Wainui Mudfest - The 6hr Wurldz

Yo!

The trails at Wainuiomata are awesome. They're built and maintained by the WTP. We don't get over there as often as we'd like, so a 6hr race was a great chance to get a good fix.

The BLR Roster for the day:

Ashley - Racing as sassy roller derby girls with her girlfriends.
Ed - In the DUETS team. A two man outfit with epic sifter, Stu Houltham.
Slacky, Al, Davo and Sharpie - Solo

The rainy weather had dealt a blow to the course and some sections were soft, gluggy and hard work. But as testament to the efforts of the trail builders, the established trails were bullet proof.

Davo's Tale

I'd done no training but was keen to see how well I could go in this. I figured if I did it, I could call it my entire winter's training.

Everyone set off really quick and I dropped back, riding a pace which I could do for 4 or so hours (figured I'd deal with the last bit when I got to it). Had some back and forth with riders including Mr Lindup, Mr Crossling and Mr Fiest. Eventually I managed to pull ahead a bit and kept my foot down. Mr Sharpe withdrew from the solo lead with mechanicals. I didn't know who was ahead of me so was pleasantly surprised to learn around 7 laps in, that I was leading! Then I started to panic about what my gap was to 2nd. Clive made the ethically robust decision to lie to me and say 15mins. Longer and I would have sat up, shorter and I might have paniced!

I lost vision in one eye for no apparent reason at around the 3-4hr mark. Switched contacts for glasses, but no better. Turns out there is a link between hard excersise and clouding vision. Wierd! I'm looking into it more. I initially thought it was my brain's way of trying to limit how much of Lynskey's NUDE lap I could witness.

I had a couple of proper 'lie downs' on the trail, then my shanks imploded so my last laps were quite lame, although made brighter by Al and Ricky's company, just when I needed it! It was great to get a win. Thanks very much to Tryfan at Floe for my prize of a great event shirt.

My favourite bits on the course were the Snail Trail's awesome pump and flow, the zippy singletrack afterwards, and passing the many kind friends who were shouting for me. Thanks very much for your support! Oh, and I loved hooning down the steep drops on Beeline Ext. And loved the gross muddy sections as I knew how boxed my competitors drivetrains were getting! Poor buggers. Mr Lindup even broke his rear mech off, after saying on the startline that he was questioning his decision to run gears.


Al's Tale

Lining up for my first race since the nationals back in February, I was really looking looking for some proelite XC rampage. Off the line it was shaping up like it was going to be a solid race, but something was not quite right... so unfortunately I had to pull into the pits after one lap and figure out what was going so wrong. Now I had two choices, DNF because my 'race' was over, or just keep riding...

So I moved to Plan B which was to sift around with Ricky for a few laps. This was a lot of fun, especially trying to make it all the way down the Snail Trail descent without pedaling (which is harder than you think). Good times were had with Slacky till Ashley decided to drop us up a hill which required some kamikaze descending to make sure we passed her on the way back down! This finished Ricky off, so with just over two hours to go Ricky stopped for a slice of salami (or maybe the whole roll!) and a lie down.

So onto Plan C, which was to find out just how hard I could push it now that I was feeling better. I was making more of an effort than I do at a singles night - and believe me I go 100% when there is the chance of a date! So after 3 more laps at Warp Speed, the time ran out. I was super happy with those 3 hot laps at the end, I was even getting air time on some of the jumps. Yes, Ricky is not the only strawberry blonde who can jump.

This was a truly awesome race and Shane Wetzel (and his team of volunteers) deserves a huge round of applause for his first foray into race organising. There are so many people getting involved in helping make this sport this much fun at the moment, this is a good time to be a mountain biker!

...................................................

So a mint day. Everyone got a treat, when they caught or got overtaken by Ashley, MJ, Rachel and Natasha. Their outfits were awesome!

Stu and Ed won the overall and Stu even blitzed a lap with just 21 mins to go, finishing with a few seconds in hand. Classy.



The Wainui 6hr was Dave 'Mono' Sharpe's last outing in the Bushlove jersey. Dave is pursuing some new projects. We'll miss him, and wish him the best of luck!

