Blackout - 10th Anniversary

Remember Blackout? If you don’t you need to read the story behind it and watch the now famous video. It’s been exactly 10 years to the day that the event took place!

When Aston Hill announced their night race it seemed the perfect opportunity to record the action and put together a video of the event. It was a bonkers concept – a night race in October at a super slippery and steep track. What could go wrong?

Some of the key figures from the event offer up their memories from that night and the subsequent cult classic that is “Blackout’.

Ian Warby – Organiser

I was running Aston Hill at the time and had been thinking about doing a night race for a long time. Our daytime downhills were really popular and I was thinking of a way to do something a bit different. It was a chance conversation with Rory Hitchen’s who at the time was working for USE, they had just brought out the Exposure Light. Exposures were literally light years ahead of their competition and he loved the idea of a night time downhill race to showcase their new product. From memory it didn’t take much convincing for my organising team to get involved although there were a few doubters about the safety aspect of holding a race on the Black Run at night. My opinion was that if people couldn’t see they still had their brakes and could ride slower. We’d do everything we could to make the event one to remember. We weren’t the first to race in the dark but I think previous races had been for pro’s on an invitation only basis so we were the first to open it up to any one with set of lights that was brave enough to enter.

Ronnie Franciosy – Founder of Southerndownhill

We were looking at doing a little video of something at the time. Quite a few websites had dabbled, and Dirt were releasing films all the time. We were already covering the photographic side of events really well, and I had access to professional video editing facilities through work, I just needed a reason to use it. Then Aston Hill announced their night race. It sounded like a bonkers event for the riders, which would also prove a challenge for us to film.

I bought four cheap infrared cameras from China. Each one roughly the size of a large egg, and each one reacted differently to low light levels. As a test, and to provide some “on board” bike footage, a few of us headed up to Aston and gave them a whirl. The test proved the cameras were able to do the job, albeit crudely.

Scott Beaumont

Scott ‘Boom Boom’ Beaumont

So its 10 years since the Blackout race at Aston Hill! How time flies! One of our team sponsors, USE were releasing their new Exposure Lights and they decided to launch them with a night time downhill race! A few phone calls later (not so much emailing back then) and the race was on. Ian Warby and the team at Aston Hill said yes and the Blackout event was a reality.

Bernard Kerr

Bernard Kerr

I remember hearing about the night race last minute and being like ‘that sounds awesome…lets go!!’ My sponsor at the time Windwave called their friends up at exposure to see if it could borrow some lights as they were sponsoring the event and also my friend and local bikeshop manager at the time J lent me one!

Rich Thomas

I can’t believe this was 10 years ago, such a rad unique event. I do remember it well, it was actually the first time I’d ridden at Aston Hill so learning a track in the dark with £20 lights was interesting to say the least! I remember having a laugh with everybody and it being more about the battle with the track and getting some light on the track than the race, which is rare nowadays…! The best memory i have of this race was the light that Jamie Faulkner duct taped to his head, it was huge! Scott Beaumont will remember this one..?! He taped over the on/off switch though and every time he went over a root or bump it switched it on and off. Let’s hope this video inspires a race organiser to do a similar style event again

Jim Kidney

Jim Kidney

The Aston Hill Night race represented the first and last time I ever raced a mountain bike.

I’d never been a competitive rider, mention taking part in a race and I’d ride rapidly in the other direction. It just didn’t appeal to me, I’d rather just ride with no timing, no-one watching and no pressure. So what possessed me to think that doing a night race was a good idea is anyone’s guess.

Ian Warby had kindly allowed [RON] and I some access to the hill at night before the race to practice with the night vision video equipment and get some on bike action video, but that was only along the top section and didn’t prepare me for what was to come race night.

Leon Rosser

Ronnie Franciosy – Founder of Southerndownhill

For the race we hired two cameras for the pit area. Both were wandering around and getting interviews with the riders. Rob and Scott were on these, and I’m grateful to both for their help while I was filming the race. For the actual race coverage, we had three infrared cameras covering a 100 meter section of the course. Each camera connected to a basic switcher, so as one rider went down, we switched to the nearest camera. It kind of worked. This was recorded into a HI-8 camera. To provide the power we hired a small generator. We only needed this towards the end as the batteries ran low, or if we wanted to use a monitor to check things. Thanks to Ian for coming to the rescue with the quad bike. Carrying that gennie back to the car would have been a pain in the ass.

Bernard Kerr

I taped some glow sticks in my rear wheel and then just had soooo much fun shredding the track that I normally just rode dry in the daytime! haha It was a ton of fun and when it’s like that I do well..I remember not even really thinking about how my run was or how I was going to do so when I won I was super happy!! To just turn up to something you have never done is a weird feeling and even to this day gets you a bit nervous just like rampage I guess but on a bigger scale now! haha

Ben Deakin

Ben Deakin

Awesome race as there’s still never been anything like it, always remember there was only a hand few of riders who could actually see due to those exposure lights being so f***** expensive so the likes of ‘Scott Beaumont’ were fine as they had it as a sponsor likewise the locals knew the track inside out so the rest of us mere mortals had to tape any form of crap Halfords light onto our bike, or if you did have any form of good light at the time the battery was the size of your head, I ended up buying 4 lights from Poundland that held up for the nights abuse to get me a 2nd in Juniors. I’m getting old!

