Back on the bike

Finally got back on the real bike last night and took the ingle speed for a night ride up at Woodhill. Rode with a couple of guys I have not really ridden with before but we were fairly compatible pace wise and I had a good night. The conditions were perfect for night riding, still and clear, cold but not too bad and the tracks were firm.

Rode up Powerball, then half way along Big Mama before one of the guys lights burnt out, smoke and burning smells and everything. Turned round and went back down the road to the carpark were he had some more lights. Back up the road and then down Afterglow and Tortellini – I have never ridden either of those at night, I had forgotten what an awesome trail Afterglow is. Back up the Link to the Cookie where the other riders light started to fade really badly, he went back down the road again and I shot down Raceface to the carpark.

Out on the trail for about an hour and half, it was a good ride. I started off riding like a muppet and fell over once and dabbed a couple of times on roots on the climb up Powerball, once I had my balance dialled in again things went well.

Though I didn’t stat for the post ride BBQ I was talking to 1 of the old school riders after the ride and he passed on a second hand comment on my trail extension. Earlier that night he had been speaking to one of the original trail builders from the bike park, the guy who built all the great trails, he had ridden my extension that day and had commented that it was good… now that is what I like to hear…

Trainer bike

I have borrowed my brother in laws mag trainer again as he has finished with it for a while.

I have set the Cindercone up on it and took it for a spin last night. I hadnt been on a bike for 5 weeks and my thighs were still sore from the night befores run.

I did a nice 40 minute session, I didnt work too hard, but steam was coming off my arms before I had finished so it wasn't too light either.

I aim to get back to doing 2 hours sessions once or twice a week and at least 1 or 2 shorter sessions. I now have a lot more video to watch so it shouldn'get too boring for a while.

Test run for the new shoes

I finally took the new shoes for a test run last night. It was a very cool night, but no cloud and no wind, so nice for running. Though I did find all the wood smoke from home fires to be quite annoying.

I did the 8.5km Godley/Portage/Astley/Taupo route as it is a good tester when I haven’t been out for a while, though it is one of my least favourite runs. The run started off well I had a good pace going down Godley Rd, hit the first Km mark at 4:43. I pulled the pace back a bit as I knew I could not sustain that for 8.5 kms. It the 4.4 km mark at 20 minutes which was still too quick. Dropped the pace up the Astley hill as I was starting to feel the affects and all those parts of me that can hurt during a run were hurting all at once. I picked the pace up again when I hit Godley for the run home. Ended up doing a 43:30 which I believe is the fastest I have done that loop. Though it felt very slow in the middle.

The shoes were Ok, I had a bit of pain in 1 foot, but I am not sure of that is shoe related or just the fact I hadn’t run or a few weeks. I also had

Sore lungs and throat from the cold air.
A really bad stitch at the 3 km mark
Sore legs, thighs still tender today
Sore chest muscles
Sore ears from the cold as I had just had a haircut.

The price I pay for running!

I have borrowed the bike trainer from my bro in law again and have the Cindercone all set up, going to give that a go tonight.

4 weeks till the Woodhill 12 hour.

New running shoes

I finally caved in and bought some new running shoes - Asics Landreths for $230. it hurt...

I have had them for 4 days and have yet to test them out. I was going to run saturday afternoon as the weather was superb but when I returned from track building I was under orders to go out and we didn't get home until after 23:00.

Nice day today (sunday) and may try and squeeze a quick run in this afternoon, but I also have to be home with number 2 son who is grounded and take a quick ride down to the motor vehicle testing station to meet my daughter who is taking her car for its first warrant of fitness.

damn - will have to watch football.

Track extension is now finished

Yesterday I went back up to the first and finally I have finished extending the No Brakes trail, there is now a very fresh additional 700 metres in the middle of the trail. I am pleased and 1 day I will even get to ride it.

Yesterday was another 'official' bike parks digging day so I rocked up early and was given the use of a bike parks grom to help finish off the last section of my track, so with the extra help I was done in an hour and a half.

