The British Downhill Series (BDS) is widely seen as the world’s leading national downhill mountain bike series and will attract 350 of the world’s fastest racers to Great Britain throughout 2013. The series is affiliated with both British Cycling and the UCI.
Photo: Keith “PHUNKT” Valentine
Dates and Venues:
1. 13/14th April Combe Sydenham, Somerset UCI cat 2
2. 11/12th May Fort William, North West Scotland UCI cat 1
3. 1/2st June Innerleithen, Scottish Borders UCI cat 1
4. 29/30th June Llangollen, Mid Wales UCI cat 2
5. 24/25th August Bringewood, Ludlow BC National Ranked Event (Not UCI)
Steve Peat and Josh Bryceland have confirmed their entries for every round.
Entry Procedure:
The race is pre entry, via the British Cycling website from December 1st 2012. Please make sure you have a valid British Cycling Membership (Silver or Gold) and a race license. Race entry is £70.00 plus a £0.60 booking fee per round.
Entries for riders with 100 B.C points or more will receive priority entry from December 1st. If by February 1st there are spaces available we will open entries to those with a B.C membership, race license and 1 B.C point or more.
International racers are invited to race, please e-mail [email protected].
Photo: Keith “PHUNKT” Valentine
2013 Race Schedule:
Friday
15:00 Venue open for team pits, parking and camping.
15:00 Course open for on foot inspection only.
15:00 Commissaire course walk.
18:00 – 20:00 Race registration, please bring your valid 2013 BC/UCI race license.
Saturday
08:00 – 11:00 Race registration.
09:30 Open practice for all riders.
18:00 Course Closed.
18:05 Riders’ meeting.
19.30 Evening video.
Sunday
08:30 Open practice for all.
11:00 Timed seeding run followed by one timed race run.
17:30 Last Elite racer down.
17:45 Podium.
Photo: Keith “PHUNKT” Valentine
The BDS aims to be the most technically advanced downhill mountain bike race series in the world. Video will be streamed live and viewable on Pinkbike.com, British Cycling, Dirt, Wideopenmag, Ride.i.o, BDS website and the BDS Facebook pages. The live feed will run from 13:00 until completion of the awards ceremony. An hour’s programme beginning at 13:00 will include a wide range of interviews, pit chat, bike checks and helmet cams of the track.
An e-mail/SMS system will e-mail riders at 15:00 on Saturday with Sunday’s seeding times and on Sunday afternoon with their race time. Results and the overall results and a short message will be included in this email.
Facebook/Twitter uploads will take place throughout the race weekend with a dedicated person located trackside to upload all the latest news and gossip. All results will posted online by Sunday at 18:00.
Aaron Gwin will be at BDS round 3 at Innerleithen.
Media:
Media Manager: Ian Cross will manage the media and provide all our sponsors and media with photographs from the weekend.
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Race Categories and running order for both seeding and race runs:
Juvenile
Youth
Veteran
Master
Women
Elite Women
Junior
Senior
Expert
Elite
10,000GBP allocated for the series for the fastest 8 riders overall from the males and 4 overall females.
Race Regulations:
The event will run under BC and UCI Regulations and Penalties. The BDS has the best safety record in the history of mountain bike racing in the U.K.
Friday 15:00 we will hold a course inspection with the Chief UCI and BC Commissaires, Head Marshal and the Head of Course Maintenance.
Race timing will by Tag Heuer. Radio or wireless communications will be used. Live split timing will be provided and provisional results from each category will be printed and displayed within five minutes of each category finishing. Full medical cover will be provided, both on course and from an identifiable base station in the event arena.
Camping will be available onsite in a separate camping area except for Fort William where no camping is allowed. A full public announcement facility will be on site with announcements throughout the day. Toby Parodi, the voice of the BDS, will be on hand all weekend.
There will be onsite catering providing fresh hot and cold food and refreshments from 18:00 on Friday through the close of play on Sunday.
Multiple male and female toilets will be onsite all weekend along with disabled and urinal facilities. All will be serviced on Saturday evening and restocked throughout the weekend.
Rankings:
We also work with the Roots and Rain website which regularly can see 10,000 images from a BDS downloaded. The owner of the site, Seb Frost, is part of our registration team and we utilize his stats for seeding the riders in the correct running order.
The BDS team is tried and tested ensuring a seamless race and event.
