Wild Wellington Trip 18 to 20 Feb 2011

Jamie J, Sasha and I arrived in Wellington on Friday afternoon in time to have a coffee and a practise lap of the course. Our Motel was in Evans Bay, handy to the airport and to Mt Victoria, where the race was to be held.

We headed up to the velodrome to check the course and met with my friend Pete, who showed us how to ride it. It was a relatively easy (therefore fast) part of Mt Vic, and fun to ride.

Josh showed up at the motel at about 10 o’clock that night.

Six o’clock on race day had us reluctantly getting out of bed to get ready to help with the set-up in the race village. All went well and we were ready well before the race was due to start.

We made the decision to do three laps each. Hiskey got our team off to an excellent start coming in third after his three laps. Josh followed, continuing to set a blistering pace and moving our team into 2nd overall. We continued through the rota with Sasha Jamie J and then it was my turn. Disaster struck – a puncture one third of the way into my first lap! It was here that I found the first ever disadvantage with the Scale 29er – the gas canister did not have the volume to fill the 29 x 2.25 tyre! I pumped the tyre enough to get me around the lap and fortunately, Hiskey was able to take over for a couple of laps while I got myself sorted.

Race day banter was fun, and we were getting closer and closer to the overall leaders, and a massive night time effort by Josh brought us very close. We did however; win our category, making it a fun and successful day.

On Sunday morning we managed to get up at six o’clock again – perhaps the excitement of Saturday was still with us. Josh took Sasha to the airport, and Jamie and I went to meet Scott Mac for breakfast and a ride.

We set off from Haitaitai through the City, past Parliament to Khandallah, and up the track to Mt Kaukau. We took the tourist approach to this ride, stopping to take in the magnificent views, and to take photographs. We rode the ridgeline through some magnificent country, occasionally touching (but never entering) suburbia from time to time. Eventually, we had to cross a road, and then climbed the switchback track up to Makara Peak. Again, we had wonderful views throughout 360 degrees, from Wellington Airport, around to the Marlborough Sounds, and north to the Kapiti Coast and Hutt Valley. We concluded our ride with a wicked descent into the Aro Valley, and a short road section back through the Mt Victoria Tunnel to Haitaitai. We were gone for over four hours, with a ride time of three hours fifteen minutes.

Another great day in Wellington