England-Wales-England

This Sunday see’s the start of the first ever England-Wales-England mountain bike race. England-Wales-England or EWE is the creation of Aidan Harding. Aidan is a veteran of races such as Tour Divide and the IditaBike race in Alaska. Competing in these races inspired Aidan to replicate the challenge in the UK. The UK has a vast amount of world class Mountain Biking on offer and the aim of the race is to link up these great locations in one big ride. The route starts in Plymouth and finishes in Sunderland visiting iconic Mountain Biking venues such as Wales and the Peak District on its route. This is no easy cycle touring route though. It aims to challenge the riders both physically and technically, mountains are there to be ridden over not around and technical trails will be ridden at all costs!

In the spirit of the Tour Divide the race is fully unsupported. There is no entry and no prize and no route marking. The riders must carry all their kit with them and buy food from local towns along the route and navigate using a GPS.

There are only 3 entries for this inaugural race, Adian, Steve Heading and Rob Dean. All these guys have vast experience of endurance racing and it should be an exciting race!

Exposure Lights have supplied all 3 riders with our brand new Revo Dynamo light. Using a Dynamo light has clear benefits on an unsupported endurance race such as EWE. The main benefit being that you don’t need to charge the batteries, the light will always be on full (800 lumens). It even saves weight over a battery light when you factor in the hub weight; i.e the added weight of a dynamo hub over a standard hub will be less than the weight of the batteries in a standard light. The other huge advantage of a dynamo light is the possibility to charge other gadgets one the move. All 3 riders will be using adaptors developed by Rob Dean to enable them to charge their GPS, mobile phone and Diablo/Joystick’s whilst on the move during the day. During the night a Exposure Redeye rear light can be powered from the Revo. There is minimal resistance from the hub, a few Watts, so the advantages far out weight any possible disadvantages.

EWE is the perfect showcase for this new product and we hope that the race will set precedence for the use of Dynamo lights, although obviously some people would be happier just using it to commute to work rather than riding the length of the country off road!

For more information about EWE take a look at the event website HERE

You can follow the progress of the riders using the LIVE TRACKING PAGE

Good luck to all 3 riders, enjoy it and keep safe.