N-Duro 3 35km race

Friday night was nice and quiet, had a wine and then left work on time, traffic was light so I was home quite quickly. Had dinner with the family members that were actually at home and then took youngest son to his scout camp and bought a bottle of Riesling on the way home. My riding buddy turned up at 8.00 to stay the night so we could get away early tomorrow for the race in Rotorua. Had a quiet evening and I went to bed quite early.

Up at 6.00 for a quick breakfast and coffee and on the road by 6.30. Stopped for gas and a proper coffee at a truck stop on the motorway and then took a slow (determined not to get a speeding ticket this time) and steady drive down to Rotorua arriving at 9.30. We unloaded the bikes and sifted up to the registration tent and got our race numbers and then I hung around and chatted to a bunch of friends and other riders, got back to the car in time to get changed, load the pack with food and get my the last minute tasks done and head up to the start line to watch the 70km riders leave.

With the MTB world champs happening in Rotorua next week there were a lot of international riders in town and a few of the team racers were in both the 70 and 35k race today.

30 minutes later a small bunch of us single speeders drifted to the back of the 35km pack and waited for the gun.

I got off to a good start, felt strong, the first bit of climbing is on a sealed road and I stayed at a fairly steady slow pace, but surprisingly was passing people in a fairly steady stream, this continued on for pretty much the entire 20 minute climb, we walked one section that was steep and quite lose, but the rest of the climb I managed to pedal away and was felling pretty OK at the top of the first single track – the lovely downhill Gunna Gotta. I managed a great run down the trail, I passed 1 slow rider before the fun parts and then had a clear run to the end. Picked up another single speeder on the way into the next bit of single track and realised I had another 1 behind me. The 3 of us moved along in convoy at a good pace until we hit the traffic where we were forced to slow down significantly, which was probably a good thing. Cleared the end of A trail, passed the slow people on the road section before tickler and dropped down into the twisty section of tickler down to the stream.

I got about 100 metres into Tickler when BANG – my chain snapped. The quick links exploded. I had no chain breaker and no spare links. I managed to get the chain back together but it was too short and I could not get it around the cogs. Race over. Arse. My first DNF. I was gutted, annoyed that I had links in the car and not in my pack. I took the walk of shame back to the finish line and handed in my race number.

I had a coffee and a feed and hung around chatting to friends until the riders started to come in. Some of the international riders were incredibly fast. The 70k riders were coming in before some of the 35k riders, even riders I consider quite quick. Guess that is why they are at the world champs.

Watched the riders come in over time, one of my SS riding buddies also DNF’d with a damaged wheel, but every one else came in happy but tired. They enjoyed the race, said the course was tough but good and commiserated with my DNF.

We left the site about 2:30 and drove the 3 hours back to Auckland for beer and pizza. 490kms and just under 6 hours of driving, $90 of gas for a 10k 50 minute ride…

At least I had legs for a ride tomorrow.