Update, and CX racing.

A brief update - I've been riding plenty but not blogging my rides much. Mostly thrashing te Wainui trails as lunchtime / night / weekend rdies as they're close to home, so I can head out and back quickly without spending half a day. I'v hit the Makara loop on the roadie a couple of times, and the odd blat to Eastbourne, but I've mostly been on the MTB.

I did a couple of rounds of the BikeHutt cyclocross series. For my first go at CX I entered the half-hour fun race in the second race of four in the series and had a great time, ending up with a third. Yesterday I stepped up to the full hour + one lap at Trentham Park in the last race of the series. I had the stock skinny Bontrager 29-3 tyres back on, and took all the accesories off the mighty Fisher to give it a more crossy style and, crucially, make it slightly easier to lift. It's not a light bike by any stretch if the imagination. Anyway, I had a nice race, sliding around and sinking into the mud at my own pace somewhere back in the field. I was eventually lapped by the winner - Ken the cx loon riding on Zipp 404s and Campagnolo Record! - but I don't think by anyone else. Had a bit of a friendly battle with a guy in VIC shorts, on a single speed, passing and getting passed which was great motivation to not slack off. He passed me on our last lap and beat me eventually.

With riding out to Trentham, racing then riding home I was pretty shattered on Sunday afternoon. I like it. If I can chase off the cold that seems to be approaching I may go road racing next weekend - the Balfour Pennington series, race 2 I think.

Did my first night ride tonight - my bike's been at the Bike Hutt, and Mike kindly offered to bring it back to me by way of meeting for a night ride. He lent me a light, like a pusher offering the first hit free, and we rode at Wainui with a regular Bike Hutt group. We rode down Labyrinth and Snails, a play on the super-steep firebreaks, then up Jungle Gym. Most of the group went off to ride Spoonhill, but I piked on that. I was running out of energy after not having enough to eat and starting to ride like a mong, and I find Spoonhill/491 tough enough in the light and dry, so at night, hungry and after some light rain I left it for another time.

There will be another time - I came home to find I'd sold my windtrainer on Trademe, so I can buy a light.

Night riding is cool. It took me a while to get used to the trees disappearing as they entered what would have been my peripheral vision, but after a while I adapted to the tunnel vision effect and managed to stop expecting to hit one. Next time I'll have some more afternoon tea!

Birthday blat

Today is my 33rd birthday. For the last three years I've taken the day of work for my birthday and gone for a ride - all road rides, round the Akatarawas the last couple of times. This year I made it a mountain bike ride. Instead of riding to work, I packed the bike in the van and commuted from the Hutt into Wellington, and introduced myself to Makara Peak.

I rode up Koru, Sally Ally, Missing Link and Aratihi to the top, then down North Face, Swigg and Starfish. After a break at the van for morning tea I rode up to the top the same way, and down Leaping Lizard then back up the road to the van for lunch - then a couple of laps of Koru, Swigg and Starfish to round things off before heading back to the Hutt to visit a few bike shops before picking the kids up at school. Cool day.

Woohoo!

After heading out yesterday and riding Snail Trail and Jungle Gym, and being quite pleased to make it round without putting a foot down or touching a tree except to stop for a dog walker, I joined a workmate for a lunchtime ride today. He suggested we ride Spoonhill/491, and I stepped up to the challenge. I haven't had the guts to try Spoonhill yet, having heard that it's a tougher trail than the others in the park that I've ridden. We ended up riding up Labyrinth, then down Spoonhill/491, the link track, a bit of the wetland, Beeline Extension and the new Westside track, then back via Jungle Scout and Jungle Gym.

I was stoked to have ridden Spoonhill/491 without stuffing it up and flying off into the trees, suffering just an accidental toppling over when getting too close behind my workmate, braking and losing my momentum - other than that, I just rode it without thinking too hard. It's rooty, rocky clay singletrack, with little dropoffs and chutes - nothing wildly dramatic, but proper mountain biking. I'm getting the hang of this stuff.

