World 24 Hour Solo Championships - Rotorua Wembo 2016

It was about 7:00am - 250 meters into the start of a new lap, more than 5 hours from the end of the race. The peanut butter and honey roll I'd stuffed into my mouth was fighting for its life. Despite my maniacal chewing I couldn't quell the little beast. It clung to my teeth and pressed itself violently into the pockets of my cheeks. My mouth was dry, my tongue was bruised and my jaw was tired - and due to a pressing need for oxygen, I couldn't keep my lips closed long enough to generate some saliva.
Involuntarily I threw up a little into the back of my throat, forced myself to swallow and wondered - how long could I keep this shit up for.
I was leading, but I was crumbling...and that feisty little bread roll was still kicking....

My entry into the 2016 24 Hour Worlds was pretty swift when it was announced that it was to be held amongst the amazing trails of Rotorua New Zealand.

Sweet course eh bro?

For mountain bikers everywhere, be it the super skinny XC types or the baggie shorted beer drinking gravity cats, Rotorua is a southern hemisphere Mecca. The local community has a deep and close affiliation with its surroundings and well credentialed trail fairies are empowered to carve amazing lines within the forest. The results are phenomenal. Hero dirt, a lack of restrictive litigation and obliging landowners have allowed a small NZ town to show the rest of the world how mountain biking should be done. When the course was revealed, all manner of froth and stoke leapt across the digital landscape.

Kyllie and I had landed in Rotorua just in time to get rained in. 200mm of heavy NZ precipitation had avalanched out of the sky keeping us and my race primed bike confined to our lodgings. My plans of finding perfect lines for both day and night laps went un-executed - and I had to be satisfied with a quick whip around half of the course and an abbreviated recon of the pit area on the afternoon before race day. 
It was far from ideal, but by this stage, I was beyond nerves. Instead I was heavily pregnant with energy and expectation - and rolling around the now fully bunted trail with Kyllie and SS hardman Michael Timp made me feel like I was waddling the corridors of the delivery ward, begging for the contractions to start.

Last minute banter with 2015 23-29 category World Champ Peter Arch

And start they did. Before I knew it a sleepless night had dawned into the flurry of pit-lane setup which then fell away to see me in the starting chute, enduring waves of silent emotions as the pre-race ceremonies came and went. The pros rolled away with a 10 minute buffer, leaving us wedged in between placarded barriers, sharing the burden of nervousness and poor pre-race humour. The announcer counted down the remaining seconds, cleats snapped into pedals and a chorus of "Good luck's" rose from our ranks as our race roared into life.
Mercifully my nerves faded away as the nuances of the Rotorua course rose to meet us. While not armed with the rocks of Stromlo or the relentless climbing of Wearverville, this loop had captured the essence of the local trails and indeed, turned out to be a demanding beast.

The first few kilometers of the trail were fast and inviting and made us eager to push harder into the forest. But it was bait in a well laid trap and we would soon find ourselves grinding up one of the two technical and rhythmless climbs that would deal out much suffering over the coming 24 hours. Before and betwixt the climbs lay sections of fireroad and sweeping super-fast drops. The descents were fast and dangerous with wet roots laying in wait in alarming places at alarming angles. Trees and ferns leaned out over the trail like football fans, straining to clip a handlebar or brush a shoulder. Jumps and berms begged us to go faster and harder and we found ourselves committing to mid corner G forces more at home in a a gravity race than a 24 hour event.
Thus, there was no rest. We would punch out on the fire trail at the end of these descents with heart rates as high as when we entered. 

Roots maneuvers 

3x womens 24hr World Champ Jessica Douglas had said that a fun course is harder to race than a hard course. She was entirely correct. It was the trail equivalent of a Long Island Iced Tea, too much too quickly and you would be without pants, in a whalebone corset in the company of deviants way more devious than you.

Holding this image soberly in my mind I let the hours tick by. On the wise counsel of 2015 SS 24hr World Champ Scott Nicholas I'd started relatively slowly. The rationale was that as opposed to finding the race, I'd let the race find me. About 3 hours in I was well and truly down the standings convincing myself to hold tight to my plan. It was hard - the restraint was driving me crazy. I felt like a sailor on shore leave - in a chastity belt.

But sure enough, the love I was looking for began to find me. I was told to expect to see my race in waves, the first wave would come back to me between 5 and 6 pm and the next circa midnight. Cats in my category came back to me just as the sun was setting, and through no direct effort, I was drifting up the leaderboard. As 10pm swung into view I began seeing the names and numbers I was looking out for. While Kevin Skidmore and I had been casually lapping in proximity, we'd caught category threat Elvio Fernandez and eventually reeled in hardman Jamie Vogele. Sometime near midnight I noticed that my shadow (caused by Kevin's insanely bright lights) had disappeared - as had his jovial chatter. The chatter I'm Ok with, but his lights were giving me the shits, so I put in a bit of a surge to maintain the gap and rolled through the midnight milestone with a significant buffer.

Dusk - and happy about it

The novelty of riding at night had disappeared and an enduring blackness had settled in, blanketing everything with a an eyestraining lack of contrast. But I was doing OK. Maybe a little too-OK. My average speed had varied by less than a single kilometer per hour for 13 hours, I had almost 20 minutes over Kevin in second and had lapped both Elvio and Jamie. I was beginning to write my speech. 
Then shit started going wrong. 

