# emtb race Saturday May 1st



## careyj1 (May 12, 2017)

Anyone interested in racing their emtb next week, May 1, at a private ranch in Nevada City, CA.

Checkout Clipped In Races - Home

It would be great to see a nice turnout from ebikers.


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## jonyrad (Jul 14, 2019)

careyj1 said:


> Anyone interested in racing their emtb next week, May 1.
> 
> Checkout Clipped In Races - Home
> 
> It would be great to see nice turns from ebikers.


I'm in s. Utah and would love to race(over 60) but cant seem to get the cats to gather. Night - time race downhill would be perfect. Are there any clubs?


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## RBoardman (Dec 27, 2014)

XC ebike racing is no fun in my opinion. (I’ve done 1 xc and 1 enduro on my ebike). It’s just a contest of who can ride their ebike past the point of power cut off for the longest. Maybe if the course was really tight or technical it would be cool, but you’ll never find that in a California XC race.


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## GKelley (Sep 4, 2018)

The winner will be the person with the longest battery life. 🤣🤣🤣


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## RickBullottaPA (Mar 4, 2015)

Having done a couple eMTB races, the basic concept is good but the reality is that there is too much variability between various types of motors/drivetrains to make for competitive racing - and add in the many hacks and tweaks that people have done to their bikes and it becomes kind of pointless. The only way it can really work well is a spec series with a common motor tuned identically.


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## Clintox50 (Feb 4, 2005)

RBoardman said:


> XC ebike racing is no fun in my opinion. (I've done 1 xc and 1 enduro on my ebike). It's just a contest of who can ride their ebike past the point of power cut off for the longest. Maybe if the course was really tight or technical it would be cool, but you'll never find that in a California XC race.


Actually this one is tight and technical with lots of handling skills needed. 4.6 miles and over 900ft of elevation change. The owners of the property and friends all ride eMTB's there. Course preview video here. I know there's a lot of differences with ebike motors, tunes, etc but we were hoping to give an opportunity to the eMTB community to race and connect over shared experience. Thanks for the mention Careyj1.


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## careyj1 (May 12, 2017)

I raced at Exchequer both XC and enduro on an EMTB a few weeks ago. It was very competitive at both sport and expert levels. Racers had different brands of bikes and everyone had a great time. 

I raced non-E XC at this location three years ago and the place is amazing. It's one of the best places to ride a mountain bike in Northern CA.


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## RBoardman (Dec 27, 2014)

Clintox50 said:


> Actually this one is tight and technical with lots of handling skills needed. 4.6 miles and over 900ft of elevation change. The owners of the property and friends all ride eMTB's there. Course preview video here. I know there's a lot of differences with ebike motors, tunes, etc but we were hoping to give an opportunity to the eMTB community to race and connect over shared experience. Thanks for the mention Careyj1.


Good to hear. I'm familiar with the TDS Enduro, so knowing how legit that race is, it's not hard to believe a sweet xc course can be laid out as well.

And the more technical you make the course, the less your ebike motor/power matters. With the exception on the Levo SL most likely. That will definitely be a disadvantage in xc e-racing, but in an enduro it may be just as good if not better than some bikes.


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## RickBullottaPA (Mar 4, 2015)

Clintox50 said:


> Actually this one is tight and technical with lots of handling skills needed. 4.6 miles and over 900ft of elevation change. The owners of the property and friends all ride eMTB's there. Course preview video here. I know there's a lot of differences with ebike motors, tunes, etc but we were hoping to give an opportunity to the eMTB community to race and connect over shared experience. Thanks for the mention Careyj1.


Awesome. That's the best equalizer, where rider skills matter more.

The races I've done were a blend of both, but in the open areas the Levo's pulled away from the Shimano-powered bikes (E8000). Two reasons I noticed: the Levo's had more raw power, but also the assist continues right up to 20 MPH (and beyond, since a lot of the riders appear to have cheated with their wheel circumference), whereas the Shimano bikes start to cut assist at around 18-18.5 MPH. Doesn't sound like much, but over the race it was the difference in finishing positions. My HR was pegged in the 150s the entire race so I wasn't slacking, so I was doing my part. ;-)

My current eMTB (Orbea Rise) wouldn't be competitive against full power eMTBs in a race. Fun as hell to ride though.

