KONA 24Hour

C

Cúl-Báire

Likes Bikes and Dirt
Well I presume some of you saw the topic in the watering hole about the Kona 24hour...Well it's been run (rode?) and Won (not by us :p ). But we sure did have fun!

Velophile organized a team of 6 riders from all over the globe, well Victoria anyways...And then it was on!!!

Friday: Was probably the most "intersting" day, Not only did I get to meet another farkin member (Velophile), but also some other team mates, Jukka and Julie (support crew, I hope I got the names right?); Both avid enduro fans, have competed in many enduro races...including this year's Mont 24Hour. :D
A group ride of the course, gave us an idea of what to expect, rocks, rockgradens, singletrack, fast fireroads and lots of fun! Most of the course was ridable for us mere "punters'"...With a team name Pub Bicycle User Group, I'm sure we weren't ment to be taking the event too seriousliy.

Saturday Race Day/Night: A good nights sleep and an early start to the day ensured that everything was ready, 12Noon start seemed such a long wait compared to my usual 10:30 race start times... After meeting two other team mates single speeders Stu, and Troy (that makes 3 including Velophile, carzy bastards) it was almost time for the race to begin :p I ended up being the first on track, after mentioning that I didn't mind starting :oops:
It began...A short run for the bikes, and then a shortish sprint for cash, around the end padock section of the course. Then it was onto the 24hours! Being the starter I got to experience the craziness for the first few km's bikes, people everywhere, fallers, mechanicals and what-not were numerious in number... After coming in with a big smile it was time to hand over to my team mates :D

Night time soon approched us, all of the team was looking really geared up for the night laps; I'm sure the caffine Steve fed us all helped with that sensation :p Night time was an exciting, but scary and even boring (waiting) time for me, as I hadn't really done many night rides.... Night time went off pretty much without a hitch for the team, minus a few spills...but before long the sun was up again.

Sunday Morning, The Countdown: Early to rise, I woke up to the sound of the comentator (on the PA) scaring the shit out of me; realized it would be my time back on track. The 7:30am ride was great way to wake up, but with the sun beating down it soon become really warm out on course... I was thankful to get back to the transition area, where I finaly got to meet our 6th rider, Paul (he arrived Sunday Morn)...

The waiting begins, to see if Paul is back before the 12:10pm finish. Paul got back from his second (straight) lap right before the finish, meaning Jukka had to go out again, for a final lap; he made it a pretty quick one too, great considering we were all suffering from sleep ddeprivation, heat exastion, and whatever else you could thing off (sore balls :p , legs etc...). It was over finaly after 25hours 20Minutes (guesstament)!

Well that was "my race", Steve add you race report here too... Sorry I got in first, but god your slow, busy catching up on sleep prehaps? :p

I would love to thank Steve (Velophile), Jukka, Julie, Stu, Troy and Paul for a great weekend and all the help, especialy Steve for the transport and such :) Also big up the FullGasPromotions team who did a great job of runnig the event, easily the best I've been too :wink:[/b]
 
V

Velophile

Likes Dirt
Yeah, I'm slow posting as well as riding. :wink: Lotsa work right now.

Well my first MTB enduro & first time getting a team together went better than expected. Of the 6 team members I'd only met 2 beforehand & only really ridden with one. 2 weeks before the event I was still posting for riders & Emailing people to get the team together. As Aaron said, we came together from all over Victoria, from Geelong to Wodonga. We didn't take it too seriously & had a huge amount of fun. That said we had someone out riding for all of the 24 hours, finishing with 19 laps, even squeezing in a last lap at the last possible minute.
The whole event had a great vibe & I kept meeting people I knew or had ridden with. It's a great course with something for everyone, rocks, logs, narrow trees, wicked switchbacks, flatout flowing singletrack & even faster fireroad.
Highlights
Racing a mob of kangaroos on the practice lap.
Finishing my second night lap near dawn as the moon set.
Cleaning each chalenging trail section at night.

Thanks to Aaron, Jukka, Stu, Troy & Paul for being a great team. Huge thanks to Kristan & crew at Full Gas Promotions for putting on such a great event.
 
S

Simo

Likes Bikes and Dirt
spewing i missed out. If you think steve was slow imagine if I was there :lol:
always next year, by then i'll be bigger, fatter and slower so you may not want to invite me afterall.
 
H

hippy

Likes Bikes
Hippy's Kona 24hr RR

Fri night:
Madly buy camp gear, food and other nicnacs and pack it for race.

Sat:
5.30am: Wake, shower eat some weatbix and pack everything into
car (inc. Avanti gearie and GT SS).

7.15am:
Arrive at Troy's place worried that there is actually
no room for anything of his!

7.30am:
Leave Troy's with all his stuff (inc. On-One SS) packed.

