Red Bull Timelaps
What is Red Bull Timelaps?
Red Bull Timelaps is a race that takes place on the weekend that the clocks go back and daylight saving in the UK ends. This year marked the 3rd edition of the event that starts at 12pm on the Saturday and ends at 12pm on the Sunday making it 25 hours in total. You can participate either solo or as part of a team; as this was the weekend before I race BikingMan Taiwan I thought it best to recruit some help (and more legs) from my Bianchi Dama teammates. Only one member of the team is allowed on the course at one time and must be wearing the race armband which you swap over in the pits.
The team that tots up the most laps wins with the added complication that at 2am, when the clocks go back, a second smaller lap opens up and there is what is called the Power Hour. Every lap that you complete of this alternative course counts for 2 laps!
Why would you want to do that?
It was actually Emma Cockcroft who first suggested we enter. She took part back in 2017 as part of a mixed team (Dr Cock and the Boys) where they scooped up first prize in their category. With 2 year’s recovery under her belt she was keen for more traipsing around Windsor Great Park but this time without the Boys.
This time she would be riding with the girls. From the 10-strong Bianchi Dama team we managed to pull together 4 (?willing) volunteers: Tasha Reddy, Sarah King, Emma Cockcroft and me. We also had a fifth member of our team: a 5-week old kitten called Tuesday. She was a stray brought in to my work and none of my colleagues could look after her over the weekend so she had to come along to Timelaps too.
Race preparation
There’s a fair amount of organisation that goes on with racing as part of a team. We’re pretty used to it as we spend most of our weekends throughout the summer months travelling across the UK (mainly to The North) to take part in the National Women’s Road Series. These races do not tend to last much over 3 hours though, and usually we’re staying in a hotel and have our team manager and mechanic to sort out sign on, attaching race transponders and to tell us where we need to be at what time.
This time it was down to us to organise accommodation (Emma’s Mazda Bongo), nutrition (3 cans of Heinz beans and sausages) and putting up the gazebo which surprisingly stood the monsoon conditions that soon followed incredibly well. Emma had drawn up an Excel Spreadsheet of our order of play and how long our stints on the course would be which turned out to be incredibly useful.
The race itself:
PRE-RACE
Arriving in Windsor Great Park and signing our disclaimer forms, we then fell to the task of attaching wristbands, numerous stickers and transponders to ourselves, our bikes and our equipment. This should have been an easy task given that there were signs everywhere instructing you how to do it, but we managed to turn it into a fairly traumatic one. We managed though, thank goodness for Emma and her trusty toolbox.
Our team was number 17 which placed us close to the main tent in the centre of the pits. Here you could access Red Bull 24-7 as well as watch Strictly Come Dancing on the television. It was thankfully heated which was a godsend later on when the weather closed in and the temperature dropped. I was very relieved to find we were also only 2 gazebos away from our nutrition sponsor Rawvelo; no bonking for us!
THE RACE
I was first off at 12pm. I completed my hour, setting a new 60-minute power in the meantime. The first transition from me to Emma went very smoothly, although I did feel bad passing the armband to her just as the rain began to come down.
And there began the pattern that was to continue over the next 10 or so hours. The rain steadily began to get more heavy. Everyone and everything got soaked. The field, and route back to the campsite turned into an absolute mud bath. Turns out bringing a kitten to the race was one of the best things I did though. Getting back to my car between stints, I would stick my wet stuff on the car heater, stick Tuesday on my lap and wait to warm up a bit.
My worst time on the course was probably between 4 and 5 o’clock. The rain was coming down very hard. The issue was when I stopped and started worrying about my chamois situation. I had bought spares but when I started comparing actual chamois numbers with my teammates, I quickly decided my stash was going to be inadequate. No sweat I thought; having sussed out where the heaters were in the main tent I decided I’d pass time gently drying mine over some hot air. Making my way into the tent it became evident that I was not the only person to have had this idea. I couldn’t believe the swarm crowded around the one heater at the far end, thrusting shoes, chamois, gloves etc. into the air stream. Apparently the other one was blowing out cold air, so I was forced to join the back of the queue. I’m glad I put some graft in though; when my next time on track came around I was very relieved to strap on some dry shoes.
Our last rider off was Sarah. We sort of knew by this point that we had won, provided we didn’t have a catastrophic puncture and/or the team just behind us didn’t speed up considerably in their last hour. I managed to sneak Tuesday in to the pits by wrapping her in a blanket and again shoving her under my jacket. I was a little concerned that maybe we’d be disqualified if we were found with an animal in the pits because I’d seen a man try to take his dog in earlier and he'd been turned away. I can’t say I read the rule book in ALL its entirety. She was not impressed at this manhandling and kept trying to poke her head out. We managed to get past the security at the gates only to walk straight into the race organiser. “I hope that cat has a wristband” he said. Phew!
