truck of a lifetime!

dakar buddy, jago and his wife lucy have an amazing once in a lifetime offer, to follow the 2012 dakar live in their 6 wheeled tatra overland truck.

proper ad to follow but the essentials are below.

Accommodation from the 29th/30th of December to the 19th of January -  Luxury Villas at the start at Mar Del Plata and end in Lima with extensive grounds accommodation and pools a global luxury expedition vehicle en route! 

The truck is a 6X6 Tatra similar to those racing in and supporting the Dakar. It is 9m long with a bespoke 7m long living accommodation cabin. The air conditioned accommodation has separate (private) permanent sleeping areas. The cabin has a full bathroom and shower with domestic grade fittings (no camping loos!) a fully equipped kitchen with oven, hobs, grill, microwave, fridge etc a lounge with AV equipment, large dining table and is finished to a high standard throughout. With a 1000litres of fresh water, solar panels, 8kv generator and a 2500km range this truck is self sufficient for a week at a time and will be the most luxurious way to follow the Dakar but still get the buzz and excitement that travelling with the Rally provides. 

The cost of this once in a lifetime adventure to be part of a genuine race team amongst the pits and action of the daily bivouacs whilst travelling across the amazing landscapes of Argentina, Chile and Peru will be about £5000 per person (depending on demand and number in the final party). This will include all accommodation, overland travel costs and food etc but excludes air fares to BA and return from Lima (Open Jaw tickets are about £1200).

The truck will be brand new so finish will be good all the beds have fully sprung mattresses with sheets and duvets (no sleeping bags) and that our driver is the owner of Overland Vehicles who built the truck so full technical assistance will be provided! Ed is easy going and likeable but also ex British military with extensive overlanding experience so the ideal person to drive and assist for a Dakar adventure!

if you are seriously interested, contact jago.pickering@googlemail.com

dusk to dusk 24 hour enduro

this was not an entirely new experience as i rode the 24 hour race solo last year. however, this year had a little more intensity with dakar just around the corner. there was a lot more competition than the previous year and stan watts was also competing in expert (he's racing in dakar 2012), the pressure was on.

my preparation was not ideal, back suffering from the beacons required a couple more physio sessions. then arriving late friday night after the logistics of getting fiona to the station, meant no supper until 11pm, pups fed and cleaned bed by 1am, then up at 645am to the cries of 9 hungry faces.....again! jen arrived mid morning for the handover, but it was after 2pm by the time i left for the 2 hour drive back to the brecons.

in the car this time, the journey along the m4 to merthyr tydfil via cardiff, was uneventful, just a relaxing drive through the welsh valleys to walter's arena! i arrived to the d2d chaos, with vans and trucks parked everywhere, intermittent rain showers, wind blowing, generators rattling, engines revving, it was exciting to be there. i only had a couple of hours to get ready really, sign on, buy a replacement goggle lens, fit my new forcefield body-armour and get my water etc ready for the night ahead. bumped into mat hall, great to see him, haven't seen him since our morocco trip last october!

before i knew it i was down on the starting line with the desert rose team: 24hr iron men - rob law and ross noble; and the 10hr big bike team patsy, glenn morgan and john michenson; and the pit crew zippy, tony and martin, what a team! (there was a 12hr team, but they were not starting until the following day).

we've been invaded!














marcus was over from.....well not sure as the man travels the world! but he's got into dakar too, racing for a honda team.

after another rain squall, the experts and veterans had gone and it was our turn. the sky was dark with thick, low, grey cloud hiding the hills and evening sun from view. it was 730pm and the night was already drawing in. rob got the hole-shot, i was close behind him as we took off over the jump in the middle of the motocross track. taking it relatively steadily for the remainder of the lap to ensure no stupid and humiliating fall, we left for the 6 mile course in 3rd and 4th position; there was a long night ahead of us.