The grom and I then joined in with 4 others to help build a few extra bits of track for the Woodhill 12 hour event at the end of July. It is going to feel good racing on tracks that I have help build. Much as I love to ride single track, we made these short sections fairly wide to give plenty of passing room. The section we were building is going to be a downhill section in the long term but for the event it is being used for a short and not too steep climb, hene the width. Designing uphill and downhill is quite different though so it was quite interesting trying to look at how the trail would be ridden to design the best lines when it is going to be ridden in different directions.

I am 'racing', maybe I should say, riding in the event in a 4 man single speed team. All guys I have ridden with before, 1 from the 24 hour of N-Duro in Feb and the other 2 from the Moonride 24 hour hour. Really looking forward to it, though I have not been on the bike in 6 weeks so really need to kick the training off this week.

Its winter - laziness has struck.

Well it has been a fairly busy few weeks with work and an extremely lazy 2 weeks when it comes to any form of exercise. I have barely moved at all in the last 10 days. The weather has really packed a sad and my big plans to get out and run have just not come to fruition. I have sort of been blaming this on a lack of decent running shoes as my current pair are stuffed, but I know even if they were in the worn in comfortable prime I would still be sitting on the couch in the evenings and not getting out in the cold wind and rain for a run.

Last weekend we had our work mid-year function and I drank way way way to much. Felt like absolute crap all day Saturday, did not even move for a coffee until 1.00 PM. I have now vowed to not drink until the end of July at the earliest. It can only be a good thing ! I am so so glad I stuck to white wine and nothing else, 1 whisky and I think I would still be suffering.

Sunday I went out looking for running shoes, I know what I want and I really do not want to have to pay $250 for them, but it looks like I am going to have to. – Damnit

Watched lots of world cup football though – go England

New seat post

I finally got around to collecting - and paying for - a new seat post for the single speed. I bent the original DMR post at the Moonride a few weeks back. I have kept the old one in the spares box as it is only slightly out of straight, just enough to make it tough to drop and raise the post.

The new post is a Phillips. It is about 2 inches longer than the DMR post which means I can raise it to full XC mode and leave enough in the seatpost tube to not put too much strain on the frame, guess I am more likely to bend it like that though. It is also a twin bolt tube which I do like. The DMR post did not allow me to move my seat forward much below horizontal, though I do like to have the seat a couple of degrees below that.

I took it for a test spin around the streets on Sunday and it felt so nice, high and positioned nice. Hopefully get to take it down to Rotorua this weekend for a run on the single track.

And yet more digging

Went back up to the track again today and got another good 3 hours of raking and digging in. I took the old work digital camera up and snapped a couple of out of focus shots.

I took the rake as well as the spade up to day and it was very useful in clearing the pine needles from the trail.

My plan was to leave the spade on the track and then start walking and rake the trail debris until I hit a patch that requires spade work, then walk back to the spade marking the edge of the trail with logs as I went, then walk back to the rake clearing anything that needed clearing. The plan worked well and I got an awful lot more work down than last week. The most time consuming part of the work was finding decent enough pieces of wood to mark the edge of the trail.







I had to redesign a couple of corners that just did not flow well and I also built a couple of small berms on off camber corners to keep the flow going.

I raked out and marked the trail to completion and kinda left it obvious to riders that there is a new bit of trail to ride.

When I got home I made a couple of small signs to stick on the start and exit of the new section from a couple of liberated old real estate signs.





Sadly I will have to dig again next week, but that should be the end of it and I can go ride again.

South Island work trip

I had a work trip to 3 of our South Island offices last week. I flew into Christchurch, drove the 2 hours to Timaru with the Christchurch manager and back again and then flew to Invercargill the next day and on to home.

It was a good trip, the weather on Thursday was just stunning, crystal clear cloudless skies on the way to christchurch afforded stunning views. I spent 2 hours in the Christchurch office which was good and then we dove down to Timaru, nice trip, flat straight road for 2 hours - luckily the Chch manager was good company. enjoyed the Timary visit and the lift back to Chch.

