Photo : Tim Grainger

Our good friend Jimi tragically passed away on 23 March 2010 racing in the ABSA Cape Epic in South Africa. The calendar tells me that a lot of time has passed since then, but it certainly doesn’t feel that way.

In issue 16 of Enduro we ran a tribute to Jimi which focussed on memories of him provided by loved ones, family, friends, teammates and colleagues. It was a fitting trib-ute and one which I have read and re-read many times over the last eight months or so.

The touching words in the tribute issue made me recall the great times I spent with Jimi, expressions he always used, his cackling laugh and broad smile punctuated by his ever-present three-day growth. While I loved, and still love, reading the tribute issue, one voice was missing: Jimi’s.

This compilation is filled almost exclusively with Jimi’s words. It’s a journey through his best work spanning his editor’s notes, adventures, race reports, in-depth articles and interviews. The compilation also traces Jimi’s journey from a fresh-faced young gun ready to take on the world, through to him being a world-beater and proficient edi-tor of a nationally-distributed magazine.

Running in parallel to this journey is that of Niki Fisher, Jimi’s partner and the graphic designer for most of the great design work which we have reproduced in this compila-tion. Niki’s brilliant illustrations and graphic design meshed seamlessly with Jimi’s witty and fun-filled editorial.

Jimi was editor of Enduro for nearly three years and contributed to Enduro and Free-wheel for many years leading up to him taking over the position of editor of Enduro from me.

Of course, the common theme in Jimi’s work is riding, but as we know, there was much more to Jimi than that. He had a great writing style which was complemented by his insatiable interest in travelling Australia and the globe seeking out places, people and things to write about.

Reading through this compilation I have laughed, reflected, pondered and shed tears but the overall impression that Jimi’s own words leave speaks with one voice. He may have lived a short life but he filled it to the very brim with travel, racing, training, friends, family and fun.

We hope you enjoy this compilation of the best of Jimi’s written work.

Mikk

A compilation of the work of James Williamson.

ed note

for the first time since I started at Enduro, I wish I wasn’t the

Editor. I know it sounds crazy, and it surprises the hell out of

me. Racing events and reporting on them is really fun but it

can get a little tricky when you work hard toward a goal and end up

being a main contender in a race that you are meant to report on. It

could be worse though - thanks to there being some handy writing

talent lying around the office, and the streets of Melbourne, we’ve

come up with a great article on the 24hr World Champ’s which is

true to the event. I’m proud of both the way the Aussies raced, and

Enduro’s coverage of the event. It really was an experience and an

amazing weekend for the Aussies.

But Enduro is not just about the 24hr World Champ’s; not at

all. There was a week in May that was unbelievably enjoyable and

memorable and should stand proudly next to the World’s coverage. If

there’s one race you should put in the diary with big black perma-

nent marker, it’s the Anaconda MTB Enduro in Alice Springs. You can

read all about it in this issue, but nothing compares to being there

- the week was fantastic, it reminded me about a thousand times a

day why I love mountain biking. It’s rare that you get to be a part of

such a positive environment and the week in Alice Springs kept me

charged for months!

I love attending and racing in events because it’s awesome to see

people getting the most out of themselves. It’s rare that you are in

an environment where everyone is digging deep and pushing hard,

and not just in a physical sense. If you’ll allow me to dig up a deeper

cliché, enduro racing is REAL; and I love it. That’s enough of that

though.

I’ve had the great fortune this year to attend some fantastic

events, including the 24hr World Champ’s and while that was a great

event, only a small sector of the enduro community can experience

it. On the other hand, the Anaconda MTB Enduro in Alice Springs was

one I’ll never forget and is one that most Aussie enduro riders can

experience for themselves. I enjoyed the week so much that I was

firing up the laptop every night post-stage and trying to capture

the energy of the day’s racing for all Enduro readers. That was fun

too, in fact writing the report on the race made me really appreciate

my job, how could I wish for anything else…?

I hope you enjoy Enduro 9!

Photo: adam mcgrath

Issue 9

race up

the race village under lights

32ENDURO 09

A bunch of our strongest Aussie Solo 24hr riders packed their bikes and bags, boarded the plane, and made the trip to Canada in July to take on the rest of the world in the World Solo 24hr Champs. Dwarfed by massive hills and surrounded by muddy trails the Aussies completely dominated the event, taking out the top four placings in Elite Male, 2nd place in Elite Female, and plenty of age class podiums. Enduro magazine was there to get the low-down on 24hr racing, World Champs style.

Aussie Domination!

