I think this is cool to share some race results here: https://www.webscorer.com/racealldetails?raceid=210089
We did automatic timing on the brussels event this weekend.
BTW: MTB = AT, the organizers work with those categories
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This will be a Brussels report (Micro Mobility Winter Games) on the event and what I learned from it. We will talk bindings, tight turns, slippery floor, EUC’s and delivering when you have too.
First I will start by saying thank you to them I meet in Brussels. There were some of you that was also interested in giving it a hard go on the track. Nice. I needed that, as I am all by my self here. So nice to be with hard shredding skaters!
Have no Idea if you are on this forum, and if you are, you properly have a crazy forum name that makes it impossible to know if I meet you in Brussels 
The event was dominated by EUC’s and I must say they make an appealing vehicle. There were also skates, onewheels, and scooters. So a perfect opportunity to see how they perform against each other.
The event was 3 days starting friday evening and finishing sunday. Friday evening was meet and greet, and get to know the track for a couple of hours. Saturday was getting to know the track from 10am and timed qualification late afternoon. Sunday was final day.
They build the track in a huge warehouse. It was tight but not ultra tight. Lots of hairpin. Really technical. The straight was ok fast and had a pretty scary 90 degree turn right up against the wall.
It was a little above 1 min track.
The floor was a bit dusty which made it slippery in the tight corners. But the good people from carve electric UK gave the floor a sweep which made it all ok. We had to sweep the corners again on the second day as the dust had build up again during the night. But there were still a couple of turns where I should be carefull not to loose traction. I had a tendency to oversteer (rear loosing traction). I had to concentrate putting some weight on the rear wheel to prevent it better. Normally I have most weight on the front foot. This made me realize that I should start working on weight distribution some more.
The track was really demanding. Around 20 turns where 10 of them were hairpins. Really worked your legs. And the straight had two heel side turns (if regular) that invited for a low stance = burning legs.
The timed qualification was two laps. I fucked up / misunderstood my qualification run so was lucky enough to get a second go, as the only one. A bit unfair
The top five skaters after qualification:
Me - stooge race board - rubber - bindings: 1:01.05
Thomas Kilminster - Lacroix new model - rubber - no bindings: 1:02.94
Billy Gaish - Evolve carbon GTR - rubber - No bindings: 1:03.42
Sepp Vande Velde - Evolve DIY - rubber - Bindings: 1:04.01
Lee - AT DIY - Rubber - Bindings?: 1:05.41
After the qualification they opened up for timed free riding and I cut my time a little bit so I ended 1:00:32.
Both me, Thomas and Billy left Saturday so we unfortunately missed sunday. But Sepp got another go sunday and cut time to 1:02.10.
This takes us to the binding discussion. Still way to early to say and not fair as the fast non binding guys didn’t get a go Sunday. But the two fastest times was set with bindings. I would have loved to see what Thomas and Billy could have done with bindings. I still believe that you need bindings if you wanna be fast on the track.
@longhairedboy EUC’s vs skate. The best EUC time Saturday was 1:03.08 and Sunday 1:01.60. Not far from my best lap. I think skates are a little faster on these kind of tracks with very tight turns. The EUC’s got their plates too low for them to really lean in the turns. Lots of them scraped their plates when turning sharp. They couldn’t lean as much as they wanted. That was a big disadvantage for them. If they build one with the plates higher, they would be able to lean much more and do the turns much faster, and give skates some serious competition. Maybe on the track I am on normally where the turns are not as tight as in Brussels they would have a better change.
The scooters was fast. There were some really powerful ones. Saturday I just barely managed to keep them behind me (1:01.10). But sunday they smashed my best time. 0:59.02
Delivering when you have to. There are a world of difference going around and around chasing the best lap and then being told now… two laps… show us what you got. How would you go about it? How far can I push it. Should I take a chance and go as hard as possible, or be more conservative. Makes it all more difficult. Being in this situation more will develop our skills on the track. We need more races. I was taken back to my fencing days and I had the same feeling in my body as I went out on my two laps. A feeling I both love and hate at the same time.
Urethane vs rubber. We have discussed this before. But just to make it completely clear again. Urethane is no good for this. The guys that were on urethane was sliding all over. End of discussion. Wont bring that up anymore.
All in all a great experience. I leaned a lot, and have a few things I will work on. Looking foreward to do more of this with all of you. Let’s push this sport
Overall results Saturday:
Overall results Sunday:
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@davidbonde Cool write up mate!