In an attempt to conserve my batteries I'd been running my lights on low beam on the fireroad climbs, but a moment of inattention saw me barreling into the Mad If You Don't section of technical singletrack at attack pace, with the candlepower equivalent of a small glass of light beer. I was riding by braille and ended up misreading a fast berm and burping my tire off the rim. A panic bomb went off in my chest. While I'd avoided a crash, I was now faced with a flat front tyre, a long way from home. 
My hands were trembling, partly from the adrenaline but mostly due to the fear of being forced from the podium by an avoidable rookie error. I was taking the same deep breaths people take before they jump out of a plane or confess something to their boss. Way too deliberately I primed an oversized CO2 cartridge, attached it to my valve and with a little silent prayer, deep inside the pitch blackness of the Whakarewarewa forest - released the CO2.
In the recent past, I've seen the frigid cold gas escape into the air, through holes or gaps or stupid errors, disappearing as quickly as my place in the field, but in this instance, my tyre went up and stayed up. My relief was so palpable it could have worn a nappy. I was back in the game - but by now my methodical execution of a relatively boring plan had been replaced by a suddenly spiked heart rate and the impulsive desperation of a junkie.

Over the next few laps I began straying from plan. I was unable to retrieve my gel flask from my back pocket without pulling the light cable from my battery - and on arriving into the pits I put on a vest with the idea I could eat without plunging myself into darkness. In my sleep deprived state it seemed solid, but it was a remarkably flawed plan. The vest had no pockets and I couldn't reach my food without pulling up my vest and yanking on the cable. I ended up being appropriately illuminated, but entirely undernourished. My stomach was beginning to complain about all the bananas and muesli bars and while rice cream and custard was a welcome interlude, I wasn't eating enough in the 60 seconds or so I allowed myself in the pits. I wasn't riding to victory, I was riding to bonks-ville.

Wee small hours - starting to get surreal

My lap times were starting to stretch and with each hour, something else had started to hurt. First my hands, then my neck, then my bum. At about 3 o'clock in the morning, my knees, something I've never complained of previously were grievously voicing their displeasure. The science inside me assured me that the pain was a symptom of tight ITBs and while I was placated by the rationale, it did nothing to alleviate the droning, monotonous pain that I found hard to ignore.

In previous 24 hour events I've found the night-time to be a strangely comforting thing. Without the harsh reality that daylight carries technical climbs and arduous fireroad ascents don't carry as much weight. What I couldn't see wasn't hurting me - quite as much as it was about to.

Disorientation and exhaustion are comfortable bedfellows. Ironically I was searching for signs of the new day, eager to rid myself of an extra kilo of lights and batteries. I was planning on shedding this equipment at 5:30am, but twilight persisted right up to 6:30am and in the darker parts of the trail, way past then. It was a little heartbreaking - but nothing compared to the fact that I'd found myself at the pointy end of the event, with 6 hours remaining, almost completely spent.

By contrast, daylight had woken up my competition. I had a 40 minute advantage over Kevin, but he was eating into that like acid. From 7:00am he was charging. In the space of three laps he'd regained 30 minutes of lost time and there were no signs of him slowing down. While still trying to ensure that I ate and pocketed enough food during my pit stops, Kyllie now had the task of recapturing my focus. She let me know, in the gentlest way she could: You're losing this. 

In our pre-race musings we'd often wondered who goes fastest, the rabbit or the fox. With our best quasi-scholarly intents Tobias Lestrell, Kevin, Hayden Muir and I had wondered if the fear of losing one's life is greater than the hunger that drives the chase.
I was finding out in a very tangible way. I was a very tired and terrified rabbit being chased by a very fast fox.

Numbers - Top 4 from the 40-44 age group (White: me, Orange: Kevin)

Kyllie stuffed food into my mouth. I forced it down over the complaints of my stomach. I drank until I felt like I was going to throw up and I pedalled. I pedalled like my life depended on it.
The rot was not routed however. Kevin was still hammering. I had slowed the advance but it was like trying to halt a flood. Like the race for elite category glory, being fought with bottles and chains by Messrs English, Wallace and Lestrell, this was going to come down to the wire.
As the race stormed into the closing hours Kevin's pit chief Kenny Soiza and Kyllie - who had both been magnanimous in sharing the load of caring for two athletes during the night, called a civilized separation of duties - lest an advantage be given to their respective riders.
There were ten minutes left on the clock when I came into the pits for what I hoped was the last time. I desperately wanted Kyllie to say that Kevin had come off the pace, that he was too far behind to overtake me and that I should be able to get off my bike and call this race done. 

Fat chance. I was in concentrated agony. Lactic acid and exhaustion burnt in the back of my throat, smouldered behind my eyes and coursed through me like a grassfire - but despite my protests Kyllie sent me out for one last, final, all or nothing effort.

