Table of contents for No 67 in Spoke

For those of us in the cold South Island, we’re faced with a tough conundrum at this time of year. Do we get overly excited about the approaching snow season and go for a ski tour before the resorts open? Or do we take the chance to make the most of the last few days on the bike before trails get shut down and that option is taken away? For Renee and Jonas, the choice went the way of the bike, the couple taking the rare opportunity to blur the lines between the two seasons with a layer of fresh snow covering the Canterbury mountains. Skids, slushy mud in the face, bails and pinned lines; snow added an extra element to some familiar trails for their last few runs of…

Is winter really all that bad? When your local dirt isn’t year-round hero dirt, the answer is yes! Particuarly in Auckland, your bike and wallet will simply hate you from the moment your tyres touch dirt. It’s this viscous cycle that we as riders repeat ever year, and one I currently find myself in. The struggle of finding the motivation (and funds) to venture out in the cold, to spend hours cleaning post-ride and then hating yourself for being too much of a wimp one month out from racing. The solution? The grass is always greener on the other side, a saying we’ve all heard and a commonly dispelled myth. However, it really is greener in Rotorua. A place where the dirt’s always good, where you and your bike can…

The fact this photo is taken on a trail called Easy Rider (Kaiteriteri Mountain Bike Park) symbolises a few things for me. It was one of the first places I took my kids riding. Not only is it a low-grade trail for beginners to develop their skills on, it’s also the place where the experienced can hone their technique and have a bunch of fun improvising. Why have easy trails? A wide audience can access them, more people get on their bikes, and a lot of fun can be had for all ages and abilities. As a parent, having these types of trails gives us the ability to all recreate together. It provides an obvious place for people of all levels to progress their skills and gain confidence, which for…

I first heard of Pennsylvania as a riding destination after meeting some riders from there at the 2010 Single Speed World Champs in Rotorua. Some internet research led me to the Trans-Sylvania Epic website, where I noted sporadic use of the word ‘enduro’, and figured it sounded like a good excuse for a visit. It wasn’t until we got to the event that I realised exactly what I’d let myself in for: five days of blind racing, each of which would include around 50 kilometres and 1200m ascent, plus four or five timed enduro runs throughout the course. Day 3, billed as the enduro day, was the standout for me. Although as my partner Ed and I were among only four riders wearing baggies out of 150 entrants, it didn’t…

“Yesterday’s helibike mission morphed from a relaxing four-hour alpine cruise into a ten-hour gutbusting epic resulting in police being notified of our overdue status. I just wanted to acknowledge the correct and calm actions by everyone involved. The various partners at home made a sensible decision to contact police based on their expectations versus information they had. The police didn’t overreact, waiting for us calmly at the end of the exit road from the valley, and were very friendly. The various members of the group supported each other throughout the mission by sharing food, water and banter as the highs and lows of fatigue fluctuated through us all. Thank you to everyone for playing their part in an epic day in the mountains. I had the best day!” – KJ…

Okay, straight up: I’m no highly skilled mountain biker. I love it, but my talents have simply been distributed elsewhere. So when I talk about bikepacking adventures, it’s from the perspective of a rider whose focus is not so much on the angles of berms and the flow of rollers, but on how much I make my companions laugh when I eat shit in the mud, and on the beers and beds that reward a day of hard pedalling. For me—and I’m certainly not unique—it’s all about après. Like many of New Zealand’s Great Walks, the Heaphy is a one-way affair, with seven hours of slow, winding driving between the figuratively named Brown Hut at the eastern Golden Bay end and the Kohaihai Shelter on the West Coast. This drive…

Getting any bike helmet to fit my rather small cranium comfortably is always a problem. So when the new Smith Rover turned up at the office, I assumed it would be another one farmed out to a reviewer with a big head. However, Smith’s VaporFit system proved me wrong. As I wound the dial at the rear, I was pleasantly surprised to feel the whole helmet tighten sufficiently around my pea sized skull, enough to convince me I could go ride without it covering half my face when I hit the first bump. Knowing it fitted well was a big factor, but the prima donna in me also wanted it to look good. Luckily the stylish vented look of the Rover seemed to suit my boyish good looks, albeit in…