24hr solo worlds

words by mikkeli godfree photos: adam mcgrath and John gibson

ENDURO 0933

extra motivation to Put in a flying laP 23hrs in…

anmore is a small town about an hour from Calgary in Alberta, West Canada. It’s the gateway to the Rocky Mountains, full of young and fit looking adventur-

ers. The town was host to the Winter Olympics which left the legacy of the Nordic Centre, where the 2008 24hr World Champs were based.

For Aussies used to flat dusty courses in the middle of nowhere, the place was a new experience with massive, dramatic mountains jutting up into the sky, clouds swirling viciously and thunder storms dumping megalitres in minutes.

The track was a bit of an eye opener too. If you like climbing up steep rooty climbs with plenty of mud thrown in you’d be in heaven, but usually people aren’t so keen on doing that for 24 hours. The course was based on a ‘figure 8’ style loop. The first lap started with a massive climb and traversed a bit before a rooty and rough descent. It then went through a series of smaller climbs and fire road descents before heading back to the Nordic Centre, through a feed-zone and to the start of the second loop. The second loop was pretty much all fire road – apart from a super steep singletrack climb that quickly became a hike when the rain came down – the latter section had yet more steep climbs and finished with some undulating fire road. If you were feeling super fast you could cover the whole course in about an hour. Fatigued riders would be happy to complete the course in two hours as it turned boggy and riders’ legs started giving out.

It was about as different from Aussie 24hr courses as Maple

Syrup is to Vegemite but as we know, Vegemite goes with pretty much everything and most Aussies seemed amped and excited pre-race. The days leading up to the race were sunny and warm but the forecast was for thunderstorms the Saturday afternoon of the race. Everyone knew the course would be a nightmare in the mud and darkness so it wasn’t looking like an easy 24hrs. According to Aussie repre-sentative Jeff Toohey, “this year’s World Champs was quite obviously designed to be tough with 650m of climbing per lap…it was a far cry from last year’s worlds which had a lot of open dusty fire-road.”

In contrast to the brutal course, the layout of the event centre was excellent, based at the Nordic Centre which of-fered a dedicated cafeteria overlooking the race transition and a cleared flat area perfect for race transition and pit areas.

The sun was out for the start and riders gathered in the timing tent. The individual rider call-up seemed a bit coun-ter-productive as the hype petered out after the calling of the first twenty riders. With the biggest names at the front of a massive field, it was a scramble for their wheels when the gun went and the race was on.

An epic run saw the riders cover some hilly loose climbs and descents on foot before making their way back through the timing tent and pit zones and grabbing bikes for a long ‘start loop’ through Canmore. From the gun, big names Tinker Juarez and Kelly Magelky joined Aussies John Claxton, Jeff

c

it was about as different

from aussie 24hr courses as

maPle syruP is to vegemite but

as we know, vegemite goes with

Pretty much everything

clockwise from above: the flags were out | riders disPlayed tyPical elegant running style | John waddell – the aftermath

ENDURO 0935

Toohey, Mark Fenner and Enduro’s own James “Willo” William-son at the front of the race for the descent into town and a fairly substantial climb back up to the Nordic Centre for the beginning of the first proper lap for yet more climbing.

The US duo of Tinker and Megelky attacked early and rode away from the pack as the four leading Aussies set a more realistic pace hoping the front duo would soon lose their impetus. Toohey was first to slip away from the bunch of Aussies, trying to bridge the gap to the leading US riders. Fenner and Willo continued to hold a solid pace while Clax-ton started slipping backwards. On the second lap Toohey started falling off the pace with gear problems while Willo managed to catch Megelky and Tinker by the base of the major descent.

The front three rode together for another lap until Willo tested the others with a quick descent, creating a gap to the other two. Attacking the major climb on the second loop Tinker came across to Willo while Magelky started having problems of some kind leaving Tinker and Willo out front with a gap on the rest, Magelky drifting back to a slow starting, but threatening, Jason English.

After the groundbreaking success of Craig Gordon, who crushed a very confident Chris Eatough, the floodgates had been jammed open. No longer would the Americans discount an Aussie they’d never heard of. As the paint started to set on the race’s complexion, Willo lapping consistently at the front, English winding it up steadily with Toohey and Claxton

still in the mix, the Americans were surely getting rattled.

The hours wore on with small changes in position taking place but nothing as major as what was to come. At about 8pm the thunderstorm broke and in no time at all the track turned into a nightmare. This was a tough time for many of the riders. According to Toohey, “I don’t remember much of this part of the race at all. I do remember being caught in a thunderstorm mid-lap & my core temp dropping very quickly. I came into my pit absolutely freezing.”