Run - rabbit - run

On that last lap I was tripping like Alice. The trail sparkled with things that simply were not there. I saw photographers change back into ferns, I saw wallabies turn back into logs and I saw Kevin's blue jersey - everywhere. My mind was both freaking out from hallucinatory input and trying to command an athletic response from my exhausted body. It was like a wrestling coach on acid. The noise in my head was so loud - inputs, outputs all mixed up with the wind and the sound of a broken body mashing the pedals of a mountain bike. I pushed myself over the micro summit that heralded the end of the last real climb and suddenly, there was a moment of silence. I craned my neck to look back at the trail and it was empty. No Kevin, no chase and for the first time in 6 hours, no fear.

The last few kilometers still hurt, probably more so as the anaesthesia that is terror had since dribbled away. I concentrated on staying upright, brought my bike through the last of the technical trail and dropped into the final fireroad section that led to the finish line. Half out of ceremony I stood up and sprinted to the line, crossing with none of my long planned histrionics but to a warm reception from the waiting crowd.

This old rabbit had found himself bent and broken, but with a long coveted category World Championship to take home to his warren.

Kevin, first on the scene post race, first to congratulate

My list of people to thank is significant, as everyone had a part to play that is hard to acknowledge in person, let alone here. 

My sponsors, Cycles Galleria and Pro4mance Sports Nutrition for their ongoing support, Curve Cycling for amazing wheels and David Heatley from Cycling InForm for excellent coaching.
Props to Craig, Lindy and Hayden Muir for their selfless help and huge thanks to Kenny Soiza for his excellent, bipartisan pit assistance.

Post race recovery @ Rotorua Blue Baths

Special mentions should be made of Scott Nicholas for his sage and calming advice, to Adam Kelsall for his enthusiasm and race-day composure, to Robert Douglas and Stuart Peele for their remote support and analysis, to Team Cnut for intercontinental stoke and to all those cats who stayed up late at night to yell at a computer screen as the race unfolded. And a big thanks to Leon, Paige and Maroun for acupuncture and osteo treatments to help keep me on course.

Huge thanks go to Wembo (Russ Baker) for keeping 24 Solo alive and growing and to Nduro NZ events (Tim and Belinda) for putting on such a rad event, even under trying conditions.

Moreover, to all those people who came out and made a race of it, especially to very good mate Kevin Skidmore, who swapped out friendly for fearsome and scared about 10 years of my own life out of me.

Finally, to my amazing wife Kyllie. She not only put up with and supported a strung out athlete for 3 months leading into this event, but executed our race-day plans to perfection, often under considerable duress. You made this happen baby, you're awesome. 

Posts Coming - Gregorian Ordering

Let not the calendar nor my varying levels of recollection and commitment spoil a good yarn. For the sake of completeness there are some races I should report on.

The Scott 24 Hour (Oct 2014)
The Mount Buller MTB Festival (Mar 2015)
The Giant Odyssey (Mar 2015)
Wombat 100 (Apr 2105)
The GMBC Crazy 6 Hour (Apr 2015)

...and some other random shit in between.

As such, until these pages are graffitied with such tales, lets just let Gregorian adherence (date order) slip by the wayside..for a while.

Jubberland 6 Hour - Catchup, Catchup

Its a funny place Jubberland. Sounds funny, looks funny, rides funny. Hidden in a green patch of map somewhere to the west of nowheresville its a quasi-natural trail network set amongst what appears to be half farmland and half native bush.
In a way you'd be forgiven for wondering how the hell trail ended up being out here, such is its overwhelming sense of secrecy and remoteness. When I first laid eyes on it, it remember thinking that it resembled singletrack with aspirations to be purpose built - yet won't shrug off its nostalgic, old trail leanings.
That is, it'd have swooping bermed lines that disappear into hostile rocky step-ups or mad A line cliff drops that fell away into mellow green grass hardpack. Looking at it with tourist eyes, it was an acid trip. However, with a little race pace, some soft hands and some hard-eyed commitment and suddenly it all began to make sense. What at first appeared to be half baked trail, ended up being an almost perfectly balanced, beautifully difficult and deeply rewarding whip through the Castlemaine hinterland. It was like a 3 hatted 7 course degustation accompanying wines, or - if you like -  a dirty magazine with some really good crossword puzzles.

Jubberland - Rocky Riders Country

Race-day cometh and cometh in glory it did. An honest morning crispness was being slowly burnt away by a warming spring sun.  All the usual suspects and lycra monsters were present for this, the fifth race of the Victorian Enduro Series. Tobias Lestrell, Kevin Skidmore and even some Nankervii (Tasman this time) were in attendance. Word on the street was that Martin Grannas, a three time category winner of the (ultimately unsustainably) torturous Avoca MTB Marathon was in good form and he too, was seen lurking around in the second row of the starting grid.

In inimitable style, Bruce Dickey of Flat Hill events arbitrarily kicked off proceedings and at some absurdly fast pace the race began. The pack clung together like margarine in milk as the course funnelled us down a long grass slope into the first section of singletrack. I was bouncing around off elbows, still blinking through dust, trying to both hold and get around wheels as the first of the technical sections opened fire on us.
Mountain biking isn't usually that loud. A little wind, a freewheel spooling away, some birds and the odd freaked out marsupial, and thats it. Amongst a paceline of hard men and women under such an assault and the ambiance was different indeed. Rocks and wood pounded upon carbon, be it wheels, frames or the vertebrates perched upon them - eliciting a maelstrom of swearing and the sounds of sudden failure.

