Jonny Walker wins final stage and takes third overall in Red Bull Romaniacs enduro.

After winning the Erzberg Rodeo just over a week ago and finishing first in the Romaniacs Prologue on Wednesday, Metzeler rider Jonny Walker fought for four days to take home first place on Sunday and third overall in the Romaniacs enduro.

Here are all the videos:

Prologue

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Day 4

In the Prologue, Walker’s excellent riding skills took him to first place, but there was a sharp learning curve for the rest of the enduro, as he had to use GPS for navigation for the first time in his career.   On the first day of the enduro, Walker got lost a few times but was still able to finish fourth. Veteral Romaniac Graham Jarvis finished first on Day 1.

Of his first day, Walker said “it wasn`t how I expected, I was lost a few times, but navigation was easier than I thought. I am happy that I finished the day all right! At one point I was even chased by shepherd dogs… We teamed up a few times with Xavi, Graham and Letti – and in the end with Chris, who was super fast in the mountains!”

On Day 2, Walker actually overslept and wound up having to program his GPS while on the bike, but had a better time overall and enjoyed the fast, flowing trails.  Of Day 2, Graham Jarvis said “I had a few falls today and every time it took me some time to recover. But this is part of the game and I am glad that I reached the finish in good shape. I am surprised by the weather, this is quite unusual for the Red Bull Romaniacs! I`d prefer a bit more rain….”

On Day 4, Walker came first,  but it wasn’t enough to take the overall title from 2^nd place finisher Andreas Lettenbichler or Romaniacs winner Graham Jarvis.  Still, Walker was optimistic. Said Walker, “I’m here for the experience this year and want to come back next year to kick some butt. I am stoked to have made it onto the podium of this unbelievable race!”

Just what is the Romaniacs enduro? Red Bull’s site explains:

4 days of competition along a difficult and enthralling course, which leads through the Southern Carpathian Mountains and redefines the meaning of “Extreme Enduro”. The Rally is tailored for ultimate offroad and Enduro fun -­‐ combined with challenges that bring the participants of each individual class (Hobby Single, Hobby Team, Expert Single, Expert Team, PRO) to their limits. Due to these challenges and the difficulty level, high abandon rates are common. Therefore: To FINISH is to be a WINNER. The track is unfolding along well-­‐chosen mountain areas, rocky grounds, hills and valleys; tarmac is avoided as much as possible.

Despite the tough challenges, all competitors agree that the Red Bull Romaniacs is one of the most beautiful Enduro races. The breathtaking countryside, the Romanian hospitality and the fact, that it is a race from riders for riders, make every event a long lasting memory for participants and fans alike. The daily distances covered range from 100km to 200km.

Walker is riding our 6 Days Extreme tire, which is the same tire Taddy Blazusiak used to win the inaugural Enduro X competition at the X Games last summer, and is the tire Walker and Dougie Lampkin used to finish first and second in the Erzberg Enduro last week.

Jonny Walker takes first in Red Bull Romaniacs Prologue

Sibiu, Romania: All eyes are on Metzeler rider Jonny Walker after he placed first in Wednesday’s Prologue to Redbull’s Romaniacs Hard Enduro race.  The phenom, who is only in his second full season as an enduro racer, last week took first in what many consider to be the hardest race in the world, the Erzberg Rodeo. Eighteen hundred riders started the Erzberg Rodeo, and only seven finished.  First and second place went to Metzeler riders (Check out the VIDEO here)

The Romaniacs Prologue is held on a city street covered in pallets, logs, and boulders.  There are ramps onto the logs and pallets to help the course from being a full-on trials problem; competitors wound up struggling more with the rock garden than other parts of the course.  In the final round, Jonny absolutely sailed through the rock garden, while his competitors fumbled.

Said Walker: “This is my first time at the Red Bull Romaniacs, I loved the prologue, this is my game. Some of the obstacles could have been a bit more flowy, so I could have taken them faster… In general this is my favorite part, after that I am only looking forward to my flight back home!”  Walker also expressed concern for the prospect of having to rely on a GPS for the wilderness sections of the ride.  Competitor Martin Freinademetze responded by saying “you will only need [GPS] it if it gets foggy, otherwise you can rely on the work of our track managers, and if everything goes wrong, you’ll just be eaten by the bears!”

For the rest of the week, Walker and the other competitors will fight for the coveted Red Bull Romaniacs title.

