Rotorua Bike Festival: Turnout pleases organisers

The Telecom Inner City Criterium Kiddie Crit was one of the last events. Photo/Supplied

The wheels have barely stopped turning on this year's Rotorua Bike Festival but organisers are already planning the next one.

The 10-day festival closed off on Sunday with the Telecom Inner City Criterium by the Novotel and included mountain bike, road and kids events taking in almost every bike niche.

The festival, in its second year, is now owned by the Rotorua Bike Festival Trust. Trust chairman Jeremy Christmas said they had yet to collate all the figures from the events but they were pleased with the turnout.

"We've had a few events that have had maximum numbers and had to be closed off, which is quite exciting," Mr Christmas said.

"It was good to see good numbers to the community events, like Frocks on Bikes and Tykes on Trikes. We're still tweaking to get the mix right but it was wonderful to have signature events underpinning the festival such as the national championships, Bike the Lake and the Skyline Sprint Warrior."

The trust is due to meet tomorrow to discuss this year's festival and start collating feedback from the individual event organisers.

Rotorua District Council events manager Martin Croft, who helped support the festival, said most of the events had doubled from the inaugural festival last year. "There was even more of a festival feel than last year," Mr Croft said.

"It was really cool. Through the photos you can see lots of really happy people of all ages getting into it. We know people have stayed in town through the week to take part in events. We want to position Rotorua as the number one cycling destination."

Capri Court Motel manager Sharon Brooks said while they had a small number of festival goers stay, their bookings were reasonably long.

"There were some who came for two to three days but we also had people book in for nine days, which is a good stay," she said.

"We've a good reputation among mountain bikers and normally have lots of bikes. I think a lot of it is word of mouth. It was exciting knowing it was coming and then seeing people around on their bikes."

Next year's festival will run from Friday, February 13, to Sunday, February 22.