Mountain Biking Down Under

In early May 08, around about the time the South Island of NZ was hit with its first snow fall for the season ahead, I jumped on a plane to Australia! I left home in Wanaka for Queensland, Australia.

I lived in a tourist orientated town called Airlie Beach (South of Cairns). The place is a very popular backpacker’s destination. There are endless water activities in the area including scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef. There are even 74 islands in the Whitsunday’s to go see by boat! The land around Airlie is relatively flat terrain, mostly used by sugar cane farmers. While Freeride and down hill mountain biking is pretty sparse in the area, there is plenty of riding South and North of Airlie Beach.

One particular riding spot I went to was a place called Kitchent Dam. It is 20 minutes drive North of Mackay. This down hill track is regularly used for state races and some local races. A very demanding trail with about half the track covered in rock gardens. It’s been well ridden in so lines through the rocky sections are easier to pick out and they are always adding new features to the track. I’m here in the winter and its 25 degrees plus! …so pushing up after every run is a little tough! Highly recommend a 4X4 vehicle for shuttles.

There is a classic outdoor pub about 100 meters from the bottom of the trail for any refreshments after the riding. The bottom of the trail is actually in the Kitchent Dam Camping ground. This whole place would make for a great long weekend get away for those that can get to it for riding, and hang by the lake.

By Dan

Winter Festival Snow Event

I competed in the annual Queenstown Winter Festival snow race on Coronet Peak last weekend. Conditions weren't good, the snow guns were real noisy and created partial white out conditions between the natural snow showers. The event was run like a 4X, with the first two to finish going through to the next round and the other two being knocked out. It was all a bit of a lottery with the deep soft snow. There was a field of about 90 competitorsracing in 3 categories, Mens, Women's and Junior Men. I was lucky enough to win all my races and take out the Junior title.

A big thanks to Outside Sports for organizing and running the event, Coronet Peak for hosting the race this year, and all the sponsors which made the event such a success. A great event. I might do it again next year.

Cheers

Cam Johnson

Junior Mens DH review

Cam Johnson
16 Yrs old

From ALEXANDRA, NZ

Dan asked me to write how I found the Wellington Nationals Track at Long Gully. As well as that I’ll tell you about some other mean races from this season.

VERTIGO ran an OPEN Chainless race in January, at Coronet Peak. The downhill track was mean as, it had good corners and flowed nicely. I finished 8th overall and with a faster time than I got in the SI Subaru series with a chain. Can’t wait till next season when Coronet hopefully has a longer riding season.

Also I teamed up with Martin, a top mechanic from Bike Fix, Queenstown for the ‘Brakeburner’ Event. A 6 hr Endurance Race, also at on Coronet Peak. We were the BIKE FIX Team and were in the Open Men’s Class, (he’s a bit older, lucky he’s super fit). The track had heaps of uphill, and not much down. In the end, we came second to the Vertigo Team. It was a bloody good day, and a great group to hang out with.

Cam durring the Brake Burner Race at Coronet Peak

Wellington Nationals Track

Well the track started on the ridge between the wind turbine and that white dome thing, and dropped to the burnout pad. While not too technical, the track was fast and full of loose drifty corners, it also had a wall of gorse along the lower part of the track that you could use as a crash pad if you needed too… OUCH!

The track ended up worn out by race day and real dusty. The weather wasn’t friendly either, typically Wellington, wind was strong and gusty, and for the unlucky, it accounted for bad race run times.

Thanks to the organizers though, it was really well run by Vince Langford and the team…. up with the best of them. Wellington is a great track to ride, any chance to do it? Get there.

Another great track to ride, was Lava Flow, in Christchurch, I went up for the NZ Open. It’s a short and wickedly quick track, very rough, and heaps of big rocks. Finishing 3^rd in U19 here was a highlight for me, before heading back to Nelson for Oceania’s.

Cam durring the NZ National Round in Nelson

The Oceania’s held on that Nelson track up Maitai Valley was in good condition. The track had cool jumps, loose rocks all the way down, and it was steep and very fast from top to bottom. The more I raced this track the more I liked it. Thanks to Chris Mildon and guys for a great and well run event.

Just run last weekend, September, Linger and Die downhill race in Alexandra. Good track, all us boys been working on it thru the winter, came in 3^rd under 19, after a bit of cross country (by mistake) right near the bottom, 6^th fastest race time overall for the day.

Next race, 3^rd Round Bluff Series race, 11th October, see yah there.

