Table of contents for No.69 in Spoke

Skiing at Temple Basin is different to skiing at a standard resort. It’s all about spotting a line somewhere on the hill, riding the tows, then walking to go get it. The vertical you get is nothing compared to the six-seater at Treble Cone, but each one of those metres is worth so much more in your memories. Riding bikes up in the alpine always reminds me of places like Temple; the more you climb, the more tantalising possibilities present themselves. This day, Cam and I were planning to climb then descend one ridge, but on the way up Cam looked longingly at a big chute on the next ridge across—not a chute like on a downhill race track, but a chute like Johan Olofsson’s section in TB5. We figured…

Wyn Masters is well-known in the mountain bike industry for many things. Anyone following the DH World Cup will be familiar with WynTV, and the many odd objects he uses as a microphone while interviewing/ annoying his fellow racers. Others will know him best for his weekly Instagram posts showcasing his insane wheelie and manual skills. Those lucky enough to spend any time with him will find the real Wyn is down to earth, a ridiculously hard worker, and possesses incredible natural talent on a bike. This makes him no stranger to national and international podiums. But at the end of the day, he’s just a big kid on a bicycle, pulling wheelies, doing skids, goofing off, and blowing up corners like a boss! Rider: Wyn Masters Location: Wairoa Gorge,…

As I prepare to leave Aotearoa for the hustle of the UK, I feel I owe a debt of gratitude to the mountain biking community of New Zealand, and it seems only fair to express my feelings in an open letter. Five and a half years ago, I arrived in a devastated and still-shaking Christchurch. Many tracks were closed, the Port Hills a no-go area, and, fresh off the plane, I had little inclination to ride a bike apart from to and from work. So, on a second hand singlespeed KHS hardtail bought from one of the city’s more dubious shops, I set about my daily commute, ignorant of the surrounding treasures. Mountain biking crept up on me. Initial trips were to the dead-flat tracks of Bottle Lake Forest and…

You can’t beat Wellington on a good day, and as bike parks go, you can’t beat Makara Peak on a good day either. Well, you can actually. Crappy weather and a less-than-desirable climb to the top can sometimes compromise one’s enjoyment of this gem near Wellington’s south coast. You can’t do much about weather, but in this case, making the climb more enjoyable was easy—just throw up a 72-metre swing bridge, add an entry and exit trail, job done. Never happy with the effort required to get Joe Average rider to the peak to enjoy the magnificent vistas of the capital and the top of the South Island—previously the only summit routes involved a 50-metre Grade 4 vertical descent in the middle, or grovelling up the “Snake Charmer”, the park’s…

Classical music isn’t a commonly used analogy when describing mountain bike trails, but then Richard Caudwell isn’t a typical trail builder. With a passion for skiing—he participated in the Freeride World Tour for several years—and a background as a coach and mountain guide, Richard Caudwell has also won an award in Norway for his landscaping there. He appears as someone capable of success in anything he’s passionate about. “I’m all about the passion, I love what I do, and it’s definitely my baby. I love the mountains, and I love the forest,” he says. Frustrated at a lack of progression in Rotorua’s Whakarewarewa Forest, he built an unauthorised trail in an attempt to resolve issues with trail intersections. The response was a council order forbidding him from returning to the…

In the past, Auckland’s mountain bike offerings have mostly been limited to gently rolling terrain on the outer edges of the city, a network of far from technically challenging XC-focused trails. While this offered riders a chance to spin their cranks and escape the rat race, with the rapid growth of gravity focused riding over the last four years, the opening of Fourforty Mountain Bike Park couldn’t have come soon enough. Situated 45 minutes out of downtown Auckland on the Firth of Thames, Four-forty is the love child of passionate rider and ex-World Cup downhiller Byron Scott. In the early days, when the park was just a twinkle in their eyes, Aaron Tait approached Byron to help him with a possible bike park project on private land owned by Waytemore…

Towards the end of last year’s World Cup season, the rumour mill fired up, as it always does. Who’s going to what team? Who’s retiring? Who’s getting paid what? One of the rumours I kept hearing was, “Blenki is leaving Norco and going full EWS for 2017”. With some solid enduro results including an occasional podium, and a less-than-stellar year (by his usual high standards) in downhill, it was a rumour that seemed to have substance. Curiosity got the better of me and I decided to find out for myself. I wanted to hear it right from the horse’s mouth. Turns out, the rumours couldn’t have been further from the truth. Anyone who follows Blenki on social media or has been to a Nationals race lately will have seen a…