Thursday night I went to a bar in Chch to meet with a few of the South Island Vorb Mafia, who I had never met before. 7 of them turned up ! had a great evening. I like Christchurch more and more every time I visit. I have long thought that Aucklanders are an unsocialble lot, there would never be 7 Aucklanders turn up to meet a fellow biker from another town. There is also some awesome riding to be had around there as well, way way way better than here. Good on ya Christchurch.

Fridays trip to Invercargill was Ok, flight there and back was a bit choppy and cloudy. Spent 3 hours in the office and they were a pretty good bunch as well.

it was a pretty good trip.

Football world cup

Well we had a long weekend in NZ this weekend, Monday was Queens Birthday so we all celebrated in style, I got out of bed at 11.00.

Well I initially got out of bed at 3:25 AM and went around to a friends house to watch New Zealand get beaten 4-0 by Brazil in a pre-Football world cup friendly match. Apart from that the weekend was a waste. I spent all day Sunday waiting at home by myself for someone to come and pick up the bunk bed they have bought of us - som miscommunication means they are not coming around till next weekend. I did get out for a run yesterday and planned on doing 13-14 km but it rained really really really hard so I went home after 6.5 kms'. And that was it for training or any other sporting activities this weekend. 3 whole days off work squandered, and today was a nice sunny, though cold, day. Family day !

The Football world cup starts next weekend and being English I will be watching as much as I can. so I expect to not get a lot of running or riding in over the next month. Though next Saturday I do intend on doing some more track work...

Dig dig dig

Went back up to Woodhill again today to carry on working on the track extension. I haven't done any work on this track for a few weeks and the pine needles were thick on the ground again. I seemed to spend more time clearing the trail so it is visible than actually doing the work I intended which was building a sand 'bridge' over some imbedded logs that I could not dig out, realigning a couple of off-camber corners and smoothing some climbs.

The problem with Woodhill being sand based (and very easy to make tracks in) is if you not get lines right or leave downhill corners off camber then you get a lot of nasty wear on the track. Hopefully as this bit of track is quite a way from the carpark it will only be ridden by reasonably experienced riders who will not brake through bends and knowhow to ride the pinch climbs without digging holes in the surface.

I was hoping to get most of the work completed today, but finished about 100 of the 700 metres of track. I walked the rest though so the line is still sort of visible though I do need to more clearly mark it out as it is in quite a dense part of the forest and a lot of needles and brances fall.

Went home after 3 hours which is when I promised my wife I would be home, she was out with number 2 son and when they got home they all disappeared again leaving me home alone... I could have finished the trail if I had known.

Went for a sifty urban spin on the single speed for 40 minutes, it was good to be back in the saddle again.

Plan to get up and run tomorrow morning though.

Mid-week runs

After my weekend run and my decision to try some electonica to run to I threw a post up on vorb.org.nz asking for thoughts on good electronic music for running to. Being an old punker I had no idea what artists – DJs – whatever fit into any genre that would be good to run, I do know that drum and bass wouldn’t work and that is it. I did get a whole bunch of suggestions, including a few not too obvious ones like old industrial bands like Front 242 and KMFDM.

I found a few “samples” on the internet and loaded up the MP3 playing phone and took off for a 10k night run on Tuesday night. I was planning on doing the last of the "hog" runs but my daughters car broke down so I had to pick her up and go wait for the tow truck, luckily the repairs only cost $45 - new fan belt.

The night was cool and clear with no wind, a perfect night for running. Some of the music worked and some didn’t, but I kept up a good pace, including the climb and posted a 51:21 – the fastest I have ever completed this loop in ever. Do not know if the music worked or not but after I had warmed up I quite quickly got in to that place where the mind goes blank and I can just run without thinking about anything except the rhythm of my breathing and running. I love a run like this, I am just so mentally refreshed when I get back – invigorating !

I followed that up the next night with a short run home from the salon where my daughter works, 23 minutes, not sure of the distance, felt good again but decided to take today off and aim to get a 20km run at the weekend.

The one issue is my road shoes are stuffed, my left shoe squeaks really badly and is quite annoying and I am starting to ‘feel’ the road through the sole as well. I have been looking for more road shoes but at $220 - $250 for a decent pair of Mizunos or Asics I am going to have to wait a few weeks. Will aim to do an “off road “Exhibition drive run at the weekend where I can use the Vasques without wearing them out too much.

