Hey all,
I have just returned from an epic mtb road trip, the pinical of which as a couple of days riding the lifts at Thredbo, thought I would share the experience to perhaps inspire more folk to head out for a look.
The Riders:
Mat - Average XC mountain biker that watches far too many downhill movies and fancies him self a bit of hell man (in real life this notion is laughable). Has minimal shuttle downhill experience and usually spends some time walking down the track rather than riding.
Clive - Bit of an all mountain rider - will wipe the floor with Mat until they reach the 50km mark of a ride then fades like a cheap t-shirt. Is a regular and spectacular crasher - almost always gauranteed a good show following him (if you can keep up). Has never riden shuttle or lift assisted downhill in his life. Is (was) a firm believer in ONE saddle position.
The Bikes:
The biggest (and only) off road bikes we own - a 6 inch Santa Cruz Nomad and a 7inch Yeti Seven.
Thredbo Day One:
We arrived late in the day. Checked into to our lift - side accommodation and beelined for the pub. After sinking a few cool lagers gazing upon the mountain we decided to take a walk up the downhill track. We made it maybe 800 meters, breathing heavy we looked at each other with wide eyes and remarked - steep isn't it... Decided to sit there finish our beer and admire the view. Clive stated that the saddle was staying put and NOT going down.
Up early the first day saw us dusting off the aftermath of the pub and kitting up in full face helmets and leg guards for the induction. We where given a talk about the trail not being smooth and then we were (group of about 9 riders) escorted over to a large stair case and told to ride down them … we did this. Everyone was very quiet, obviously not wanting to crash in front of all the other downhill cyclists. After a few nail biting runs down the stair case we were ushered over to a rock wall and told to ride off it (like a steep rock garden). Everyone completed this. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t just a little bit scared at this stage.
We where taught the ways of the chair lift and up we went, one person per chair. Clive and I were in sequential chairs nervously clutching our very small bikes (the smallest there). We had an 11 minute trip to contemplate the ride down… and try not to wet our pants… at the top we listened to more talk about what to expect… The talk went a lot like … 'not that hard'… 'should be able to roll over everything'.. etc etc. I think during the chair lift ride something in Clive changed cause at the top he was jamming his carbon fiber seat post as far into the frame as it would go and muttering something about sawing the post shorter.
The start is a fire trail with killer water bars … quite steep.. it was here that we later learned that Clive would need to take a break to allow the fire in his break pads to extinguish before we could continue down the hill. From there on the trail was basically very very rough and most of the time the rock gardens, while rollable, where so steep that Clive got the crutch of his shorts caught between the seat stay brace and his rear tire! A bracing moment no doubt. The bottom half contained a very steep scary looking rock garden (still not sure how i didn't crash though it) and some really fast traverse sections. We reached the bottom of the mountain, our induction was over and the first thing I did was head back over to the shop and hire full body armor. Then I went to the toilet…
Up we went again and slowly piece by piece learnt the track. We had to stop a minimum of 3 times on the way down for 3 reasons:
1. Clive's breaks had caught fire again… (not literally) but had stopped working due to heat,
2. Our arms, legs, core muscles and lungs conspired against us to the point we (by we, I mean me) thought we might vomit. Really, downhilling is much much much more physically (all over) demanding that ANY cross country race I’ve done… I have a new respect for downhill athletes. Possible the strongest, fittest cyclists in the world.
3. I had suffered one of 5 flat tires I got during 2 days of down hill (no really XC tires are not suitable for downhill riding).
We survived the first day, over all our adrenal glands where totally withered and spent, our pupils so dilated we wondered if we would ever go back to normal, our eyes dry from lack of blinking. We headed back to the pub for more larger and jager bombs to celebrate not dying on our first ever day of downhill. We did meet a crew from Brissy (thanks to Clive's 'for the riders' jersy)... good folk, much faster than us! - if you are reading this shout out, would love to tag along on some more rides locally.
Th second day dawned and we were super keen, far less scared and ready to roll. Clive decided to ride all the A lines (minus a gap jump into corner) while I started a little more hesitantly. Eventually i got there gingerly riding the A lines, crashing more often than not. Every now and then we where totally blown away by some kid half our age jumping and whipping it over a A line with style... the very A line that had claimed most off the skin off my right ankle.
The fastest speed we hit on the track was about 46 km / h (thanks to my downhill GPS) … at which point I was having a really hard time hanging onto the bars. There was a couple of sections we tried to master… both of us crashed repeatedly … body armor did its job. It took us about 20 mins to decend… the top racers do it in 6 -7 minutes. I managed to destroy my rear shock. No matter what the sales person tells you … rock shox monarch’s are not suitable for downhill….
Was it good… GOD YES… would I do it again… IN A HEARTBEAT….
If you are looking for a week long Mountain Biking holiday i would recommend heading here no matter what your mountain biking skill level is like (well to an extent).
Some photos from the trip:
Body Armor On, thumbs up, belly out - CHECK.
Grab the bike like this, Pedal goes here, and bingo... we are off!
Funny how photos make things look not steep.