Climbs became an energy sapping boggy mess and some sec-tions quickly became unrideable. One section of singletrack on the second loop turned into a steep, slick hike-a-bike, not great for legs or minds already sapped from 8 hours of intense racing.

At the front of the race Tinker and Willo continued lapping together. Willo recalls, “Juarez never went to the front, he just sat on my wheel the whole time. This meant he was get-ting more of a break on the fire trails but it also meant I was able to gap him on the descents and he had to work to get back on.”

Having let the leading Aussie do most of the work, Tinker got a gap close to nightfall on one of the first major climbs. This had turned into a few minutes gap over Willo by the pit zone at the end of that lap. Choosing to get a change of clothes instead of match Tinker’s attack, Willo let the dreadlocked hardman punch on through the rain.

left: kelly magelky leads Jason eng-lish on saturday afternoon | right: the rain came with the night

36ENDURO 09

willo leading a styling tinker early in the race

38ENDURO 09

39 ENDURO #9

Things were looking good for the veteran Tinker until early on in the very next lap when disaster struck in the form of a spec of mud which got caught in his eye. No amount of flushing or prodding could dislodge the pesky spec, Tinker’s Achilles heel which would force him to withdraw from the race at the end of the lap.

With Tinker out of the race, it was suddenly wide open with Aussies saturating the top-end of the field. Willo led with Jason English about ten minutes behind and a charging Mark Fenner not too much further back. Surely it couldn’t come down to this…Craig Gordon cracked the big one but three Aussies filling the top three spots…if they weren’t so mud-soaked and fatigued at this early stage, the top three would have been pinching themselves. But there were bigger fish to fry, like maintaining the status quo!

The Aussies did fantastically through the night. Many a 24 hour racer has come unstuck in the night. Usually it’s down to fatigue and the increased difficulty of the track in the dark, but add to that some serious Canadian rain and you have a massive challenge on your hands. Willo built a gradual lead over the chasers as Fenner and English duelled for second place. Recounting the night laps, Willo said, “the track got horrible. There was plenty of walking on the steep climbs and some tree root sections involved pedalling for two me-tres, dabbing for one, pedalling for two…exciting stuff…”

Exciting it was not, but separate the men from the boys it did. So with three Aussie men up the front, it became a

battle of the antipodeans with the guys trading blows all through the night.

Willo chose the tactic of consistency over speed, gradually building a lead over Jason English. Word started getting out that an Aussie was winning the race and there were plenty of words of support out on course. Willo recalled “the vibe was great out on the track, team members always gave a few encouraging words, they could obviously see how brutal it was out there!”

“You’d get a moment of being amped and excited when you came through the pit, every lap they’d scream for me, that was awesome! But then you’d have to head out into the muddy dark track, up the first of many climbs – it was tough times out there, for sure.”

The morning finally broke and, with clear skies, the track began to dry up slightly. The course had lost some of that slickness caused by the thunderstorms and, with the benefit of daylight, got a whole lot easier to ride.

Willo had pushed out a clear lead as the sun showed itself on those massive Canmore mountains. Fenner started closing the gap to English though and the battle for 2nd place was looking like a close one. At 8am Fenner had overtaken English for 2nd place and was feeling like he might be able to hold onto it until the current Aussie 24hr champ English attacked and passed Fenner.

According to Fenner, “At twenty hours I’d taken 2nd spot

another storm Passes over

there was Plenty of walking on the

steeP climbs and some tree root

sections involved Pedalling for two

metres, dabbing for one, Pedalling

for two…exciting stuff…

ENDURO 0939

mike cotty from cannondale Punching it uP the climbs

“i remember being caught in a

thunderstorm mid-laP and my

core temP droPPing like crazy.

i came into my Pit absolutely

freezing. i went out again but

i was suffering. mud sPlashed

in my eyes through every Pud-

dle, the drive-train groaned

in the claggy mud. add to this

a bunch of tree roots that felt

like ice under your wheels and

a heaP of climbing – it wasn’t

easy out there.” Jeff Toohey

clockwise from above: ”you shoulda seen the mud out there!” | mark fenner Punching the tree roots | katrin van der sPiegel – 2nd elite women | tinker Juarez was all smiles before the race

climbs became an energy

saPPing boggy mess and

some sections quickly

became unrideable

42ENDURO 09

Jason caught me on the climb. He attacked me hard and fast, I had nothing left in the tank to respond with. I tried and felt empty with nothing in the legs. I was a couple of gels down. Once I got the food down again I had a strong last lap and got back to within 6 minutes. I really thought I was going to catch him napping.”