Scott Beaumont

Scott ‘Boom Boom’ Beaumont

I remember there being a sense of excitement and uncertainty as to how this would pan out. Practice was in the daylight then the race runs were in the night. My best memory from this race was Danny Harper and Jamie Faulkner. They showed up without lights! 30 minutes later and after a trip to B&Q they were back with a set of lights. They both bought a 5 million candle torch. They were huge. With a full roll of gaffer tape, the torches were attached to their helmets. It was hilarious. If they tilted their head slightly sideways, they couldn’t lift their head back up. It looked like they had taped a 2nd helmet on top of the helmet they were wearing. I’ll never forget it. We laughed all day and night about it.

Chris Astle

Ian Warby – Organiser

The race wasn’t without it’s challenges. The week before the race I organised a practice session and with strong winds and heavy rain it didn’t bode well for race night. However the weather gods smiled on us and we had a dry, bright, chilly evening for the race. One of the reasons that I didn’t run another one was that I didn’t think I could be that lucky with the weather twice. It was an amazing atmosphere on the night. Race organisation is never without its challenges and more so in the dark. Even though I couldn’t get the generator started for the prize presentation the candles and Exposure lights just added to the atmosphere. Packing down had it’s challenges too especially in the dark and I’ll always remember the quad running out of fuel literally as I pulled into the car park with the last of the timing equipment at 1am in the morning.

Jim Kidney

Jim Kidney

There were a few things that went wrong,

1) They sent me down first in Seniors, terrible idea. I should have been at the back.
2) I couldn’t see where I was going, my lights were rubbish and held in place with electrical tape as the mounts didn’t fit the bars, shortly after the bomb hole they were beginning to point anywhere except where I needed them.
3) Andy ( can’t remember surname ) was behind me and was significantly faster. He caught me, I crashed, he crashed and then our bikes got tangled.

Everything looked so different in the dark, the shadows made everything look bigger than it was, you couldn’t see the drop until you’d gone over it, tree’s loomed out of the murk.

When I eventually got to the finish I was asked whether I’d do it again, I said “maybe” .

As yet I’ve still not ridden another race of any kind, but if offered a chance at another night race I wouldn’t ride in the other direction.

Dan Rootes

Dan Rootes

My main memories from the race are the fact that I was literally taking a leap in to the darkness! Roots and Rain confirms that I’d done one downhill race before the event. I’d only just bought my first downhill bike and really didn’t know what I was doing. We taped the batteries for my Cateye lights to the top tube, stuck a camping head torch on my helmet and joined everyone else in trying to see where I was going. I seem to remember torrential rain, but I think that was on a practice day, or night.

Since then I’ve moved away from downhill, to racing motorcycles (www.rootesracing.com) yet “that night race” is still a story that gets talked about when I’m discussing racing downhill with people. I’d love to see another one taking place, and would definitely come out of retirement for one.

Rich Thomas

Ian Warby – Organiser

Indecent Exposure (the name my wife Michele came up with for the race) was a hit with everyone that entered and despite the naysayers we had nothing major happen to any of the riders (we used to have more injuries in the daylight). I really can’t believe it was 10 years ago, I know I and everyone else that raced that night will never forget it and for those that did race it’s been a talking point for the last ten years and the next I’m sure. It’s always something that people that were bring up in conversation when I see them and we reminisce about the old days on Aston Hill.
Blackout was a real achievement too, the Blair Witch meets Most Haunted and testament the guys from Southern Downhill filming on the night and then putting the edit together. I still have a copy of the DVD but it’s great that Ride it out have put the film online for those that weren’t there to watch. Thanks for the memories!

Aston local Matt Kemp takes the top spot, Ben Deakin 2nd and Dan Hume, who was tragically killed in Afghanistan in 3rd spot

Event Photographer – James Fremont

When Ian Warby asked me if I was interested in taking photos at a night mountain bike race he was thinking of running at Aston Hill I was a little bit concerned to say the least. As an ex-racer myself I was always mindful of firing a flash on full blast into a riders face, this is difficult enough in a dark wood during the hours of daylight in full darkness it’s another thing all together. In an effort to see if it was possible for riders to safely make it down the Black Run in the dark and to give me a chance to practice Ian ran a test event a few weeks before the actual race. It quickly became clear that the only place I could sensibly take photos was in the Bombhole because I could at least see the riders coming and I could also ensure I wasn’t firing the flash directly at them. The photos were taken using a Canon 1D Mark 2 with the flash mounted on a tripod and fired using a wireless trigger, the flash was powered by an external lead acid battery pack as normal batteries wouldn’t have lasted the night! Because it was so dark the camera autofocus didn’t work so I manually set the focus to a point on the ground about half way up the berm. Camera technology has moved on a lot in the last 10 years, it would be easier to do this today with even an entry level camera, with professional equipment it was a challenge back then!

Scott ‘Boom Boom’ Beaumont

The race was awesome. Fun and relaxed. Results did not matter and everyone had a blast. The Blackout race, Cheddar Challenge, The Malverns. I’d give anything to see these events back again……..