The future of Downhill!

During the recent Queenstown Bike Festival we were lucky enough to help out a local young man by the name of Sam Robbie, who at 11 years old was the youngest competitor in the Dirtmasters DH race. We have seen young Sam thrashing around the trails on his trusty hardtail and when we heard he was racing we thought we have to lend him a DH bike for the occasion.

So we hooked Sam up with a 2012 Giant Glory 1 (in a small obviously) and let him go and terrorize the hill for the weekend of the race with all his mates. The grin on his face getting to ride one of these bikes was great for us to see and made all the better by the fact that after the race weekend he is off to hospital for knee surgery, so it was an extra special little treat for him.

Sam was shredding the race track to bits during practice, putting to shame people twice his age. He was loving riding a proper DH bike and it showed with his awesome 2nd place result in the 12-15 Junior Men category with a time of 4.22 (this placed him 68th overall in the field).

Sam is one a number of young groms that are starting to appear and be nurtured along by the very healthy mountain bike scene we have here in Queenstown. Another one to look out for is young Boaz Hebblethwaite who was also in Sam's category and seen to be ripping the track up over the weekend with his extremely stylish and smooth riding style, unfortunately Boaz took a tumble in his race run, otherwise he would have been right up there! These two are ones to watch out for in the future!

Queenstown Bike Festival

The second Queenstown Bike Festival has just finished after a 10 day long exravaganza of the best cycling has to offer in the Wakatipu. The first year saw the event getting thrown together over a matter of weeks on the lead up, and the organisers Southern Traverse have to be praised for getting the festival off the ground in such short notice and on such a small budget. It was truly visionary of them and something many people have talked about being missing from the Queenstown bike scene since the demise of the "Fat Tyre Festivals " that took place many years ago. Every element of biking was covered during the 10 day long spectacle, with the goal to allow everyone in the community and outwith to be able to attend something for their level and enjoyment. We had kids mini-cross, social coffee rides, night rides, road rides, XC races, DH races, video edit competitions, super D races and slopestyle events to name but a few.

The buzz in town was immense, and this years festival had a more international feel to it, rather than just a local showdown like last year. The imagination of people outwith Queenstown has definitely been captured, and the media attention it has received is going to help cement it as a must do event for any bikers calendar. From personal experience from this festival the more you got involved and participate the more you get out of it and the more enjoyable it became. There was a warm feeling of camaraderie and bonding between the locals, as we all got to ride together more than we would normally during the busy summer in this tourist driven hot spot. Friendships that have fallen by the way side over the months as we have been too wrapped up in work are rekindled and the cranks are turned side by side once more.

What is more we got to share these proud emotions with out of towners and international competitors, many of whom it was their first visit to Queenstown riding our trails. Hopefully we put a good show on for them, they will tell all their friends and they will be back in force next year.

TEVA SLOPESTYLE

Special mention has to go to this event and a big shout out has to go to Teva for making it happen. This was a big risk for all parties involved, and a lot of work from a lot of different people went together to make this happen. The guys at Teva for funding it and marketing it so well; the course builders Tom Hey and Kelly McGarry for building such an amazing course in such a small time frame; the volunteers for picking up a spade and a rake to help Tom and Kelly get it ready in time and most of all to the crowd who turned up in there thousands to support this spectacular event.

Many words have been spoken about this event, most going along the lines of "sensational", "awesome", "mind blowing". Statements such as "best thing I have seen in Queenstown" were not uncommon also.
There are a lot of live down town events such as these throughout the year, but this one stood out for many reasons. The action was non-stop, riders were thrilling the crowd for the entire 3 hours, and the action was world class. The crowd was amazing, sometimes you can have big crowd but they can be lifeless. Not here, the crowd was loving every minute of the action and getting behind the riders making them push themselves and wanting to go higher and pull harder tricks!
Teva were nothing short of generous throughout, with a plethora of Teva branded goodies constantly sailing into the crowd. T-man and JC behind the mike did an amazing job of keeping the crowd pumped throughout and working for their free giveaways.
The event was such a success that Teva have agreed to fund the event for the next 2 years!