CAM

SPONSORED RIDER THE BIKE FIX, QUEENSTOWN,

RED TUSSOCK GALLERY ALEXANDRA

PHOTOS SUPPLIED BY James Allan

and Eddie

Guides Low Down On Recent Multi Day Trip

Disillusioned by traffic, pollution, bad weather and overpopulation I like to grab my bike and hit the wilderness..Mountain biking is special - it offers an opportunity to pedal away from your familiar world, to go somewhere new, to face new challenges. It takes you to those 'lose yourself and find yourself again' places. It brings new people into your life. It helps you appreciate where you have been, and to make good decisions about where you’re headed. Riding bikes brings on a good headspace.RIDING BIKES IS FUN!

A road trip around New Zealand with like-minded bike enthusiasts, riding downhill bikes all day everyday, sounds mint eh? Well it was.

Dan Mcmullan and myself are head guides for Freeride NZ. We did a 21 day trip across NZ recently and i thought i would fill you in with what happened!

We got up at 8am most mornings, fuelled up with caffeine, toast and every cereal imaginable while watching south park episodes on the laptop. Quick bike check, then load our days gear n bikes aboard the limo. Hit the destination ride button on the auto pilot and wait in anticipation till we arrive at the start of an epic trail. We would ride hard all day stopping only to refill with subway for lunch. Then we would come back, have a few cold beers and reminisce events of the days riding.

One of my favourite trails from the trip was the Remarkables DH trail situated just north of Queenstown. The trail starts off just as narrow dusty flowy single track that just got better the further you went along it. Huge round rocky stony berms that were filled with the finest dust which exploded when you hit them. The next turn would be a flat turn that you could ride sat down, leg off, moto styles! There were rock gardens and jumps dotted from top to bottom. One jump was built up from a car engine with the carburettors as the lip! A giant fade away hip jump shot you up and away to give you max speed on landing to a tight left hand rock step down shooting you onto a tight pumpy single track next to the access road giving you a good chance to race the shuttle van back down for a 200 meters. The bottom section was a clearing of grass and sheep poo to a cheese wedge style booster which the van is waiting an amping ya to get back up to have another go.

Being based in Wanaka which means renewal of the soul, for the first five days was great! The town itself has a cool selection of bars and cafes. The weather was amazing while we were stopped over in Wanaka giving us 360° view of mountains and a crisp blue lake...breathtaking!

Waking up everyday with a huge smile on my face after a really good dream featuring my girl cat and drew barrymore, but that’s another story for a different kind of site…ok, so where was I??? Right.. waking up every day with a huge smile on my face knowing that its going to be another epic day on our bikes shredding up trail after trail.

So much to say but in a nutshell….
Countless blue sky days and phenomenal rides in the stunning N.Z country side made for a never to forget road trip!

Sighning off…

Glenno

Miss Downhill in NZ

The Austrian Pro Downhill racer, Helene Fruhwirth came to New Zealand for an off season and describes her trip…

I have travelled to New Zealand twice now to compete in the National Downhill Series, firstly during the 2005/06 summer and more recently the 2007/08 season. The racers are a great fun and an awesome way to see the fabulous country and meet riders alike. The Nationals begin in December and finishes in February. These races send you from one end of the country to the other. I decide to race in NZ because here in Austria where I come there is just nowhere to ride in winter time. Everything is covered with snow and it’s cold and wet. It’s great off season training.

Yes and so no wonder that I came back. It took 2 years because I had to finish my studies. But this time I knew many people, knew places where to go and more. But I was even more nervous to come back to NZ than I was at my first trip. I didn’t know if it could ever be better than two years ago!

Now I can say this trip was so different that I can’t compare it at all. It was great to see all my friends, who I took to my heart. It was also really good riding new tracks I hadn’t riding before (e.g. Dirt Park NZ).

The whole trip nearly fell through because I managed to twist my ankle in trampoline training (suspected of a broken Talus) and got a plaster 10 days before I was to fly out. It was nightmare I couldn’t believe it. I put all the eggs in the basket- cut the plaster 24 hrs before my flight and got a special brace with crutches for the plane. The flight was a nightmare to my foot as it got swollen and put me trough pain during the whole flight. When I arrived it was okay I just thought about riding to get over the pain. I hardly could walk the first to weeks but I could ride my brand new Morewood bike!

I raced all the national races, took it easy got good results and good feedback from my sponsors. I loved the atmosphere to race in NZ. Nobody cares about my time, my results, who I was or what I should be. I could just be 100% me. In Europe I have to ride with a little more pressure, in that I need to always be in the top 10. Of course I used NZ as my training ground to get ready and prepared for the World cup season but I also enjoyed other things like wakeboarding, mini motocross riding with Dan McMullan, fishing, Jet ski riding, cliff jumping, pump track riding, the barbeques!, partying with the my friends, dancing with Chris and so many other things. I was having to much fun to miss Austria.