WE WON!
I haven’t been allowed on to the top step of a podium all that often so it was such a good feeling to get up there. Even better to be up there with some of my best friends. We were given a bottle of champagne which Emma insisted on spraying over all of us and the Red Bull Timelaps Women’s 1st Team trophy which my teammates have very kindly allowed me to keep.
Red Bull Timelaps is a race that takes place on the weekend that the clocks go back and daylight saving in the UK ends. This year marked the 3rd edition of the event that starts at 12pm on the Saturday and ends at 12pm on the Sunday making it 25 hours in total. You can participate either solo or as part of a team; as this was the weekend before I race BikingMan Taiwan I thought it best to recruit some help (and more legs) from my Bianchi Dama teammates. Only one member of the team is allowed on the course at one time and must be wearing the race armband which you swap over in the pits.
The team that tots up the most laps wins with the added complication that at 2am, when the clocks go back, a second smaller lap opens up and there is what is called the Power Hour. Every lap that you complete of this alternative course counts for 2 laps!
Why would you want to do that?
It was actually Emma Cockcroft who first suggested we enter. She took part back in 2017 as part of a mixed team (Dr Cock and the Boys) where they scooped up first prize in their category. With 2 year’s recovery under her belt she was keen for more traipsing around Windsor Great Park but this time without the Boys.
This time she would be riding with the girls. From the 10-strong Bianchi Dama team we managed to pull together 4 (?willing) volunteers: Tasha Reddy, Sarah King, Emma Cockcroft and me. We also had a fifth member of our team: a 5-week old kitten called Tuesday. She was a stray brought in to my work and none of my colleagues could look after her over the weekend so she had to come along to Timelaps too.
 |
| Team (minus Tuesday). |
Race preparation
There’s a fair amount of organisation that goes on with racing as part of a team. We’re pretty used to it as we spend most of our weekends throughout the summer months travelling across the UK (mainly to The North) to take part in the National Women’s Road Series. These races do not tend to last much over 3 hours though, and usually we’re staying in a hotel and have our team manager and mechanic to sort out sign on, attaching race transponders and to tell us where we need to be at what time.
This time it was down to us to organise accommodation (Emma’s Mazda Bongo), nutrition (3 cans of Heinz beans and sausages) and putting up the gazebo which surprisingly stood the monsoon conditions that soon followed incredibly well. Emma had drawn up an Excel Spreadsheet of our order of play and how long our stints on the course would be which turned out to be incredibly useful.
The race itself:
PRE-RACE
Arriving in Windsor Great Park and signing our disclaimer forms, we then fell to the task of attaching wristbands, numerous stickers and transponders to ourselves, our bikes and our equipment. This should have been an easy task given that there were signs everywhere instructing you how to do it, but we managed to turn it into a fairly traumatic one. We managed though, thank goodness for Emma and her trusty toolbox.
 |
| Emma and her trusty toolbox. |
Our team was number 17 which placed us close to the main tent in the centre of the pits. Here you could access Red Bull 24-7 as well as watch Strictly Come Dancing on the television. It was thankfully heated which was a godsend later on when the weather closed in and the temperature dropped. I was very relieved to find we were also only 2 gazebos away from our nutrition sponsor Rawvelo; no bonking for us!
THE RACE
I was first off at 12pm. I completed my hour, setting a new 60-minute power in the meantime. The first transition from me to Emma went very smoothly, although I did feel bad passing the armband to her just as the rain began to come down.
And there began the pattern that was to continue over the next 10 or so hours. The rain steadily began to get more heavy. Everyone and everything got soaked. The field, and route back to the campsite turned into an absolute mud bath. Turns out bringing a kitten to the race was one of the best things I did though. Getting back to my car between stints, I would stick my wet stuff on the car heater, stick Tuesday on my lap and wait to warm up a bit.
 |
| Race duties included being a cat Mum. |
My worst time on the course was probably between 4 and 5 o’clock. The rain was coming down very hard. The issue was when I stopped and started worrying about my chamois situation. I had bought spares but when I started comparing actual chamois numbers with my teammates, I quickly decided my stash was going to be inadequate. No sweat I thought; having sussed out where the heaters were in the main tent I decided I’d pass time gently drying mine over some hot air. Making my way into the tent it became evident that I was not the only person to have had this idea. I couldn’t believe the swarm crowded around the one heater at the far end, thrusting shoes, chamois, gloves etc. into the air stream. Apparently the other one was blowing out cold air, so I was forced to join the back of the queue. I’m glad I put some graft in though; when my next time on track came around I was very relieved to strap on some dry shoes.