The new Recluse from Intense is a 140mm trail beast sporting the revised VPP linkage system, which sees the lower link shortened and tucked in above the bottom bracket for better ground clearance, shorter chainstays, a better shock spring rate and a sleeker, tidier look. This is the first bike I’ve ridden since my Santa Cruz Nomad that made me feel like the bike was taking me for a ride. I gave it some serious stick on some pretty demanding trails and came to the conclusion that it could handle any trail surface or hard landing with confidence. It did however have to be ridden very aggressively to get it to float like a butterfly. I put this down to two things. Running 140mm rear and 150mm front makes the…

When Kevin Costner uttered the words “Build it and they will come” in the 1989 movie Field of Dreams, he was talking about the ghosts of dead baseball players he hoped would come and play on the idyllic baseball field he’d built in his backyard. Creating an idyllic mountain bike playground is a bit more complicated than mowing a diamond in a paddock, and if you did manage to create one, you’d still be left with the same question: Will they come? This question will be running through the minds of the team behind the Christchurch Adventure Park as they set out to build their own fantasy bike playground. By the time the park opens its doors in December there’ll be a 1.8 km chairlift in place and the first…

Occasionally I get asked what my favourite thing I’ve done on a bike is. Until I went to Loosefest it could have been a number of things; trail riding in Japan, digging and filming with Tim Pierce, competing in Red Bull Rampage, jump track laps with the boys… the list goes on. However, earlier this year I was lucky enough to get an invite to the Fest Series stop, Loosefest, thanks to event organiser Nico Vink. I’d seen the videos come out of a little bike park in Belgium called La Ferme Libert, where Nico had built the craziest jumps I’d ever seen, so I kind of knew what I was getting myself into. No video will do justice to the size of the Loosefest jumps. When I first checked…

Winter is a paradoxical time for mountain bikers. Bleak and cold, it lacks the vital daylight hours for us to ride as much as we desire. Yet in turn, it also brings uncrowded, tacky trails, night riding, and ideal conditions for trail fairies to mysteriously appear. More northerly parts of New Zealand barely flinch at winter and biking life continues in earnest, albeit with a few extra layers, while cooler regions slip into a bike hibernation to escape winter’s harsh grasp. Regardless of where you live though, the first signs of spring bring an air of excitement and anticipation. With the equinox comes daylight savings, the saviour of the after work ride. The lengthening days and warming temperatures signal a rejuvenation across the country; change is in the air. The…

So you’re thinking about getting a new bike. There’s nothing actually wrong with your existing bike but whenever you hit your local trails and pull up to other riders, you see them glance at you, then your bike, and turn away. You just know you saw that look of disdain and it’s confirmed when you’re ignored and relegated to the back of the pack. You haven’t worn your bumbag so you’re a bit pissed, because you know you can handle a bike pretty well and this current one cost you a pretty penny eighteen months ago. Maybe you really should get a new bike so you can fit in with all the cool kids who always seem to have unlimited funds available to acquire the latest sled. But wait! You…

It’s 2002 and I’m at a Swiss Cup DH prize-giving in the European Alps. The winner is called and we all give a roar as Kiwi Justin Leov has spanked the field. Next thing I know, Justin asks to borrow my baggy shorts; he’s only got a full skinsuit and doesn’t want to stand on the podium with his lunchbox on show. That trip to Morzine and Les Gets was my first experience of the Alps and, looking back, I realise what good times they were. I was young, impressionable and loved nothing more than thrashing the long downhill lift-accessed trails. Now I’m all grown up, adventure trail riding is more of a drawcard these days. By this, I mean missions of discovery. I’m sure most of you (more mature…