Listening to bad Techno now to find appropriate vocal less tracks.

Track digging day

I did not get out for a ride again this weekend, this is getting to be a bit repetetive, but that is life I guess.

I had a good reason this weekend not to ride as I did go track building up at the Bikepark on an official track building day. Considering that it had been hammering down with rain for the past week and was raining at the scheduled start time it was amazing that close to 20 people turned up to help cut a new trail.

The Bikeparks crew had marked out the basic plan so it was a simple matter of following along the path with a rake and a shovel. I was in a nice small crew building berms at the tail of the group. The Woodhill forest is sand based so trail building is a relative breeze, and building berms is simple...

I spent half a day there and had a good time building berms with a couple of riders I know well. The track is going to be really good once it has been completed.

Went out for a run in the afternoon, ran from home up through Titirangi and out along Exhibition drive. I had had some yoghurt for lunch a couple of hours before and it really did not sit well in my stomach. I was burping the whole way and was really quite uncomfortable. I did keep a reasonable pace up considering so was fairly happy.

I have decided I am going to try running with some electronic music with no vocals. I find that I spend too much time singing in my head to the lyrics and not concentrating on what I am doing. I also pace myself to the song which means I am sometimes going too fast for the run. For the longer runs I do need to hit that magic pace and then zone out, I am hoping that listening to some repetetive musix will allow that to happen. I am not sure if I can do 2 + hours of running with no music - though running to electronic dance music could be interesting as I am not a fan.

Loaded hog run - again

I did the Loaded Hog 5km fun run last night for the first time in weeks.

The weather had been dubious all day but it did not actually rain until I got out of my parked car just up from the Hog. In the end i decided to run without a rain jacket, which was the wise decision as it stopped raining 10 minutes into the run.

I felt good for most of the run, I thought I had kept a consistent pace throughout the run, but half way split was 11:08 and my full run time was 23:01 so a minute slower on the return leg. I was hoping to do under 23 minutes and was a bit gutted to do 23:01. Oh well...

next week is the final run for the series so I will dig it in a bit harder and get that sub 23 again.

Bought a live Get up Kids CD, yesterday it is pretty good, needs to played at some volume though.

Listening to Monster Magnet tonight.

Quick zap around the bike park

I got up this morning with aching legs and stiff hips, I had not felt this bad after a run for a quite a long time so it was definately a good wake up call if I am planning on doing any long runs this winter. I wasnt sure how the ride would go so planned on taking it easy. I had not arranged to ride with anyone nd was hoping to see some one in the car park to ride with, but having said - I do like to ride on my own.

I was a bit stiff getting up the entrance trail but by the time I got to Spaghetti my legs had freed up and I was ready to ride comfortably. There was two events on at the park today so the place was a bit of a zoo, at the end of the Spag. trail I had to ride the road up to the northern end as the middle block was closed for a race, I also found out that most of the northern block was closed for an event as well so I did a sneaky couple of trails between races and then shot back out on the road for the long haul back to the carpark.

So a short ride, mostly on the road, but my less felt OK, though they have tightened up now.

I discovered yesterday when I was getting the bike ready that I have bent the seapost on the DMR. It is a very thin post at 25.8 - so I may have a bit of fun finding one. I tried the Freeriden shop on the way back today but they didnt have one. At least it is rideable.

19.5 km run

I was intending on getting some trail work done this morning and finally finishing the addition to my old trail, but as usual time and family conspired against me. I spent the morning doing odd jobs around the home and cleaning up the trenches that had been dug in my front lawn by various cars over the past 7 days. I did clean the single speed from last weekends 24 hour ride and have that ready for riding tomorrow.

After dropping youngest son off at a friends house so he can go camping tonight - (man that is going to me cold) I went up to Exhibition Drive to get an afternoon run in.