Jubberland Wallride - AKA Matching wines

By the grace of whatever God I decided to believe in at the time I got through the opening lap carnage relatively unscathed and thus began to settle into another race campaign. In his unflappable fashion, Tobias had rolled away with the team riders leaving myself and Kevin Skidmore rolling through the opening few hours together. We seemed well matched for pace. While I couldn't (and still cant) match him for pure power, I was able to find and finesse some speedy lines through the technical stuff to ensure I was saving my watts to hold his wheel when the trail opened up.

Come lap five and I was 9 minutes 50 up on Martin Grannas. Not that I knew it. Instead what I heard was that had a mere 50 second advantage. Angered and a little scared I attacked the new lap with less flow than gusto. Within about a minute I'd cut open my tubeless rear tyre and found myself with my hands full either spare tube or gritty sealant covered rubber, yet I was able to execute a pro-level speed repair and get back on the trail at the cost of only about 3 minutes. In my mind Martin was gaining and with my heart racing like a chased fox I forgot to replace my spare in transition - a mistake that I realized some 4 kilometers from pit lane on the very next lap. Despite some the very kind donation of a tube and CO2 from a fellow rider, my second rear wheel pinch flat and failure to fix it had me running.

I hate running. I really, really do. I had been running for about ten minutes, pushing my wounded bike, swearing, cursing and flopping into my cleated, carbon soled shoes like I'd had my hamstrings cut when Martin finally passed me. 'Bummer Jase'. I'm sure he didn't do it just to piss me off, but he got out of the saddle and blasted up the hill.

I really, really hate running. But I hate losing even more. Especially when I've been a douchebag.
So I kept running. I ran until lactic pooled in the back of my mouth. Pit lane seemed miles away and I was passed by chatty rolleurs and kids and the fucking shadows of growing trees but I still ran.
Finally I jumped on my bike to safely roll my flat tyre into neutral spares where I was able to switch in a downhill spec tube and set off in a spirited although seemingly ceremonial pursuit of first place.

Over three laps I'd burnt 25 minutes, turning a 10 minute lead into a 15 minute deficit with 4 laps to race. While the run had killed me, it felt like it was all in muscles I don't really use and so it was almost a relief to be able to tip an effort into a set of pedals. Craig Muir (father of U18 racer Hayden) was giving me updates in pit lane and to my surprise was able to give me some good news. On my next lap I'd turned everything up to eleven and was rewarded by the report that I trimmed the gap to 10 minutes. On the next the gap was now 5 minutes, and on the start of the very last lap I was chewing through the carbon on my stem when Craig bellowed that Martin was 50 seconds ahead. I kept thinking I'd see his orange jersey rushing up at me at every bend but it was still over halfway into the lap when I finally got on his wheel. I'd had this moment played out an attack/chase/counter attack/defend scene so many times in my head that it was almost an anticlimax when Martin amiably pulled over and let me pass. Immensely glad I was though. After bouncing around in the red zone for 90 odd minutes a pitfight with a tough old punk like M.Grannas was the last thing I wanted.

By the time the very welcome sight of the finish line was in view, I was grinning like a thief. As I came down towards my pit I even allowed myself a celebratory victory salute...the opening syllable from a popular Village People track.

'Young man'...um you're not talking to me are you?

Props to Tobias (who was so fast I didnt see him all day) and Kevin who also had a blinder to come in third. Mad ups to Cycles Galleria who ensured my Pivot Mach 429 Carbon ruled, and Pro4mance let the pistons run free with all their good stuff.
Thanks again to Kenny Soiza and Craig Muir in pit lane for their help and patience while the red mist descended and to Bruce Dickey and the Castlemaine Rocky riders for ensuring the stars aligned for a cracking race.

And Jubberland? Awesome. Don't go changing baby. Stay as you are.

Fat Tyre Flyers - Officer Six Hour

The Officer 6 Hour had the mid winter honor of being number 4 of the 7 events that form the Victorian MTB Enduro Series. I'd done OK to date, with two wins and a runner up in the 40+ category and I was pretty keen to adorn my VES campaign with a little more podium glamour.
Bad weather was somewhat in Melbourne. It growled and strained against the sky like a pod of hungry whales as I departed, but as I approached race central, it'd let - totally, almost laughably loose. When the rain came down, it did so by the metric tonne.
Within a minute I was snorkling.

There was discussion and I slopped my way to race central. A few furrowed brows as the commissaires blinked through the deluge. As good mountain bikers would have it, irrespective of the weather, we raced. The rain may have turned a dry Officer trail into an accident with a chocolate truck but there were significant measures of points, pride and pity to be earned, and though few riders would have been saddened by a decision not to race - they were not unsurprised that we did.

I'd already switched onto a mud tyre for my front wheel, hosed my frame with silicon spray (helps the mud slide off) and did my warm up in shoe covers and full winter combat wear. I was sort of ready, though there are few things that really prepare a rider for a 6 hour mud-mauling.

