Coomealla 3 Hour
It never really seems to be dull around us, something always seems to be going on/wrong... And this weekend was no exception.
Coomealla were to hold their first enduro race this weekend, just down the road from dear old Mildura. For those of you that don't know how far that is from Melbourne, think of a really long time, and keep going a few hours after that. Its a way let me tell you, especially for the weekend. But Jack and I both had separate family reasons to go, and we made all involved happy. (Except for Jack's family who probably wish he would go home right now, but more on that later.)
Friday arvo we arrived and settled in, tried to stretch out the knots from the van (unsuccessfully) and collapsed in front of the crystal bucket early. Saturday we hooked up for a ride along the Murray, in Jack old stomping ground, and it was good fun. Other than 1)the sand and 2) Jack's apparent lack of understanding of the concept called going slow, it was a pleasant few hours exploring stuff I'd never ridden, but somehow I managed to get my shoes wet and nearly, very nearly my whole body on a magical little hole that opened up during one river crossing...
This was where I nearly went over the bars... (Jack laughed a lot) My front wheel just dissapeared into a hole under water, clouded by Jack having ridden through, and I had to jump over the bars and run to stay balanced. Wet feet, wet bike, boo for me...
Posting this photo is where I get him back for laughing!
The trusty and oh-so-comfy steeds!
So we found this little cliff section with some blue sky and red dirt, got a little arty and decided correctly that we were better riders than snappers and moved on... The riding along the river is super fun, although it has been butchered a bit by the moto's but the rabbit and roo tracks are a blast, as well as the hard packed fire roads for transfers. And after much trepidation about the horrid prickles known as 3 corner jacks, I can say that we didn't get a single puncture - tubeless rocks!
DSC, DRNE, whoever they are these day, confused us by these clever info boards... Invisible ink perhaps?!
And onto the race we went... Well, I went. I got a text at about 7am from Jack saying 'sick, not coming' basically. I decided a half litre of 'hard'n-da-f#$k-up' would pep him up, but he was cactus and so we left him to die in peace. To put it in perspective, Jack had driven 7 hours, primed himself, thrown up every 10 minutes for 12 hours and had me in his ear telling him harden up (jk) and still pulled the pin. Just as well too, as he got smart and spent the next 6 hours in hospital trying to get stabilized, 2 bags of IV goodness and even today he still can't keep food down. No idea why, its a mystery...
but back to the racing. I lined up without Jack for the start, with the rest of the competitors. A nice low key club race was pleasant and without further delay we were counted in to 10am and away we went. The Kynton SC boys were up on holidays and set an early pace, but I wandered past them and off into the distance for the rest of the race, destined to ride solo. Struggling to concentrate midway through the race was a difficulty with the temperature rising and the wind howling on the course. But that was the height of the difficulty really. Never headed, I rolled around to take the win, enjoying the course without mountains but some really flowy single track and fun sand for a change.
And that was all folks. We stuck around for presentation, everyone had a great day out there, the club asked us to pass on the fact that there is some great fun riding for all abilities in the area, so if you are ever up there you should take a bike!
And check out this gem- this is what Jack used to get around on. 3 Wheels, dad fabrications, flat tyres and goes as hard as the day it was welded together!
Checking if that bit of chewy he stuck there 17 years ago was still good..
And it even wheelies!!
Coomealla were to hold their first enduro race this weekend, just down the road from dear old Mildura. For those of you that don't know how far that is from Melbourne, think of a really long time, and keep going a few hours after that. Its a way let me tell you, especially for the weekend. But Jack and I both had separate family reasons to go, and we made all involved happy. (Except for Jack's family who probably wish he would go home right now, but more on that later.)
Friday arvo we arrived and settled in, tried to stretch out the knots from the van (unsuccessfully) and collapsed in front of the crystal bucket early. Saturday we hooked up for a ride along the Murray, in Jack old stomping ground, and it was good fun. Other than 1)the sand and 2) Jack's apparent lack of understanding of the concept called going slow, it was a pleasant few hours exploring stuff I'd never ridden, but somehow I managed to get my shoes wet and nearly, very nearly my whole body on a magical little hole that opened up during one river crossing...
This was where I nearly went over the bars... (Jack laughed a lot) My front wheel just dissapeared into a hole under water, clouded by Jack having ridden through, and I had to jump over the bars and run to stay balanced. Wet feet, wet bike, boo for me...
Posting this photo is where I get him back for laughing!
The trusty and oh-so-comfy steeds!
So we found this little cliff section with some blue sky and red dirt, got a little arty and decided correctly that we were better riders than snappers and moved on... The riding along the river is super fun, although it has been butchered a bit by the moto's but the rabbit and roo tracks are a blast, as well as the hard packed fire roads for transfers. And after much trepidation about the horrid prickles known as 3 corner jacks, I can say that we didn't get a single puncture - tubeless rocks!
DSC, DRNE, whoever they are these day, confused us by these clever info boards... Invisible ink perhaps?!
And onto the race we went... Well, I went. I got a text at about 7am from Jack saying 'sick, not coming' basically. I decided a half litre of 'hard'n-da-f#$k-up' would pep him up, but he was cactus and so we left him to die in peace. To put it in perspective, Jack had driven 7 hours, primed himself, thrown up every 10 minutes for 12 hours and had me in his ear telling him harden up (jk) and still pulled the pin. Just as well too, as he got smart and spent the next 6 hours in hospital trying to get stabilized, 2 bags of IV goodness and even today he still can't keep food down. No idea why, its a mystery...
but back to the racing. I lined up without Jack for the start, with the rest of the competitors. A nice low key club race was pleasant and without further delay we were counted in to 10am and away we went. The Kynton SC boys were up on holidays and set an early pace, but I wandered past them and off into the distance for the rest of the race, destined to ride solo. Struggling to concentrate midway through the race was a difficulty with the temperature rising and the wind howling on the course. But that was the height of the difficulty really. Never headed, I rolled around to take the win, enjoying the course without mountains but some really flowy single track and fun sand for a change.
And that was all folks. We stuck around for presentation, everyone had a great day out there, the club asked us to pass on the fact that there is some great fun riding for all abilities in the area, so if you are ever up there you should take a bike!
And check out this gem- this is what Jack used to get around on. 3 Wheels, dad fabrications, flat tyres and goes as hard as the day it was welded together!
Checking if that bit of chewy he stuck there 17 years ago was still good..
And it even wheelies!!
posted by Ash Thomas at 5:39 pm
1 Comments:
hey ash... I was the rider from the bicycle superstore who u followed for the first little bit of the race then u just rode awawy.. i dont know why everyone thinks im from kyton.. i live about 4 hours from there..haha
Could u help me out and link me to your blog.. www.kiddracing.blogspot.com
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