Lyttelton is a place of contrast. On one hand, it’s a trendy wee town with a thriving music and art scene and organic veggies at the Saturday markets. Then there’s the port, the town’s lifeblood, which gives the place an industrial, working-class edge. It’s the largest port in the South Island, running all hours, every day. Employing more than 500 people, relative to Lyttelton’s whole population of 2859 according to the last census, it’s a huge part of the town’s makeup. Like all of Christchurch and the communities that surround it, Lyttelton has been shaped by the earthquakes. It took a hammering in the big shake of February 22, 2011, during which several historic buildings were ruined and subsequently had to come down. The empty spaces are a constant reminder…

While many riders subscribe to the n + 1 formula for the ideal number of bikes in your quiver—where n = the number of bikes you currently own—for most of us, the versatility of a bike which can transform from handling long-distance mile-munching with one wheelset, while happily keeping up with longer-travel enduro bikes on an uplift day with the other, is enticing. The 148 hub standard has made that option a possibility, so I was interested to find out whether the Specialized Stumpjumper FSR Carbon Comp 29 makes it a reality. Over the last 20 years I’ve owned four Stumpjumpers, hopefully making me well-placed to provide a nuanced POV on this one. Spesh have been pretty good at keeping one of the longest-running trail bike platforms close to the…

These Oozy Trail 395+ wheels from Spank sport an internal rim width of 35mm (outer width 39.5mm) which seems to be rapidly becoming the magic width for a wheelset intended to have the versatility to be used with both plus-sized tyres and large-volume standard tyres. Alloy rims, triple-butted straight-pull spokes, and relatively light hubs combine in a wheel build that will never be regarded as svelte by avid weight weenies (2080 grams), but is reasonable when compared to other similar products on the market. If you want to go much lighter than this, you’re looking at carbon and a price tag at least two to three times that of these. Our review wheels arrived tubeless-ready out of the box. Fitting and inflating was a doddle with only a track pump…

As I write this, helicopters, planes, and hundreds of fire fighters are struggling with an out of control scrub fire which has spread across a handful of Christchurch’s favourite trails. The Flying Nun was first to go, followed by the new Christchurch Adventure Park, with Victoria Park becoming the latest victim. By the time this goes to print, we’ll know the extent of the damage, but in the meantime we can only sit and hope trails like the one pictured will still be around once the smoke clears. For this shot, Rupert Chapman and I headed into Victoria Park with his brand new Pivot Phoenix. The news of him shifting teams was still a secret, so we couldn’t release the pictures. Right now, there’s no telling if these features are…

“You have to try it. I mean, you can feel however you like to feel about it, but it’s really fun to ride.” —Matt Hunter 1 By opting for a belt, instead of a chain, we’re able to keep the motor silent and free of annoying vibrations. 2 The motor uses tightly-pack coils surrounding premium Neodymium magnets, and it gets instructions from our custom software before amplifying your power. 3 With Bluetooth® and ANT+ communication, you can tune the motor output to your liking, as well as customise your range. 4 We put 40 cells into a strong, rattle-free case, while leaving it easily removable, so you can charge from wherever you like. 5 Full-suspension or hardtail, no matter your style or terrain, we have you covered. At Specialized, we’re…

The first rule of mountain biking is keep the rubber side down, but as any rider knows, that’s not always possible. Most of the time, when we come off it’s just a matter of dusting ourselves off and continuing down the trail, but occasionally a rider crashes and can’t get back up. In Rotorua, they’ve done something about it. The Rotorua Mountain Bike Club has started a new programme to speed up the process of extracting and treating seriously injured riders. The First Responder programme was set up in direct response to a few serious injuries in recent years. One involved Laura Lee Stuart, one of the founding members of Revolve Rotorua, the women’s bike club. She was paralysed in a crash on the Riff Raff trail, and spent almost…

New for 2017, the Centurion 100-miler is another option on top of three already on offer at the annual Contact Epic race around Lake Hawea: the 125-kilometre Epic course, the 95-kilometre Classic and the 35-kilometre Traverse. Actually, it’s not just an option, it’s all three rolled into one: 160 kilometres long, 5:30am start, reach the Dingleburn Station bluffs before last light or you get pulled out. What is 160? The tonne in old money? That point where your life is recklessly slewing all over the road in your mate’s Valiant as the needle creeps right around? Not this April. It’s the first chance you’ll have to do all three courses. The Centurion: 160 kilometres in total joined together on one day around the Lake Hawea area. I’m picking there will…

