The following article has been supplied by Kristen Pimpini
What an amazing weekend, hitting the trails of East Kowen Forest. This being my first 24hr MTB race, I didn’t know what I was in for. I decided to catch a lift with two experienced racers in Wade and Garran. At the initial pick up, I realised I had no idea about the required preparation if you want to be comfortable and stay dry if it rained, however looking at the forecast clear sky’s were ahead of us.
Other than a few detours, we arrived Friday afternoon, got ourselves a great campsite and immediately hit the trail. Cruising around the track, it was clear a well thoughtout design and build had gone on in previous months. I didn’t think much of the Mont emails coming through with updates on the trails, though hats off to the Kowalski Brothers
and all the volunteers that helped to get the trails completed in time. It was a blast, I was so excited I over cooked many of the corners, but it got my eye in for the race ahead.
Riding in a team of 6 was always going to be social, however there is no excuse for an easy lap. Riding as part of 2 teams of 6, it was clear, there would be 2 races going on. So for some pre race fuel, we headed into the Royal Hotel Bungendore to watch the Head to Head Roller Racing, grab a feed and a couple of quiet beers which was a great night.
Race day – getting up in the morning, I was slightly bored having to wait around until midday for the fun to begin. Lots of bike tinkering and of course the odd mono here and there, the time came for race briefing then off to the start line for a running start.
As our nominated runner wasn’t showing until 2pm, I ended up taking honors. The gun went off, we hit the road and it was chaos, people everywhere and that was before we got into transition. Found my bike and I was off!! The racing had begun and I left my lungs 200m into the run leg. After settling in and trying to breath through the dust, I finished up with a respectable lap. I handed my bat over to my next team mate, who 5km in had our first mechanical. We kept ticking over team members, everyone really pleased with the racing and the well organised event.
For our evening laps, we ended up pairing up. Fortunately I did the 6 & 8pm laps, which meant I had a reasonable sleep through the night only to have to wake at 5am. Other than a few mechanicals and one of the guys running out of battery mid lap (my fault, I gave him a battery thinking it ws charged) we had a good evening, no crashes and not too many complaints.
Waking up on Sunday morning, there was a slight chill in the air, not as warm as the day before for sure. As I began my preparation for my final lap, it started to rain, the wind picked up and the temperature dropped a few degrees. All I thought was, this is going to make dust settle on the track and be a blast out there. Oh yes, the dust settled and there was plenty of rain, so plenty of mud. Although it took a little bit of extra motivation, all the others got out and hit the trail and they all loved it.
A great event, very well organised and a fantastic trail, not more you could ask for for your first 24hr MTB event.
I hope to see some of those MarathonMTB.com boys out there next year to give Rockstar a run for their money! (Thanks KP, keep dreaming -Ed.)