9am:
Arrive at Redesdale and setup bikes and everything else, except
tents, which can wait until later (when it's even hotter!).
We sit under the shade provided by Steve and Jukka's tarp
arrangement, get ourselves registered (collecting a horrid, evil,
black, drink-approximation and not paying the $5 mtba fee??).
After attending the race briefing we send our first rider to the
line. Jukka was all set to draw straws to decide the first rider
until Aaron "volunteered" to go off first. ;)

12pm: The start was a 400m run along the campsite from the
transition tent, around the corner through the entrance gate
and up Mt. Lofty Road to where handlers waited, holding the
runner's bikes.
Once riders had grabbed their bikes, there was a short prologue
course before returning through the transition start/finish line.
The first rider to complete the prologue won $100. I think it
someone mentioned Sid Taberlay winning this?
Wisely, Aaron took it easy at the start and followed most of
the bunch through - after all this was only 5mins worth of a
24hr race!
Start-line antics consisted of one male rider stripping off
normal clothes to reveal a (SBR?) bikini, complete with major
wedgie action - a technique to scare away other racers perhaps?
Another rider decided to do their first lap aboard Kona's
ridiculous (but oh so cool!) BikeHotRod
(http://www.konaworld.com/2k4bikes/2k4_bhr.cfm).
The ss gearing looked super-low and I don't think this
machine would even fit through most of the twisty singletrack!

12:30pm:
Back to Tarp City to hydrate, eat and talk crap.

4pm:
My first lap is shocking...
I'm nervous and too excited. I go out too hard so that I'm
nearly hurling. It's really hot and I've had too long off the
bike before the event.
The track starts with unsealed road, and moves into some
seriously fun, twisty singletrack that has riders dodging trees,
left then right, down, hairpin, flick the back around, pedal out
from the corner, fast down, flick back around tree, "damn, those
trees look close together.." BANG! Bars smack into one of them.
At least I know I'm not the only one to do this as there are
bar-height marks on both trees already!
The uphill firetrail and heat cane me but there's nothing really
steep and they link to a lot of singletrack which is really fun
and gives riders a rest.
Some rocky sections, where I'd dabbed lots during a practise ride
a few weeks before, I managed to clean. I was trying so hard I
didn't even notice the rock drop until I'd plowed right over it!
Nice :) Pity I couldn't bring myself to do it again for the other
two laps.
Mid-lap I do what everyone says not to do - I try something new -
a gel. A few minutes later, lunch almost comes back to say "hi".
A short and steep ascent had me pushing the bike uphill which at
least gave the backside a rest.
I cross the line looking like death on two wheels and the
commentator comes over with the mic and comments on me doing it
tough. He spots the fact I'm racing in my sneakers with flat
pedals, wearing board-shorts and pays me out about it. I mention
something about crashing lots and needing to get my feet out
quick. I think I was one of the only riders on flat pedals and
I won some patches and tyre levers for it. Lap time was 1:17, or
about 30 minutes slower than the fast riders!

6pm:
Eating, drinking lots of Gatorade and the best bit.. showering!

9pm: Wood-fired, teriyaki chicken pizza from the stall. Yummo!

11pm: My second lap. This one is at night. Uh oh! I've never
ridden real mtb tracks at night - this is going to be
interesting. I strap the 10W Vistalite to my helmet with the
battery in my Camelbak and attach the 5w onto my bars with
battery strapped to the Avanti's downtube. Head over to the
transition area and wait for Steve to show...
High five Steve and I'm off and racing. This time I force myself
to take it easy at the start and with no sun I'm wearing a wind
vest over my jersey - much more comfortable - except it's all
dark.
I quickly forget about being worried about the darkness and
start having fun shining my lights around the bush. I've never
used a helmet light before (good prep eh?!) and it makes it
heaps easier to ride twisty or fast sections as the light is
higher and shines where you are looking, not where the bars are
pointing. Glad I bought that helmet mount now...
I managed to go over the bars in a slightly rocky section this
lap. A short time later when looking for the distance remaining,
I noticed I didn't have a speedo! No, wait. I did have one, it
was dangling off the bars - I'd snapped it off at the mount.
Hey! It was still reading the k's :)
About 3/4's of the way around the track my helmet light starts
dying. I make do with the bar light and only switch the 10W on
when it gets twisty. Doing so squeezes out all the sweat in my
helmet pads.. yay! another shower! :)
With a kay to go, my helmet light is totally dead and I'm
forced to try and work my way around the last paddock section,
which is scattered with rocks (lots of 'em, hidden in the
long grass).
I do the best I can but end up losing the track. I can see the
finish line from here and just head towards it. Over the line
with a 1:33 lap time, I hand my pump to Troy and he sets off
to set another blinder of a lap. Even in the dark, on a
singlespeed, this guy's flying...
Even though I was slower, I felt heaps better this lap and
ended up with the biggest smile on my face. It was only out
of consideration for the poor, sleeping masses that stopped
me screaming out "YEAAAH!".