BTW Sepp is my brother, he don’t have a account here 
Sorry for the much hairspins I did in the track 
I tried my best to combine technical and some speed.
Floor was indeed a little bit slippery.
Lars and I were to nice for you 
We have never had a EUC faster then a ESK8 on a kart ride if I am correct. We do some other kart rides in belgium. This is one off them with manual timing:
If they will ever create one with the baseplates higer they will kick our ass hard…
Scooters were going very fast, sunday it was incredible fast…
I think many guys feel the stress at that moment. That is the moment when you make faults or go to hard and fall. Sunday we did 3 tracked laps. (Saturday it was the first time we used the automatic tracking system. We setted up the wrong amount off laps.)
Indeed I see on each event that the AT boys have much better times then street. Just because off the extra grip you got on that rubber.
Yeah! hope to see you again!
Links to results:
08/02/2020 Competition https://www.webscorer.com/race?raceid=209991
08/02/2020 Free Time https://www.webscorer.com/race?raceid=210004
09/02/2020 Competition https://www.webscorer.com/race?raceid=210089
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Hehe… I had to see how fast I really was. I would have made a much bigger scene than I did if I didn’t get another go 
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Great write up for the event. It was an honour to be racing you, trying to get the fastest time. I wish we could’ve stayed till sunday and really get the competition going for ESK8. When i did my last free run, i got a few seconds faster than my final in the qualifiers which sucks but i am happy either way.
It’s a shame i could’ve have brought my Trampa as that has bindings and makes a big big difference to em when riding. Bindings give esk8 a big advantage no matter what anyone else says. I am now tempted to put some Freebord Bindings in my carbon, just so that when i race i can get the best possible lean and turns for the track. (especially those hairpins)
I really should prepare myself much more as i see you are always practising and i am the opposite haha. I only tend to ride when there is a ride happening in London and barely ever get to race unless it’s my small time practising at the track i work at. Even with the board itself, next time i will bring my slick AT tires as is till had little grip, with the nobbly tires that i was running.
Super interested in @MoeStooge wheels you were running though. if i could somewhat get a conversion and put them on my Evolve, that would be insane. They had perfect grip from why i saw, and i’m keen to push them to their limits if and when i get my hands on them.
Great time with you though. Hope to see you in Paris.
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@davidbonde great report bud. So gutted I couldn’t make it.
I wanted to know, why do you think the scooters were so quick? I would guess they were less powerful than some of the boards and harder to lean into heavy acceleration. Maybe more grip? Keen to hear your thoughts on this.
Also hey @Billy_Wiz, welcome to the forum finally.
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Sorry, I must have missed what “EUC” means
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You mean EUC? Electric Unicycle.
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The scooters were insanely powerful, and had more traction i think. I didn’t see a single scooter slipping or something like that.
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Yeah… they had big ass wheels. Lots of grip. I also think that their handle was an advantage for them. Something to grab on both accelerating and turning.
Still think I would have had a fair chance of beaten them had I been there Sunday. Lots of places with potential for cutting time here and there. And we need to believe in our self and have lots of confidence until we are proofed different
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I hadn’t even thought of that but that’s an excellent point. Now that i think about it, plate scraping happened to me a lot when cornering and sometimes it even lead to dismounts with leg bruising.
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@davidbonde care to send me some close ups of your wheels?
Just to compare the wear (ware, wair, w… derogation!) with my street stooges
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This video shows the track in Brussels and shows us an EUC and what’s their biggest restriction was. The scraping of plate. Watch with sound and listen. Most of the scraping is from the filmer. Think he was more agressive on the track. But you will see the one in the video scrape as well.
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These are the four wheels after a year of riding.
I got the race wheels. 45/40a 6.5cm wide. I wanted them as sticky as possible. Think the street wheels have more range.
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I’m not a EUC guy… nor do I want to be… but this appears very similar to riding a supermoto on a kart track, and motorcycle footpegs, if the made their foot pads articulate slightly up and down and put a non-skid on the bottom, they wouldn’t have to raise the pads and CG and still be able to lean…
Like I said, never been on a EUC, but the dynamics appear similar that the lean is in, the foot-weight is on the outside peg, and the CG over the CG of the EUC…
BTW @davidbonde well done!!! I really liked watching the vid of you making laps and grabbing the rail in the hairpins!!!
