Man, if you want to have a lot of fun (and one hell of a work-out), then take up Mountain Bike Night Racing!
I did my first official MTB night race last night in Victory Park, Johannesburg. What a rush! A short single track trail, which takes about 5 minutes per lap, curls around trees and goes up and down grassy banks, over a few dirt opstacles and under some trees.
The racing works as follows. Everyone starts at about 7:00PM, just as the sun is setting, and you’re given one hour to see how many laps you can complete.
My heart averaged about 168 bpm for the duration of the race, mainly due to the continual rush of adrenalin, but also because of the fact that a few guys from the MTN-sponsored MTB team were present and one really doesn’t want to get lapped too many times, so you push as hard as you can, all the way! Testosterone can be such a pain!
I managed to complete 10 full laps, which was really not bad for a first attempt!
It was an awesome experience and I’ll definitely do it again. What I really want to experience though is a 24-hour MTB race, but this quick one-hour nigt race was also extremely enjoyable and a good, quick, mid-week training ride.
This coming Sunday I’m participating in the Carnival City MacSteel 100km Cycle race in Benoni. The last major race before the Argus. I received a seeding to once again start in the A-bunch, but since last week’s strategy of dropping back one group and starting in B worked so well, I’ll follow the same plan this Sunday.
Happy cycling!
Tags: Mountain Bike, Night Racing
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