First double header of the year

Busy weekend and I am left feeling pretty stiff and sore today. Partly fatigue, partly minor injuries.... but it feels oddly satisfying. Following a summer devoid of racing (through injury) its kinda nice to be able to damage myself


First up was the Tarawera Ultra Marathon. While this ridiculous fit (and sightly crazy) bunch of guys trotted their way through 100km of trails, us mere mortals opted for the relay option. Having acted as lead rider on my MTB for leg 1, I was nicely warmed up for the super hilly 18km leg ahead of me (actually warmer than I'd hoped... had to ride quite hard uphill to stay ahead!). Leg went well. After letting loose over the final 5km of descent to Okataina I'd erased all but 40sec of a 5min+ gap to 1st. Guess I'm running ok? With strong efforts from Thomas Reynolds, John Gray, and Old Man Pearson we ended up a close 2nd to 3 time champions the Hamilton Flyers. Forcing them to break their course record to win. Next Year....


Sunday saw the iconic Triplecrown. My arm might still be a bit weak, but I had a bike to test and I couldn't turn down a day of shuttles, long Super D descents, and general smack talking.

I learnt trying to race fast on a track you've never ridden is pretty hard. Two over the bars crashes within first few minutes of Tihi O Tawa soon took the wind out of my sails and made me pull my head in a bit. Soon resorting to fast XC speed (rather than a competitive Super D pace). On the plus side, it did get the fear of cashing on my plated arm out of the way though.


Forearm got pretty achey pretty quickly. Still a lot of strength to be regained, but at least I can ride with some confidence. Having backed it off to 80% I wasn't overly competitive, but it was still a cool day. Got some good practice in, gave the arm a good workout/test, survived some crashes, and finished 20 something'th.

So sore arm? Check. Bruised thigh form crashing on roots? Check. Sore calves/hammies/butt from fast trail running? Check. Satisfied to be back mixing it up again? For sure!

Napier National XC

A wee bit late in posting this, but life's busy schedule has a habit of delaying such things! Wind the clock back about 10 days, and we made a whistlestop trip down to the Hawkes Bay for the final round of the NZ National MTB Cup series.

For Nic a chance to see where fitness was at. And for me... well an excuse to ride on my awesome new 2012 Avanti + ENVE carbon wheelset. I'd only ridden once since my arm injury and figured I may as well jump in Masters and have a non-pressured play on what is always an awesome race course laid on by Hawkes Bay MTB Club. Off course it also meant I could make my recent once per season appearance in the series, keeping the 14 season streak of National scene appearances going. Man I'm old.


Race went well. Followed the fast starting Weasal for the first climb before skipping ahead into the first descent. Didn't want to get the sharp looking new Black Dirt Kit dirty from roost after all.


Was able to pull a good gap and pretty much ride my own race after that. Which was nice, because my repairing arm was getting pretty angry with me by the final laps. Was a good fun hit out, and man are those wheels impressive. So stiff the handling of the bike was much more precise than I have been used to. Highly reccomended.


Nic took a wee bit of time getting acustomed back to the lap race XC format. A late and rushed arrival at the venue wasn't the best prep and she was feeling kinda flat. Still, was great to get back into the scene and put some good consistant laps in during a race situation. And helped her define some specific goals and targets for the coming months.


Thanks also to everyone who has made nice comments of the new kit/brand. There has been a few questions, and yes there is some kit available (in a variety of sizes). Flick me an e-mail if interested. cabinracing@gmail.com

A month in pictures

So after Dad visited on Friday night and quite rightly pointed out that he was eagerly awaiting actual blog updates as for sale ad's are boring..... I figured I best get something up here!

The last four weeks have flown by as we keep more than busy. In a strange way its actually been really nice NOT to be on the national MTB circuit. Sure we both have missed it. But being closer to home, being able to enjoy the weather, get some training in, do the gardening/lawns, and have relaxed evenings with friends. We almost feel normal!

But that doesn't mean we've been slacking....


As Nic continues her ebuild phase, she has enjoyed a return to triathlon. And when I say return, I am stretching it a little. Apart from a token couple of tri's at high school (when she was a rugby/hockey player), and despite being a 2 x XTERRA NZ Champion, she's never really done a road triathlon. But seemed a good excuse for some training and what better specific intervals than racing? Here she smacks out a tough 40km bike leg at Kinloch in the Erin Baker tri.


And then holds it together for a strong final 10km run. This was on the back of a good hit-out the week prior at the fantastic Blue Lake multisport festival. She is enjoying starting to feel fit and strong again, as oppossed to being "fast". The two do not always go hand and hand.


And why not throw some road in there too? A good hard weekend of training was to be found at the very well run (and popular) Bev May 2-day womens tour based out of Morrinsville. While the results on paper may not have been what Nic wanted, the mission to get good hard training in was well and truely achieved. Being awarded the Most Aggressive jersey for her day 1 exploits indicates she certainly didn't sit in for an easy ride...


Amongst all the spectating and attempts at re-building my own fitness our 2012 goodies have been trickling in. Thanks to Avanti and Wide Open this rather impressive looking weapon now resides in the garage. Taunting me everytime I walk past it. While the arm is coming along pretty well its still not quite up to full blown MTB action so the weapon will have to cool its heals a wee bit longer. Great motivation to get right though.


And finally... I jumped into some competitive action with the World Famous (in Eastern Bay of Plenty) Ohope Sprint Tri. A pretty decent field showed up in what I thought would be a nice low key no pressure re-introduction to some intensity. I swam poorly, biked kinda decent, and ran ok (tentatively as some overzealous training had resulted in a dodgy calf) and held on for a solid 4th. Pretty hpy with where the aerobic fitness was at. Just need to get strong. All looking good though.

Bring on the next few months.

Can you say bling?

Lots to report and catch up on, but in the meantime I had to get this up. The arm is rehabing nicely and progress steady; but after this care package turned up from the boys at Wide Open the desire to get back on the MTB just got a whole lot more intense. This will test my patience!

Completely unrelated to cycling

I love youtube. Apologies if you have already seen this elsewhere, but I just had to share. Shouldn't laugh at others misfortune, but sometimes.... Funniest thing I've seen in ages. Enjoy.

World famous (well aussie at least)

In our own humble opinion; heres a hopefully entertaining read on the last page of the Decemeber edition of Australian Mountainbike Magazine. Some random NZ MTB'ers...

A nice bit of video for a rainy day

Nice feature from SBS in Australia on this years Cape to Cape. Hopefully it see's some airtime in NZ. Also keep your eyes peeled for a featue in the next edition of NZ Mountainbiker mag. Great reminder of what was a very cool week. Starting to think I should organise a tour group for the 2012 event. Any takers?!

http://www.sbs.com.au/cyclingcentral/video/2175696303/cape-to-cape