We were all pretty tired after another classic day in the saddle and are looking forward to 2011's edition! You can check out the album here. Clive took loads, you might well be in a couple!

Cheers :o)

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Wainui Winter Weekender 2010

Some pics from Todays mudfest at Wainui.
Props to Shane Wetzel & Crew for organising, hopefully becomes a regular on the race calender..

Now stare at the pain in Davos eyes.

UPDATE: DAVO TAKES THE 6 HOUR SOLO WIN!!!!...

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Wainui 6hr Race Prep - Gone Fishing FTW

Its the Wainui 6hr Wurldz race on Saturday. I decided to join epic sift-kings, Al Maulman, Sharpie and Slackshanks in doing it as a solo. Ashley is in there too in a hottie team which we will linger behind at any and every opportunity.

I'm going to run the SS rather than my new flashy Ibis Mojo trail bike. Its probably going to be pretty muddy in places, and I'm used to racing the SS, especially when it's wet. Besides, people always think you did really well when you race a rigid singlespeed, even when you suck badly.

I broke my Crudcatcher! I only like the original Crudcatchers, which I can't find in NZ. I remember when they first came out in the UK back in around 1993. Before that we used to fix ice cream tub lids to the downtubes. So I knocked up the old-school solution earlier on.


I had a big selection of ice cream tub lids.... I went for a Vanilla/Gone Fishing combo.

Looking forward to seeing all the keeners in the 'Nui on Saturday.

Cheers
Dave

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Beginners guide to skidz!

There is much debate on skidz in the world of mountain biking, with many people saying that are a lack of control by the rider.

However there is still a time and a place for doing a skid. Bushlove is here to educate you on when and where you should do some skidz...

Firstly, where should you do a skid?

As you can see in this photo, Ricky (on the right) is explaining to this nice gentleman that this lovely bit of singletrack does not take kindly to skidz.

So no skidz on singletrack!

However, take the example below. That is a beautiful lawn, but it is lacking that little something to give it a bit of style... well what could be better than a lovely skid right through the middle?

Doing skidz on your neighbours lawn is where it's at!

Secondly, what do you need to do a skid?

Well obviously a bike is a necessity. But the kind of bike you use is very important...

As demonstrated by this fashion biker, skidz on fixies heft mere fail

So we'll leave it Steve Peat to demonstrate how it's done

He's on a mountain bike and his skid has evolved into a drift. Steve Peat shows us all how - again!

And finally, when?
In front of a cafe full of roadies?

Of course not, they don't appreciate bike handling skills (because they don't know what they are)

However...

Nothing impresses the ladies like some mean skidz!

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Crazy Rampage Compensates For Failed BLR WOF

Well seeing as Davo failed The Crazyman WOF for 2010. I decided to take my old body into VTNZ to see if I could get a check over. Yip, as I thought, it failed on account of too much rust and crumbling pistons. Despite not obtaining a satisfactory WOF, I signed up to the Crazyman anyway, but brought race insurance with a ring-in runner – Stephen Day.

After a long night Sandbagging in Queenstown with MonoStrosity Civil Defence - Queenstown Emergency, I sifted back to Wellington just in time to take the start line. It seems that during the trip home Mono had a monostrosity and subsequently failed his Crazyman WOF due to a lack of riding. Leaving just me and Wonderwoman to up hold the good BLR name.


The "Southerlies, thunderstorms & hail" were due to hit Wellington about the time the mountain bike section of the race kicked off. All Crazyman entrants were watching nervously as it rolled in across Wellington and rampaged up the Western hills! Much to everyone’s delight the Southerly stayed West long enough for it not to hit the race.

9am and the hooter went (Mono and Davo were probably tucked up getting their hooters online), the Crazyman was underway. Leaving the runners to do the real work. Stephen was all arms and legs along the beach front, getting ready to settle into the hills. Loving the up hills, he appeared second out of the bush behind James Coughbrogh who holds the current course run record). Stephen was able to hold this position to the transition area where I took over for the MTB ride.