Pro-class Prologue Results:

1. Jonny Walker, KTM 300 EXC (GBR)

2. Xavi Galindo, HUSABERG TE 300 (ESP)

3. Andreas Lettenbichler, HUSQVARNA 300 (GER)

4. Graham Jarvis, HUSABERG 300 (ENG)

5. Erwin Kovacs, KTM 300 EXC (ROU)

6. Paul Fratila, KTM 350 EXC-F (ROU)

7. Melcior Faja, KTM EXC 250 (ESP)

8. Chris Birch, KTM 300 (NZL)

9. Sean Clarke, SHERCO 300 (NZL)

10. Kendall Norman, KTM 300 (US)

Walker is riding our 6 Days Extreme tire, which is the same tire Taddy Blazusiak used to win the inaugural Enduro X competition at the X Games last summer, and is the tire Walker and Dougie Lampkin used to finish first and second in the Erzberg Enduro last week.

From Mpora.com and Redbull.com

Erzberg Rodeo: 1800 started, seven finished. The winner rode on Metzelers

This year’s Erzberg Rodeo was so tough that only seven of the 1800 riders wound up completing the race.  The race is a brutal race through a iron quarry in Austria, and the main appeal is that it’s an event so tough that you probably can’t finish it.  99.6% of the riders who started this year DNF’d.  The more abusive and impossible the race is, the more fanfare it gets.  People are getting very interested.

The Rodeo starts with the “Iron Road Prologue”, a competition to whittle the field down to 500 riders.  Jonny Walker—the eventual winner of the Rodeo—came third in the Prologue.

On race day, Walker was in the first wave of riders to tackle the quarry, which is nicknamed the Iron Giant.  He and Enockl distanced themselves from other riders early on, but a half hour into the race Walker went over the bars in a field of rocks known as Carl’s Diner.

The first one across the finish line was Briton Graham Jarvis, but he was disqualified for missing a terrace in one of the hard sections.  Metzeler rider Walker came in a few minutes later for the official victory in his second-ever Rodeo.  Douglie Lampkin came second—also on Metzeler tires—and Ben Hemingway came third.

Metzeler’s answer to Erzberg Rodeo is our 6 Days Extreme.  It’s the tire Lampkin and Walker rode this year, and it’s the tire Blazusiak used to win the inaugural X Games Enduro X event last year.  It’s a tough tire, with Metzeler’s “High Resistence Polyester” carcass and “X-ply” constuction, which keeps the tire going in the most extreme conditions.  The knob design, distribution, and compound provides excellent traction in both dry and wet conditions—check out the video above for proof!

Results:

1. Jonny Walker, KTM (Metzeler)

2. Dougie Lampkin, Gas-Gas (Metzeler)

3. Ben Hemingway, KTM

4. Paul Bolton, KTM

5. Taichi Tanaka, KTM

6. Lars Enöckl, KTM

7. Dan Hemingway, KTM

Metzeler 6 Days Extreme

Metzeler wins Portugal WEC round in E1 and E3

In the small town of Torres Verdas, about 40 kilometers north of Lisbon, this past weekend was the 4th stage of the 2012 World Enduro Championship (WEC), and the winners in E1 and E3 class rode on Metzeler’s MCE 6 Days Extreme!

It was a terrific weekend for the ultimate off-road tires: Both Rodrig Thain and Antoine Meo in the Enduro E1 class, Johnny Aubert in the E2 class and Christophe Nambotin in the E3 class drove to their victories on Saturday and Sunday wearing the excellent MCE 6 Days Extreme tire.

In E3, Nambotin took his fourth win of the season (out of four races) on his KTM.  His perfect record puts him 50 points ahead of his rivals and Joakim Ljunggren and Aigar Leok.  His team-mate David Knight—also on Metzelers—had considerable difficulty in Portugal with both his machine and the terrain.  He was able to secure a 7^th and 13^th place on the days—we imagine he was disappointed with the result.

In the E1 class Antoine Meo–despite continued technical problems in the first round on Saturday—elegantly rose to second behind Rodrig Thain.  Thain took home E1 victory for HM Honda and Metzeler.

In the E2 class, Metzeler also triumphed: Johnny had a strong comeback after issues in the hot South American races earlier in the year. On Saturday he was unstoppable, and in the second round on Sunday took second place.