 |
| Scenes in the main tent. Chamois city. Conditions: tropical. |
Power Hour came at 2am and it was my turn on course. We had organised timings in such a way that Tasha and Sarah were able to get some sleep in the Bongo whilst Emma and I raced from the early evening through until 3am. We then switched so that Emma and I were able to make our way to the Bongo and sleep through to 8am. Actually a lie in in terms of when I usually get up to ride before work! I managed to complete 6 laps of the Power Hour course which I’m sure was beautiful but I couldn’t actually see any of it because it was dark. I very much enjoyed the lighting around the course though; they had promised a disco set-up at the briefing and Red Bull did not disappoint.
I made my way back to the Bongo with a hot water bottle for Tuesday. The rain had thankfully stopped at this point but the temperature really had dropped. I debated bringing her up into the Bongo to sleep with Emma and I but she has quite a knack for disappearing into small spaces and she’s so small I was concerned one of us might roll over and squash her in the middle of the night. I did my best to cover up her box and wrap her up in blankets before crawling (with some difficulty) up into the Bongo’s pop-up tent bed. I really did sleep well in the Bongo, but when my 3 hours was up I awoke in a state of panic with dead-person-level cold feet worrying that Tuesday must surely have frozen to death. Thankfully she hadn’t, and I think was actually a little affronted when I woke her up, shoved her under by jacket and then sat her in front of the Bongo’s heater. I made her up some cat milk and Emma made us some gruel on the camping stove. I say gruel because we had to make it with water after having left the milk in the pits. I did offer up the cat milk but she declined.
I made my way back to the Bongo with a hot water bottle for Tuesday. The rain had thankfully stopped at this point but the temperature really had dropped. I debated bringing her up into the Bongo to sleep with Emma and I but she has quite a knack for disappearing into small spaces and she’s so small I was concerned one of us might roll over and squash her in the middle of the night. I did my best to cover up her box and wrap her up in blankets before crawling (with some difficulty) up into the Bongo’s pop-up tent bed. I really did sleep well in the Bongo, but when my 3 hours was up I awoke in a state of panic with dead-person-level cold feet worrying that Tuesday must surely have frozen to death. Thankfully she hadn’t, and I think was actually a little affronted when I woke her up, shoved her under by jacket and then sat her in front of the Bongo’s heater. I made her up some cat milk and Emma made us some gruel on the camping stove. I say gruel because we had to make it with water after having left the milk in the pits. I did offer up the cat milk but she declined.
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| 7am in the Bongo. Sharing cat Mum duties with Emma. |
The rest of Timelaps actually passed in a bit of a blur. It all became a lot nicer once the rain stopped falling. The morning was cold but riding was a lot more enjoyable in the daylight. The one feature I do remember was the fabulous marshal who sat at the intersection of the main lap and the Power Hour lap. I am still unsure whether she was sat there the entirety of the 25 hour race but she was always there when I was going round! She never once stopped shouting encouragement and her enthusiasm never seemed to wane!
Our last rider off was Sarah. We sort of knew by this point that we had won, provided we didn’t have a catastrophic puncture and/or the team just behind us didn’t speed up considerably in their last hour. I managed to sneak Tuesday in to the pits by wrapping her in a blanket and again shoving her under my jacket. I was a little concerned that maybe we’d be disqualified if we were found with an animal in the pits because I’d seen a man try to take his dog in earlier and he'd been turned away. I can’t say I read the rule book in ALL its entirety. She was not impressed at this manhandling and kept trying to poke her head out. We managed to get past the security at the gates only to walk straight into the race organiser. “I hope that cat has a wristband” he said. Phew!
WE WON!
I haven’t been allowed on to the top step of a podium all that often so it was such a good feeling to get up there. Even better to be up there with some of my best friends. We were given a bottle of champagne which Emma insisted on spraying over all of us and the Red Bull Timelaps Women’s 1st Team trophy which my teammates have very kindly allowed me to keep.
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| Waste of good champagne if you ask me 🤷. Photo: Darren Wheeler. |
I am unsure whether we’ll be back next year. I thought, being a relay, that Red Bull Timelaps would be a bit kinder on my legs than other endurance races but this was not the case. You really do go full gas and the fear of letting your team down is an added incentive to push yourself really quite hard. If you like Windsor Great Park though this is definitely a good race for you; you're guaranteed to see it a fair few times 🤔.
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