The course had changed from the previous year and included some of the ace Wainui singletrack. I decided it would be best to stallion off the front and concentrate on catching the 'Capital Sports Medicine Team', which I managed about midway through the climbs. Unfortunately Alex Revell had the same plans and caught me near the top, just before starting the undulating section midway through the race. As he passed me and I chased hard, Alex took what looked like a cunning alternate line to make extra ground on me... Mega fail on his part as he hit a steep hill pinch, allowing me to steal 50m on him to take the lead. Now the fun started - it was DH RAMPAGE time and as the BLR DH God (Slackbladder) had proven over the years, there aren’t many who can own a rampaging Bushie on an XC DH RAMPAGE mission. So I opened up the taps and stepped on the juice. Was able to take a good couple of minutes out of Alex which I would need later on the 12km gravel track to home. Head down with the Flux locked out, I steamed the river trail road with Alex chasing close. Every time I looked back expecting Alex to ride past no-handed, browsing my horoscope in the Hutt Times, I was pleased to see he had not made much ground on me. Big head throbbing and little head shrinking, I dug a little deeper to hold Alex to a 23sec gap for the Duathlon Team win. MINT! First rider home too. I was stoked with me and Stephen’s efforts for the day.

A wicked day out and another Team Duathlon course record for the second year in a row - Awesome.

Cheers
Tiger

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Leave the running to the Runners

Porirua Grand Traverse, Hawkins Hill Climb and My Return to My Running Career:

Check list:
Tick - Skimpy Flappy Panel Shorts
Tick - Old skool, retro running track suit
Tick - Legs that look like they belong to a chick
Tick - Free running shoes from where ever you can get them
Tick - A plethora of national medals that you don't really deserve, as you only fluked them in the beginning - Priceless



As you can tell I looked more like I was ready for a retro class running race than a hardcore mountain adventure run/bike, but I guess I could look worse...


PGT = I had forgotten over the years just how hard it was to put one foot in front of the other at a pace faster than a walk. Paaaain!!!! was the order of the day for this race. I had a runner lined up but this had fallen through at the last minute. How hard can it be, I asked myself as I put my "Individual Duathlon" entry in. So off I went on the Mountain Bike section constantly reminding myself to "Reserve some energy for the run". As some of the usual suspects (Hiskey, T-Rex, etc) steamed past I had great problems letting them go "It's not a lunch time sift with Davo & Angry, let them go! I said"

I survived the ride and actually enjoyed parts of it, but now it was time for the run... Transition went well and it was off across the field to begin the arduous steps up to Colonial Knob. Before to long I found myself running around an industrial area... 5mins later I made my way back on course Orsome!!!

Once I had finally run "BACK!" to the start of the race and found the marker I missed I started on the steps, on and on and on and on they went, they were just relentless. As I popped out near the top of Colonial Knob it was at least a change to fire road, I felt relief... for a second! Now it was time for the thigh shattering down hills to smash my punny pins in just a little more. Along the coastline, across Titahi Bay Beach, Up to the radio towers, past the Golf Course, through the swamp land and finally the 3km straight stretch of boring road to home... I was spent! Run in! Beaten! but somehow I managed 2nd place What The &*@#$!!!


Hawkins Hill Climb = I'll keep this one brief. Speaking of briefs, Marco was sporting his usual pair of Flappy Panel running short from back in the 60's.

The race started as it did last year with a "Hare" off the front until we turned into the hill section where the "Pins Of Power" kicked in and I took over the lead. Running hard I had one goal in mind, to catch the God Father (Marco Renall) who had left 5mins before any of the runners. Before I had even broken into a sweat or passed the stockyards I caught Mailman puffing heaving like singles night at Mermaids. Giving him a slap on the ass we past each other a couple of times until it was back into the steep stuff where I was able to get the better of him. Onward to The God Father now, who deemed harder to catch than an STD in a nunnery. 500mtrs from the top I caught him, his Flappy Panel Shorts. This made for the perfect target as I ran past for a quick down trow (Apologies to any female runners blinded by the sight of his glowing white cheeks as he struggled to hike them back to ball choking levels).

