Category Archives: Mountain Biking

Results, photos, and packing (again)

Results from last weekend’s Kargo 10 hour MTB race are up here. Thankfully there appear to have been no last minute race commissaire changes or alterations, so I hung onto a podium finish. Very pleased.

There are also some excellent photos from the day on ActionPhoto, and I’ve popped a few of the ones of me below. A lot of tongue-chewing. Not sure that chewing my tongue is a great idea whilst mountain-biking, given the risk of an unexpected bump resulting in an unexpected bite, but there we are.

 

 

This afternoon it’s off down to Cape Town for this weekend’s racing adventure: The Contego Wine2Whales Race. Really looking forward to this one – it’s a 3-day MTB race in the Cape, roughly 70km per day, with some fairly big ups and downs (roughly 4,460m of climbing over the 3 stages). The route profile and maps are here (Day 1, Day 2, Day 3). 

As per usual, last night was spent staying up late than was sensible, frantically packing and re-packing to see if I could get three days of mountain bike race gear into a single bike box and a carry-on rucksack. Think I’ve managed it, but to be honest I’m not ruling out either an excess weight charge (the bik box is feeling a bit grumpy, and heavy), or a re-pack on the floor of the departure hall. No surprises, have been there before enough times.

Not sure where we’re staying tonight (Declan’s been in charge), but the following 2 nights are in a tent in the race village – should be a good introduction to South African MTB stage racing.