An untouched hillside: free of trails, scrub, berms, and undergrowth, designated for mountain biking. A blank canvas of sorts, packed with a variety of dirt, tree stumps, rocks, and drop-offs. It’s not all that common these days, is it? As the popularity of mountain biking increases, so too does our expectation of trails. For some, there’s a growing demand for beautifully sculpted lines scattered through forest and tussock, where flow comes easily, even to the most novice rider. But for those more experienced, there is still the pull of untouched dirt, of having to scope lines, of trusting the bike, and sometimes just hanging on. We’ve all sat glued to Red Bull Rampage; heck, we thought we’d need to venture to the furthest corners of Mongolia after seeing Where the…

When I think of backcountry New Zealand riding, of beech forest and overnight hike-a-bike missions, it’s images of places like Craigieburn, Nelson and corners of the South Island that rush to mind. This will be the case for most mountain bikers. Truth is, the North Island isn’t what you think of first when it comes to alpine riding or big backcountry epics. Rotorua is the Queenstown of the north, and for good reason—it has year-round hero dirt, a huge trail network and a large diversity of terrain. But beyond the bright lights of Rotovegas, there’s really no one drawcard location. We don’t have the postcard vistas, gondola-assisted bike parks or cinematic sex appeal of the south, but now what we do have is one of the best backcountry trails in…

It’s notable when you start grading trails according to likelihood of death. In the system we’d devised by the end of our adventure, ‘extremely likely’, ‘quite likely’, ‘likely’ and ‘should be okay’, were our grades. This was, of course, cheap humour, but there’s no smoke without fire, and at times the fire had raged. So it had come to be, a crack squad of six “international mountain bike experts” (more on that later) assembled at Heathrow Airport, most with little knowledge of what they would undertake over the next 19 days in the Indian Himalayas. I myself was ignorant; while I’d been charged with assembling a team to carry out a reconnaissance study for a local government department of India, I too had scant information about what our work would…

On the hunt for a hard-wearing, good-looking enduro shoe, I got my hands on a pair of Five Ten Kestrel Laces. Mountain biking shoes do take a hammering these days; they need to be all-weather worthy, stiff for pedalling and able to tackle hike-a-bikes without falling to pieces. I’ve reviewed the women’s version here, but boys take note, the only difference between the sexes is in the sizes and colours available. The Kestrel Laces fall into FiveTen’s shoe lineup between the stiffer Boa Closure System-equipped Kestrel and the downhill-oriented Hellcats. If we were to stereotype, the Kestrel Lace shoes fit into the “casual” category of shoe, helping us to avoid dressing like we’re gearing up for an XC race. The Kestrel Laces are simple in design; just laces and a…

Merida have been in the two-wheeled world for a very, very long time. It’s a not-so-shouty brand which, despite not being at the forefront of many people’s thoughts when it comes to aggro trail bikes, is still silently beavering away building a tonne of other brands’ frames. With possibly the most established frame manufacturing plant in Taiwan, there’s a high chance your bike rolled out of Merida’s factory in its infancy. Merida’s previous foray into the 160mm trail/enduro market was a mixed bag. With a somewhat ugly frame design and a linkage system that tried to remove the rear mech from the frame every time you compressed the back end, it left a lot to be desired. Prices were, as always, good value though, and the paint schemes were nice.…

The first weekend of February has become a must-do for many mountain bikers, as those lucky enough to have scored a golden ticket to enter the annual Dodzy Memorial Enduro descend on the Wairoa Gorge, feasting on its array of trail goodness and lapping up the camaraderie the event encapsulates. One of the highlights of this year’s event for me was listening to the radio banter amongst the Gorge crew as they tried to clear the riders off the hill after the Saturday practice day. Calls were coming in from all around the trails as “last groups” were ushered “hooting and hollering” to the bottom. (Though I believe the honour of official last group off the hill went to an unnamed Hawaiian shirt-clad Christchurch couple.) Keegan Wright was a newcomer…

Transition: noun 1. movement, passage, or change from one position, state, stage, concept, etc., to another; change. e.g. “All we can hope for is a peaceful transition of power.” 2. Incline on a hill. e.g. “Try to land both wheels on the transition.” There is still time. That’s what I always think in autumn. Still time for a few more sunny afternoons, a few more events, a few more long rides after work before the balance of dark and light tips in favour of the former, and the days become shorter than the nights. A few more weeks before we give ourselves over to the winter pursuits of skiing, Netflix and boiling the jug for endless cups of tea. The feeling is especially strong this year, following a summer which…

