Riding the Rim…

We are now in Christchurch, our final point of call on our NZ trip. Today Robyn decided to be super Mum and manage the kids while I went exploring another renowned MTB destination here in the Sth Island. Port Hills rests on the rim of an enticing and very large extinct volcano and is home to some great riding. The trails are by far the most technical trails I have ridden since being in NZ. As you could imagine, it is very rocky and steep. The trails flow well, although most are short and you need to link them together to get a decent ride in. It was heaps of fun bashing through the countless amount of rock gardens.

City one side, bay the other. Plenty to look at whilst riding.

Beautifully made trails.

Air time...

Randall and Rhino posted thier oics over the finishing stand at the Day Night Triller, so I thought I would also.

Queen Charlotte Track

What a day. Today Robyn gave me a leave pass to go riding. Not just any old ride either. It started by catching a boat to Ship Cove, the beginning of Queen Charlotte Track at the top of the South Island in NZ. The boat trip took about an hour and left me all alone with 71km of walking/single track ahead of me, plus another 25km on the road back to Picton (our camp for the night). This track usually takes walkers four days and it is recommended to ride it in two days. I tackled it with an extra 25km on the end for good measure. What was I thinking. The terrain was extremely hilly and rugged and was quite muddy in sections. In summer you are not allowed to ride the entire track due to the amount of walkers taking on the challenge, so my timing was great. I will let the photos do the talking.

This is the boat that took me out to the start. It is the official mail boat, dropping off mail to the residents living way out here. There is no road access at all, boat only.

A very unstable suspension bridge.
One of the many places to stay the night .. and an honesty shop. I looked but no Coke.
Drift wood...come bike work stand...come kitchen bench for campers.
Not a bad view hey...
There was so much to see on this track. Time flew by. This is one I will remember for a long time to come.

Bloody blogger

Sorry for the delay in getting these posts up. Blogger had issues, and they sat in cyberspace for a week.

NZ encore...

I need to do a big thank you to Andrew Patten from Ay Up. He is a very supportive sponsor, is very passionate about mountain biking and a great guy to boot. We had a great time with him and the other Ay Up guys in New Zealand. Below are a few pics from the week spent with them, Randall and Rhino.

Ay Up supplied all of us with special edition green and gold lights. I gave them straight to Jackson for the final test before racing with them.

The Team. Rhino and Randall racing pairs. Myself and two of my best pit crew. These two handed me bottles on the fly whilst Robyn was tied up with Jackson.

I don’t have many racing shots yet, but I will get hold of some shortly. Andrew P. took this one.

On Monday after the race all the Ay Up riders went for a ride from Rotorua – through some of the best trails in the world. We were guided by Dave from Bike Vegas, a top bloke too.
The boys having a ball in the bush.

Randall styling it up off a 12 foot gap.

Today I was up for an encore race. I have been on antibiotics all week after suffering with the worst saddle sore ever. It was a XC style club event (something I haven’t done for about 5 years). It was great. Plenty of climbing, great single track- technical, rooty and a tad muddy in spots. I think I finished 5th in Elite, but most importantly, I had fun. (Sorry no pics, Robyn took the kids shopping whilst I was riding).

NZ Trip

It’s time to recover and start our NZ holiday. The race (Day Night Thriller) in Taupo, NZ went as planned. I had been sick all week leading up to the event which kept me off the bike until Friday. And then it was time to simply make sure the Four Supreme travelled ok not much else. With almost 3000 competitors it was a manic race start. I lined myself up with Randall (Yeti Aust/ AyUp) and thankfully we had to circumnavigate the entire camp group before we hit the trails because we were not in the best position to hit the front off the gun.

I will fill in the gaps during the week, but to cut to the chase I won solo by a good margin and Randall and Rhino also won the 2/3 man teams with the other two teams on the dais having three riders.

Ready...set....go. Well almost...

It has been a hectic few days. I managed to squeeze a smallish ride in on Saturday and a family picnic in on Fathers Day and then, SMASH, just like a Mack Truck over a cane toad on a warm summers night, it hit me, sore throat, body aches and blocked sinuses. The rest of the family have been fighting colds and flu's for a few weeks but I managed to hold it off until the week I fly to NZ for a race. Yeh me.

Anyway, I have almost got all the packing done. I am not too sure how I will fit it all in the car to get to the air post. I will post a pic of the packed car tomorrow if I have time. In slightly more exciting news, I have been given a prototype front derailleur from Shimano Japan (I normally get Shimano stuff from Shimano Aust.) to test and give feed back. I think I will race with it in NZ, on first test it seems to work great.

I will try and keep you posted on our movements in NZ. It should be fun

AyUp Shop...

Ayup are just about to open a retail shop in Brisbane. This really goes to show these lighting systems are designed for the mass market. They have so many uses. For more check out their website here.