THROUGH THE LENS SHORT VIDEO EDIT COMPETITION

This was a new event for this years bike festival, it had a basic layout, you had to create a short movie edit 5-7 mins long that featured a mixture of riding and lifestyle shots filmed in the Wakatipu area and the final videos were all shown at the World bar where people could mark the videos for their creativity and lifestyle vibe.
All in all their were 8 video edits compiled for the final showing at the World Bar. The venue proved to be a great choice, with all us bikers getting the entire outside area which had a big projector screen and wood fires burning with plenty of room for everyone to pack in. The atmosphere was spot on, and pretty much the entire local mountain bike fraternity turned up to see what was on offer and just generally have a good time with mates.
The videos were a real mixed bag, from the super serious JonTv super tweaked pristine edit to just plain fun ones like local legend Pete MacInallys "When Lycra goes Bad" edit.
Plenty of laughs and good times were shared and in the end there was only one man who was going to win with his super polished homage to the Queenstown summer, which was a beautiful compilation of all the best bits that Jon has filmed all summer. Everyone was just silent watching it and you couldn't help but feel proud to be part of this area and it really showed that we have something special here in Queenstown.

DIRTMASTERS DH

Last but not least would describe this event. Held on the last weekend in the bike festival calender. The entry numbers doubled from last year which was great to see, with more people making the journey to Queenstown to participate in this superb event, with the top 5 NZ DH riders racing the event (all top 10 World Cup racers), it really was of truly international standard.

The track was put together by local legend Blair Christmas and it prove to be a popular one with a great mix of all the Queenstown Bike Park has to offer, with a few new sections cut in especially for the race. The finish was in town down the Brecon Street steps, finishing just outside of Vertigo Bikes. The clock stopped at the finish of the tracks in the Bike Park but the organisers wanted to have a ceremonial finish in town to help bring the event to the masses which it did nicely.

Lots of locals made the effort too, young and old, with special mention to a couple of the two young rippers that are the future of the sport being Sam Thomson and Boaz Hebblethwaite, both only 11 years old and putting some pretty hot times down on the demanding track!

In the big boys categories, the racing was always going to be hot, as the top 5 men could all win world cups on their day. In the end Sam Blenkinsop took the win

with a ridiculous time of 3.30, closely followed by Justin Leov on 3.31 and Alexandra local Mat Scoles in 3rd on 3.32. It was impressive to see how fast the worlds best could rip down Ben Lomond, and gives something for locals to aspire too.

All in all the 2012 Queenstown Bike Festival was a superb event that was received well both by locals and by the visitors. The only way is up from here and the festival can only gather momentum and get bigger each year. Us Vertigo boys are already counting down the days until next year already, bring it on!

Speights Summit Super D 2012

Vertigo Bikes Team take the win two years on the trot!

The Speights Summit Super D was in the inaugural event for the 2012 Queenstown Bike Festival and took place on Saturday 31st March in the Queenstown Bike Park, utilising the Skyline Gondola. The format was simple, race against the clock for 6 hours, clocking up as many laps as you could in that time. Do it as a team of two or three, or even solo for those man enough.

Super D enduro events are proving more and more popular every year, and the turn out at this one was no different. It was great to see lots of people from out of town making the journey this year and entries were pretty much double that of last year.

The course this year was superb, it had a real mix of technical descents and lung busting climbs. You started off heading down the top of the Vertigo track, and then straight into Thingymajig. Once you hit the mid-way clearing you then faced the first climb back up Fernhill Loop for about 4-5 mins until you met Hammies Track. A flat out blast down Hammies until you reached the One Mile walking track where you had a new section trail to ride with some technical switchback climbs that took you onto Singletrack Sandwich. Down Singletrack Sandwich until you hit Original in the open section, where you then climbed back up to the Step Up/Step Down section. This had a real little short pinch of a climb in it which hsaw a few people getting off and walking and battling cramp! From here you turned back on yourself and it was through an old piece of singletrack that was cut a few years back that weaves it way through an open grassy paddock that connects back to Original a bit further down. Then it was a flat out blast down the rest of Original and along the return trail and back to the pits by the Gondola bottom terminal.
Lap times were around the 24/25 minute mark, with the fastest lap being just under 23 minutes.

The most hotly contested event was the team of two event, with the racing remaining really tight right until the very end. Matt Scholes and Jimmy Pollard of Alexandra took the win over Paul Angus and Blair Christmas by just over one minute over the 6 hours of racing!

The Vertigo Bikes/Giant team won the three man team by over 2 laps after the 6 hours, with Tim Ceci, Simon Smith and Jamie Tilbury showing domination throughout.

Ethan Glover took out the solo win, and also the fastest time to complete 15 laps throughout the 6 hours, very impressive indeed!

Another superb event and a great start to the week long two wheeled festival!

Photos courtesy of Spoke Magazine, cheers Caleb