Oceania mountain bike champs.

After racing in the Oceania mountain bike champs in 2012, I set the goal to race it again this year in Hobart.  With Samara asking me if I wanted to go over with her, Karen Hanlen and Karens husband Mark, it started to look like I'd be able to go. I was going without family, so had to learn how to get through customs and about booking tickets, insurance and other tricky things, but I couldn't wait to go.

Day 1.

Myself, Karen and Mark left Auckland airport on Thursday and arrived mid-day in Hobart, the flight was good, I took extra food, sat next to some friendly randoms and watched a movie.  We met Samara  over there about 1 hr after we arrived. At the airport me and Karen were waiting for our baggage but it didn't come through so we tried the other carousels and there was still no sign of our gear, we then heard an announcement on the speakers saying that they had forgot to load some baggage on to the plane so we were stuck without our bikes and I was stuck without my clothes for the first day. We both started to panic a bit because we had come all this way for a bike race but we had no bikes here to race on, we tried everything we could but they couldn't do anything but we were told that they would get delivered some time.

Anyway, we moved on, got our rental car and headed to our cabin after stopping off at the supermarket to get our food for the next couple of days. We got to our cabin, put all of Samara's stuff in it and thought how the hell are we going to get another 2 bikes in??  We booked a bigger cabin, but they gave us a different one.

We took Samara out to the track for a ride while me Karen and Mark walked around. we were walking around waiting for the gnarly rock gardens and drop offs to come up but there were none it was a track with one up and one down and a whole lot of switch backs, we were a bit disappointed but other than that it was a good track though.

walking the track, Karen checking lines

After walking the track, we went for a look up Mt Wellington.

mt wellington 1270m high

top of mt wellington.  The race course in red was as high as wainui hills, theres a track from mt wellington all the way down too.

We headed back to our cabin after mt wellington hoping for our bikes to be there but there was still nothing.

It was about 8 pm so we got to bed for an early night. About 10 pm the courier knocked the door with our bikes. yeah! I slept better knowing I had a bike.

Day 2.

I woke up at about 6 thinking it was around 9, it was cold outside and none of us were really prepared because we thought aussie would be nice and warm.

We chucked all of our warm clothes that we had on and headed out to the track for an early morning ride to get a good feel for the track before tomorrows race day.  I did 3 laps including a hotlap, doing about 16min, I was feeling ok with that. The loaner set of enves from Wheelworks felt really good with all the corners and when standing up.  After a chat, we headed back to base, had a shower, ate and relaxed.

Samara, Karen and me on the start. pic - samara

Day 3(race day)

We were up nice and early, had some brekkie, got our stuff together and headed out to the track. Samara and Karen were racing at 9am in the pro-women category and i was at 2:30pm in U15 so I had a bit of a wait, I didn't really know what I should do before an afternoon race but I managed to entertain myself though, and I was going to give Samara her drinks during her race.

The gun went for the women's race, Karen got off to a bit of a shaky start but Samara was looking good. Karen ended up pulling everyone back to get the gold medal which was cool to watch and Samara finished strong with a 5th place.  Amber Johnston won U19 girls with my Endura team mate Harriet getting 2nd too.

I also watched team mate Sam Gaze and Anton Cooper win their categories so i felt i had a bit of pressure on myself now. I started my warm up but I was feeling a bit dead so I chucked in a couple of 10 second sprints and that seemed to do the job ok. With only 2 laps in my race, I carried my lezyne gas pump and tools with me just in case, because I had no time to run to tech zone to fix anything. I headed to the start gate waiting for my name to be called up, rolling up to the start line a few rows behind the U17s, I was happy to be starting with them.  I was feeling my nerves kicking in now, I just wanted to start racing.

BANG! we were off, I got a good start passing everyone with the holeshot into the single track. We climbed up and came back down, I put a bit of a gap between myself and the rest of the riders on the downhill, really happy bout that. I led the first lap including U17.  At the start of the 2nd lap climb my dead legs came back, I didn't have my usual push and ended up being passed by a couple of U17 riders. Near the top of the climb I was feeling strong again and was able to crank it back up, but I still lost over a min from my first lap.  I gained some time back down the hill and managed to get a strong finish in to take the Oceania title for 2013!  Even though it wasn't the lap times I knew I could do, I was happy!

little jump . pic -Russel Baker

lots of corners - pic Russell Baker

podium - pic Russell Baker

We hung around with the NZ crew for a bit, It was good to catch up with aussie Liam who came over and raced me last year.  We'll probably see heaps of each other later on.

Day 4

We had a bit of a sleep in but woke up to a storm(or at least it felt like one!)

We dropped Samara at the airport for her flight to Europe for her world cup season - good luck Samara! We were off to see some Tasmanian devils and do some other touristy things, but I had a problem.. I was trying to get my money out of a money machine and the bloody thing swallowed my card! I was stuck with $45 for the rest of the trip!

It was about a 90 min drive to our first stop, we had a look and moved on to our next stop, the blowhole! It was pretty cool. We got a good look at that, took some pics and followed the road again to the 'Devils Kitchen'!.. this was pretty much just some massively big cliffs about 200m high with flat rock face the whole way down.

Next stop were the Tasmanian devils, they're really cool. We watched them being fed some wallaby meat. They would fight for 5-10 minutes straight just for 1 piece of meat! (crazy), we pat the kangaroos and watched the bird shows too.

After that we headed towards the famous Port Arthur.  we got to read a bit bout this and what all the prisoners were put there for and for the amount of time e.g. one man stole a handkerchief and was put into this prison for around 4-10 yrs! They would all try to escape but their escape route was a challenge of getting through the 'Eagle Hawk Neck' which was just a narrow road where they put dogs and had police with guns making sure they were not getting through.

We drove back to base after seeing what we could, and had a good time having dinner with the Oliver brothers and the Hope sisters. thanks guys!  I'd definitely come back to Tasmania!

I headed to the airport around 9 pm for my flight back to Melbourne. I arrived in Melbourne around 12 am and had to entertain myself until 6am for my next flight to Auckland.

I ate some snacks and had about a 30 minute sleep (on my bench) and was up again.  I was finally able to check my baggage in and board the plane back home. My seat was at the back of the plane next to the toilets so I was getting all the drafts, but I had a row to myself. I landed in Auckland and my dad picked me up, we went back to granddads new place in Warkworth. It was good to see them. I mowed some lawns on the mower, ate bbq and I had a good sleep!(yay).

It was a good experience to race overseas hanging out with Samara, Mark and Karen, there are some things I would do differently next time, but I had a awesome time. I hope I get to do it again.

Thanks to Revive massage, Nigel at EnduraNZ and specialized bikes for the support and sponsorship, porirua foundation for giving me an award which I put towards the trip, wheelworks for loaning me the demo pair of enve's, best wheels I want some! PNP for being the best bike club and giving me some good suppport, helping me compete at Oceanias.  And finally thanks to Karen, Mark, and Samara for looking out for me while i was over there.