JOE BARNES, TEAM ORANGE

“I’ve loved it. There are so few races nowadays where you do proper flat grass turns and natural terrain like this. It’s the purest kind of fun and reminds me of races in Scotland when we were young, like at Killin.

“Stage one and two were favourites for me as they are just so long and natural and you’ve got a mixture of gullies, scree stuff and then super- slippery woods down at the bottom with really hard pedalling in the middle. I think I managed a good time on stage one too.

“We’ve not been before and obviously we’re done racing now, so we can put our feet up and enjoy it – we’ll stay the night and enjoy all the stuff going on in the pits and the atmosphere down there – it’s just a great set-up with all the brands here and everything.”