how many silver class events have you done now
six or seven I think maybe
and what we're seeing here...
would you say it's fairly typical of what you've seen in silver class?
every race is going to have different terrain and different obstacles
this particular race was all natural terrain
there was no man-made prologue or anything like that out on the track
I think the rocky Creeks were the main thing
so if you train in Rocky Creeks? fantastic!
but like the Kosciuszko killer event, if you can't do big Hills
(which I can't do) then you're kind of screwed
because there's a lot of big hill climbs where you
just second or third gear pinned for as hard as you can for as long as you can
we didn't have any Hills like that at Ironstone Extreme
so you really need to have many different Tools in your toolbox of skills
you can't just be a one-trick pony guy
I can ride over big logs because that's not always going to be the end answer to our race
so how long before you move into gold class?
I'm happy sitting in silver!
I've come to reality that I'm never going to be on the podium in silver
but I'm happy being in silver
it is a challenge for me
every race is a challenge
my goal is just to get around the course
I don't want to place anywhere
I'm not a competitive person
and to be honest every year these Races they are getting harder and harder
the course designers are making them more and more difficult
so I feel that if I can sort of keep on top of my training and developing
my skills which is a slow process as long as I can get in there and
have a crack and finish a race I'm more than happy with that
the interesting thing too.... we've had our own little Personal Taste of
what's needed to get into gold class because of Ben Gilmore
he is a good riding friend of ours some of you in the
Australia National hard Enduro game will know him
the phenomenal amount of effort he's put in in recent years
well actually Jeff you know better than me what sort of hours he's been putting in
hours clocking up on his bike and just going out practicing by himself
yeah exactly like back in I think it was 2018 we bought a couple of beta RR300s at the same time
and I think Benhad clocked up something like 500 hours on his within two and a half years
and I think I'd barely scratch 50 in the same amount of time and he's had three bikes tomorrow
four bikes to my two all with high hours yeah he is he is putting in the hard yards he's doing
the static balancing he's doing the slow wheelies he's doing everything to excel as a as a top class
writer like I look at the things that he does now and it's just insane I wouldn't even dream
of doing it but yeah he's there he is he's having a crack at it he he doesn't and get it and he just
keeps keeps doing those same obstacles again and again until he's nailed it and that's the
difference like he's uh he's prepared to put in that that hard effort and and ride hard and train
um whereas I'm not and uh I'm happily sitting back in bronze taking three hours to do a trail
that he'd do in probably an hour and 15 or something but you know kudos to him I'm happy
and uh but he is certainly pushing himself and no doubt he'll probably do gold at some stage
in the near future yeah definitely ready for gold Captain Benji yeah yeah and I know a lot of people
would look at him and just say oh well he's a natural and look maybe there's an element of
that but I really do think it comes down to the hours you you put in the time and it's a little
beef of mine actually with Society sometimes as it stands at people are looking for the easy way
they're looking for the life hacks or and you see these [ __ ] YouTube videos four tips for
easy wheelies yeah 10 10 things you're doing wrong and then you know and yet an actual video
like that will they'll show drills um you know we'll get one tenth of the amount of views but
the five things you're doing wrong video will will get you know 200 000 hits in 12 hours yeah there
is no easy path to success but if you put in the time and you put in the effort you will get better
over time you've just got to commit to it I've definitely seen the phenomenal Improvement in
your standard and it's because of all that hard work mate so well done and congratulations on
finishing a silver lap we should mention where you finished well where did I finish I'm not too sure
what to do a fact check on that one but it was at least mid-pack it was I think it was pretty
pretty well close to bang on mid-pack which is I think is about where I prologued as well so
kind of the prologue you know kind of panned out in the race format as well so that that's
I'm happy with where I finished so mate well done if anybody's getting into Hard Enduro or thinking
of going from bronze to Silver just remember there are some incredibly dodgy training videos
out there and I'd just do your best to avoid them cross-training Enduro you didn't hear that from me
thanks guys it's been a pleasure Barry