stuck it out. But i can understand why folk left. The event marquee, was knee deep in mud.

To illustrate how much it had rained, the main roads north were flooded. with RAC vans much in evidence pulling conked out cars out of the flood waters. We ended up having to drive south and get on the A6 to shap, and then on the M6 there. A6 was close to be impassible when we went by. 

I am interested to find out if they managed to carry on with the event, and if folk managed to get out of the lake district today!

in summary, my worse Polaris ever! The couple whose inability to peg down a heavy tent, showed no remorse whatsoever for ruining our Polaris for us! "oh were you going to carry on? we were just going to leave anyway, its horrible".  Just an apology was all we wanted, some people!

i would also add that the above situation could not have happened with remote camping event.

a) we would have had all the rest of our kit in dry bags in our packs, so it could not have got soaked

b) the tent would have been in our back packs so could not have got ruined

c) during the day everyone elses tents would have been in their back packs so they could not have blown into ours

Tent was a bargain £30 on sale job. We had to just bin it.

glad it was not my lightweight racing tent!!

Too bad to hear about your bad luck Fraser. 

Moving the parking was the correct desision if you had seen the field on finishing on Satarday there was absolutly no doubt that that was correct.  Cyceling to the finish line was somthing of a challenge for most people.   The marquee which had been OK priory to the start was three inchs deep in water 6 hours latter.  The parking on the forest road all seemed OK there were pleanty of turning points.  my only gripe was that a couple turned up at 1.30Am and managed to wake me up in my van as they parked opposit.

Unfortunatly the Satarday night stage got called off and I only got to find out having come down the hill ready for my start.  I which I had gone and done a loop of the single track in the dark as I had initaly though of on finding out but my competative instincts got the better of me and I just cycled the 100m of clamb back to the van trying to avoid getting a swaet up.

The contrast on Sunday was amazing the air was realy clear and there was not a coud in the sky for most of the day.  I need to get to see the routes that people took because I though I had done better on the Sunday but I managed to drop back in the field so clearly I missed somthing.

 Ifor

I am not suprised they cancled the night stage. But i think had i been there, i would have been annoyed at this. may as well be wet while riding as wet sat in a field. 

I looked at the weather on the sunday, and must confess it made me rather sad to not be out in the Lakes! It would have been nice to be able to ride there and actually see the surroundings. Also 4 hours on sunday is a nice easy way to finish.

I feel such an anticlimax. I am missing that great feeling you get when you arrive home after a Polaris weekend.

Well here's my story for what it's worth.

After a busy week at work I was slightly irritated on the Friday to hear about the parking up a track news and the horrendous forecast. I was kind of looking forward to a chilled event - my memory of Malham was such a good one. Anyway, I turned up and found the forest track to be actually perfectly fine, pretty level for my small camper, not too narrow or boggy. I froze my nads off hurtling down to register on the cold Friday night. The map was interesting with seemingly loads of controls, and no really obvious routes to consider when compared to other events. The rain started as expected in the early hours and by morning was continuous and heavy...and cold. I started off in good spirits and headed off into the forest. Four and a half hours later, utterly soaked and starting to get too close to mild hypothermia for comfort, I decided for the first time ever to finish early. I was a bit gutted but seeing so many others bailing at least made me feel less crap. The event field was flooding and even the impervious Martin Stone was looking bedraggled. I managed 200 points which didn't seem too bad. Cycling back up the hill in the deluge and near gale was hideous, but a pint of tea in a dry van later things didn't seem so bad. My rather harder mate managed the full six hours although managed to get lost on a moor somewhere for an hour in the maelstrom. He found the whole thing funny!

We both agreed thought that we couldn't be arsed with the night stage - despite enjoying night riding. It was still throwing it down and getting windier. Good news then that they cancelled it. Frankly I suspect it would have been foolish to go ahead. It would have been white water biking, in the dark, and also perhaps the final straw for some. A few beers and some sloe gin later, we were laughing merrily.

Sunday was utterly glorious, a day to really enjoy. Even though there were puddles deep enough to submerge an entire wheel (really, this is no exaggeration) it was fun. I flew aroung the forest visiting loads of places I had never been - Grizedale has some *good* biking. Time evaporated and I hurtled in with 10 mins left and 260 points. Well pleased.

So - a big thanks to the organisers who could so easily have binned the event. It was more hassle than usual, but it also great fun and, as my mate pointed out, these sort of ordeals make the best stories.

Now, when can we expect a posting of that voice message from that stroppy but hysterically funny bloke who phoned the emergency number to complain the control on the transmitter didn't exist...!?  

I love the Polaris, i think its a brilliant biking event. Not finishing one, makes me feel like i have somehow failed.I still keep trying to think of ways that I could have finished the event, without getting hypothermia sleeping in a muddy puddle. But there is no point fretting now.

Looking forward to the proper full fat Spring Polaris.

Is there any news on the guy who was ambulanced away?

We were with the Paramedic as he treked up the footpath to get to him. The chap was wrapped in survival bag, looking in a bad way and could taste blood in his mouth. He had taken a spill and handlebars had knocked him hard in the mid section.

"Now, when can we expect a posting of that voice message from that stroppy but hysterically funny bloke who phoned the emergency number to complain the control on the transmitter didn't exist...!? "

what a plonker. as well as abusing the emeregency number, how can you miss a control point with a ruddy great transmitter by it!! it was fairly obvious.

It all ended amicably with a hand shake! One of the organisers (tall bloke, Pete someone?) popped up to the forest track car park at the end of Sunday to say thanks to everyone for getting on with the last minute changes - which I thought was a nice touch. He was telling us about this call and it turned out the bloke who made it was standing next to him! he played it back - utterly hysterical. A total rant! You know how it goes though, piss wet through, searching high and low for a control which is somewhere else because you are cold and wet and starting to lose the will to live.

There were two medical evacuations apparently. No news on outcome though, hopefully all good. Anyone who had a crack at Saturday deserves a medal - two, if you were mental enough to attempt the Walna controls!

In my defence,,,,,insanity levels were high as we did successfully reach the Walna controls,,,by which time my slight blindness which prevented me from seeing the "other" mast earlier in the day had become almost total!!. Fortunately,,,as WillC says,,Gary is a complete gent and accepted my profuse apologies. He then revealed the fact that he had saved the messages and played them to anyone who cared to listen,,,whilst I looked for a hole to hide in. Apart from that it was a splendid event where the pleasures easily outweighed the grumbles.

Gary is indeed a gent.

got the wife to book me and my team mate into the campsite 1km to the south on the way up.  Lovely showers by the way!!!! why didn't they suggest this to competitors on Friday the farmer was oblivious to what was happening on his doorstep?  anyway Grizedale beck did a good job of flooding the field on Saturday.  Being a Polaris novice all I can say is Lake District, October, Mountain bike what do people expect.

Sunday was great and it proved the events takes you places you wouldn't normally venture.  So 2008 Summer Polaris & Autumn, should i go for the Spring format?

Spring format is my favourite one. Its a bit more hardcore, but in effort terms not significantly more than the base camp versions. One great thing about spring format is that you cover a lot more ground as you ride away to remote campsite, rather than looping back to your starting point in one day.

The non basecamp format is what makes the Polaris special, it moves it further away from the riding you would normally be doing.

Its great to be out in the hills completely self sufficient. everything you need is on your back. if things get too hairy, you can stop, put up your tent and get a brew on!