i had decided to wear my sleeveless jacket to start as it was not particularly warm and it was certainly wet, but after 4 laps of the 6 mile night course, my goggles had steamed up and i could hardly see. into the pits to drop the jacket off, quick drink and away again. i'd had 2 additional led lights fitted to the bike, which together with my other halogen, made for good night vision, a big difference to last year. the night wore on, pitting every 5 laps or so (about 1.5 hours) dawn broke and the longer 15 mile day course opened up. i thought i'd ridden 32 laps, but according to the scores i'd only completed 29, hmmm! the sun was bright as the clouds parted, revealing a stunning vista across the welsh hills.

zippy getting my bike ready for my final laps














at about lunchtime i was feeling a little jaded, but this soon changed when asking zippy about positions, i was told i was in 4th, one lap behind ross! if the truth be told, i was a little annoyed with myself. i was back on the bike and off, i had to pull back ahead if i wanted a podium. however, disaster struck a shortly after. i took the first extreme section which cuts a corner off the route, that was fine; then the second, a very steep decent forcing me to walk the bike down before sliding sideways into the ditch at the bottom. still ok. up a gnarly incline and then a short ride through a puddle, a waist deep puddle!! i lost my footing and before i knew it i was falling back into the water as the bike disappeared under!!!!

i knew the score as i stood up, sodden, with the bike now upright feeling sorry for itself! pushing the bike through the pool of water, up over the track with bikes flying past, i stood the bike  up next to a tree and called zippy. while he was heading over, i whipped off the tank to get to the spark plug, but the spanner i bought for this particular plug did not fit, bugger! 3 marshals turned up, front wheel in the air, pumping the kick-start water forced out of the engine and exhaust. then bled the carb before zippy found us (eventually! ; )) and got the bottom of the carb off to empty the water out of there too. after about an hour and after ross had past me, i was outa there. bloody annoying to lose an hour, but i was still racing. mum, courtney and millie were possibly turning up, so that would have been disappointing!

smiling? delirious more like! been up since 645am the previous day and raced for 22hours....














still, the extreme sections needed to be tackled as they shaved off a fair bit of track and time. the final extreme section was a pretty steep climb, but actually quite simple and certainly shaved at least 5 minutes off the course. i wished i'd started using that since the morning, would have saved the best part of an hour through the course of the day.

downing a can of pussy! tony, zippy and patsy looking on














amazing how one feels after a little pussy!














after a couple of laps i came in for a final break before the end. i was feeling terrible, but pats gave me some coke (cola variety!), a banana and poured a few cans of 'pussy' into my kriega pack to give me a kick start. mum was there, but i was not quite with it at that point!

2 more laps (about an hour per lap) and i arrived at the finish at about 715pm to find a load a riders in the holding pen, which meant the lead rider had not finished and therefore the race was still on. i rode over to the marshals to ask whether i could get another lap in, even with 15 mins to go, they said i could and the lap would count. although i was knackered and the last thing i really wanted to do was go out again, i recounted the saying "pain is only temporary, but losing lasts a lifetime". as i started a slow turn for the final lap i heard a voice in the distance, yelling "get another lap in!!", it was patsy! snapping me out of my inertia i was off, parading around the motocross track before reaching the start/ finish line. nick plumb had the chequered flag and asked whether i wanted to do one more lap!

racing across the horizon for my final lap














i remember passing the holding pen and seeing rob's face in what looked like disbelief! as i tore on up the hill out of the arena, patsy, zippy and a few others were cheering me on, waving arms, it was brilliant! i haven't felt so exhilarated since my rowing days, it was an awesome feeling knowing that i had the team behind me.

making steady progress i was called to a halt by a marshall to assist him and a few others to push a bike out of a small river back up onto the main track above. it was the last thing i wanted to do, but the poor guy who's bike it was looked worse than i felt! not long after, i passed another rider who's been stuck for the past 3 hours, waiting for a marshal. again i stopped made a call to zippy to call the marshals, which were sweeping the course in any case. lights were on now as the sun was setting for a second time; i didn't want to do a second night out there!!

heading back round the arena for the final sprint to the finish. the place was deserted, it was 830pm, an hour after the main race had finished. however, nick plumb was there to wave me in, with one other marshal, plus me ma, courts and spills there. all their smiles made it worthwhile. it was worth every bit of pain!

