in my life.

The Karapoti Classic Mountain Bike Race - 50km 

Excruciating. I’m still in pain.  I wish I hadn’t already used the “of my life” line in a previous post. I would like to say that was the hardest race I’ve ever done in my life, but I don’t want to anyone to think I’m just an exaggerator. But it was…

For me, the excitement started on March 4^th, the day before the race. I woke up at 5:40am to make my breakfast, finish packing, and to make my way to Picton. At 11:00am I caught the Interislander ferry to Wellington, and felt seasick for the entire 3 hr trip. Once I arrived, I picked up my sweet swag bag at a bike shop then hopped on a train to Upper Hutt, a small township within the region of Wellington. I was hoping to find a cheap hostel near the race site, but the man (Paul) at the information center informed me that since Upper Hut isn’t a popular backpackers destination, there isn’t really any cheap accommodation.

Paul was the best person I could have met that day. He told me that he was hosting 5 guys that were taking part in the race the next day, and that although his house was full, he would call his neighbors to see if they’d be willing to take me in for the night. So I ended up staying at Paul’s neighbors beautiful home, which was about 500m from the race site. I really couldn’t believe my luck. They were the nicest couple of all time, and they gave me my own room and bathroom for the night. Paul invited me over for dinner where I met the other racers staying at his house, 4 Tasmanians who organize a 4-day, 7-stage race in Tasmania called “Wildside” (www.wildsidemtb.com), and 1 Canadian, Tomas Skinner who has been traveling and riding around New Zealand for the past few weeks.

Anyways, great people, amazing luck, and beautiful location.

Would I do this again? Hmmm I think not…

At the start of the race, we all lined up ankle deep in a fast(ish), flowing river. The bridge overhead was lined with enthusiastic spectators. As my category waited and watched the elite/expert men start their race across the river, it became obvious that the shortest distance across was the deepest and the most risky. The guys who chose the longer, more indirect route didn’t have to battle as much against the waist deep current. Considering my height, I chose to take the longer, shallower route. The water level was still past my knees, so I think I made the right choice. Although the combination of algae-covered rocks and my lack of ability to easily shift my balance made for a slippery and dangerous river crossing, it was hard not to enjoy it.

1st river crossing - starts muy shallow gets muy deep

I was having a great race for the first 25-30kms, sticking with some speedy chicas that were setting a good pace. Then we hit the “unride-able” section of the race called “Devil’s Staircase”. It made me want to cry. You had to carry your bike on your shoulders up the biggest and steepest hillclimb I’ve ever seen IN MY LIFE (in a race situation). The climb went on and on and on and on and..on and on for ~2.5km.  I had lost one of my water bottles on a rocky descent prior to this section, and had forgotten my cliff blocks in my warm-up jacket. Ooooo it was bad. Partway up the climb, I assumed a cheerleading role and pulled off to the side to encourage others on. I really needed the break. I did finish this race, but barely. The race ended with the same river crossing that started the race in reverse, but this time I had to resist the desire to drop to my knees and float away. I raced for 3hrs and 58mins. Longest race of my life.

In the end I won!...a participation medal. And that’s the end of the Karapoti chapter of my life.

I have a few pictures and the GPS data marking out the course that I will upload in due time.

I hope your first 2 races this season go better than mine!

Over and out n’ about in Wellington.

e.bruised

grape work is grape

Another day, another dollar.

I'm employed again! Thus, I have been very busy and haven't had time to update this thing. I've been working at a vineyard for the past 2 weeks in a town called Blenheim. My daily responsibilities on the job include pruning, picking, snipping, de-clumping and stuffing my face with fruit and pesticides. I seem to be the only one on the crew who can't resist devouring half of what I pick. Maybe it's because of the pesticides. The bunches we pick are the ones we throw away and breaks my heart to see a perfectly ripe bunch of grapes hit the ground. So I eat em'!

It's pouring outside which means no work today! If we prune the grapes when it's raining, we can damage the fruit, and we really can't have that. It was so nice to sleep in this morning. On work days we get up at 5:20am which I'm getting used to, but it really takes a toll on you by the end of the week.

I'm staying at a hostel called SWAMPYS that supplies work for travelers like me. There are about 50 of us and we all wake up, eat, work, and sleep and the exact same time. We became a big family pretty quickly, even though some people don't even speak english. Everyone seems to have some form of culinary skill so I'm going to step-up to the plate and make braided Fin bun today. A nice comforting activity on a rainy day...

Training - ugh. Hasn't been going swimmingly in the past two weeks. My heart rate monitor died so I've been training "by feeling" instead. I depend pretty heavily on my HR during workouts, so I'm having a hard time knowing what zone I'm actually in while training. And it seems like I'm in a bit of a trail-free zone so I've been doing everything on the road. I haven't missed workouts, but they just don't seem to be going as well as before. Maybe it has something to do with those cool kiwi teens that I rode past the other day who pointed and yelled out to me, "LOSER!"...or maybe it's the amount of peanut butter I eat.  Nah, I think I just need to snap out of it, get an attitude adjustment, get a grip. When I need to pull myself together, I just think about my new bike which I'll be picking up immediately when I come home. OR I go into this bead store. Both make me giddy and excited again.

Well I'm off to the g.store to get ingreeds for my bread.

may as well publicize it...

Nothing like a good ass-kicking to get the season started. haha wow. So I entered the NZ series cup race in Nelson last Sunday. The course was great: 5 laps with just over 5k per lap, almost all singletrack, no real techy sections and about a million switchbacks.