'Dedicated racers' is another term for a small field. We thundered up the opening climb as the rains tumbled down. The Officer trail is what you may call pretty organic. It's old school evolved rideable walking trail, with ninja-pinch climbs, tight corners and more disruptor features than a game changing iPhone app.

In the dry, its killer fun, mad technical and a brilliant, if brutal, nostalgic trip to what we all used to race on before people got paid to make trail. In the wet its like being caught in an avalanche of wet socks.

The trail held up ok for the first lap. It still had something resembling structure and grip but within an hour serious leaks were beginning to appear. Double digit gradients and were now tyre deep in mud and going both up and down required a level of bicycle manhandling totally disproportionate to the speed of said bicycle.

My front wheel was holding in just fine, but my back wheel was searching for grip and finding none. Every now and then any forward momentum I had would run for the side exit as my back end broke away and slipped sideways off the trail.
Three hours in it was becoming a real slog. By the time the 3 hour riders were testing their metal circa 1:00pm there had been enough water and wandering rubber on the trail to render it almost completely unrecognizable.

Big pools of water had now formed over technical catch-outs, muddied into opacity - leaving a rider needing either an excellent recollection of the line choice at each corner or blind luck that they didn't mutilate both bike and body. The climbs were hard in the dry, but under these conditions it was like scaling a mountain of icecream. As I came through transition I heard somebody say something really, really nice to me.
The race has been cut short - I only had 60 minutes to go.

60 minutes meant about two laps, and with a handy lead over an equally soggy Peter Shaw in second (40+) all I needed to do was swim another few miles of this Shawshank escape and I'd be ready for a 35 minute shower and a full body enema.

And a very pleasant shower it was too when I got to it. A little win to stretch my lead in the VES, some more bike schwag and a new chainring shaped medal to hang on my full sized mannequin of Dennis Lillee.
Despite the conditions my Pivot Mach 420 Carbon ran without issue thanks to Cycles Galleria and while I longed for a clean pair of glasses I never wanted for energy, thanks to Pro4mance Sports Nutrition.

Moreover, a huge shout-out to a certain Kevin Skidmore who not only toughed it out for another great result, but shared my sojourn through the Somme and to Kenny Soiza who supplied us with unsullied food and grit-free water for the duration of the race. And thanks to the Fatties, (Fat Tyre Fliers) who against the odds, still put on a great race and had the good sense to call it short.

Mount Donna Buang - Winter Ascent

There's slow business like snow business.

It only takes an hour or so of lurking around on Facebook to bend ones mind into doing less than sane things. Playing games without purpose or passion, reposting stupid comments, downloading another trojan, or deciding to climb a local berg in the middle of one of the coldest weeks in recent history.

In this instance, I was following the lead of a certain Ewen Gellie. Talented bike rider and excellent frame builder he is, but it'd be fair to say that - like me - he is not above failing to think through the consequences of what appear to be dubious recreational pursuits. In a moment of peer inspired sub-brilliance, we'd publicly committed to climbing Mt Donna Buang up the gravel roads from Healesville, in the middle of winter.

Early morning, early days

And so on the morning of the ascent, twelve intrepid riders turned up at the designated meeting point in Healesville ready to begin a relatively novel cycling adventure. Almost everyone, with the exception of myself and a bloke called Brian John on our 29ers had chosen CX bikes for the journey - the principle being that skinny, grippy tyres would cut through the snow to the gravel underneath.

We didn't have to wait long to test that theory. Garmins were reporting 650 meters or so of elevation, and already, we were in a couple of inches of white stuff. It was very pretty, pretty crunchy, in parts pretty slippery and for the most part, pretty good fun. And as we regrouped we were all pretty excited about getting amongst it. However, that was about to become pretty different - pretty quickly. The snow got deep quicker than a breakup conversation and our expectations of rolling to the top in happy harmony through 3 inches of talcum like snow were beginning to melt away.

Waiting for stragglers...still happy...ish

Within the hour we were spending efforts like they were post war deutsch marks and finding our speed dropping south of walking pace. The snow depth climbed with each kilometer. Our group had splintered. Off the 12 that started one had dropped off below the snowline, another four had already realised that this snow climb fantasy was a unicorn and the remaining seven of us were pushing on in the vain hope that at some point, this Christmas in July would let us open our presents.
There were Christmas trees, but no presents. We pressed on, reaching a saddle in the climb were the gradient fell away, but it seemed that the snow had chosen the same place to rest as us. It was so deep that even on a downhill, in granny, we were still returning only single digit speeds. At this glacial pace we passed a sign reading 9 kilometers to go - indicating the halfway point. Another three from our party pulled up stumps right there. We were down to four.

Cold feet? Love some

As the road began to regain climbing status we were beginning to walk a lot more than ride. Those on CX bikes were without the wide bars and deep cassettes that we on 29ers had and struggled to not only get over the gear but to get control of their rides. Having walked the last hour, out of food and water and getting pretty sick of wet, freezing feet, the last two CX bikes decided that the glory on offer was not worth the investment -  and turned back.

Twelve was now two, with only Brian John and I remaining. He's a tough old bastard Mr John. He too has done every Odyssey, he's an expert in distance racing and took a win off me at the Beechworth 6 hour almost a year ago (way earlier blog post). What this meant is that nobody was going downhill until we'd got to the top.

