Roost the
AUSTRALIAN MTB RACING & CULTURE VOL 1 ISSUE 1
PREVIEW
Words : Leon Fry
Photos: Sean Lee
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lbany, on the south coast of Western Australia was the venue for the first round of the 2012 West Australian State downhill series. The race was held over the Easter weekend which gave people four days to make the trip south and enjoy some time away. After a two year absence of an official state series as well as the Albany track as a venue, everybody was excited to be back there racing. The Albany track is on Mount Clarence which is one of two small coastal mountains that reside right in the heart of the town of Albany. The location of the track is truly unique and despite being very short, it is a roller coaster ride that affords some of the best scenery in Australia to riders and spectators, not to mention the photographers. The track starts on a permanently constructed steel start platform that is big enough for all the timing equipment and timer plus three riders on top.It is a well thought out start that really helps to rocket you into the first section of technical rocky singletrack. Fifty meters down the course riders enter a tunnel of coastal trees and shrubs that completely surround the track not leaving much room for error. The first section is best attacked hard at the beginning and then hop, skip, and jump your way through the rocks as you try to keep up momentum. Riders emerge into the sunlight around a tight left hand corner straight into a small tabletop that requires momentum to get over cleanly. Once over the tabletop riders traverse a series of granite slabs, singletrack sections, and berms that take you down to “Money Shot Straight” which heads straight towards the ocean via a couple of nice jumps and provides a great backdrop to all the action. At the end of the straight riders compress into a fast double drop left hand berm and rocket into the bush, drifting two loose but very tight corners before dropping into a wooden s-bend berm that rockets you towards a large rock that requires a good hop to get over quickly and smoothly. A couple more corners and you drop into the final steep shoot which has a small jump at the bottom that riders transfer out and into the final left hand berm and across the finish line. The track is short being around the 1:30 mark but it is really fun when you dial the lines in. Practice went smoothly, everyone had a great time riding and catching up after a long hot summer. There were plenty of spaces track side to chuck down the esky and a few chairs which really added to the relaxed, fun atmosphere. Riders were able to stop and check out photos, and chat to wives, girlfriends, and parents on the way back up which made for a nice atmosphere for the wags and parents who loyally support us in our crazy endeavors year in year out. One exception was Allan “Kamikaze Pilot” Coremans, who had a big crash on the first tabletop landing hard on a granite bedrock slab and smashing his hip among other things. With the track being in the middle of town he was quickly driven to the hospital for some heavy pain relief and pelvis x-rays. Thankfully they came up clear and sporting a huge black bruise that extended all the way down the leg and around to places his fiance will miss for a while, the Kamikaze Pilot picked up the camera and hit the hill the next day determined not to miss the fun.
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Words & Photos : Robert Conroy Perched high atop Mt Panorama Bathurst, on the edge of one of the most famous motor car race tracks in Australia, Newtons Nation with all its associated sports would come to play. Heading out from Sydney around midday friday I arrived late afternoon and after being plied with more wristbands than you can shake a stick at there was just enough time to set up camp with a few mates. The event was meant to kick off in the evening and with the darkness and cold of a country winter setting in we thought we would check out the surrounds. Newtons Nation has been run every second year since 2008, it is a hybrid, sitting somewhere between a sports festival and a music festival. Started by Barry Newton it is full of all sorts of action sports including street luge, BMX vert , BMX dirt jumps (whoppers built by Cam White) and of course Downhill and Dual Slalom. Having never been, my expectations were high after weeks of being inundated with videos of previous Newtons Nation events not to mention numerous teasers of the bands that would be on the bill, over the coming two nights. None of them really struck a cord with me save only The Getaway Plan ( I thought they had split up?) however I have a particular kooky taste in music and perhaps the line up wasn’t for me. Moving on. Finding our way to the beer tent we chucked in our cash for chips and went to check out the stage. There didn’t appear to be too many souls around but everyone just put it down to it being friday night and more would probably arrive in the morning when the event really kicked off. So after a few beers we headed to bed. Fractured sleep and one particularly frozen night led into a bright sunny saturday, perfect for racing. Riders had come from all over the eastern states to have a crack at the $7000 totalled prize money. Some big names were also in that line up, such as Chris Kovarik, Claire Buchar and Rhys Willemse, which would certainly make podiums spots that little bit harder to grab. The track at Mt Panorama lovingly restored by bathurst and lithgow locals was short but packed with interesting features including the “famous” velocity gap, a
Photos L to R : Andy Blair powers through the home straight for the win, Champagne on the podium
THE ST ALBANS CONVICT 100 RD #3 OF THE XCM SERIES Words & Photos : Robert Conroy
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St Albans is a strange place it is as rural as your most back country town yet it is really close to Sydney, closer too than say Katoomba or Newcastle for instance. Despite how close it is there is really only one avenue of approach and that is through a car ferry which can get quite banked up come race day.