Here is the summary of the rankings:

Portugal, Saturday:

E1: Rodrig Thain (HM Honda, Metzeler ), Eero REMES (KTM, Metzeler ), Matti SEISTOLA (HVA);

E2: Johnny Aubert (KTM, Metzeler ), Pierre-Alexandre RENET (Husaberg), Jeremy Tarroux (KTM);

E3: Christophe NAMBOTIN (KTM, Metzeler ), Aigar Leok (TM), Sebastien Guillaume (Gas Gas)

Portugal, Sunday:

E1: Antoine MEO (KTM, Metzeler ), Matti SEISTOLA (HVA), Rodrig Thain (HM Honda, Metzeler )

E2 : Pierre-Alexandre RENET (Husaberg), Johnny AUBERT (KTM, Metzeler ), Cristobal GUERRERO (KTM, Metzeler )

E3: Christophe NAMBOTIN (KTM, Metzeler ), Oriol MENA (Husaberg), Aigar Leok (TM)

Overall standings / points:

E1 : Antoine MEO (140), Rodrig Thain (109), Eero REMES (93)

E2 : Pierre-Alexandre RENET (133), Cristobal GUERRERO (118), Juha SALMINEN (100)

E3 : Christophe NAMBOTIN (160), Joakim LJUNGGREN (110), Aigar Leok (109)

The next round of the World Enduro WEC place on 30 June and 1 July 2012 in Castiglione Fiorentino (Tuscany) at the Grand Prix of Italy instead.

6 Days Extreme

Sidi’s Crossfire SR can make you faster

The folks at Sidi lent us a pair of their top-of-the-line motocross boots, the Italian-made Crossfire SR.  We had been hoping to borrow a dirtbike from a friend and race in an enduro, but it never worked out.   We could only ride around New York City on our regular bikes.   People look at you funny when you arrive at a stoplight on a 70 cc Honda Cub in Crossfires.

We were blown away by the quality of the materials and the thoughtful design of the boots.  After spraining an ankle in some woefully inadequate touring boots in an enduro last November, seeing such a burly boot was reassuring.  But it’s the details—rather than just than strength and protection—that really makes the Sidis stand out over not just touring boots, but over other purpose-built MX boots as well.

Before we get to all that, let’s get this out of the way.  These boots are comfortable.  They’re snug, fit like a nice shoe should, and though they’re a little awkward to walk in, they dual-pivot ankles make it as comfortable as possible for a stiff boot of armor.  When these boots arrived, we adjusted the buckles, strapped ourselves in, and promptly fell asleep (we’d just come back from a long day at the office).

Water resistance – Less than five minutes into our enduro, we fell into a deep mud puddle.  Muddy water rushed into our touring boots, grit got between our toes, and our left foot was uncomfortable for the rest of the race.  The Sidis have a waterproof liner with Velcro all the way up to the top.  The boots may have gotten muddy, but our feet would have stayed clean and dry.

Cam-lock buckles –  Sidi’s cam-lock buckle feels robust and its action is positive.  There’s no way the mud we got in would have phased it.  If you injure yourself, the buckles will help make it easy to remove the boots.

The adjusting straps keep their position—adjust them once and they’ll stay that way.  The touring boots we raced in had zippers up the back, and after that first dump in the mud, the zipper on the left boot got clogged.  By the lunch break, the mud had dried and the zipper could only be opened with vice grips.

Open wide – One trick of the plastic exo-skeleton of the boots is that they split open wide, nearly all the way down the side.  That makes it easy to put the boots, and easy to remove them—even in the event of an injury.

Other Details – The Sidis have leather heat shields right at the height of most exhausts, and adjustable calf panels to accommodate riders of extra large or small calves.  They also have dual hinges—one at the ankle and one a few inches above it.  The heel has ridges on it to help manipulate the shift lever if you’re in a crazy position.

Replaceable parts – All the bolt-on parts are replaceable.  The panels, the buckles and the soles—all replaceable.

Crucially, boots like these make you faster – perhaps the best part about being protected is that you can spend less time wincing at near misses and more time focusing on the trail.  In our enduro, we were on the lookout for high stumps (we were on a TW200—quite a low-slung bike) and eventually caught one with our foot.  But in proper motorcross boots we could have just looked down the trail and let our feet bounce off whatever.  In our mind, a product is a great one if it can let you ride faster while decreasing the risk of injury.

Sidi Crossfire SR