Smile..frozen on 

We'd noticed that a couple of intrepid riders had attempted to get to the top the day before.Their tyre tracks and accompanying footprints indicating that like us, they had found the term 'push bikes' to be particularly apt. We struggled on, our speed now reduced to no more than three kilometers an hour. Feet, backs, hands, legs were all hurting - a pain sometimes numbed and sometimes amplified by the freezing conditions. This slow-snow march seemed to last for hours, our halting conversation based largely on trying to figure out what caused these strange tracks in the snow and where the other previous days riders had gone. Their tracks had disappeared some distance down the mountain. 

Suddenly, appearing on the trail was a bloke on skis, his wife in ugg boots and their labrador. It was a strange encounter. A quick chat, a pat of the happy lab and a snack (thanks to Brian for sharing his Cliff bars) and we were fired up for the final assault. Our off piste pals had informed us that we were only a couple of kilometers from the summit, something that made us very happy indeed.

Before we knew it we had punched out of snow and were on the tarmac, cautiously spinning our way to the summit across the black ice. It'd be fair to say we, as a couple of soggy mountain bikers stood out a little amongst a swathe of wobbly snow tourists, trying to stay upright as they shoved their children into short bursts of toboggan-run terror. We took a couple of celebratory photos and began preparing for the descent. This included four buckets of hot chips and a couple of hot chocolates - all the fuel a slightly twisted bike rider needs.

Brian John, trying to smile...I think

We decided to take on another extended period of exertion in the deep snow rather than accept the almost certain broken collarbone that the icy blacktop offered.

And while we still walked a lot, the trip down was altogether more rewarding. The snow had softened and gravity was helping a little too and despite still being hammered like galley oarsmen we were making reasonable progress - and even having some fun.

We got over the saddle and down under the snow line and wound our way back to the carpark - still freezing cold and using whatever energy we had left to keep up our average speed, and hopefully, our core temperature.
When we got back to Healesville it was a circus. It was a total contrast to when we started and moreover, so totally different to where we'd just been. We'd just returned from something so quiet and so exceptionally beautiful that all the bustle around us seemed a little surreal.


                       Helmetcam Video from the day
       Some would say arthouse, others would say crap 

A great day out. Thanks to Ewen Gellie and Jason Johnson for getting us involved. A huge shout out to all those dudes who came along and mad ups to Brian John for getting to the top with me...because I probably wouldn't have done it without him.

Great bikes too. 29ers, take the win in the snow!

A late edit - Tough guy Gags, up for the ascent on the day, matching his bike skills with supreme video editing. He's what the day looked like from the perspective of a good camera-handler.

Gippsland 6 Hour - Blores Hill

Gippsland - God's Country, with singletrack.

The best thing about racing is where one can find oneself. The Gippsland MTB event - the 6 Hour at Blores Hill takes me to Gippsland. And of all the great places I get to in Victoria, Gippsland is up there with my favourites.
Heyfield is the kind of place you'd imagine European based ex-pats dreaming of. Its clean, quiet, calm and quintessentially Australian without reeking of defensive jingoism. As you drive into Heyfield it sort of wraps its arms around you, inviting you to casually listen in to the jovial conversations of the locals and to witness school kids taking the long way home on their rebirthed bikes. In a strange way, it feels like a home.

Kyllie and I had been to Heyfield before, fine dined, finer wined and left feeling like we'd been given a healthy rubbing with a loofah made of clean fresh air.
During last years incarnation of the BLores Hill 6 Hour I was nursed around the course at break-neck speed by a certain Kevin Skidmore, turned myself inside out, suffered like a quitting smoker and crossed the line in a exhausted, lactic infused third place in Vets.

                    Recon ride video, shake it like you mean it.

This year, I wanted to win. I'd taken open podiums and category wins in the last three six hour races I'd competed in (missing race reports for Albury and Forrest coming soon) and despite an upset stomach and a fledgling cold in the week prior, I was enjoying the way that '3 from 3' sounded in my mind.

Shhh...I'm being relaxed. Abington Farm

Swanning around our little beautiful little apartment at Abington Farm after an enjoyable recon ride of the course I was feeling pretty comfortable. Confident even.
Come race day and I was excited. I always am, but this time I thought that all my ducks were lining up.

On the starting grid I bantered amiably with Corey Davies and relived the opening 200 meters over and over in my mind - having repeated it as my warm up.

And when the gates were opened, I was one of the first birds through the chute and found myself hitched to the wheels of the team elites, flying through the opening stanza, getting prepped to power through the kicking singletrack that is the Blores Hill circuit.

Fifteen minutes in and I was feeling like my own tailwind. I was bouncing around in the red zone but I could have been bouncing on a jumpy castle for all I cared. I had more free speed than a corrupt customs official and was living the mid-race equivalent of the high life - but unknown to me, I was under surveillance - and the bonk-police were closing in. After two laps leading  the solo category I glanced back and saw Tobias Lestrell leading a group of low numbers right up to my back wheel. Corey Davies, Phil Orr and sitting in like a syringe hidden in beach sand, was a very composed and altogether scary 40+ hitman Tim Jamieson.

