What's Next for the Big Mountain Enduro Series? 2

Kyle Warner sits down for a candid interview with Brandon Ontiveros, founder of the Big Mountain Enduro.

sspomer
6/2/2020 8:21am
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The Big Mountain Enduro is the premier enduro mountain bike race series in North America. Brandon Ontiveros, founder of the BME, took his love for bikes, adventure and racing to make it his full-time job. When pro rider friends told him about European-based enduro mountain bike racing in the early 2000s, Brandon saw the writing on the wall. He embraced the format, began the successful and fun, Oregon Enduro Series and eventually the Big Mountain Enduro series, which he still runs today.

 

Kyle Warner, a BME racer, interviews Brandon about the different facets of what enduro racing is, or could be. They discuss the challenges and logistics of hosting a race, and they look into the future of the Big Mountain Enduro. In 2020, there will even be an e-MTB class at select venues.

COVID 19 has obviously impacted the 2020 race season, but BME events are currently scheduled to resume at the end of August in Big Sky, Montana.

www.bigmountainenduro.com

Big Mountain Enduro 2020 Revised Race Schedule as of May 22

  • Big Sky, MT: August 22nd-23rd
  • Winter Park, CO: September 12th-13th
  • Angel Fire, NM – BME Finals: October 10th-11th

 

cover photo by Eddie Clark

Related:
Coronavirus
Brandon Ontiveros
Big Mountain Enduro Series (BME)
Racing
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Kyle Warner
2 comments

View replies to: What's Next for the Big Mountain Enduro Series?

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Clavdivs
4 years ago
Loved this interview but as an enduro-newb, i'm a bit confused. I am definitely not trying to start a flame war about e-bikes here but i am looking for some clarity. He talks about not wanting to water down the original hardcore, backcountry nature of Enduro to the point where I would be frankly scared to make the jump from a Revolution enduro to a BME event, which is fine-I'm not a pro racer.
But at the same time he lays into people for hating on e-bikes, which would obviously undermine the entire hardcore, endurance nature of the sport that he helped pioneer. I guess it seems contradictory to me to say (paraphrasing here) 'we need to keep the sport pure' and 'we need to roll with the present trends'. It has always been confusing to me that enduro's have these grueling transfers but oh, hey, now we are going to have e-bike races.

I guess my question is, why not just make the transfers between stages less grueling? Or if not and motorized assistance is cool, why not just make enduro races multi-stage DH races?

Please don't rip me a new one, just a sincere question.
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iwil815
4 years ago
Yeah I dont quite understand the e-bike thing. Its just taking enduro and essentially making it easier. So the question is why? Assuming its the same courses, it just makes a significant part, the "endurance", that much easier so what is the point? I don't hate e-bikes but from a racing perspective it just seems odd. Like you said, if people don't want to pedal as much, just make a DH stage race with all uplifts.