other riders pricey new steads and soon enough it was time to hop on the ferry. Having already given up on making the 7am 100k’er kick off things were well on track for the 50km start. Making way through the picturesque fog layered countryside, it wasn’t long before we were in the packed town of St Albans. This was the third round of the Cyclenation Real Insurance series and it was also the third race in as many weekends. The Wombat 100 kicked things off in Victoria and the rescheduled Capital Punishment filled in between the weekends it would be a hard race this weekend for those elites going for series honours. Who would have the legs after two weekends of hard out racing. Cars filled in every crevice and tents
After spending the previous weekend in a tent freezing I wasn’t too keen on spending another in similar fashion, so instead I opted for the dawn trek out. Making good time heading north west across Sydney, it wasn’t long until I was amongst dense fog snared in the line for the car ferry at Webbs Creek. However it so bad especially when your sharing it with a bunch of mountainbikers. Brief chats ensued as well as the casual drooling over
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Photo : Jason Morgan powers through a corner
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SID TABERLAY IS A RIDER THAT TRULY REQUIRES NO INTRODUCTION BUT WE’LL DO ONE ANYWAY. SID HAS BEEN AT THE STICKY END OF THE FIELD FOR CLOSE TO A DECADE AND HE IS STILL ONE OF THE RIDERS TO WATCH ! HE HAS BEEN TO A OLYMPICS A COMMONWEALTH GAMES AND COUNTLESS WORLD CUPS AND NATIONALS ALL WHILST REMAINING ONE OF THE TRUE GENTELMEN OF THE SPORT. LATELY HE’S HAD A FEW UPS AND DOWNS AND WE WERE THERE TO HEAR ALL ABOUT THEM AND MORE. SO WITHOUT FURTHER ADIEU HERE’S SID TABERLAY. NAME: Sid Taberlay AGE: 32 HOMETOWN: Hobart SO YOU ARE ONE OF AUSTRALIA’S MOST SEASONED MOUNTAIN BIKERS BUT WHERE DID IT ALL BEGIN FOR YOU ? I must have been about 13 or 14. My friends from school (Matt Hunnibell, Mark Morgan & Adrian Morrisby) were into Mountain Bikng and in this case it was a natural progression of just wanting to do what your mates did. I had a second hand 10 speed K-Mart clunker to start with but it didn’t take long to realise that bike wasn’t going to cut it on the trails around Hobart (note: it’s all straight up & down). WHAT ARE YOUR FIRST MEMORIES OF RIDING ? To be honest I don’t really remember any specifics. I used to do a bit of running so I had the fitness to climb well on the bike. We used to just find stuff that seemed unridable (for our ability at the time) and just tried to find ways to ride it. Once one of us did it the others then had to man up. This is really how Mountain Biking progressed for me - from local trail riding to XC, DH racing, trials riding & dirt jumping (nothing the size of what kids are doing these days). I was just a kid who loved riding bikes, now I’m a big kid who still loves riding bikes. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST RACE ? I’m not exactly sure. It was pretty soon after I started riding, so 14 maybe. It would have been a Dirt Devils/ Hobart Wheelers club event. I kind of think it was a local event <5km from home at Tinderbox that consisted of XC, DH & Slalom over two days. I can’t really remember much about my race other than I was dazzled by some pretty fancy bikes & watching some fast guys do the slalom. YOU CLIMBED PRETTY QUICKLY UP THROUGH THE RANKS TO U23’S TAKING OUT THE NATIONAL SERIES AND NATIONAL CHAMPS MULTIPLE TIMES. WHEN DID YOU BEGIN TO SEE YOURSELF AS A CAREER RACER ? I didn’t set out to become a career racer - it was a bit of a stumbling process. I went to Junior Nationals in 1997 & 1998 as part of the TIS talent identification
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Going into the untimed section was a surreal experience. I made the executive decision to go fairly hard through the streets and crossings; this meant I would be out of sight (and hopefully out of mind). With this rather optimistic nugget, I hit the throttle once more and tried to make back some of the time I had lost earlier. However with the open fire trails and short open climbs I couldn’t peddle my climbing fitness as much as I would have liked, this along with forgetting batteries for my heart-rate monitor (crucial for a day like this) was dwindling my prospects for a successful solo effort. Coming into 10km to go the cold was starting to get to me mentally, and I think it was then, that my internal furnace may have pulled the pin. The final decent into the Stromlo grand stand was a highlight for me having raced it only a few months ago at nationals, and after some serious timing issues I managed to hang on to 3rd, after a quick lunch and an even quicker podium hop it was off to Orange for phase 2. To be honest the trip to Orange is a little hazy for me. Mostly because the vision out of my front windscreen was at an all-time low, thanks to the armada of bugs and other flying insectile creatures that were assaulting my windshield, and partially because I was driving through some of the most dangerous roads to drive on at night. I am of course talking about the single lane 100km/h roads that would have you off the side in a heartbeat. After a few brief stops I arrived at Orange safely, and after a hearty meal of Bolognese (Thanks to Mrs Mackne!), it was off to bed to try and recover as much as it was possible.
