Bannockburn Gutbuster 2008 - MTB Race

Well a great weekend on the MTB, Went up and raced in the Bannockburn Gutbuster ride from Garston to Bannockburn – 75km with 1300m of climbing in it, so a good honest ride. From Bannockburn I caught the bus through to Garston. The bus ride wasn’t the best as I ended up down the back end of the bus and the windy road made me a little bus sick, losing a bit of breakfast on arriving in Garston, luckily the bus arrived about an hour before the start of the ride, so I was able to get some food into me and get rid of my grogginess!! Anyway at the start of the ride everyone was off! Not long into it and the 1st climb began, I settled into a pretty solid and comfortable rhythm and worked my way to the top of this climb feeling good (which was planned as there is a lot further to go) a the top of the climb my rear tyre felt a little softer than it should have been, so I stopped and puffed a bit of air into it, thinking that it was probably going to keep going down. Anyway blasting off down the hill I was right as the tyre went down, by the second creek crossing I dunked the bike in and could see a stream of bubbles coming out of it, bugger! So a quick tube change here, a bit gutting seeing people cruising past a s I repaired this, but back onto the bike after this and I managed to make up a lot of time and places on those who passed me and was feeling good. On and on down the valley and finally arriving at the start of the climb up to the top of Duffers Saddle, from the bottom to the top I just focused on keeping those pedals spinning round and eventually got to the top, feeling pretty exhausted but satisfied with the climb, from her it was a quick descent and grind along the road to the finish in Bannockburn. I finished in 4hrs7min, and this placed me 65th overall and 35th Open man from a field of about 300 riders. A good blast. click on this link to view web page of full 2008 results http://www.cromwell.org.nz/downloads/2008Gutbuster.htm

Kaitangata Black Gold XC MTB Race - 16th November 2008

An awesome 45km MTB race around some fantastic purpose built single track along with farm land, forest roads and a very small amount of sealed road. The race started off on tarmac at the Crescent Rugby Club before entering forest terrain with and undulating tracks. There is a moderate climb followed by a fast narrow single-track descent back into the forest. Racing took us across farmland, alongside the Clutha River and through bush before the finish at the clubrooms again.
Awesome weather and a great turn out of riders, felt pretty good most of the way and loved the single track stuff. Jumping around 4th - 5th - 6th place for a lot of the ride, but lost a couple of places in the last 5km to finish 8th which i was still pretty happy with considering the numbers and level of riders there. An awesome event - back again definetly!

Peak to Peak Multisport Race Queenstown - 19th July 2008

One of my favourite races, the Start of this is high up on the Remarkables and the Finish is at the Ski Field Base at Coronet Peak!!! Stages are as follows
1. Run/Ski
2. 17km MTB - fantastic downhill on the Remark's access road
3. 7km Kayak across from Frankton to Queenstown.
4. 9km Run (all up hill) to the bottom of Coronet Road
5. 9km Cycle up Coronet Peak Ski Field Road.

This year was my 5th time racing as an individual and i managed a PB time of 2hrs 45min which i was stoked with. The winning individual time was 2hrs 22min. I had pretty good stages feeling strong in all areas. I finished the run in 38min which was the 6th fastest individual i think. A well run event and heaps of fun! Open mens section placing was 16th out of 51 individuals and overall including teams i was 48th out of 150 entries!