Oblivious to the battle behind him, Willo had enough of a lead to rest those weary, muddy legs at the 23hr mark. This was an amazing moment for the young Aussie, “I thought I still had to do one more lap but, my pit crew flagged me down and said I could stop, I didn’t have to do that last lap! As if the joy of winning wasn’t enough?! I was so stoked, I was preparing myself to head out again but I wasn’t feeling great in the motivation department, there wasn’t too much exciting trail out there to tempt me back out.”

So, the organisers gave the call and Willo rode through the finish tape as 2008 World Solo Champion. “It was an amazing moment. Mentally, it was the hardest 24hrs I’ve ever done with the sections of hike-a-bike and the huge amount of climbing per lap. To get through it and come out on top was unbelievable for me, it just blew me away, thinking about it still gives me goose-bumps weeks later. Those few minutes at the finish are moments I’ll never forget!”

Fellow Aussie Jason English came through in second with Mark Fenner nipping at his heels about seven minutes behind. English was surprised with is performance given his poor preparation, “The course was average. It wasn’t flowy, there were no rewards after the massive uphills. There were lots of granny climbs and stuff not even worth riding.” Luckily for English he hadn’t travelled over the other side of the world to just enjoy the trails on the racetrack (although that would have been a bonus!) he took home a well-de-served second place in an Aussie club sandwich.

Toohey took out 4th place to complete an Aussie top four. “I had a really low patch between 6pm and mid-night but I started coming good after that. I was really relieved to get fourth, I’d been chasing people down for hours to secure 4th overall. This completed the Aussie podium of the event and I was really proud to be part of it.”

In the Women’s race Aussie Katrin Van der Spiegel kept last year’s winner Rebecca Rusch on her toes to take 2nd place. Katrin went into the race fearful of the hilly course, “I was actually terrified when I first saw the profile of the course - with my bulky build I’m not exactly the best climber!”

After putting in a strong performance through the night, Katrin hit the toughest part of her race in the final hours, “During the last lap I started to shut down - the petrol tank was totally empty. I wobbled home through the last few sec-tions of track on autopilot. I was very glad to hear I was far enough ahead of third so I didn’t have to go out for another lap. I might not have made it back!”

Across the finish line all the hardship was forgotten, “I was absolutely elated and grateful for the support I’ve received to get to this point.”

The age classes were also dominated by the Aussies with Joel Donney taking out 2nd place in the u/25’s, Andy Fellows taking out the 25-29 category, Troy Bailey and fellow Aussie Jason Mcavoy taking 1st and 2nd in the 35-39’s and Craig Peacock taking the 45-49 category for yet another year.

When all was said and done, no-one could ever have ex-pected such a performance from the Aussies. Will it drive the competitors from other countries to come back fitter and stronger next year? Let’s hope for plenty more gruelling 24hr Worlds in the future…and maybe some nicer trails!

Probably the most common question for any 24hr racer is “What do you eat?”

We pulled a few Aussies aside to get their secrets.

mark fenner // High5 Energy Bars, High5 Energy Gels, fresh oranges and bananas, plain pizza, some home-cooked chocolate brownies.

Jason english // a loaf and a half of Vegemite sand-wiches, some GU’s, sports drink.

James williamson// white bread and banana sandwich-es, jam sandwiches, peanut butter sandwiches, baked rice pudding, porridge, sports drink.

Jeff toohey// tuna salad sandwiches, banana jam & sultana sandwiches, pizza, risotto, porridge, hot chips, choc chip biscuits, Sustagen, strawberry milk, hot chocolate, ammo electrolyte, coffee with a bit of coke, the odd gel & some jelly lollies.

katrin van der spiegel// jam rolls and chicken noodles. My secret weapon from National Champs, bananas, just didn’t do it for me this time. Maybe I had too many at Easter…

what the aussies eat

willo gets tangled in some rubbish left on course

Thanks to Canberra Off Road Cyclists (corc) for providing airfares and cash to send our top Aussies to Canada!

ENDURO 0943

in his last race, the cape epic in South Africa, jimi pounds the pedals with teammate and long-time friend Shaun Lewis behind him. his face is set in that half-smile half-grimace that we all know so well. jimi went out doing what he loved doing. travelling the world, racing at the highest level and sharing it with mates.

An enduring memory of Jimi.

Photo : Mikkeli Godfree