The weather was almost perfect for a run, cool and cloudy but with an unwelcome light wind that hit at the depressing 500 meters to half way on each lap point. I intended on doing 2 laps of the 6.5 km circuit, but after lap 1 I was feeling good and decided to go for 3 laps if at the end of lap 2 I was still perky. Lap 1 went in a respectable 35 minutes, for the first half of laptop 2 I ran about 50 metres behind a girl for the whole way, I just couldn't catch her but did a reasonable time and ended up with a 36 minute lap. I started lap 3 feeling good but about quarter of the way round really started to feel it in my legs, I made it to the end without stopping, but it was a tough run, the last lap took 39 minutes. Total for 19.5 km was 1 hour 50 which was Ok considering I have not run that sort of distance for probably 10 months.

I am thinking of doing my first half marathon in almost a year at the start of July so now I know I can do it, I will squeeze in some decent training and it should be easy. Except for the climb up Mt Wellington ! Am thinking of doing the full Auckland marathon in October - but I thought that last year and ended up doing a 12 hour solo mountain bike ride instead.

Also going to do the 12 hours of Woodhill race in July in a team of 4 Single Speeders. All ready have Mikey from the Moonride signed up and the mad 24 hour solo SS'er Paul keen to do a team race. Will train for that to...

Quick ride in the morning as I have to pick up number 2 at 12 so car is packed and ready to go.

Listening to The Get up Kids again, havent listened to them in a while, they are so cool.

Moonride 24 hour event

The Moonride 24 hour and 12 hour team bike race is an annual event in Rotorua. Last year I competed as a 12 hour soloist – it was my first attempt at a solo 12 hour and it went well- I didn’t come last !

This year I organised a single speed team in the 24 hour event, the intention was to have a team of 5 but after 2 drop-outs we ended up with a team of 4 with a couple of people who were in geared teams volunteering to do a lap for us on a single speed. Our team site was also hosting a 24 hour single speed soloist and his wife who was crewing. I was the oldest guy in the team by 10 years and had never met 1 team member before so it was going to be an interesting weekend.

The week before the race the weather was pretty lousy, heavy rain across the north island and Friday dawned cloudy, when team member number 2 arrived in his rented camper things were looking decidedly average. The forecast was good for the duration of the race, though I took a ton of gear with me in case. Rider number 2 had decided to rent a camper van with 3 beds, cooker, fridge etc so we would have a bit of comfort for the event. We loaded up my crap and the mighty DMR and left home at 9.30 AM to pick up rider number 3 in Hamilton, about 120 kms away. The drive to the Tron was wet and windy with some very heavy rain storm! After picking up rider 3 we continued heading south towards Rotorua, luckily the weather got better and better as the further sough we got. We had a quick stop in Rotorua for a BK power lunch and then shot out to the site to pre-ride the circuit as the event starts at 10.00 PM and we wanted a quick squiz first.


As we found out at the race briefing a few hours later, the course had to be redesigned 2 days before due to the rain so there was a lot more fire road than we and the designers would have liked, but the single track that was there was just lovely. The course was just over 8km long with a gentle 1 km climb and a correspondingly sexy downhill! Towards the end of the single track the trail took a sudden hard left turn and I commented to the others that someone would take out the marker tape on the first lap and chaos would ensue – sadly I was correct ! The course was fun, but I think we were all glad we pre-rode it before the night time start.

After the pre-ride we went back into town to complete registration and then headed back to the site to find a spot for the camper. We had the perfect place, on the hard park car park, 20 metres from the finish line, with a portaloo hidden behind some other caravans about 50 metres away. Mad solo turned up soon after us and we got the site set up with an easy-up next to the caravan and a ‘borrowed’ bit of fencing that made a great bike rack, until the race organisers took it back just before race start. We were onsite at 4.30 PM though the race did not start to 10.00 so there was a quite a bit of sifting around chatting to old friends for a while. Ride number 4 turned up at 8.00 PM and we were ready to race.