It started off with a long climb up a dirt road to spread the racers out and let me tell ya, the start was FAST. The whistle blew, and I was immediately at the back of the pack desperately trying to hang on to anybody in front me. Once we got into the singletrack at the top, a few girls went down and I was able to slip past them without getting dangled up in the crash. The next 2 laps were uneventful, I didn't really pass or get passed. I was really just trying to make my way up to a racer who I would catch glimpses of every now and again.

80, good number

And then on the 3rd lap: BIGGEST CRASH OF MY LIFE.

It happened so fast, but I remember it in slow motion. I hit a bump in the trail and instead of absorbing it I got some air, landed on the edge of the track which was super soft and flew off the front of my bike into a thorny bush. I sat there, winded but intact, with my bike tangled somewhere below me. It happened to be a high density spectator area, so several people came down to help me.

They were all asking, "Are you ok?!"
All I remember saying is, "I think I'm in a rosebush."
Them, "They're blackberries."
"I see."

A woman asked me to hang on to her dog while her and another man helped untangle my bike from the thicket. Illegal yes, but they were so eager to help, I was so full of little thorns, and I love dogs... I didn't decline their help. At this point I had been passed by everyone and knew that I would be pulled before the end of the race anyway..hmm does that make it ok to accept help from others? Now I'm not so sure...

Everybody kept asking me if I was going to keep racing. My prickly hands told me absolutely not, but the fact the announcers called out, "ERICA BOTA FROM CANADA!" every time I started a new lap, and the fact that it was just a crash and it happens all the time, meant that I had no choice but to continue.

In the end after continuing on to complete a 4th lap, I was pulled off the course. Embarrassing. They directed me to a little path of shame off to the right of the course. I felt bad for myself for a few minutes, found Caitlin who had been my faithful feeder each lap and who was still watching the course eagerly, waiting for my arrival, and her and I had a good laugh at what had just happened.

I'm not too disappointed. I have a lot of training and racing ahead of me and will look back at this event and laugh, as I already do. Oh good times...

sad, crash site

"we're just tired"

One of my besties from back home is in NZ right now as well. Caitlin is working as a sea kayak guide in a town called Motueka, a 2 hr bike ride from Nelson. We're living close enough that we can go on mountain bike and apple stealing adventures on her days off, and far enough to be independently figuring things out in a new land. 

Recently, we went explorin' through the Kaiteriteri hills, a region just outside of Motueka. We faced some seriously extensive climbs, as well as some "high-risk" descents (but we showed em who's boss, mostly).

For most of the ride, we had a ton of energy. Towards the end of the ride however, we were both feeling tuckered, and agreed that hitchhiking the remaining 10km (downhill) back home was the most sensible option. (why....why?!)

About 5 minutes later, a truck with ample storage space stops to pick us up! I run towards it and start hoisting my bike into the back, then notice he's trying to get my attention through the rear window.

I walk up to the passenger window and he says, seeming worried, "What's happened?! Is everything ok here??"
"Oh yeah, we're just tired." I respond. Wrong answer.
"Oh, you'll be alright." He drives away.
I turn to Caitlin, "We need a better excuse."
"I've got a sprained ankle!" She peels off her sock and starts towards the road with a limp.

Owe, that looks sore. Who cares if she's facing the wrong direction,  PICK HER UP

A few cars pass and we start to feel lazy and embarrassed. Caitlin puts her shoe back on and we bike the remaining distance. We spent the rest of the ride uncontrollably laughing.  How we would have composed ourselves if somebody had actually picked us up and confirmed that Caitlin's ankle was indeed sprained and looked pretty swollen? We hadn't prepared enough to answer any questions about the injury and would have burst into laugher if anyone had been concerned for her.

Remember the eels? They exist.

Shrubbery

This morning on my ride I saw a baby hedgehog chilling by the side of the highway, munch, munch,  munchin’ away at some roadside shrubbery. As I rode passed him, he indicated to me that he wanted to cross the busy road. At first I disregarded him, and continued on down the road. But I could not ignore my conscience and I quickly biked back to the shrubbery where he still sat, munch, munch, munchin’ away. I swear though, he did want to make the cross. If you have never seen or touched a hedgehog before, they look a lot like a porcupine, and feel as prickly as they look. I scooped him up (and a bit of his shrubbery), yelled, “OWE BABY HEDGEHOG!” (he really was prickly),  and ran him across the road and farther into a big farmers field. SAFE. I continued on, guilt free J.

Later on down the road, I stopped to observe some llamas with twitchy ears.  Llamas are weird, so I pressed on.

The trails behind where I live

A tree for sale! I want it...

I had taped my camera to my handlebars in the hopes of capturing some sweet trail riding, but my camera ran out of battery. I'll try that again some other time.

the mutual wave

I have concluded that here in NZ, when two cyclists traveling in opposite directions on the same road pass one another, it is not custom to acknowledge the other with a wave. Back home, the wave represents a sense of like-mindedness,  a bond that cyclists seem to have with each other for the simple reason of being cyclists.  Here, when I initiate the wave to a fellow passerby, the response is almost always, "see the wave, ignore the wave, look back at the road." I will not be discouraged. I WILL participate in a mutual wave exchange.

I quit my job! This is a VERY good thing. The chefs in the kitchen were a particularly hideous breed of mean. I would walk into the kitchen feeling happy and light-hearted and would exit feeling like life just wasn't worth living.  After being sworn at countless times,  I decided I just couldn't handle it anymore and I walked out. I was working 40+ hrs a week and it was starting to conflict with my training. So I quit, and that's that. I'm so much happier already.

This also means I'm not tied down to Nelson anymore. I have loved exploring the area, but have a huge urge to move on and travel down the east coast of the island. I'm thinking about following the mtb series from Nelson on Feb.13, to Christchurch on Feb 20th, to Nationals in Dunedin on Feb 24-27th.

We'll see where the wind blows!