Thinking about Nepal has always given me goosebumps, and now I’ve been there I get even more excited when I think about this amazing country. So happy was I to finally be visiting Nepal, I was buzzing on the plane to Kathmandu. But as soon as we landed I knew I had to stop daydreaming and get straight into it. Nepal was experiencing a serious fuel crisis and the place was in chaos. Hundreds of people had spent days waiting for their luggage without any information. Thankfully I was much luckier and after a two-hour wait I saw my bike case appear. The trip was on! I joined the film crew, and Sophie, in town, where we spent a couple of days working out our plan and organising the mission.…

Australia’s capital, much like our own, isn’t the country’s largest or most well-known city. On the contrary, Canberra’s obscurity is such that Singapore Airlines has only just announced the city’s first international flight. That’s right; the capital of Australia has just gone international, 80 years after the rest of the country. The good news for Kiwis is that this groundbreaking flight is connecting our two capitals and we can now make the trip direct to ACT in a little under three hours. I took the chance to head to Canberra to discover what the city had to offer the discerning mountain biker, and was surprised not only at the quality of riding but that there were a few similarities to our own capital. We know that what Wellington lacks in…

This is not a tale for the faint-hearted. It’s a tale of one miscalculated decision after another. A tale of fear, deceit and lies. But also of bravery, loyalty and the kindness of strangers. And making the best of a horrible situation. “Who wants to join me for some mountain biking in Bolivia?” our friend Davide posted on Facebook. After some brief consideration of annual leave, finances, and dog-sitting, my partner Matt and I decided this was an opportunity too good to refuse. There is a Bolivian proverb: “Todo es posible pero nada es seguro”, meaning “everything is possible but nothing is certain”. This was the underlying theme to our whole two weeks in this weird and wonderful country. It’s possible to get your bike to Bolivia; it’s not certain…

As much as I like tinkering around with my bike, I’ve always had an aversion to gears. The rear derailleur is a mystery to me and fine tuning of those crunching gears is a dark art best left to professional wrenches. So picture this; I’m standing in the garage with a package of strange looking sprockets and derailleur pieces, there’s a YouTube tutorial playing and a look of anguish on my face. However, 45 minutes later that look had turned into a rather smug one and I was feeling very impressed with myself after successfully fitting the OneUp Shark kit and MiniDriver to my bike, with only a few drops of claret. So what the hell is a Shark kit? Well, it’s a very clever conversion kit for Shimano’s XT…

I remember Elliot growing up, he was a little kid who used to play with Rubik’s Cubes and race his mates to finish them in under 50 seconds. Now my little cousin is a big cousin and races his mates on mountain bikes instead. Elliot was one of my teammates for Crankworx Deep Summer Photo Challenge this year, and his rekindled love of the mountain bike has seen him excel in leaps and bounds since he started calling British Columbia home. This was the last day of the three day shoot and there I was tucked into one of the most photographed corners of the world trying to make some magic with the last few hours we had left. I made him run back up four or five times to…

It is said of competitive people that, for them, there is no difference between second and last. This is why some Olympic athletes cry when they get silver, whereas most of us would be so thrilled to be allowed anywhere near a competition of that level we’d be too busy stealing souvenir Olympic-branded towelettes from the athletes’ village to even make the start line. I got to thinking about competition this year when I decided to enter a bike race for the first time in almost a decade. There were a couple of reasons I did it. For one, because it had been so long, I’d forgotten how hard bike races are. Also, I’d won a free entry at a work raffle and it was non-transferable. I thought I’d start…

It’s a warm Wednesday evening. The crème de la crème of the Queenstown riding community is gathered on the slopes of Wynyards. A young man with a picture of a taco on his helmet tables over the hip jump, and slaps it past ninety on the Dream Track step-up. “Who’s this kid?” I ask one of the big names floating around on the track. “Why, that’s Kurt McDonald”, the big name replied. Kurt can be found in the darkest tent of the World Cup circuit, present at every round like the riders (albeit behind the scenes; that’s just how it is being a mechanic), from morning till night. Setting up bikes, fixing issues, tuning suspension, servicing forks, making sure every bike is race ready at a moment’s notice, known only…