Tim Jamieson, frightening from any angle

On the third lap, mostly out of desperation I suggested that Corey and I attack. We flew over the technical Trigg Point climb and swept into the singletrack. We may have opened a gap of about 20 seconds, but the effort had punctured a hole in my energy reserves. I burnt the last of my matches attempting to stick with Corey as he took a turn, only to see the fire go out as he rode off me. I made it to transition before the chase group caught and passed me. I had been nicked...guv'nor.
I spent the next few laps sitting in a cave. Both my hip flexors were killing me, I had stupidly let myself food flat, get dehydrated and knew that ol' TJ was mashing the pedals like they were root vegetables. I would see him heading out for a new lap as I came in - meaning about a 40 second gap - and infuriatingly thats where it stayed for the next 3 or 4 laps - but despite refuelling and replenishing and I couldn't bridge over to him.

Mrs Archer - bringing sweetness to the
steepness

Despite the crushing disappointment of watching the win get away from me, there were brighter moments. My talented wife Kyllie was out racing in the 6 hour pairs and I managed to pass her prompting a little on bike affection which was a parting of the clouds.

Eventually I was able to get some rhythm, and actually started enjoying myself a little more. I was having a bit of a yarn with some of the three hour riders when my back end started feeling a little squishy. Way squishy.

One CO2 bulb burnt and I was on my way again. Squishy though had decided to come with me. There were another four stops for air/CO2 before I started my last lap. By now I was scared again. Being the first loser is bad enough, but losing to the first loser is worse. So I powered up for my final loop and prepared to withdraw everything from the account. 
With squish still floating around under my saddle and having already chewed up another CO2 I thought that brutal pace would be the better part of valour. I spent that last lap out of my saddle, weighted up over the front wheel, listening to my rear tyre burping through the corners like a hick at Oktoberfest. To cap off the paranoia, team racer Richard Vrins had caught me with 300 meters to go and challenged me to a sprint finish - which after 40 minutes out of faux-sprinting I needed like having my lips stitched together.

A lines - A study in marginal returns on investment

I haven't collapsed from bike after a finish line since my first melodramatic races almost 10 years ago, but I did then, as it turns out only a few minutes in front of lactic addict Scott Nicholas - on a goddamn singlespeed.

When all the numbers were counted, Tobias Lestrell had pipped Phil Orr and Corey Davies for the open win, Tim Jamieson towelled me up to the tune of 8 minutes (a shellacking) relegating me to 5th and 2nd in Open and Masters categories respectively. Kyllie, partnered up with Jimmy Lefebvre crushed it to finish a category second. Golden.

A big shout out to everyone who had a crack at a super-honest loop, to the Gippsland MTB club for turning on a super friendly but killer race, to Cycles Galleria and Pro4rmance Sports Nutrition for all the wicked kit I need to belt myself in such a fashion and to Kev and Kenny, Jimmy, Craig and Ross for packing away all the kit when I was still shuffling around like a zombie.

Times. In the words of Malachi Moxon, people only remember the times. Check-em out. Race results and Vic Enduro Series results. 

Giant Odyssey - April 2014

Giant Odyssey

If you've not ridden this race, you should. Its like Wimbledon for marathon mountain biking. Its one of the biggest races in Australia and attracts the A-listers of rough rubber royalty. Its long, fun and scary hard to boot.

This event and me have a long, chequered past. I form one of 15 or so masochistic psychopaths who have completed each Odyssey since its inception some bazillion years ago. In achieving this dubious milestone I have burnt as many calories as McDonalds Ararat sell in 20 minutes, sweated near to 900 litres in human seawater and been vigorously, consistently, mercilessly punished like a small full back playing in Tony Lockett's return to country football. 

And despite the years of mad heat and relentless rain I have fronted up again and again, usually under-done,  to stupidly drag my scarred cadaver over climb after climb, hoping that this would be the year that I would gain something resembling glory. To date? Nothing.

But this time - with the event date moving later into the calendar year, I was ready. A little altitude training, a little attitude training and more than a little wallet emptying and I was fit, awash with kit and ready to rip.

Even my wife, Kyllie had her race face on, having let me shoehorn her into her maiden 100km entry some 6 months earlier. Moving through the starting chute I even had enough sparkle to rev up marathon-mudder hardman Simon Goninon for settling into a mid-pack beginning.

And there I found myself, high heart rate and cold legs, three back from sharp end of a skinny and hungry pack, straining against the start line like wild eyed greyhounds - yearning for the gates to open. And when they did...

Holy shit.

Go that way...really fast.

I held on, bumping elbows and rubbing tyres as the group rushed through the opening five kilometers like bogan crowds at Boxing Day sales. Occasionally I could see my rivals in the 40+ category, bobbing to the surface like flotsam and then disappearing again under the torrent of dust and lycra. Then, as we swung off the tarmac and hit the first of the sandy climbs I saw them all quite clearly. Riding off into the distance.

Climb it like you stole it

At this point all sorts of voices started howling in my head. Those harsh, hurtful ones that seem to enjoy puncturing holes in your soul, just to watch the strength leak out. I was hunched over my bike, head down, to the casual observer trying both to draw out my breath and slow down my heart rate. But in truth, I was trying not to let my heart break.

