Wednesday Mulgan Richmond Greenwood Godley Taylor

chris and nelson assembled at mine and we vanned to scuzner. headed round to moncks bay and up Mulgans, the boys cleaning the first couple of corners, but not the steppy ones. for some reason chris walking a whole bunch (wrong geared i think), and i lagged behind feeling wheezy and asthma'd, fat and slow. sickmaking climbs up the narrow alleys round the watertanks and past York's old place. layer off once on Panorama.

then up to the rooty singletrack, all of us blowing out on that rocky little up, then relaxing it out on the flatter section up to the trees bout 7.45 to some stoned boyracers who were impressed at our riding prowess. cruise up the road to Greenwood reststop.

singletrack, nelson leading off, chased by Chris and me lagging behind again. legs still not recovered from all of sundays treadling, and staying back from them left me somewhat more dust free... gave them a good headstart from above the ruins, leaving a nice big gap and then took off, flowing nicely, and catching them before the first of the big corners below, chris having had a misbalanced nearmiss on the first rockies. ate their dust for a few corners, then sat in closer behind as staying right on the tail of the next guy leads to marginally less dust in the eyes and mouth.

at the narrow rock gap i stopped and watched as they diminished round and til nelson went round the corner of the hill, then i took off and flowed nicely again, meeting up with them just round from gloomy gulch. off again, and i paused and left them to it again, creating dust settling gap, then took off down the rocky descent and into the groove. lots of fun, but with some slippy dug-in corners through the switchbacks, then over the grate, jump, flowy pump section round to the little (dry) creek, then the 'backstraight', bombing down here, i had one near miss over one of the rockydroppy bits, with the bike aiming directly off the trail, somehow managed to swivel back onto trail and changed down and spun up the rocky uppy bit after the tree, getting jammed at the top. off again, flying down the last bit til the exposed-over-evans-pass-rd corner where i couldnt see a thing for the dust raised by the other two, slowly through there and out to the road.

when were still down on the road before hitting Godley trail, i said, "i've already admitted defeat, i aint gonna clean the first section". nelson and chris led off, i followed slowly behind, watching from a distance as first nelson blew it, came back down for another run, then chris blew it, and i selected an appropriate gear and knuckled into it - got over the first couple of holes, up past Chris, popped up the next rock or two, body-englishing my way up the next bit, then gave a line straight up some solid rock a try i never thought would work, and voila, i made it out the top, not an issue! w00t inspiring. the other two had a struggle at it once or twice more, blowing it again and again... i blew the next bit tho, but for the rest of the way out i stayed on Nelson's tail pretty well for a while, while Chris struggled with balance from then on.

i led on the descent to Livingston, in order to show the way on the new bit, which is getting better, and then left the lead to the others for the next climb. got up to the rocky bit and found chris stopped behind nelson who was down off the track, having bounced off a rock and sorta tumbled backwards. garked his shin, so dressed it, and off we flew again, chris, me then nels, chris losing balance in the rutty narrow grass before the sidle line, missing the sidle turn off where i took the lead down to breeze.

into the eye of the snake. nelson lead, followed by me at a distance (for dust), then Chris. good blat, tho still a lot of dust raised by Nelson, making some jumps difficult to get a good line on due to visibility, but a great blat down, and i had a really good ride down the tail too - the other two complaining of off-balance-ness and other difficulties. the climb out of Taylors i immediately bogged down, riding through treacle, the other two left me for dead. caught up at the top and i lead off down through Nicholson, having a mildly close call with a 4wd when we got down to the road. back to the van bout 9.30 and on home via yunkfood

Sunday Free-form Funkified Filth

the usual crew of deadbeats assembled at Steve's, them being Warren Andrew Wayne Tony Pete and Marie. the 8 of us headed east, along the Heathcote Cut and behind Ferrymead to McCormacks Bay. the Grunt began. steep wee ups followed by steeper wee ups with a couple of steep wee ups thrown in for good measure. cleaned the 9 switchbacks at the top, into the 10th where the steps begin. then up the road and up 'the terrace' to John Britten Reserve. hmmm... no "no bikes" signs in evidence, so we (mostly) rode and pushed (a little) to the top (which is where the title Free form Funkified filth comes from, the sheepshit up there is epic).