 

 

 

Warming up....

With the weather warming up and the choice (am getting in the NZ groove) time to ride is in the middle of the day. However yesterday was an all day affair for me. By the time I made it to the Fatties ride I was getting a bit over it. I ended up slowing the bunch down and opted for the lift home over flogging a dead horse on the bike track to the outer eastern suburbs.

Today it was time to put the feet up and begin the taper for next weekend. With such great sunshine outside I couldn't resist dusting off the old trike and taking Jackson for a spin.

Is 5 months too young to be chewing the stem? Poor little guy, a few hour after this pic was taken he was at the doctors getting his second course of antibiotics for a chest and ear infection. He should be back in fine shape just in time to board the plane.

Weekend bliss...

I woke up Saturday morning feeling very tired. Jackson has decided he no longer needs to sleep so Robyn and myself are getting very minimal sleep. This is not good at all, I am running out of time to get some miles in my legs before the Day Night Thriller in NZ and I am not prepared to ride when I am that tired. I don't think I get any benefit from it and besides I get really crabby and annoy everyone else in the house. We made it to bed by 8:30 and managed to sleep for about 6hours in total so I decided a couple of hours on the road bike was in order. I rolled nice and easily to the base of the dandies and preceded to do two repeats up the One in Twenty (The Basin to Sassafras, about 7km). The first I didn't allow my heart rate to go over 140bpm, this made for a very pleasant climb. It felt really good to jump on the bike and not have to flog myself stupid.

I also managed to spend some time in the shed. On the left is a crank arm off Pop's bike which I have polished, one the right is one I haven't touched. I am pleased with how they turned out, but I have a long was to go. I have also started to straighten the wooden rims. Firstly I stripped them to bear wood, and got them nice and wet. Now they will live under heavy weights whilst they dry (hopefully a bit straighter).

Product Update...

As many are well aware, AyUp lights are one of the most versatile on the market. They have so many uses unlike most lighting system which are restricted to using on the bike. They will soon be releasing a stage programmed battery. It has 5 power settings plus a strobe mode. I have been using a prototype of this battery and even in its' development stage it is impressive. I have used it with a narrow been on my helmet to get a little more brightness out of it (it does drain the battery a bit quicker) and it is great in a dull mode (battery last much longer) for commuting etc on the road when extreme brightness is not required.

This first pic is the dullest mode. (all pics with narrow beam)

This one is in the middle mode (there is one setting between these first two pics)
And this is the brightest mode (there is one setting between these last two pics)

The prototype I have is the same size as the six hour battery. I am unsure if it will be available is both types, but keep an eye on the AyUp website to find the release date.

In other product news I am happy to inform you that the Enduro Ceramic Bottom Brackets are great value. After the third round of the Anaconda Enduro Series (the very wet one), I left my bike untouched for three weeks. Usually this would see the bottom bracket being removed and placed in the bin. When I had my bike in the stand the BB was almost totally seized, but by removing the seals, spaying with WD40, blowing out with compressed air and applying a thick chain lube all was good again. This can be put down to the fact that the bearing aren't metal so rust isn't a problem. I recon they where revived to about 85-90% as good as new, which still makes the better than a standard BB. Check out DIYMTB for the latest Enduro products.

Anaconda Enduro Round 4...

Sunday I drag myself out for the last round of the Anaconda Enduro Series at Lysterfield. It was an 8 hour outing this round, so race start was nice an early (8:30am) which is something I am not use to. Off the line I felt fantastic. I was with the leading group of team riders for a good few minutes before I made a tactical decision to drop off them and ride a conservative race. Rolling around on the first lap I knew I had two solo competitors in front of me but because this race was a little longer than the previous rounds I was confident I would slowly peg them back.

At about the 2 hour mark I caught second place and I has then happy in my decision to hold back. I soldered, on catching the leader (Stuart Brown) at the half way mark. I was happy to roll around with him for half lap or so until Clackers come past and I decided to put some power down, hold his wheel for a few hundred meters and pulled away from Stuart.

From then on I just wanted to ride consistent laps without hurting myself too much. I rolled in ofter lap 11 with 5 minutes to go, I thought I had enough lead to not go out for another lap but decided it would be good training and rolled through for anther. Lucky I did, because Stuart gave everything he had in the final few laps to come in from lap 12 only about 20-30 seconds behind me. I had absolutly no idea he was there and was quiet glad I didn't bludge the final lap and make it a sprint finish.

This is my support table, it did a great job and never missed a beat. Preparation is the key to good consistent racing.

I don't think I ever looked like I was hurting for the entire eight and a half hours.

11.5 kg of fluid and gel consumed, climbed 3000m and not a drop to spare.

The bootie, two wins and third in series. Ash has done a great job on the trophies. The kids have loved them enough to take them to show and tell.