Hannah Barnes - Sporting Life

PNP MTB Spring Series
Race 2 - Wainuiomata
Unlike the cloudy day that race one brought, this day was one of those that have no clouds whatsoever. I had done a really useful pre-ride/skills session with Peter Reynolds, and although I was a bit nervous, I wasn’t scared for my life. Once again we had an enormous grade in Under 19 Girls, three people! We need to get more young women to dare to have a go on their bikes.

The huge climb up Roller Coaster really got me puffing. When I finally reached the “top” I found that the bit I thought was downhill actually keeps going up for ages before they let you go down. Spoonhill wasn’t too bad, I managed to ride most of it and pass quite a few people. I got to the playground and clambered over the wooden stairs and rode along the road a bit to far, so focused on sprinting hard that I went a couple of hundred meters past Waiu Street, before I realised I was going the wrong way.

Jungle Scout and Gym got pretty trafficky. You could hear Ashley from a long way off, which was really good because I could figure out how far I had left to go. It was probably one of the trickiest places to marshal, with the A,B and C riders all coming at you one way and the D graders coming from the other way, but she handled it perfectly. The first time down Beeline there were too many people pushing their bikes down the drop off for me to be able to ride it, but the second time was good.
I was leading the race at the final corner, but it seems I was the only person who had difficulty finding the entrance to the school, there you go, I lost three minutes weaving around the buildings instead of taking the straight route. I only got a second place for this race, and so it’s “race on” for Mt Vic. Congratulations to Caitlin for her first win. Perhaps my navigational skills will serve me better next time, but for now all I can do is train lots.