This is the third year the Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge has offered a parallel mountainbike event. I did the first one in 2008. As I spent more time on the 74km course of the Huka MTB Challenge than some 90 per cent of the competitors, I feel I am an expert.
I wasn't so much racing but taking painstaking note of the course for future reference. So I could draw you a map of the biggest hazards on the race but let's not ruin the many surprises this race offers.
The biggest of these on that first event was that the course the organisers had billed as 74km was actually 80km. I detected this some 6km away from the Taupo township finish line. Strong language may have been involved when my speedo rolled past 74km. But as 90 per cent of the other competitors were a long way out of earshot, this remains unconfirmed. The organisers now say the race is 80km.
Eighty kms on a mountainbike spent on winding Waikato riverside trails and the mixed terrain of Wairakei Mountain Bike Park (aka The Craters of the Moon) is a very long way.
Especially if, like me, you are able to stretch your race from the chilly early morning start to afternoon summer heat - and be finishing back in Taupo about the time as the under-5 tricycle division of the round-the-lake road ride was crossing the line.