Next year is going to be big for cycling here in New Zealand. Every year, the popularity of mountain biking grows like a spreading forest fire, and in 2017 nowhere will this be felt quite as it will in Christchurch, where the eagerly awaited Adventure Park will have opened its gates and be in full swing. The city will experience a huge swell in the number of bike visitors to the region, and the park will begin developing a scene where many new ‘locals’ will emerge. Like an American prom, the bike park will need a King (and Queen, naturally). Someone that’s instantly recognisable on the trails, that you instinctively know has every line dialled and holds a pocket full of crazy good bike park edits. Think Rémy Métailler in…

Even if we didn’t know him, we all knew Stevie Smith a little. This is mostly thanks to a segment in Seasons, the now-classic 2008 film from Canadian production company The Collective. The film followed a group of riders over the course of a year, documenting their lives on bikes during each of the four seasons, and it starred an array of the already-legends of mountain biking, including Thomas Vanderham, Andrew Shandro and Steve Peat. Then there was Stevie, a 17-year-old boy no one had heard of, from Cassidy, a small town in BC no one had heard of. And, unusually for a guy in a bike movie, a lot of his on-screen time was shared with his mum. Stevie featured in several of the film’s seasonal segments, but it’s…

With their blond mops, tanned faces, and bright T-shirts, two grinning faces stick out like dog’s balls in the darkly dressed crowd; Casey Brown and Conor Macfarlane look happy to see me. In contrast, my complexion is pasty and pale. More than just the result of having left the Southern Hemisphere winter, I was on the right side of 13 weeks of morning sickness. Yes, four months pregnant, I was to spend two weeks riding and shooting with these two legends in the Japanese Alps. Casey and Conor had been waiting a while; their flight from North America had landed hours earlier. They looked pleased with themselves, having already sampled some of Japan’s bizarre cuisine and gotten lost in the chaos of Narita Airport. A relative veteran to Japan—I’d made…

Her size was what hit me at first sight in the port of Omišalj. I felt amazed, almost reverent. She was berthed in port, brilliantly white. I saw her from a distance, and approached slowly. I reckoned she was about 30 or 35 metres. Arriving at the bow of the impressive motor yacht, I was able to read her name: Andela Lora. Incredulous, I stood there thinking, ‘no way is this ship ours’. I looked around, unsure. With a broad grin, a young man came up to me and my three travelling companions and introduced himself as Sasha. He asked us to bring our luggage on board across the narrow gangway. So it was true; we were going to be staying on the Andela Lora for the next few days,…

I specifically asked to test this bike. I’ve owned and loved a Pine Mountain in the past and was pleased to see the resurrection of the name with a 30th anniversary model. In many ways it reminded me of my first mountain bike over 20 years ago: fully rigid with a basic but reliable spec and accessible for just over a grand. But could such a simple setup still be as much fun 20 years on? There are two main drawcards for the Pine Mountain 1. First, it’s crazy cheap: $1299 all done, with 27.5 Kenda plus-size tyres, 1x10 drivetrain with a wide range 10-42 Sun-Race cassette, Shimano brakes, cromoly frame, rack mounts and nice Marin in-house finishing kit. Second, it’s very versatile, with the ability to handle a range…

Shimano’s XTR Di2 electronic groupset has been on the market for a couple of years now, but apart from a short demo when it was first launched, we hadn’t managed to get a set in at Spoke for a proper long term review. First ride impressions in that short demo were very positive, but I was keen to get hold of a groupset for a period, go through the setup process myself on my own bike (not purposely designed for Di2) and see how things faired at the hands of an averagely competent mechanic and rider. Earlier this year Shimano New Zealand obliged and sent us a box full of Di2 goodies. They also threw in a set of the new XTR Trail brakes (look out for a review in…