I like the fact that these events present a "gathering of the tribe" opportunity for eMTB riders - that's a better vibe than a hardcore race anyway. I think a cool format for these events would be a blend of an XC event on technical terrain (45 minutes to an hour), a couple enduro segments (including an uphill technical segment or two), and a super tight "trails-lite" section that rewards skills + smooth assist (but doesn't require full on trials riding skills).


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## careyj1 (May 12, 2017)

The Clipped in race was fun. If you can ride the Ranch, do it, it’s mountain bike paradise. Clipped in really knows how to put on a race. Very impressed.


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## Wooly Worm (Mar 15, 2015)

I raced an ebike race recently and it's one of the hardest races I've ever competed in and I've been doing this since 88'. I think part of the problem with some of these early ebike races are they're being held on non mountain bike style trails. Ebike races that treat ebike as actual bicycles and run them on actual single track with tech, is challenging just like a standard bike race. I think there's still a silly misnomer that ebikes belong on a different type course. The GNCC series is one of those. Only one race they've done this year actually used a MTB course. The rest they just sort of throw you out onto mini bike hare scramble courses with ruts and 7 different lines through trees and across corn fields. If there's no single track that isn't rutted out by big bikes and ATV's they create "MTB trails" by driving an ATV through the woods and shredding the undergrowth. The ground is soft and horrible and you can barely tell there's a trail there.


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## careyj1 (May 12, 2017)

Wooly Worm said:


> I raced an ebike race recently and it's one of the hardest races I've ever competed in and I've been doing this since 88'. I think part of the problem with some of these early ebike races are they're being held on non mountain bike style trails. Ebike races that treat ebike as actual bicycles and run them on actual single track with tech, is challenging just like a standard bike race. I think there's still a silly misnomer that ebikes belong on a different type course. The GNCC series is one of those. Only one race they've done this year actually used a MTB course. The rest they just sort of throw you out onto mini bike hare scramble courses with ruts and 7 different lines through trees and across corn fields. If there's no single track that isn't rutted out by big bikes and ATV's they create "MTB trails" by driving an ATV through the woods and shredding the undergrowth. The ground is soft and horrible and you can barely tell there's a trail there.


I used to race GNCC races on a motorcycle back when I lived in Ohio. So far both of the ebike races I have done in California where on courses that were build for bicycles. My output was the same as races on a non ebike. (hard and all out) I wouldn't want to race an emtb on a blow out GNCC course. I still watch most of the GNCC motorcycle races on RacerTV. Class 1 emtb should be on bike trails. It's a bike, you can pedal it without any power, I just did in the last race.


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## gonzo (Feb 18, 2004)

The fair thing to do on an ebike race is to issue the same model to every rider. Then have the course longer than a full charge on the battery. So if you turbo mode the whole way, you will run out of juice and have to pedal the dam thing to the finish line.

ebike racing is just a for fun thing to do because every one will not have an equal advantage on ebikes (modified bikes, secret extra battery, etc)


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## Wooly Worm (Mar 15, 2015)

gonzo said:


> The fair thing to do on an ebike race is to issue the same model to every rider. Then have the course longer than a full charge on the battery. So if you turbo mode the whole way, you will run out of juice and have to pedal the dam thing to the finish line.
> 
> ebike racing is just a for fun thing to do because every one will not have an equal advantage on ebikes (modified bikes, secret extra battery, etc)


At Specialized Cup (all races) and the UCI world Championships they check the bikes, just like they do non ebike, before you go to grid. It's not hard. Ebike racing (and riding an ebike in general) is just like riding a regular bike with some of the physicality taken out, and I say some because racing ebikes is not easy. Ultimately it comes down to who is a better bike handler and the strongest overall in the end, even with batteries involved.


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## RickBullottaPA (Mar 4, 2015)

Wooly Worm said:


> At Specialized Cup (all races) and the UCI world Championships they check the bikes, just like they do non ebike, before you go to grid. It's not hard. Ebike racing (and riding an ebike in general) is just like riding a regular bike with some of the physicality taken out, and I say some because racing ebikes is not easy. Ultimately it comes down to who is a better bike handler and the strongest overall in the end, even with batteries involved.