Finished to be first runner home. A massif ups to Alex Revel who stormed home the Mountain Bike for a course record that will stand for what may seem like years to come.

My return to my running career= Once again a fluke and maybe short lived... (But great Cross Training fun)

Enough said, I'm a Mountain Biker now not a Runner.
Tiger

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Cycle Surgery Singletrack Fiesta

Saturday was the Christchurch Singletrack Fiesta and as the name suggested it was to be a day of Mexician festivities. Being a family event, I kept it clean leaving my skinsuit at home and instead rocking the rainbow poncho. While it may look like a Technicolor dream coat it was actually gay pride Mexican style.

Rapido

The first race of the day was the Rapido xc race. Wanting to save myself for the ss race in the afternoon I thought I’d take it easy and just sift. I was riding the much neglected huckmobile (Litespeed obed) and even lined up near the rear of the field. My plan not surprising failed - as soon as the gun going off just sifting became “just sifting” bushlove style.

Getting stuck behind heaps of traffic ,the leaders rode off into the distance leaving me heaps of work to do. With some effort I caught up to Craig on Lap 2 and had a bit of a race with him for a few laps. I pulled away on the last climb to finish in 3^rd overall and 1^st in 19-29. While it was fun steaming the gnar on the huck bike it reaffirmed the inherent superiority of the wagon wheels.

Velocidad Solo

The big guns of Chch mtb made an appearance for the feature race of the day, the Velocidad solo.

After another zany start involving a run up a hill then some Mexican pot spinning, we were off for two hot laps of Living springs. From the start Dayle (on his pimping new Ti Singular) and I rode off with Oli closely chasing behind. Dayle led the way up what is one bloody hard ss climb and I did my best to hang on to him. We came in neck and neck with Oli 25 sec back. We were greeted with an appetising plate of cold beans decoratively placed on a bed of nachos which we were told to eat sans hands. We polished off all the beans (well almost) and while delicious I’d go for a beer any day.

After sticking to Dayle on the downhill he kicked it into a higher gear and rode away on the climb. I could blame the morning race but on the day Dayle was much stronger so it looked like he’d be a deserving winner. As we reached the crest of the climb I had settled in to cruise to 2^nd place but someone had other ideas.

Apparently the Nachos weren’t just there for looks so Dayle and I were presented with the biggest, most hot sauce covered plate of nachos known to man as a penalty for being cheating bandito’s. With great difficulty and a few spews, I worked my through another plate of beans AND nachos while as every second passed Oli made his way towards us. With a cheeky grin he casually rode past and onto to the win.

Given the controversy, Oli and I battled it out mano el mano with a game of Stingray, Crocodile, Steve Irwin at prizegiving with fate prevailing on Oli’s side to take the title.

Prizegiving turned into an epic haul of pirate treasure, I scored $60 of bike vouchers (thanks Cycle Surgery), a bottle of wine and some coffee. Sarah scored some Barkers goodies for being the pie lady for the day.

Was an awesome day thanks to the good sorts at Singletrack club, their lovely helpers and some very generous sponsors.

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Belmont Sunday Sifting Documentary

You can right click to play bigger in youtube....

Cheers :o)

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Civil Defence - Queenstown Emergency

CIVIL DEFENCE EMERGENCY - SEND IN THE BUSHLOVE FIRST RESPONDERS

We heard that for some reason linked to heavy rains in Queenstown, that they are looking for any help they can get with the task of Sandbagging.

To aid the locals we are sending our best to do what they can for the community.

Naturally our mercy mission sandbaggers will ride there, despite never actually doing any riding. We are dispatching Tony Keith and Dave Sharpe for starters. They will leave on the bikes tonight from Wellington and are really unfit and chubby. They'll be there for morning tea tomorrow on the shores of Wakatipu.