At the recent opening night of McGazza Fest in Queenstown, after the McGazza memorial mega train had descended from Queenstown Bike Park and through the streets of town to the local biking fraternity’s wharf-front watering hole of choice, a familiar flaming red Diamondback DB4L was hoisted to take pride of place above the bar at Atlas Beer Café, to a roar of cheers and tears. The idea to rebuild Kelly McGarry’s 2013 Rampage canyon flip bike first arose at a meeting of the Kelly McGarry Foundation on a wintery Queenstown evening in mid-2016. Paul (Pang) Angus, of Vertigo Bikes, oversaw the challenge of sourcing all the missing parts needed to bring the iconic red rig back to the exact spec of the bike that flipped the 72-foot canyon at the…

In the depths of my man cave (sounds dodgy already), there lies a slew of mid-90s to early-2000s tech from the, shall we say, “second experimental era” of the mountain bike scene. I have everything from hand-built Ti frames, which span that engineering period when the industry was moving from 1” threaded to 11/8 ” threadless headsets, to a brand new first generation XTR rear derailleur, and a lot of odd stuff in between. But probably my most prized possession is the 2003 Balfa BB7 hanging from the floor joists. This bike has a history that spanned a few racing generations, and tech that is echoed in today’s downhill elite. The Balfa BB7 hails from the eastern side of Canada, a part of the country more famous for poutine than…

When changing safety regulations closed the playground at Juvenka Earthson’s school, South Wellington Intermediate, he decided to do something about it. He decided to ride his bike, really far. In December, the 13-year-old finished a month-long, 1626-kilomtere ride covering the length of the North Island. Accompanied by his mum Fiona Hood, and grandfather Greg Tump, he left Cape Reinga on November 6, planning to follow the North Island portion of the Kennett Brothers’ Tour Aotearoa route back to Wellington. The idea for the trip came after Juvenka and his mum did the Queen Charlotte Track together. “We thought, ‘we want to do more of this’, and we looked at the idea of cycling across the North Island,” he says. “It started off as an idea for fun, and then my…

When you live in Whakatane, your riding options are fairly limited. It’s either mellow cycleways, the full day adventure trails of the Whirinaki Forest, or the hour-and-a-half drive to Rotorua. These options aren’t always great if you’re a downhiller or a dirtjumper. So Logan Jensen started to think outside the square. When what you want isn’t there, use your hard-wired Kiwi can-do attitude, and make your own. Fortunately, nestled in a small Bay of Plenty valley south of town was a private section of land perfect for the task at hand, complete with an area already being mined for dirt by the landowner, and a 120-metre high shuttle-access hill covered in native and pine forest. Logan, partner Amanda Monk, and their misfit band of riders grabbed shovels, bikes, and diggers…

As a professional mountain biker, I know what I do may sound like the most glamorous lifestyle in the world, and I wouldn’t change it for anything. But travelling and racing from event to event is also physically and mentally exhausting. Always on the move, pushing your limits, fighting start gate nerves, week in and week out, floating from one country to the next, from one rental car to the next, and mixing it up between tents, vans and hotel rooms. Customs officers look at you suspiciously when you can’t remember your previous port of entry or where you’re heading, and you’re always looking for internet to file race reports, make flight changes, or just stay in touch with loved ones. Race and work season is one massive blur with…

Trek’s in-house accessory and apparel brand Bontrager are no newbies to the tyre manufacturing world. After years with Trek’s World Cup DH team, as well as Tracy Moseley’s domination of the Enduro World Series, they should know a thing or two about what does and doesn’t work. We’ve been running a pair of their SE4 Team issue TLR tyres in a 29x2.4 guise for a few months now, and must say they’re a very worthwhile alternative to the myriad options these days. In trail form, Bontrager offer most of their tyres in either an ‘XR’ (XC/Trail) option or an ‘SE’ (AM/Enduro) version. In layman’s terms, the SE varieties have greater sidewall and sub tread protection to fend off punctures on the roughest and gnarliest of trails. After years of riding…

I’ve been running the new ME7s since September, and they’re yet to miss a beat. They’re comfortable, well-designed, good looking and, most importantly, black. Like a lot of new products these days, they’re adorned with the oh-so-trendy ‘enduro’ moniker, but what demands does this en vogue style of riding ask of your shoes? The modern rider seems to be looking for a cleat that has the stiffness and pedal-ability of sporty XC winklepickers combined with walk-ability, a ‘wearto-the-pub’ look and the protection of a downhill loafer. And credit to Shimano, they seemed to have nailed it with the ME7. The Torbal carbon reinforced shank makes them easily stiff enough to transfer power efficiently, yet the Michelin rubber sole has enough flex in the toes to make walking feel effortless. The…