As always I did the first lap, it does not bother me, but most people just do not seem to like doing it. The lap started with a 1600 metre ride along a flat tarmac road which just sucks on a single speed with 32:18 gearing, when we did hit the forest I was closer to the back than the front. The first lap went Ok until we hit the section of trail with the hard left and the now missing tape. The group I was in got lost and we ended up back on the up hill fire road and went back to the start line. The first lap took me 33 minutes which ended up being consistent with my average so it was not too bad. Mad soloist got lost in another group and ended up taking 45 minutes and a rider from our neighbours got lost in further group and was gone for an hour 15. We were lucky… I did a double lap and then got back to the camper for some rest. All the other riders did single laps so I was back out sooner than I wanted to be and it was starting to get cold, down to 1 degree at 5.00 AM. The night laps were fun, I did 6 laps in the dark. On my 4th lap my light went and I could see nothing, the rutted bumpy downhill in the dark was a real challenge. I did not get much sleep during the night, it was cold and I was out riding every couple of hours.
The day dawned sunny and soon warmed up, this certainly raised everyone spirits. The 12 hour teams started at 10:00 AM and we had the deck chairs out by the start line to heckle/cheer/jeer friends and soloists as they went past.
Our guest riders did their laps during the day so I got some nice length breaks, and mainly did single lap circuits as well, trying to post the fastest lap, rider four got the quest in at 27 something and it was close who came second or third with two of us posting times in the mid 29’s.

I gave the bike its one and only service during the day and apart from some clogged up brake it worked very well.

Mad solo bugger
By the end of the day the mud was getting very sticky, there was one point just before the start of the climb that became un-rideable on the single speed, the mud was just so sticky that all momentum was lost and as it was the start of a light climb I ended up getting off and running up – it was quicker.

My 11 and 12th and final lap was started at 7.30 and I was pretty broken by the end of it, I walked the ‘big’ hill and was passed by mad soloist on his 34th lap still riding….

The team did OK, we came 32 out of 56 in the open category which was Ok considering there was only 4 of us and we were on SS’s. Mad soloist came 3rd in his category which was very cool for him, though he has sworn to never do a 24 hour single speed again.

49 hours till the Moonride

49 hours until the start of the 2006 Moonride 24 event. I can never really call these things races as I only ever intend on finishing.

This year we have a team of 4 single speeders, was meant to be 5 but 1 team member disappeared. Last year I did the 12 hour solo, so this should be a breeze.

The DMR is going well, it is cleaned and lubed and the bike box is packed, so I am half ready to go. Friday morning I am being picked up by Thorg a fellow Vorber from Whangarei in a rented camper and we will head to Rotorua.

Forecast is average, Friday showers, Saturday fine, Sunday rain. Hopefully Sunday's rain will not come early as the race finishes 10.00 PM Saturday night.

I am reasonably pumped for this...

Dirty Riverhead Winter Ride

Had a most awesome ride today. Organised by the Freeriden shop guys, the first of,what will hopefully be, a series of Riverhead rides. The weather had been pretty bad during the week with some quite heavy rain - Riverhead is clay based and does not like rain, Saturday however was a great day for riding, sunny with a gentle breeze. 21 riders turned up for the 18km afternoon ride which is a large number by Auckland standards.














The ride was a mix of slippery, gluey, dirty generally downhill single track and nice stony climbs. The single speed worked a treat and I managed to get up most of the hills, some of the greasy clay was impossible (for me) to climb, in fact it was hard to walk in some places. Though I easily cleared this climb, but the boys on the heavy free ride bikes with an extra 5 kilos of clay stuck to their wheels did not find the up hills as much fun as me. 1 of the back 2 riders broke his rear free wheel so had no pedals. We had 1 read deraileur snap off and 2 flats, but apart from that it was an injury and damage free ride.













I walked down 1 steepish section but otherwise stayed on the bike for the rest of the ride.Thats me at the top in the black shirt













It was damn good dirty muddy fun...













The bike the next day before it was cleaned. The big chunks were scraped off before I put the bike in trhe car to come home.

The Stairs

I work on the 18th, and top, floor of my building. Well my empoyers are only on that floor so it is hardly the whole building. The main foyer is on level 4 and this week I have started walking the stairs with an aim to walk them at least once a day. So far so good - I acheived that goal succesfully last week with a slightly better time each day, I am sucking serious air at the top of the 14 flights though.