Survived!
I have just returned from an epic mtb road trip, the pinical of which as a couple of days riding the lifts at Thredbo, thought I would share the experience to perhaps inspire more folk to head out for a look.
The Riders:
Mat - Average XC mountain biker that watches far too many downhill movies and fancies him self a bit of hell man (in real life this notion is laughable). Has minimal shuttle downhill experience and usually spends some time walking down the track rather than riding.
Clive - Bit of an all mountain rider - will wipe the floor with Mat until they reach the 50km mark of a ride then fades like a cheap t-shirt. Is a regular and spectacular crasher - almost always gauranteed a good show following him (if you can keep up). Has never riden shuttle or lift assisted downhill in his life. Is (was) a firm believer in ONE saddle position.
The Bikes:
The biggest (and only) off road bikes we own - a 6 inch Santa Cruz Nomad and a 7inch Yeti Seven.
Thredbo Day One:
We arrived late in the day. Checked into to our lift - side accommodation and beelined for the pub. After sinking a few cool lagers gazing upon the mountain we decided to take a walk up the downhill track. We made it maybe 800 meters, breathing heavy we looked at each other with wide eyes and remarked - steep isn't it... Decided to sit there finish our beer and admire the view. Clive stated that the saddle was staying put and NOT going down.
Up early the first day saw us dusting off the aftermath of the pub and kitting up in full face helmets and leg guards for the induction. We where given a talk about the trail not being smooth and then we were (group of about 9 riders) escorted over to a large stair case and told to ride down them … we did this. Everyone was very quiet, obviously not wanting to crash in front of all the other downhill cyclists. After a few nail biting runs down the stair case we were ushered over to a rock wall and told to ride off it (like a steep rock garden). Everyone completed this. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t just a little bit scared at this stage.
We where taught the ways of the chair lift and up we went, one person per chair. Clive and I were in sequential chairs nervously clutching our very small bikes (the smallest there). We had an 11 minute trip to contemplate the ride down… and try not to wet our pants… at the top we listened to more talk about what to expect… The talk went a lot like … 'not that hard'… 'should be able to roll over everything'.. etc etc. I think during the chair lift ride something in Clive changed cause at the top he was jamming his carbon fiber seat post as far into the frame as it would go and muttering something about sawing the post shorter.
The start is a fire trail with killer water bars … quite steep.. it was here that we later learned that Clive would need to take a break to allow the fire in his break pads to extinguish before we could continue down the hill. From there on the trail was basically very very rough and most of the time the rock gardens, while rollable, where so steep that Clive got the crutch of his shorts caught between the seat stay brace and his rear tire! A bracing moment no doubt. The bottom half contained a very steep scary looking rock garden (still not sure how i didn't crash though it) and some really fast traverse sections. We reached the bottom of the mountain, our induction was over and the first thing I did was head back over to the shop and hire full body armor. Then I went to the toilet…
Up we went again and slowly piece by piece learnt the track. We had to stop a minimum of 3 times on the way down for 3 reasons:
1. Clive's breaks had caught fire again… (not literally) but had stopped working due to heat,
2. Our arms, legs, core muscles and lungs conspired against us to the point we (by we, I mean me) thought we might vomit. Really, downhilling is much much much more physically (all over) demanding that ANY cross country race I’ve done… I have a new respect for downhill athletes. Possible the strongest, fittest cyclists in the world.
3. I had suffered one of 5 flat tires I got during 2 days of down hill (no really XC tires are not suitable for downhill riding).
We survived the first day, over all our adrenal glands where totally withered and spent, our pupils so dilated we wondered if we would ever go back to normal, our eyes dry from lack of blinking. We headed back to the pub for more larger and jager bombs to celebrate not dying on our first ever day of downhill. We did meet a crew from Brissy (thanks to Clive's 'for the riders' jersy)... good folk, much faster than us! - if you are reading this shout out, would love to tag along on some more rides locally.
Th second day dawned and we were super keen, far less scared and ready to roll. Clive decided to ride all the A lines (minus a gap jump into corner) while I started a little more hesitantly. Eventually i got there gingerly riding the A lines, crashing more often than not. Every now and then we where totally blown away by some kid half our age jumping and whipping it over a A line with style... the very A line that had claimed most off the skin off my right ankle.
The fastest speed we hit on the track was about 46 km / h (thanks to my downhill GPS) … at which point I was having a really hard time hanging onto the bars. There was a couple of sections we tried to master… both of us crashed repeatedly … body armor did its job. It took us about 20 mins to decend… the top racers do it in 6 -7 minutes. I managed to destroy my rear shock. No matter what the sales person tells you … rock shox monarch’s are not suitable for downhill….
Was it good… GOD YES… would I do it again… IN A HEARTBEAT….
If you are looking for a week long Mountain Biking holiday i would recommend heading here no matter what your mountain biking skill level is like (well to an extent).
Some photos from the trip:
Body Armor On, thumbs up, belly out - CHECK.
Grab the bike like this, Pedal goes here, and bingo... we are off!
Funny how photos make things look not steep.
Survived!