Once they've pushed back a muffin and a couple of Gary Colemans, they'll begin telling locals how they might race Rec Men this year and how they've done no training for months.
A NZ Airforce heli gets into trouble in the sand cloud sent up as the Bushies head south


The locals can expect a great deal from these boys. But if even they fail to bag enough sand, we'll call in the big guns and arrange for Jase Goldie and Nick Kennedy to sift down.

And if even he doesn't sandbag sufficiently to solve whatever problem Queenstown has, well let Carl Patton know. He'll fix it in minutes.

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SS nationals - Queenstown

Just like all the best things in life the singlespeeds had moved South for the year. While not as big a field as Rotorua the previous two years a top field had lined up with Ex national champions, Olympians, Kiwi brevet winners, a seedy guy called Garth, hairy men in dresses, fairies, members of the village people and a fearsome looking bumblebee. Unlike these collections of freaks I maintained the bushlove flare for style with a subtle sophistication in a hot pink sequined skinsuit.

Not just being content with looking stylish the skinsuit also served the dual purpose of aerodynamics. Extensive testing at the bushlove high performance lab revealed a 1.6W/Min/m/kg advantage over a nurses outfit and fishnets. This was an advantage I'd need every bit of.

You see back in the day I was a proper singlespeeder. For the better part of 3 years I pretty much rode only singlespeeds no matter how inappropriate the ride. For much of the time I didn't even own a geared bike (although at one time still had 5 bikes) and never really missed them. The reason I got into singlespeeding was pretty simple, I hated cleaning my bike, but once its sucked you into its hard to go back. This all changed last year when I snapped my frame leaving me without a ss for a few months. Since then I haven't ridden a ss so had no idea how this race would go.

As with all singlespeed races a zany start was required so we lined up for a 500m run with our front wheels. Unlike some of the other Bushlovers I'm no Bi-athlete so was quickly dropped off the line by Garth and was well stuffed by the time I got back to my bike. After fumbling to get my wheel back on I was off.
The Queenstown mtb club had put on a phenomenal course for the race based at 7 mile delta. For those who haven't ridden the tracks I'll just say they are awesome and you should go ride them now. With 100% singletrack with a total of 10m of flat track it certainly was a riders course. Having never ridden the tracks before, I quickly found was massively overgeared, oh well I'm used to rocking more (gear) inches than most.

Back to the race a local Jimmy had got off to a flier getting a break on the field from the start. Garth, Andy Reid, Marcus Roy and myself formed the chasing pack and rode together for the first 3/4 of a lap till Garth showed his class and broke away. I kept riding with the remaining two till the first beer stop where they kept going while I stopped for my first beer of the day.
Up to this stage I was riding like a mong, running pinches and generally lacking any kind of ss class. Some stage on lap 2 though, my moment of zen occurred and I flicked back to ss mode remembering all the little tips to being a singlespeeder.

Sadly on lap 2 Andy who I'd been having a great race with had an epic spill breaking his collarbone and loosing a boob from his fetching netball dress in the process. Hopefully he's recovering well and didn't get too many strange looks at the local hospital.

I ended up riding the rest of the race solo and loved every minute of it. Jimmy was always just ahead of me but I could never close the gap. I could quite happily have kept lapping them out all afternoon as the course was that good. Showboating across the line I was pretty happy with my third place. Congratulations to Garth who is in amazing form at the moment riding better than I've ever seen. I'm expecting big things of him at the worlds.

Big thanks to the Queenstown mtb club for putting on an awesome race, all the racers and the Queenstown weather which held off from the torrential downpour of the rest of the weekend for the race.

Next race is the Cycle Surgery singletrack fiesta. I hope to see you all there (and I promise I won't wear my skinsuit)

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Bushlove discusses the moonride

Disclaimer: Whilst the Bushlove Racing Team does endorse both silly cheap laughs and complex comedy, it does in no way support the Nazi Party, or any associated groups.

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Mind The Gap - Grom in Training

Nothing to do with this post, but its been a while since we saw the pic of a liquored-up Tiger Keith, looking like Freddie Mercury.

After a great morning with my daughter, Ella, at the Revolve Willy-Free XC race series, I popped out for a sift around the locality.