Except it's not that simple. Different drive systems obviously produce different levels of assistance, and those drive systems also start to taper/reduce assistance at different speeds. When the courses are wide open, as described above, there is a distinct advantage to some models that would require a 10-15% difference in fitness (not skill) to compensate for. Also, despite the "tech check", many riders are still "cheating" or bending the rules by changing wheel circumference, which is rarely if ever verified pre-race. Plus, tech inspection seems mostly a perfunctory step rather than a precise set of tests (e.g. F1).


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## careyj1 (May 12, 2017)

Wooly Worm said:


> At Specialized Cup (all races) and the UCI world Championships they check the bikes, just like they do non ebike, before you go to grid. It's not hard. Ebike racing (and riding an ebike in general) is just like riding a regular bike with some of the physicality taken out, and I say some because racing ebikes is not easy. Ultimately it comes down to who is a better bike handler and the strongest overall in the end, even with batteries involved.


Great information. I think it's funny that many of the comments come from people that haven't raced an ebike. I have raced three times this year. First time, there were different brands and both in the XC and Enduro races. For the XC race, different brands were used and most of the times were close, the race was under an hour. Same thing in the enduro race. In another race it was all Specialized bikes, just happened to end up like that. The lap times between the different racers were close enough that it came down to the racer not the bike. This race was almost two hours so battery management via use of Eco, Trail and Turbo came into play. All the races have been great and very close racing. It some of the best and fun racing on two wheels.

The other thing is in ebike racing as long as you keep Class one ebikes in the same group the bike performance should be about the same. Give or take a little bit. Yes, you can have cheating, like hacking the computer but unless I am racing for money, I don't really care. In big races like, GNCC Pro, Sea Otter Pro and some others, they do a test on the top three winners bikes. But again, go ahead a cheat, I don't really care. Also there is cheating in a lot of bike racing (non-e). Course cutting and doping are two most common. I would rather enjoy racing then sitting around crying about cheating.

Some ebikes have a little more torque some have a little bigger battery. In a race under approximately 1 hour 20 minutes, the battery size doesn't come into play. In a longer race battery size does come into play but most class 1's are about the same range.

Look at offroad motorcycle racing. The motorcycle races are broken down into Pro, A, B and C levels. The A, B and C levels are then broken down by age groups or bike size depending on what class you want to race. I don't hear the Pro racers or the age based racers complaining that it's not fair because some people are racing 450's which have more power. I don't hear racers saying that all the motorcycles need to be the same.


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## RickBullottaPA (Mar 4, 2015)

careyj1 said:


> Great information. I think it's funny that many of the comments come from people that haven't raced an ebike. I have raced three times this year. First time, there were different brands and both in the XC and Enduro races. For the XC race, different brands were used and most of the times were close, the race was under an hour. Same thing in the enduro race. In another race it was all Specialized bikes, just happened to end up like that. The lap times between the different racers were close enough that it came down to the racer not the bike. This race was almost two hours so battery management via use of Eco, Trail and Turbo came into play. All the races have been great and very close racing. It some of the best and fun racing on two wheels.
> 
> The other thing is in ebike racing as long as you keep Class one ebikes in the same group the bike performance should be about the same. Give or take a little bit. Yes, you can have cheating, like hacking the computer but unless I am racing for money, I don't really care. In big races like, GNCC Pro, Sea Otter Pro and some others, they do a test on the top three winners bikes. But again, go ahead a cheat, I don't really care. Also there is cheating in a lot of bike racing (non-e). Course cutting and doping are two most common. I would rather enjoy racing then sitting around crying about cheating.
> 
> ...


Offroad motorcycle racing is a whole different beast, as you know. You're rarely racing at the limit of power, whereas in many eMTB courses you are doing so (bike + rider) a significant percentage of the race, except in the tighter or more technical sections, which are sparse on many eMTB courses. With many of the wide open grassy sections, you and your eMTB are pegged, and that's where the differential shows. Even 5% differential over that amount of open area is the difference between podium and not. Personally, I could care less - I've decided that eMTBing is more for fun than competition, for many of these same reasons. Cheers and BRAAAAAAP! (or for an eMTB, ZAAAAAAAAP!)


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