The down hill tracks in Europe compared to NZ are so different. I would say we have less jumps and not so many crazy lines. It’s not really surprising to me that different riders appear in the top 10 of the world from one day to the other. I loved to see how motivated the kiwi riders are. I didn’t have days where I didn’t get a ride with someone somewhere…. So great!

Now its time to head back home to Austria for racing DH and 4X in the Northern Hemisphere. I plan to race our Nationals, World Cup races, World Champs, Crankworx in Canada, European Champs in Italy and more!

If somebody is keen to follow my race life check out my blog on www.miss-downhill.com

I wanna thank: Kai Crow, Dan McMullan, Dave and Gail Judson, Chris Vanderkolk, Hadley Boyce, Hamish Kay and his flat mates and of course all my sponsors.

Photo by James Allan

Freeride NZ 3 week NZ multi day tour

Heading North!

We set off north from Dunedin on our way up to Christchurch, its a good 5-6 hour drive up there so on the way we stopped off in a small town called Timaru where we had heard there was a really cool little dirt jump park.

As we rounded the corner we saw what could in no way be called a small dirt jump park, with lines ranging from small tables on the right to massive stepped up doubles on the left and everything in between. It was definitely a spot for hard tail bikes over bigger bikes but the great thing about my Reign X is its versatility and after stiffening up the suspension it was as good as a hardtail over any of the jumps. It was a really fun place to hang out for a couple of hours and ride with the locals while at the same time breaking up the long drive up to Christchurch.

Local Timaru rider showing us how it is

We awoke in Methven. Today Andy from a local guiding company (dhnz) would be taking us on what he promised would be a day of riding we would never forget. We were heading for a secrete locals spot where we were told we would be riding some scree runs. There were no shuttle roads for this type of riding so it was packs on and away we went….Real New Zealand wilderness riding! After a 20 minute ride up a relatively wide track we got off the bikes and preceded in single file out onto the side of the mountain and before long the bikes were on our shoulders and we were once again hike-a-biking up to the saddle between two peaks.

Once at the top though we were confronted by a steep scree slope stretching away for 300m plus in front of us! After a quick snack we hiked out into the middle of the slope until we had a straight run of scree in front of us. Andy pointed out the single track we were aiming for at the bottom and said “its just like powder skiing”, then he was off half carving like a skier. He flew down until he hit the single track and stopped to wait for us to Man-Up and show our skills on this alien terrain! We exchanged ‘it can’t be that hard’ looks and set off on our own little freeride adventure. Once you set your mind to it, it was great. Just using the front wheel as kind of plow to slow you down as brakes were almost useless. I laughed the whole way down.

Riding and Hanging out at Mt Hutt near Methven

Once we all met up on the single track beating each other on choice of line and style. It was going to be hard to maintain that high but the single-track to the bottom was equally inspiring. It shot along the contours of the mountain through forest at the perfect gradient that you could choose to pedal or not.

ahh just more amazing single track!!

By the time we got to the bottom we were shagged but so pumped with adrenaline that we chatted at about mack ten, and anyone who knows me knows how fast I talk when I’m excited, for about an hour before we drove onto Christchurch ready to shred the local trails the next day.

Thanks again to Andy for an amazing day.

Take it easy

Cal

Freeride NZ 3 week NZ multi day tour

Heli-Heaven!

Heli bike day dawns with a bluebird sky and some serious anticipation on my part as it was going to be my first time (in a Helicopter)! Aussie Dan and me got dropped off at Wanaka’s airport and met our pilot. Once sat in the Heli we were all amped and ready to go after the pilot spent 2 min’s hitting the oil gauge on the control panel to get it to register we were off. It’s a unforgettable feeling leaving off terre-ferma vertically but funnily enough I found it far less unnerving than flying in a plane. Flying above the ridge we would soon be riding was a very different experience; you could see the various single track sheep track which would make up our route along the ridge.

how is the serenity?!

As we stood straddling our respective two wheeled steads a top the 1600m plus mountain looking over jagged mountain ranges and down to Lake Wanaka it was a pure moment as we began this epic ride! It took the first decent to get used to the exposure on the ridgeline. When Dan said he had chosen a very special trail for us, I now realise he wasn’t actually joking! …A wicked trail that suited all our riding styles and abilities.

After a couple of minutes riding we began to really let loose, all choosing different lines along the mountain. Just as we settled into the flow we were hit by what seemed to be a mountain on top of a mountain so it was bikes on shoulders time ready for a bit of a Hike-A-Biking. We had to negotiate exposed goat paths, steep rocky faces and a good bout of vertigo but we made it too the top and it was as they say all downhill from there. So begun an hour long decent consisting of virgin single track, open freeriding and high speed 4 wheel drive track to finish.

It was one of the most amazing days of riding so far and was followed by one of the best night’s sleep of my life. I guess I deserved it!

Over and out Cal..