I visited the Tawa jump track by the railway station. Was my third trip there. I've been trying to lift my riding a notch, as for years I have just ridden regular XC stuff. I've got a lush Ibis Carbon Mojo now. It really is the swiss army knife of bikes. I've been able to do a couple of XC races and not come last, in addition to getting the confidence to get into more threatening riding than before. Almost beyond XC!



I managed a couple of the quite small doubles which was great. Rob Willis, a very competent local chap, gave me lots of advice and a few demonstrations on how to do some bigger stuff. He sold me the 10ft gap jump into the main berm, much like a used car salesman would sell someone a car which they could hardly afford, and with far more power than they could cope with. I had a few run ins to check my speed, as Rob suggested, then gave it a crack, heart in mouth style, as Rob and a couple of the young fellas watched on (probably baying for XC blood).

After falling of once as I went too slow, then a couple of attempts where I cased the lip and nose wheelied down the other side a bit, I finally popped a few more psi in my fake freerider ball-bag, and gave it more juice. Just about got it. Felt awesome. A real tick on my route to becoming a proper grom.

Thanks to Rob for his help and advice. Now when they start putting big gaps in XC courses, i'll be dishing out the good news to my skinny, shaved friends.

Cheers
Dave

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Can't stop, Hanmer time!

First up sorry for the terrible terrible pun, its almost as bad as the infamous redrocks blown seal joke.

I've always been a big fan of racing of induro racing in Hanmer so as always was looking forward to it. Thinking way back to 2005 it was one of my first races in a mixed team with the foxy Daydreamer. I don't want to spread gossip so all I will say is we were young, impressionable, it was cold and the tent we had was small. It was also my first solo 12 hr back in 2006 and possibly the coldest, wettest 6hr in 2008.

Back to the future, the race has been taken over by the Hanmer mtb club and they had put on a great course that could be enjoyed by all. While there was nothing technical it still had enough in it to keep it interesting for more experienced riders. Being the unorganised punter I am at the last minute I realised my bike was virtually un-rideable so I owe a big thanks to Dr Bike for sorting the Titus out. With f all notice he serviced my forks, tuned my gears, rebuilt my rear hub and dealt to a severe case of nipple failure (which up until now I thought only happened to Slacky at Karapoti).

The day dawned frosty and cold. We were glad for our warm cabin complete with fire and I'm sure we had a much warmer night than the hardy people who had camped overnight onsite. We set up camp next to Tinkerbell's tent mansion and Mrs K was glad the sun was shining after our last cold and shelterless experience in Hanmer. Was great to see that Bushlove's reputation is spreading in the South, Tinkerbell even referred to me in her blog as "one of the legendary racers of the mighty Bushlove Racing Team"

With the 4 and 8 hr starting together the pace was hot from the start especially from the in form Jeremy Inglis who was riding the solo short course. There was no way I was keeping up with him so after the first lap I settled into having a good battle with Andy Reid on his Stigmata cross bike. It was good fun doing my best keeping up with him on the flat faster sections while trying to drop him on the downhills. It must have been pretty brutal going though, as after 5-6 laps he had to change to a bike with suspension.
I felt like I was riding well at this stage opening up a handy lead of at least a few minutes. By lap 10 it had all started to unravel (I even got stung by a bee!) and my lead had nearly disappeared. Not being used to riding more than 20 minutes at a time my back started killing me although some painkillers (sans vodka as I'm no singlespeeder) courtesy of Ryda and Jude helped.

By lap 11 Oli easily passed me and rode off. Once the painkillers kicked in I started to feel much improved and really enjoyed the last few laps. In the end I finished 2nd a few minutes behind Oli but a lap up on 3rd.

Overall it was a well run race and great value too. It was a very good idea have it based out of the Forest Camp again (a location much better for spectators) - I did miss Pizzacarto though.

Thanks to Sarah for being race coordinator extraordinaire. She did a great job organising all the details, feeding me and generally being winsome. Thanks also to Craig, Rebakah and all the Singletrack Christchurch crew making the day so enjoyable.