1am+: Not sure of the time but after putting the 10W's battery
on charge I try and go to sleep. All I can remember doing is
shivering, no sleep, just laying in a sleeping bag shivering.
All too soon, I hear Jukka return and Steve head out - something
had happened to Steve's lights, I think, so he had come back to
camp to fix them.

5am: I crawl out of bed and put on lots of clothes... I was
soo cold! Eat, drink and grab lights I'm ready to go again. By
now we had a pretty good idea of everyone's times ('cept maybe
mine!) so waiting at transition wasn't too bad.

5.30am: Third lap was the dawn lap..
I thought it was too dark at the start to end up seeing sunrise
but one of the other guys on the line was sure we'd get it.
I was pretty buggered now, but this lap was awesome!
I was now a lot faster downhill and through singletrack, just
slower up the hills with low energy and a seriously complaining
lower spine.
15 mins in, my 5w bar light dies. I carry on with just the
helmet light until it is bright enough to do without lights
altogether.
Having the twisty singletrack churned up in corners from
countless riders before me meant that I could slide through and
use the mini berms with less braking. I was running 45+psi to
avoid pinch flats on my hardtail so the bike was a bit skittery
earlier laps.
The scene from the really fast firetrail section, across the
valley, was <Bruce> Special </Bruce> with the early morning
colours looking fantastic... okay! okay! I slowed down a little
bit before cresting the hill to get a better look! :)
I love the big berm just before the rocky last section, near
camp.
But each lap I got so excited about hitting it fast that I
always messed my timing for the next turn. This time, I nearly
went OTB (again) when I smashed a pedal into a large,
grass-covered rock. No wonder there's no red ano left on my V8's!
I think Troy and Steve attempted similar tricks during one of
their laps too?
With a 1:25, I handed over the baton, err.. mini-pump to Troy so
he could go and put a fright into those other breakfast riders...

8am: Our 6th rider, Paul, arrives and does a double lap with the
boys refilling his Camelbak in-between. Phew! We were all
worried that we'd have to go out for another lap! :)

12pm: Race ends and everyone waiting to cross the line after 24
hours (you have to, to make it a 24 hour race) walks across the
line from around the corner.
We sent our last rider (Jukka) out "just" before 12 to get
another lap in. He still managed to rip out a 1:15 lap time! He
passed some riders on that last lap, so the final rider came in
a bit after he finished.

1.45pm: Last rider crosses the finish line and soon after
presentations start. After the winning teams/solos were awarded,
(http://www.fullgaspromotions.com.au/24hour.html for results),
the organisers started giving out chain lube, patches and stuff.
Then someone won some bars and out goes an $800 pair of forks!
Next prize is a $600 set of CrossRoc UST disc wheels. The number
called was "1338".
Now, I thought I was 1336 so that's pretty damn close! I was
sure 1338 must've been on our team? Sure enough, "from Team
PubBUG" was mentioned - our team. Then... MY name! Holy sh*t!
I just won a wheelset!
...and all this while eating a free pastie from the caterers :D

3pm: Packing up camp. I took beer, but during the race didn't
touch it. I was already brain-dead so thought better of
downing one before the drive home - Coke instead. From the
first lap I was battling - mtb'ing seems so much harder than
road riding (at least if you are not used to it?) and I have
a whole new appreciation for the solo riders. Next time, I'll
take less stuff, but include a torch and a towel. Maybe even
try clipless pedals!! Now the hunt is on for a light-ish
duallie - something to take care of my back while doing races
like these - because I WILL be doing more races like this!

Mon: Sore back, sore legs, sore arms, sore fingers.
Maybe I should've actually ridden my mtb before doing a 24hr?

Big thanks to all the people that ran such a fantastic
event as well my team: Steve, Troy, Aaron, Jukka, Paul!

hippy
 
C

Cúl-Báire

Likes Bikes and Dirt
Jessssus Stu! I though my post was long :p We did pretty good at the race, and we all got along great; well as great as we could whist being completely stuffed :p

The Downhills were a Hoot, I found myself in the later laps cranking so hard out of the turns, but I was too stuffed on the uphills to make much of a difference in my lap times :(

It was a great race though, and I also sgould have rode more than I did before hand, OhhhWell! I am already looking foward to next years event, maybe I'll have my light wieght hardtail built up by then :wink:

Ohhhh and welcome to farkin.net :p
 
C

Cúl-Báire

Likes Bikes and Dirt
Velophile wrote:
Cleaning each chalenging trail section at night.
Click to expand...
You mean bombing over it with the Crafty right Steve? :p 6 or so inches or travel can make a fairly rough trail, quiet smooth you know.lol. :p

*Dreams of owning a Craftworks Dualie*
 
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