PNP Mountain Bike Series - Round 4 - Belmont

Belmont - home of the steep, greasy climbs and technical descents. Probably my most dreaded venue. At the pre-ride, I was having bike problems, with my rear disk rubbing, but Bike Barn managed to fix this and my bike was in working order. Having been beaten by Caitlin by 10 minutes at the last round in Mount Vic, I wasn’t sure how much of that was having a cough, so I wanted to show I could still beat her. Luckily we had pretty good weather beforehand so the tracks were all in pretty good condition. The end of Stratton St was icily cold so I decided I’d wear my jacket, a choice I regretted about 5 minutes into the race as I gasped my way up Danzig. Thanks to Don McLeod who put in a lot of time and effort putting gravel on Danzig so it was pretty good.

I got all the way up Danzig, along Old Coach Road and along all the grassy knolls to the airstrip where I stopped to get my bike over the fence before I first saw Caitlin (my arch rival) about a hundred metres behind me. Slightly panicked, I picked up the pace and nearly came off at the bottom of Hill Road, but fortunately I managed to just do a bit of a slide and continue on. I finished my first lap of the Belmont loop and when I looked back Caitlin was still about the same distance away. I did my second loop and although she didn’t catch me or gain on me I wasn’t gaining either. I hammered it as hard as I could go along Old Coach Road to the top of Danzig, which we were descending. Going down Danzig I was desperate not to be caught, however very near the bottom I conveniently rode too close to the bank, hit a tree and I went over the handle bars into the dirt. Luckily I landed in between the tree trunks so I got up with only a few scratches. Remounting my bike I glanced behind and much to my horror there was Caitlin. We rounded the last bends of Danzig with her right on my wheel, and came down past the woolshed to do the finish loop. Turning onto the sealed road Caitlin managed to get in front by a couple of bike lengths, but I got past and got to the finish just 25 seconds ahead. At the finish I got a few strange looks probably due to my pained expression and loud wheezing, but I was very pleased to have finished the my most intense race ever.

I thought this year’s course was terrific, usually at Belmont there are major traffic issues but I didn’t have that problem at all. At the prize giving my name got called out for a spot prize and I scored myself a nice pair of gloves, brilliant, as mine are sort of falling apart and needed replacing anyway. Thanks to Marco and Al and the rest of the team for putting so much time and effort into this series. The next race is Makara, my home ground, but with NCEA exams starting the day after on the 15th, my training will be very limited for this round. Nevertheless I am keen for the last of what has been a spectacular series.