Post race the Titus returned to its always intended singlespeed state for my next race. All going well I even hope to have a special treat for the throngs of bushlove fans.

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Any Given Saturday - Bushlove Leave Pass Rampage

After getting a mammoth leave pass to hit the trails yesterday, I'm feeling a little jaded. Today's physical activities will be no more extravagant than a trip to the new playpark and maybe a swim. When I say 'swim', I am referring to the time I will spend lying in the shallows at Porirua pool with my groin over a pleasant warm water jet, whilst my 4yr old, Ella and her friend go down the small slide 500 times.


(MC Hammer soundtrack removed as it was sometimes being blocked for copyright! Doh.)


Last weekend Ashley & Marjolein held the first round of the Revolve Womens MTB Series. It was a great success and Willy-Free Racing proved to be very popular with 51 lovely ladies competing at the inaugural event. The awesome Karapoti race got 143 ladies in its 25th anniversary year by my count, which makes the 51 in attendance look very impressive. I'm looking forward to joining some other Bushlove pro-marshals at the second round at Makara next Sunday (25 April) to see some more oestrogen fuelled trail rampage.

Yesterday morning Mr Sharpe was delivered to my doorstep by his lovely smokescreen, Keryn. We were riding over the 'Best Of Belmont' and over to meet chums for even more guffaw-packed trail riding.

On the way we took in Chopper and Big Weta. Choppers has the start of its winter grease now, as we found out when our front tires went straight across the first corner and not around it. With Mono's encouragement, I nailed the techy right hand rock drop at Baked Beans Bend. Although did wish the rock was drier and I was better at mountain cycling as I began the drop, it went well. I'd always wanted to tick that off.

We met up at the new Miramar Trails, lovingly crafted by Slacky, Ben Wilde and many others. Thanks all. Good job. We had an awesome time riding Jail Break, the dh track. It is a sensational bit of trail. I can see me promoting more family trips to the inlaws who live nearby. I enjoyed cutting Slacky's lunch by hooning a drop and caught him of guard as he whined about being on an XC race bike with slick tires.

We headed over to Aro Valley for a coffee (which I have just remembered I didn't text Ashley and Dan about. Soz guys!). After some banter with epic mountainbike legend Carl James Patton we rode new Aro/Polhil tracks. I think it was Transient and Highbury Fling. Great tracks and a credit to the trail masters who built them.

I still had to ride home to Porirua and was running on an empty tank. Monochops rode up Ngaio Gorge with me before we farewell and I moseyed off home. Up Ngaio Gorge, Mono still looked like an idling, curb-crawling Lamborghini. In that he had a huge amount of horsepower in reserve, but also looked a little sleazy. I stopped at the Tawa Jump Track to do a few lame XC rider jumps with the locals. They were entertained by my plastic bike, but not my puny airs.

Davo.

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The Crazyman WOF for 2010

This was a simple outing with the idea to give ourselves a bit of a warrant of fitness before Crazyman 2010. Originally we were going to recreate as much of the course as possible and do a run/bike but for various reasons I will not go into, this was canned.

We did the full crazyman run in about 1.30. Timing was difficult due to the banter breaks, and waiting for Davo to finish showing us how to do pushups.

And how not to.....

Marco was inspiring in his usual running kit.

Jo took out the downhill section, no picture of this as there was absolutely no way of catching her. However pictures of Davo and Marco are available.

Jo showed her usual determination to reach the top first.

And Davo.... musing on perhaps accepting a ride to the event next time rather than going over belmont to begin with!

The full team of Marco, Davo, Sharpie and Jo (I am missing from the picture due to a lack of a long arm) at the top of the hill.

Marco chose this moment to get a head start on everyone leaving us looking silly before bolting after him.

A nice outing with full marks to everyone else who rode out to the nui to then do the 18km trail run. Also full credit to the godfather who decided to run the last road section in bare feet.

Some nice video action interviews happened. Although this is the only one that has "family" content.

And a small amount of house keeping....

Jo I have your drink bottle and orange

Godfather I have your drink bottle

Davo I have your pottle of vasaline...

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