All of these tracks are on tracks.org.nz, for the curious.

First week back offroad

I picked up the new machine about a week and a half ago, on Saturday, and took it out the next morning to re-acquaint myself with how to ride offroad, after a 10-year hiatus. That first ride I was unstable, unsteady and had no flow whatever - I clipped a tree with my shoulder, fell down a bank and generally rode like a total newbie. I headed into the Wainui trail park and rode
Labyrinth, Snails, Jungle Scout and Jungle Gym, then met a workmate and did another lap before heading home.

I made it out for another four rides during the weekday lunchtimes, all at Wainui, then on Sunday, as the Wainui trails were closed for the Wainiuomata mountain run, I thought I'd head up the pylon road to see what that's like. It reminded me a lot of my expeditions along the top of Flagstaff and Swampy, back in the day - decent gravel roads to rutted 4WD tracks. As it had been raining on Saturday, there was a lot of drive-train eating mud puddles, and after hitting one or two too many of these I had massive chain suck in both the middle and granny, so ended up big-ringing it home. Pinch-punctured the back too - all in all, too much repair and cleaning required for a relatively uninspiring ride.

When I got home I removed a ton of mud, cleaned and lubed, added some colour-matched PVC tape to cover the chainstay paint damage from chain suck and protect it from the next occurence and chucked a small bottle of oil in the saddlebag for next time.

New machine

My new MTB is a Fisher Mamba, bought from The Bike Hutt in Upper Hutt. They did me a good deal on the first two changes from the stock setup when I bought the bike - first replacing the stock cable disc brakes with Hayes Stroker Ryde hydraulics, and then selling me some meatier tyres at a good discount to replace the stock Bontragers, which have tread more suited to hard and dry trails. It's now wearing Maxxis Ardents, 2.4 front and 2.25 rear and the Bontragers are waiting in the shed to maybe come out in summer, or for cyclocross racing.

Introduction to a punter

I'm a recreational cyclist, living in Lower Hutt, New Zealand and riding road and mountain bikes.

I used to mountain bike as a university student in the 90's, riding tracks around Dunedin - Flagstaff and Swampy Summit, Signal Hill, and the dirt back roads of the Peninsula. I had a pretty basic rigid steel GT Timberline, not a flash bike, but I got to some cool places and enjoyed myself. In the late 90's I got more into running, did a pretty slow Otago Harbour marathon in 2000 or so, then some trail running - the inaugural Pulpit Rock pursuit stands out as a highlight, as does the Three Peaks race over Flagstaff, Swampy and Mount Cargill. The bike was left to commuting duties. I kept the running going after moving to Lower Hutt, and ran with Hutt Valley Harriers for a few years, did a couple of half marathons and some more trail running, and kept riding to work.

After some long-running injuries made running increasingly frustrating, I turned back to the bikes for endurance sport. After finally riding te old GT into the ground as a slicked-up commuter, then riding a stop-gap Healing 10-speed for a while, I got an entry level road bike three years ago and went road riding, including some club racing with PNP. I'm enjoying that, love heading out for an Akatarawas or Makara loop, and still learning things every time I go racing and get smashed by C-grade.

The new thrill in my cycling life though, is mountain biking again! A crew of volunteers has built the Wainuiomata Trail Park, a mountain bike park just over the hill, and so I've bought a mountain bike again, in order to re-learn how to ride singletrack and get amongst it. I got the new machine on Saturday afternoon and have so far ridden Sunday morning, and Monday and Tuesday lunchtimes in the trail park. I'm starting to get the hang of keeping it moving through the tight corners, learning how far I can trust the bike with its huge floaty tyres and suspension fork and trying to recover the balance I'm sure I used to have. This blog will record some of my road and mountain bike riding, as well as anything else I can think to add. If I can convince my ankle to play along, there might even be some running again!