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From Brussels to Stockholm. This weekend was spend in Stockholm to the Winter Open 2020.
Had an awesome day with nice people and a different track. It was a dedicated gokart track, or at least a track where they only drive go-karts. Think it was mostly a polter aben / team building kind of place. But I could be wrong.
The track was mostly narrow and therefore pretty tight. It had one real hairpin and two “sort off” hairpins. It wasn’t as physical demanding as my own or the Brussels track. Maybe because it only invited to get low in the hairpin. The rest was pretty much standing.
Surface were cement or painted cement with small strips of asphalt. I have seen many go-kart tracks like that, and I have been wondering how that would feel. It was a first time for me on cement. Lap times were around 25 sec.
The competition were head to head. Three persons on the track. First two laps, then three and in the final six. Two first qualified for next round. Last one eliminated. First time for me competing like that. It really gave the competition some nerve.
As I wrote last week there are a world of difference in going around the track your self and chasing a good lap time, and then deliver when you have to. And the head to head added to this.
Racing laps were very different than the practice laps. People fell, perfect line was difficult to get and everything was more jittery. Think we need to do this more to be able to do it better. We talked about how different in felt practicing vs racing. So it was something we all felt.
Competition ended with Niklas Lundquist first. Jens Sjögren (@Seabjorn) second and me third. I only reached the final because in the semifinal Torbjörn Rosdahl fell in the last turn and I could overtake him.
In the final I didn’t have a change. Jens even fell but managed to come back and overtake me.
Jens and Niklas were on trampas WITH bindings and evolve pneumatic slicks. It seemed that the pneumatics performed better on the cement, than my wheels. I slid a lot and it felt like they could put more into the turns before they slid.
Unfortunately we didn’t get on each others boards to see how that felt. That would have been great though.
This is the first time I have slid for real on my wheels. On my own track they are like really really stuck down. More than the pneumatics I have tried. But it makes sense if different wheels perform different on different surfaces. We need to find out how it ties together.
Hopefully Jens and Niklas will find their way to my track in the relatively near future. I need to be pushed on that. And it would be good learning to see how their setup performs on that kind of track. Could be awesome to get a small group of hard shredding folks to me track. I am all alone here. I need you.
Could also be that Jens and Niklas are just that much better than me
Bindings…. This track got me thinking about how to use them best. To begin with I have divided it up in two. 1. relatively stiff legged, leaning a lot and not lifting the rear heel. 2. Low stance. Which means you don’t need to lean as much and therefore maybe be able to go harder with the same lean.
The first is the easiest. Also the most scary. If you loose traction you are hanging there. The second feels more safe but also more difficult to get the lean. My thought is that the lateral force when leaning standing will be greater and therefore you can’t take the turn as fast. If we are lower the lateral force will be relatively less and therefor we can have more speed if we can manage to withstand the g force. Leaning stadning feels like we can withstand the g force easier. I am sure the downhillers want us to get low. The question is if it’s necessary. My gut feeling is that it would be good to do.
Someone more experienced in this and with physics please chime in.
If I do the turns high standing I can wrap the bindings pretty hard and be one with the board. If I do it low standing I need the back binding to be very loose so I can lift the heel and turn my back foot. I will work a bit on the latter way of doing it and see where that takes me.
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Thanks for the feed backs, it’s very interesting …
I’m not a truck specialist but it might be linked to the RTC (return to center/bushing tighteness) of your truck as you have more leverage to lean the board when standing high than in low position.
Trying other stance (if duck stance) could also be a solution…
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How were Jens and Niklas going through turns? Standing or squatting?
Standing.
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Great summary mate! I’m definitly going to take you up on the offer to visit Copenhagen, hopefully within a month or two!
To answer your question @Soflo I need to first say that I ride regular, aswell as @davidbonde . The track we raced at did only have one real heel side turn for us, which was the hairpin. In a 180° heelside turn I feel like squatting down and grabbing the board is the way to go , way easier to maintain balance and speed. In Toe side turns on a narrow and short track like this I like the leverage from a standing turn, it also allows me to lean my body over the corner obstacles. maybe a low stance could have it’s advantages, I’m thinking on a bigger track with longer turns. I also need to experiment more with this.
Nicklas rides goofy so for him most turns were heelside, advantage or disadvantage? I guess it’s highly personal.
Here’s a video link of me and David doing a few practise laps on the track
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