MARIGOT—It wasn’t only about the usual suspects at Sunday’s 3 hours of Bellevue mountain bike race, but even more about the growing number of e-bikes that participated, a grand total of seven teams took part this time, more than ever before.
Purists may dismiss these electric battery-driven bikes but there’s no argument they are fun to ride, a great assist on the climbs but still cumbersome on the technical stuff.
It was not surprising then that e-bike teams were the fastest on Sunday, taking the first four places overall for most laps of the course. Team Drunk Fish (Christophe and Pierre) snatched the most laps with 19 before the bell sounded for the three-hour mark.
Second overall with 18 laps went to Moustache (Pascal and Julien) and third overall to 103.SP 2.0 (Yann and Daniel) and Los Chorizos Electricos (Pablo and Luc) in fourth tying on 17 laps each.
Luc Scheulen made the switch to e-bike about a year ago and never looked back: “When you reach a certain age, e-bikes take out the hard work and make riding even more fun”, he said with a wry grin.
Back to regular mountain bikes, Tom and Jerry (Andy and Jahkim) were the top Junior team completing 16 laps; a great match-up of teenage talent, both riding smooth and super-fast with barely a glitch on any of the technical sections.
Interesting to see that Andy Guibreteau’s mother Marina was on the e-bike mixed team Electric Boogie Woogie completing 15 laps. It was the first time a woman has competed in an e-bike category.
Team Sit and Spin (Mark and Travis) were the top Men’s Team, completing 16 laps to edge out Always Late (Kianny and Reni) with 15 laps. Age and experience have advantages even if you are competing against two of St. Martin’s top young roadies.
The top mixed team was G Squad (Sandra and Ronan) with 14 laps. It was also good to see an all-women team Annee and Isabelle braving the course as they are more accustomed to riding road bikes
“This time we did the course back-to-front, which was a last-minute surprise to the teams,” said Susy Piscione who was on a mixed team with husband Pablo. “It made it a lot more fun and nobody had an advantage over anyone else. So, it turned out harder and longer but with less steep climbs, with a couple of technical ravines to negotiate.”
Conditions for the race were perfect, cool and overcast, with a moist track thanks to some early morning rain.
Saturday’s first 2 hours of Bellevue Youth Edition saw just six teams participating on a shorter and easier course. Team VCSG 2 (Jahiem and Edgar) completed 18 laps to win the 13-15 category and Team Diron (Divenchy and Robinson) won the Under 12 category, tying with Team ACVPB (Edwards and Edrick) on 15 laps.
Complete results of both events on Tri Sport’s website.