then hung a right, onto the singletrack proper, followed by a bomb down the road to Castle Rock track. good wee grunt up here, cleaning everything i didnt clean on friday night (ie the very top). pete snapped his chain, and i got messages from home to be home by 12.30...). at the top were some 48hr filmmakers doing a post-apocalyptic romantic comedy.

another bomb down the tarmac, round, and hit up the Witchy-poo. awesome blat round this, again, cleaning the one bit that got me Friday night under lights. top of rapaki, a snack, and then up the Vernon. good hoof up this too, once again, cleaning the one bit that caught me out friday.

Onto the lowest-common-denominator trail, blottlelake of the hills, the traverse. flew around this having some excellent fun, but how smoooooth is it? into vic park and down through the pines, me choosing to see how the see-saw was, a few yumps through brake free, then peeled out back in behind Steve for the blat down into the gummies. neeaarly lost grip of my bars on the rockgarden intro, but tight on Steve's tail all the way through, over the wee yump, back round and up to the Skidder site.

Then it was a quick spit down dazza's, and a dark and lumpy clomp down brent's, pete and me choosing the log exit rather than the nanna's route, and into flow to bridges highline, funny noise in the brakes down over the drop, and the final blast down the valley. end of the road, tony and marie left, the rest of us onto Eastern with the rest going for coffee and Pete and me having to get home on time.

In the afternoon, family went to Bottle Lake, me and O on the singlespeed and tagalong, T with H in the seat on the back. we took the easy trail out to the beach, played there a bit, then on the way back through, O wanted to blast the rest of the loop so T and H headed back to the car and O and me (utterly exhausted by this stage) headed for the inner (shorter, but still not that short) loop. last couple kms i was shattered.

Frieday night, Port Hills jaunt

Nelson had parked Bongo at mine and we had some dinner and headed for the hills. parked up outside the Grape Escape, grabbed a couple of Kristallweizen and planted them to be earned. Headed up Major Aitken Drive, grunty little bastard that it is, i showed Nelson the little singletrack section, which caused a dog to bark and bark and bark at us, until its owner came out and shut it up and we struggled on up past their house. then up Kenmanure drive onto the main up the grunt and onto dirt sweet dirt.

crept our way up under the pylons the wind finally biting up there. on up to and through the shitty grovel to the top and onto Vernon, sweet sweet singletrack. Nelson took the lead, and i kept catching him, buttoning off, catching him. he wasnt enjoying the Teddington shit, doesnt trust it. onto Witch Hill and he left me for dead. i just bided my time round and back onto the road, then it was up to Castle Rock.

Had a wee look at the trail that had sparked an asshole mtnbike thread on vorb this week, thinking, fuck thats steep. then hit the legitimate singletrack, nelson giving me the lead. left him behind, had a really good run, picking the sweetest lines and flowing and gliding all over the gnarl. he on the otherhand apparently was being pinballed from one rock to the next, thrown all over the place ending up entirely wronggeared. at Bridle, we turned tail and hit straight back up the singletrack. nelson leading again, cleaning it all nicely, meanwhile, i stuggled away in the background.

Tucked in for a fast flight down the road, then onto Witch Hill, Nelson getting away again quickly on the climb, me just managing to get up the bits i needed to and then having a nice flowy bomb back to Rapaki-top. on up the Vernon, Nelson again getting away on me big time, me just making it up struggling away, taking the shortcut from the first switchback above Farmtrack to make some time on Nels (who got a "You are AWESOME, bro" from boyracer when he got to road). Lighting making me blow the very last bit of the 'rocky corner' up top there, then getting on with it and getting back down to the road nicely, we headed round the traverse til just before Lava Flow, peeled right and down, gravelling to OldSkool, bombing to gate.

Off piste, found a few interesting sheep tracks onto and off of the usuals, then into the steep-rocky where i found the coooolest new line... somewhere off the right, down this wicked wee face... anyway, all leading down onto the fun fun singletrack, across, down backwards and forwards, and out. back to the van, home, and Kristallweizen...