Words : Andrew Arthur
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any people simply shook their head when I told them what I had planned, some even proceeded to try and talk me out of it “Just miss the first round, it won’t matter!”, but I was locked into these two races, and I had been mentally preparing myself for the onslaught for weeks prior. Leading up to the event I was getting a strange mixture of excitement and nerves, mostly because I had recently had a few weeks off the bike, and I was unsure of my current race form. For those that still have not trigged, I am of course talking about the monster Capital punishment/Single Track mind weekend pain-fest.
The morning dawned cloudless and freezing, after a quick pit stop at McDonalds, and a GPS that wanted to take me across a large body of water I arrived at Kinross state forest. After a quick spin, I realized then and there my legs still sharply remembered the 50km from the day before. That means new U23 STEVENS rider Blake Polverino was up for the first lap! Little did I know the old duo of Andrew Lumley and Brian Price had been doing some secret training and were back racing, and the formidable BikeCulture team of Jon Odams and Lukie Dale, placing us into very tough, but welcoming competition for the first round in the series.
The morning of the capital punishment dawned a nice and frosty 4 degrees, accompanied by a subtle little blanket of fog. However, with a good 8 hours of sleep in a warm bed (thanks Sarah!), I was a little less beady eyed than some of the other interstate dwellers, and was ready to hit the trails blazing. A mix up at the registration the night before had me starting at the back of the race. I was given the option to start at the pointy end of the field, but also warned I would be likely disqualified… at least initially. Needless to say, I took that chance! The start was your usual affair of attacks by known contenders, and the odd kick by a local punter hoping to crack the race in the first 5 minutes. After making a wrong turn, Kyle Ward (Jet Racing) and Brad Morton were off. Just like that, one second I was waiting for “the move”, the next I was chasing down two riders who were setting an impressive pace up the pinch. I could hold the gap, but I couldn’t close it, and law of physics begun to gently take its toll on me, and by the time I descended into Mildura they were almost out of sight, leaving me in no man’s land about a 1 min in front of the field. Luckily Troy Glennan (Rockstar Racing) latched on sometime after entering Mildura, with young Jayden Ward (Jet Racing), completing the chasing threesome. Unfortunately Jayden had some gearing issues, and knowing 3rd place was on the line I attacked Troy on the first climb I could see, and managed to gain about 15 seconds going into the untimed section.
The 8 hour was your standard affair, with one exception; the trails at Kinross forest are AMAZING. The track provided a perfect mix of climbing, berms and rock gardens to keep the weary on their toes. Personally, the last section of the trail was my favourite, with its beautifully sculpted berms and doubles, and even at 50km through some sections, it all felt very flowy and smooth. Trails had the capacity to challenge riders at all levels, sections that could be dangerous at speed could be easily navigated by slower riders, sounds perfect right? It was. With all said and done we finished a respectable 3rd place, and another perfect weekend of riding was had. The only thing that was left to do was to drive home. An ordeal I won’t even try and bore you with. To cut a long story short, don’t leave your keys in the boot whilst getting changed, they have a habit of staying in there when you close the boot. Nothing a bit of wire and a tent peg can’t fix...
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