Womens MTB Revolve Series - Race #1

I have decided to have a rest from racing for a while, but I thought I may as well help out and marshal for this event, because I know that Ashley Burgess and Marjolein Ros have invested a lot of energy and passion into women's cycling, including helping me, and this was a chance to give something back.


7:30am was the time to be at the velodrome on Mt Vic ready for the marshals' briefing. Jony and I were placed near Charles Plimmer Park, but before we left the velodrome we put up the start and finish flags, as well as organising a finish desk.
We arrived at our marshal point and were given specific instructions. Jony was about 100m up the track and on the other side of the bush so I was alone. Before the race started I had to warn the many walkers that there was a race about to start, some seemed interested and were happy to adjust their walk to stay off the tracks that were being used, others. . . not so willing.

The first riders through were from the “Queen of the Mountain” category, the harder of the two, but they were closely followed by the girls in “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun”. Where I was marshalling I had the two groups coming down different tracks and merging onto one. I had to make sure they didn’t collide (nobody did) and send them up the hill, much to the despair of many,
“UP!?”
“Sorry, yes, up.”
Was a common conversation.

Being right next to Charles Plimmer Park, a dog exercise park, I had to talk to a few not-so-happy dog owners. One dog (that was not on a leash although it was not in Charles Plimmer Park) nearly caused some riders to crash. There must have been around a dozen dog owners walking there dogs on the track that I saw, but not one had a leash. This is a serious danger hazard. Fortunately I had no actual crashes, but it’s only luck that stops them happening.

After both the Tail-End-Charlies had come through I waited for Jony and then we walked along the course picking up arrows and markers as we went, we got back just in to watch the prize giving. Rebecca Speirs won the “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” grade and an awesome home-knitted beanie, and Rachel Renyolds won the “Queen of the Mountain”and a really cool home-knitted scarf. The event was a success with 53 riders on the courses, many of whom I recognised from the MTB Chicks group, run by Rebecca Speirs (check it out at http://www.mtbchicks.org/). Ashley and Marjolein did a great job of organising it, from the colourful wool for tying numbers onto bikes, to the hand knitted hat and scarf that Rebecca and Rachel won, it was a fantastic and girly event. I recommend this series to all women who ride, whatever their ability. See you next weekend at Makara!

Full details are at http://www.revolvetraining.co.nz/mtbSeries.html. The photos on this page are borrowed from the links on the Revolve website.