Twelve hours pedalling a push bike virtually non-stop through bushland is not everybody’s ideal weekend getaway but for eight determined Gunnedah riders, it was the ultimate challenge.
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The endurance event, 12 hours in the Piney, last weekend tested mountain bike riders to a multi-lap race around a 13km course in the Armidale State Forest (Piney).
Local race duo Pete Hall and Heather Jaeger set a blistering pace in the mixed pairs division to place second.
This was not Hall’s first competition ride but it was new territory competing in the pairs race category.
Also riding well from Gunnedah was Casper Jaeger and Grant Phillips, who combined with Trevor Jaeger and Andrew Riordan in the four-man team division.
They placed 19th in a strong field of 25 riders for the men’s teams event.
Doing the whole thing solo was a gutsy Nathan Wharley who finished 14th out of 18 competitors in the men’s individual category.
Fellow solo rider Adam Carylon placed a sensational sixth with just two brief stops in 12 hours.
“I had two breaks of about 10 minutes,” Carylon said.
“Enough to take on some food and water but that was about it.”
It was the first 12-hour race he had competed in and particularly tough completing it on his own.
“You’re only relying on yourself,” he said.
“It’s self supported.
“So if something happens, you’re on your own.”
As the name suggests, the course featured plenty of forest trails, mixed with a few open parts, technical stretches and the formidable “rock gardens”, Carylon said.
But the 12-hour race was small fry for world champion 24-hour competitor, Jason English, who won last weekend’s men’s solo division by a comfortable margin and placed sixth overall alongside the team categories.
