TPRNo6 // Michael’s custom Enigma Esker at the Trans Pyrenees Race

After last year’s scratch left him with unfinished business, Michael Drummond (049) returned to TPRNo6 ready for redemption. Alongside building his fitness back up, he’d spent the year working with Enigma on a custom Esker designed to meet the demands of the Trans Pyrenees Race. From its technical specifications to the personal touches that make it uniquely his, Michael shares how the bike carried him across the Pyrenees, and why it means so much more than just getting to the finish line. Normally a member of the Media Team at Lost Dot races, Michael left his post behind the camera to experience the race for himself once again.

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Words by Michael Drummond

Photos by Liz Seabrook and Tomás Montes

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On the Esker

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The Enigma Esker, with its 50mm tyre clearance and slightly more relaxed geometry than traditional road and endurance bikes, is the ideal ride for feeling fast and planted on the tarmac, while remaining slack enough to buzz over the ‘Work in Progress’ roads littered with rubble and rocks that cut through the woodlands between CPs and Parcours.

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With this year’s course made up of more than 90% road, 36mm tyres were the ticket for me. For the rough stuff, the Esker’s relaxed head tube angle helped me descend at pace, both day and night, to eke back minutes and hours wherever possible.

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The flexibility of the frame means that when the trails back home become muddy and rough, a simple tyre swap can see the Esker switched back into rowdy off-road mode with some wider, more grippy tyres, keeping me riding and training all year round.

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The climbing on the TPR is the real kicker: 34,000m in total, with various backcountry lanes ramping up to 20%, including the now-infamous Parcours D, alongside some lesser-known cols that drag on for multiple kilometres at 10–13%. This is where a less traditional road gearing alternative comes into play, in the form of the SRAM Red XPLR groupset. Running a 36-tooth chainring up front and a wide-range T-Type 10–52 cassette gave me the gearing I needed to avoid grinding my way up the bounty of mountain passes along the route. The frame’s hand-bent stays accommodate the 1x drivetrain and wide tyre clearance while retaining a more traditional aesthetic.

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Having built the bike around a specific fit to ensure comfort over the long haul, I kept the cockpit simple. This time around, I chose not to use TT bars, which I only regretted for a day or two, thanks to some long, flat stretches and the odd headwind from hell. The ENVE In-Route system was comfortable and clean-looking, while the slight sweep of the bars gave me more confidence on the descents.

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The lightweight, high-engagement Road 36SL wheels from Boyd Cycling helped keep things light and responsive, while being resilient enough to withstand some of the rough tracks that cropped up along the way.

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The combination of lightweight wheels, the bike’s geometry and the frame material itself made for a very supple ride. Titanium glides over rough tarmac with a different waveform to other materials, and it was a joy to take on this voyage across the Pyrenees.

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Beyond the practicalities of the build, the finishing touches and custom flourishes are where the Enigma customer journey becomes so much more.

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Dignified Details

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Having so many unique aesthetic details on the bike provided a bounty of morale boosters while muddling through the tougher moments on the route. To begin with, the rainbow anodising on each graphic element of the build was a joy to see whenever I parked up outside a petrol station or laid the bike down next to my bivvy, catching my helmet light as I surfaced from a brief al fresco nap.

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Then there are the more emotionally loaded touches, which honour different parts of my journey in life and on two wheels. As a dedication to my now-retired fluorescent pink carbon gravel bike of seven years, a custom paint scheme, colour-matched to its sun-faded top tube, now adorns the ENVE fork and stem. That way, while the paint has faded, my memory of it won’t.

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For me, the cherry on top of it all is the custom decal commemorating my late father, John. The ‘Lizard King’ motif was created in collaboration with the design team and is a homage to a line from a poem by Jim Morrison of The Doors: “I am the Lizard King, I can do anything.” It’s a quote that will forever be stuck in my head, one that I can still hear my Dad uttering in his Glaswegian accent as he went about his day-to-day life.

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It can’t be understated that, despite how hard this year’s TPR felt and however many obstacles came up, the ever-present reminders and lasting nods to both him and what has come before kept me on the right side of moving forward. It was an encouragement I sorely needed when things got gritty.

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It’s a beautiful bike, and the consideration shown by the Enigma team, along with the dialogue between us to make sure everything was just right, was invaluable. It made for a bike that could not have been better.

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I’m so glad that I now have a bike which, in some way, allows me to cycle the world with my Dad.

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Find out more about the Enigma Esker and their custom build options here: https://www.enigmabikes.com/products/enigma-esker-gravel-bike