Paul Petch

Night riding at Mcleans Island in Christchurch

It’s now dark by 6.30- but all is not lost as the season of night riding kicks in! I did a fair bit of night riding back in Australia and just loved it. What is important though is the choice of trail to ensure a good workout. For the past few weeks John and I (with guests some nights) have been taking our two weekly rides at Bottlelake Park which is just perfect with nice wide (compared to Port Hills!) single track.

On Tuesday evening we headed to Mcleans Island here in Christchurch for something different to meet up with a mixed group (mainly Johns work mates) of 5. It was the first time I’ve ridden there and it was great for night time antics with VERY smooth and hard packed single track- with a 11km loop through tight, bermy and FAST flowing tracks. Admitidly there was not much technical riding but it was great fun hitting the tight turns and leaning the bike to see just how far I could push the tyres without washing them out. It was awesome with 5 of us hammering through the tight pine trees trying to keep up with the leader… then swapping the guy at the front- and repeating. It was hard work too and felt very much like interval training! We also bumped into a group with one member sharing his experiences of the Otway Odyssey….. small world eh?

Apparently 20min is a good time per loop during the day- and we managed 26mins- so we were flying! For a first visit at night- I hung in quite well :) We managed a couple of laps- some gas bagging- and some serious grins. Isn’t night riding great! We have now worked out that we will ride Tuesdays at Mcleans and Thursday at Bottlelake Park. Sweet.

I’m running a set of Ayup lights (first editions- one on my helmet and one on the bars) combined with a Cateye Tripleshot Pro (bar mounted). They are both LED technologies and suit the type of riding I’m into during winter just perfectly. I could go on and on and on about lights like the rest of the internet seem to at this time of year- but they work- I can see- so I can ride. That is all :) One thing of note though is how cool the black Ayup light looks on my skid lid……he he.

The cold and early nights have arrived but I’m still managing my 3 rides per week, which I’m happy about. Two night rides + something on the weekend is fitting in with everything else quite well. Let’s hope that Christchurch stays dry this winter, and I’ll be set.

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Related posts:

1. Mcleans Island – Christchurch
2. First night ride at Port Hills
3. Riding at night on the road- safe or not?
4. Night riding on Port Hills rigid…ouch!
5. Mcleans Island mountain biking

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 24th, 2008 at 6:19 am and is filed under Cycling and tagged with mcleans, night riding. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.