Racing is a funny thing. The expectations we place upon ourselves seem never to be met and those we place on others are regularly exceeded. The Odyssey is my benchmark, my high and low watermark, almost a fucking birthmark. This time I went into it expecting a category-win, or at least podium - and while I never said that openly, lest somebody else's expectations of me not be met, I had rehearsed my acceptance speech, such was my level of commitment. To watch the podium ride off me, and easily, like I was a roadside mailbox, was one crushing little moment in my usually pretty jovial history of racing. First world problems yes, but problems none the less.

Dudes, podium, dudes on podium...somewhere up there...

Eventually, all that shit stopped. Largely prompted by a gentle realisation that bitching to myself about myself was probably going to get old pretty quick - reinforced by knowing it would certainly not bring the finish line any closer. Racing called and I got back to business, kinda embarrassed by my little internal moment. I got up and over the Sledgehammer and made up a few places barrelling down the long fire road descents. Hollow little victories but at that stage I was happy for whatever scraps I could get. Post the first stop at Forrest football ground and I was in a better place. I was refuelled, refreshed and had my racing is fun fire rekindled. Moreover - I was in singletrack...and I like singletrack almost as much as mid morning sex.

This section went all too quickly, which, due to having a plate zip-tied to my bars suited me just fine. Marriners run, Grass Trees, Foxtail - some of the sweetest trail in the country was being very nice to me indeed. By the time I'd reached transition for the final loop, I'd made up a handful of hard to get places and was feeling like this race wasn't going to be so bad after all. I think I even let out a 'WooHoo!'

The course, rough, course even

Post the final transition and we were all faced with a bit of a grind. 7 or 8 kms of tarmac smooth fire road ascent, straight up Kannglang road. I was forcing down an Odyssey sandwich. Some sweet singletrack corned-beef in between two stale and hard to stomach slices of HTFU.

Women give birth with less moaning than what I did dragging my arse up that climb - and by the time I'd got to the top I'd almost forgotten - again - how much fun all this racing should be.

With more than just a little resolution I attacked the timed Red Carpet descent and while it was largely ceremonial, with nobody immediately in front or behind me I still ripped through it like a beer bottle goes through a grocery bag.

Turns out I made up a little time. I had descended through the ferns, deep into the belly of the beautiful Forrest undergrowth and had climbed up one of the last painful dirt ladders to gain a little altitude again before getting onto the final 25kms - beginning near the famed West Forrest trailhead. While the climbs had hurt me, I was still in the ring with more than a couple of punches left to throw - and having ridden this section more times than I eat cheese (which is a lot) I was looking forward to finishing on a high.

Not smart - or attractive. Baby air.

But there was more fighting to come. West Forrest trail is a deceptive beast. At recreation pace its a mostly sweet, occasionally savoury section of singletrack with arousing features and lines that will make a grown man wish he'd worn shy-shorts. But at race-pace, it can be a piercing howl as every meter seems to demand more and more tech prowess to get by. I got by OK, and also got by a few cats who were more writhing than rhythm. And as this wonderful section came to a close I caught Liam McCrory - a hardass mofo holding down 5th in 40+. A place I was more than happy to relieve him of. 

Mrs Archer - flying

I popped out of that section knowing it was only 5kms or so to the line, but also fully aware that I needed at least 1.5 of those kilometers to hold off a certain Mr McCrory who goes up hills like a bushfire...and sure enough, as I crested the first of three small climbs, there he was. Right behind me. I bombed the resulting descent, hoping that the ultrafast downhill would put enough space between us, and while there was 'space' - I was a little short on 'enough'. On the next climb he went by me like helium, and despite licking the paint off the inside of the hurt box to hold his wheel -he had gapped me, easily.

With only a time trial kilometer to go - with nothing technical or vertical between us I tipped everything in. I mashed the pedals, flicked up gear, mashed them again. It felt like I was gaining on him, and the odd furtive glance he shot back confirmed it, but with 200 meters between us - I needed him to be getting bigger in my vision a lot faster than he was. As is would turn out, I made up almost all of that space in the final approach - hitting the last gravel turns brakeless and gunning it over the grass to come in only a bike length behind. No podium, no glory, but the best result I've had in the Odyssey and a cracking balls-out finish to boot. A total time of 5:07:03 - 34th overall, 6th in Masters.
Kyllie also had a flyer - storming home to finish her first full distance Odyssey in a touch under 7 hours...a feat many of my riding buddies are yet to manage. So proud.

And big thanks go to Rapid Ascent for another surgically precise event, to Cycles Galleria for not only my epic Pivot Mach 429 Carbon, but Kyllie's very cool Trek Fuel and to Pro4mance sports nutrition for fantastic foodstuffs all day. Mavic can take a bow for the excellent Crossmax SLRs I was rolling with and SRAM for the XX1 group that ran better than flawlessly.
Moreover, thanks again to everyone who came out and pushed themselves, dug deep, grimaced and grinned to make an event like this so much more than a bike race. And finally, while we all race for one reason or another, uber-hardman Simon Goninon races for a really good one. Check out his work for Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME)/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) over at MudRacingMechanics.

Full Race results should you like numbers. I know you do. We all like numbers.