On Sunday the 27th October, mountain bikers from around Victoria travelled to Erica for round nine of the Gippsland mountain bike club Championships, the S&J Cycles Erica 3 hour enduro. In the lead up to this event, the local trail crew put in many hours, cutting the new Silver Top Spur trail, as well as brush cutting and raking the trails in preparation for the race. The circuit which was about 11km in length consisted of the trails Crazy Snake, Bones and the newly cut Silver Top Spur trail featuring many climbs and fast flowy descents and would provide one of the most interesting races Erica has seen.

As the 36 riders lined up for race start, the rain started, providing a muddy and even more interesting circuit, especially on the first decent which was filled with ruts on the steep and slippery surface. As the riders tackled the descent, they were greeted with the sound of cow bells and cheering from the energetic spectators.

With a bit of drizzle and overnight rain, the sun finally came out and greeted the riders, drying up the track and providing a faster track lap after lap. After completing five laps in a time of 3 hours and 43min, Brad Fisher took out the solo male and outright class, followed by Justin Prior in 2nd and Matthew Franke in 3rd in the solo male category. In the team’s category, first place was taken out by Team Puffalot in 1st followed by the Psycho Wombats and M&T in 3rd. Juniors was taken out by myself, completing 4 laps in a total time of 3 hours and 40 minutes in the Solo Junior category.  2nd place was taken by Brent Freeman, followed by Tristan Mooney and local rider, Norman King.

Mountain biking isn’t all about the males however as there is also a strong field of women in the sport. In the women’s Solo category Britta Weller took out first place with 4 laps in 4 hours. Kirstin Curtis took 2nd place followed by Karli Magnuson in 3rd.

The race that started off rainy and muddy, turned into a warm pleasant day, everyone had smiles on their faces and had a great time, ending the day with a BBQ and presentations to reward riders. For full event results and other information on local mountain bike racing, visit www.gippslandmtb.com.au and to keep up to date with Erica MTB Park, make sure to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.