Nick Plumb waving the chequered flag for the last time!














chatting with ross about the closing stages of our race














last year i completed 32 laps; 23 through the night and 9 during the day and came 4th in clubman. this year i completed 39 laps; 29 through the night and 10 during the day. i came 3rd!

got to get the desert rose badge out for the photos ; )














i had my first proper podium finish and it felt bloody great. up until that moment ross and i were bantering about who was going to get third place. it was a very close call, one lap in it and a bloody good contest. ross laid down the gauntlet and i had to work bloody hard to make that finish. hats off to him*.

chatting to 'slick' who came second













*it turned out that ross had also had a major bike problem, he'd burnt out his clutch and had to finish on zippy's bike. not quite sure how he got his bike back to the pits, but he lost a fair bit of time.

24hr
me 3rd 39 laps, ross 4th 38 laps, rob 5th 35 laps

10hr
glenn 1st 25 laps, patsy 2nd 24 laps

a couple of burgers later, having collected our trophies, spills drove me back to malmsbury in my pick-up, i was going to have a bath and sleep in a real bed compared to the original plan which was to sleep on a mattress on the floor of the truck like last year!!

thanks desert rose racing and touratech, another gruesome race!!

things getting tough

the last 5 weeks have been hard, working, training, racing and rearing pups! not your obvious combination ; )

the day after clapham junction was hit by the riots i woke up with a crooked back and could hardly walk or stand up for long. no physios were available that day due to the riots and ultimately led me to calling patsy 530 the following morning to say i could not make it to dunkirk - all my kit was laid out ready to go so that i could bike down to dover and meet the crew for another day training in the dunes, and this time on a ktm 525, my future dakar bike. it wasn't to be : ( i knew patsy would not be impressed, but i've never been in such pain and for the next 2 weeks, i saw the physio nearly every other day. upshot was that laura penhaul and sam wilde from puresports got me back on my feet, enabling me to compete the following weekend in the beacons rally and the weekend after in the d2d 24hr enduro.

i took the 950 down to the beacons rally, stopping over at mum's in malmsbury on the friday night. early start got me to llandovery for 830am saturday morning. wearing my rally gear plus an additional goretex jacket as it was raining - i was in wales; funnily enough, i was dry until i crossed the severn bridge!! pats had the porridge ready and there was just enough time to get a few bits together before we headed off to the hills for scrutineering. it pissed it down for most of the day, but the riding was good. plenty of fast and windy tracks, with 2 excellent special tests, each lasting a good ten minutes, plus an optional section to provide some muddy rut practice.





















the first half of the day we had blinding rain, you couldn't wear your goggles as it was like driving without wipers , but without the goggles your eyeballs felt like they were being stabbed by a thousand needles, you couldn't win!! but by the afternoon the rain cleared away bathing us in sunshine for the ride home. back was sore throughout, but only when standing. so when we arrived at the checkpoints and had to wait, i either remained sitting on the bike or stood, slumping over the seat; really odd, really uncomfortable.





















woke up to a smattering of rain, so the few items i had left out to dry were wetter than before. but fortunately the cloud covering was light and not before too long, the sun came out and remained with us for the day. we covered much of the same route, just in the opposite direction, plus instead of 2.5 laps, we had 3 laps to do. it's a tight course for a big bike rally, which when riding with patsy and steve hague for one part of the course, was a lot of fun. even had a chance to chat with steve about his dakar experiences and preparation while waiting for a special to start; a long way from the bmw training course where i met him originally. Scores: 7th day 1 and 6th day 2.

although the sun was out, there was still plenty of mud and water around!

as soon as the race was over i headed back to the campsite to get packed up so i could head home to the cottage as early as possible to see chobe and the pups. the 100 or so mile journey along the a40 on a bike is awesome, but it still took 2 hours on 2 wheels. by 6pm i was back, in time to see ali and stu, the stud dog owners, who were visiting. they were really impressed with the pups and chobe's condition, so that was great to hear for both myself and fiona. i stayed up with chobe and the pups for as long as possible as i knew i was going to see very little of them over the following 2 weeks.