Thursday night East End blast., the late night crazy singletrackers

Nelson had parked the Bongo outside my place in the morning and turned up around 6. we stuffed about for a while, just as well, cos some people came for a dog kennel i'd sold on Tardeme, then we spend a while dismantling the lights switch on the bongo and fixing it so low AND high work now!!!

headed out to Scumner and treadled on up the Captain Thomas. cleaned bits and blew the usuals, last night's legs slowing me down a bit. got out top and headed up the road for the top of Greenwood.

bit of breeze up top, over and round, then straight into the the down. first bit down after the ruins and over that first jump my eyes were watering like mad making the landing a bit sketchy. then on round wind to the side, then round and headwind again. first right hander i kinda washed out wickedly but kept it on track and chased on. not too much dust up here cos the wind was good to go. strangely i thought about how chuffed steve is with his Gravity Dropper on this section, i wonder why... i think cos he'd be raving about how good it is on those sections. my seat was up.

the boardwalk came up very quick, and got through gloomy gulch, but after that i just had to rest. then, big lead by Nelson now, i took off again. good run down down down, loving that bit after the fence, over the jump then pumping round to where the creek is. blew the rocky uppy bit just after the tree as had nelson, rest was okay, tho thought how that exposed bit above Evans Pass Road, just before the macrocarpa is gonna get me one day, kinda off camber and too exposed, apparent big drop (specially in the dark) off down to the road.

Godley... whats there to say. the rocks are all bigger. neither of us cleaned the first bit, nelson tried twice. i was getting tired.

anda the anaconda... yep. pretty dusty, wind just placed right that i was eating all of Nelson's. railed the berms, bombed it down, and the tail was nice too. clambered, struggling now, out of taylors and explored nicholson park off piste a bit and the playing on jumpies off driveways all the way down before the waterfront.

grabbed a feed, and home by 10.30 or so...

gotta watch dis.

full screen it, bol.

Chris Akrigg TEOCALI.0 from chris akrigg on Vimeo.

Wedsdney after yeaster blight, middle hills blat.

took the Cotic to Little Ak for weekend, but didnt get out on it, rode it to beach a couple times with H on a cushion on the top tube, but no ride ride.

was gonna get out last night, but was tired, so didnt.

family still at L.Ak cos floors have been sanded and polyeurothaned so house is toxic like a P lab right now, so tonight, to escape the fumeage, i hit the hills. blat across town through rush hour, the length of Wilsons, then Koromiko to alley then up Parklands Drive on Huntsbury. quite the wee push at its top leading into yet more push on Hunts Drive up to where i'm used to top of Aotea, on up from there. gradually overtook a good sized group of variable speed starting on that last grunt of seal and continuing through them right up past the pylons. then grovelled up the top gravel, nearly losing my balance onto a hottie jogger, and on up to top.

layered sleeves on and mounted headlight and headed round the traverse superhighway. at the highest point i ran into Jo from work. so, we hooked up and rode together. cooling down, so vest on. we debated which way to go and settled on back to top of Rapaki, then back round to OldSkool. so, thats what we did. me getting massive gaps on her, and then waiting, riding briefly with her then gapping off again, repeat, numerous times. but was good. lights on for the descent.

rode together up road back round past Farm Track. sleeves onto vest at fence, and then hit the single again, then down the rockies, and Jo headed down the grovelly gravel and i pranced between the tussocks.

then the blast, down, a massive CRACK sound when a rock hit something (bashguard? downtube?) juust before the gate, no marks tho. then down all the shortcuts, only baulking/dabbing once, while Jo took the easier lines. then into the OldSkool, lovely, except... under lights the dirt's grey is just sooooo grey, and featureless, but its such a clean track now its not an issue and you end up just wafting down it, like riding a cloud, albeit a very grey one.

then quick stop at StMartin's NewWorld for Ice Cream and Boysenberry's then to Colins for an impromptu dinner of Crayfish, roastied spuds and fresh picked salad accompanied with a bloody nice Chardonnay and then the dessert and an O for Awesome Montepulciano. followed by a cold ride home to a toxic house.