dirtman

BOTTELARY HILLS MTB DAY-PERMITS NOW AVAILABLE 24/7 AT THE SONEIKE ENGEN GARAGE, KUILS RIVER Please note that as from this Saturday the 25th of January day-permits for the Bottelary Hills MTB routes will also be sold at the Soneike Engen Garage on the corner of Bottelary Road & Amandel Drive, Soneike, Kuils River. Permits can be bought 24 hours per day (just remember no night riding is allowed). A permit costs R50 and is in the form of a disposable bike-board. No deposit is required (the previous system of a returnable bike board for which a deposit was required, was scratched). Day permits can now be bought at the following sales points: Engen Garage - Soneike - 24 hrs Radish Restaurant – Bottelary Road from 08h00-18h00 (Mon – Sat) and 08h00 – 15h00 (Sun) Devonvale Hotel (at the Devon Vale Golf course) – 24hrs Devon Valley Hotel – 24hrs Zevenwacht Country Inn – 24hrs

We will cut the grass on certain sections of single track this week - this should help with the tick problem. Spraying your legs with Tabard also does help.

I have been working together with Hellwarp on the Bottelary Hills MTB trails since opening and the excuses for riding without a permit are never ending. Some of the standard and not so standard excuses given to me are: - I did not know I need to pay to ride these trails (and this within 50 metres after riding past a VERY big sign stating that riders must pay to ride!) - I did not see the sign stating that riders must pay to ride (I never realised that a large percentage of MTB riders are blind!) - I am from Pretoria / Bloemfontein / wherever and don’t know this area (why then do you ride a bike with the branding of a local bike shop and how did you manage to find the trails?) - It is the first time I ride these trails (so what, did you also not pay the first time you went to the dentist?) - I want to ride the trails first to see if I like it and if I do like it, I will pay on my next ride (I assume you also eat for free in a restaurant to see if you like the food or not?) - I have been riding here for free before you guys opened these trails – why must I pay now? (I you did ride here before the trails were opened, you were trespassing on private property!) - I am only going to ride on the jeep tracks and farm roads and not the single track; since you guys did not build these roads, why must I pay? (such logic just boggles the mind) - I am a member of XYZ club and thought I could ride for free here as well (so I assume you ride for free with your club bike board in Tokai. Jonkers , Welvanpas and all the other trails?) And then the one from the guy on the R60 000+ bike: Jou p#@s, ek sal ry waar ek wil! (I don’t have a response to this one, other than “joune ook!” ) To all the riders out there who pay to ride - not only at Bottelary, but at all the other trails, thank you. To the freeloaders out there – I wish you all the bad luck that is possible on a bike.

Climbing of around 1200 m sounds about right. Did a late route change last week that took out about 200 meters of climbing on the loop between waterpoints 1 and 2 for the 45 km riders. Original plan was to take riders all the way back to just below waterpoint 1 to join up with the 35 km riders. Maybe next year if you really want to do 1400 m of climbing!

Just back from the final route inspection. All route markers are in place. Will do another quick sweep of certain areas very early tomorrow morning to make sure markers have not been tampered with overnight. Trails look good. One muddy patch on the 35/45 km route that may require a “hike-a-bike”. Just a friendly request to the 45 km riders – you will do two single track sections that have switchbacks – PLEASE do not lock your bike’s brakes in the switchbacks and do not slide your bike’s rear wheel around the switchbacks. If a few hundred riders do this, those switchbacks will be destroyed at the end of the race. Some advice for the race snakes - you will start climbing within 50 meters of the start, so there will be no opportunity to "warm-up" the legs. Also make sure that you are in the chutes early, as there will be two or three starting batches to prevent bottlenecks on the first climb after the start.

The last route markers will go up tomorrow and we will test-ride the whole route on Friday to ensure all the signs are in place. Weather looks good for the weekend. Just a bit of advice - there are a lot of horse-flies around, so better take some preventative action. Tabard spray works well. Also check for ticks after you have finished your ride.

I rode the 45 km route from Overgaauw yesterday to check the conditions of the trails and whether we need to do any work before the race. Overall the condition of the route is good, with as few muddy spots that will hopefully dry out during the next two weeks. It took me 3 hours 45 minutes to do the whole route (I am above average fitness, but no race-snake), so the average rider can expect to take about 4 hours to do the 45 kms. The not-so-fit will be looking at up to 5 hours. My advise is to forget about chasing a "good" time on the day - rather enjoy the beautiful surroundings and flowers, and set aside at least 5 minutes at each water table to fill up with the best and tastiest food you will find at a race.

@ Mopkop I see you use the word "night", so I assume you were riding at night with lights. If this is indeed the case, please take note that NO night-riding is allowed on any of the Bottelary routes. There were a number of posts on this thread regarding this, so if you are doing night-rides, please stop it immediately. If you need to use a light, you should be off the trails. We like to welcome all riders to the Bottelary routes, but please, do not ride at night, otherwise the farmers will shut us down.

Just a friendly request to please stay away from the trails for the next week and give the trails time to dry out. Riding the trails after the amount of rain we received, will cause damage and will increase the maintenance that will be needed. Save yourself a big service bill on your bike and rather go and chase the roadies on tar this weekend.

I can’t speak on behalf of other trail builders, but my request with regards to the Bottelary Hills MTB trails is to please stay away for the next week and give the trails time to dry out. Riding any trail after the amount of rain we received, will cause damage and will increase the maintenance that will be needed. Also, save yourself a big service bill on your bike and rather go and chase the roadies on tar this weekend.

Have cleared the single track through the woods today and cut up and removed the bigger trees as well. Will head back to the green route tomorrow to drain some of the puddles. Overall the single tracks are in good condition taken into account the amount of rain we had. Just be careful on some of the farm roads which are rutted in places.

Nuwe single track op die nuwe blou roete. As die weer saamspeel, hoop ons om dit oop te stel oor twee weke.

Net ‘n “lusmaker” vir die nuwe singletrack wat ons besig is om te bou en wat die nuwe blou roete sal vorm. Die rooi lyn heel bo is die huidige single track op die rooi roete. Die single track heel bo (blou lyne) is nie duidelik sigbaar op die foto nie, maar is ook deel van die nuwe roete. Die single track op die foto is ongeveer die helfte van wat gebou word – aan die ander kant van die kloof word omtrent dieselfde afstand gebou, maar dit sal meestal “climbing singletrack” wees. Ons hoop om oor twee weke klaar gebou te wees, maar dit hang af van die weer.

MTB rides depart from the Engen service station at the traffic lights at the entrance to Sandbaai every morning at 6 am.

I was a member of the two men team who built Hillcrest, Kliprug and Meerendal, as well as some sections in Majik. We also did the whole of the Bottelary Trail system and are still working on improving and expanding the Bottelary trails. Musashi is correct that Bottelary is more cross-country type of riding where you can ride up to 5 hours and about 60 kms if you do all the different route options. Tygerberg has the most singletrack, but we are adding single track to Bottelary all the time – there are about 8 kms of single track at Bottelary at present. I myself do my weekday rides on the Tygerberg trails, but on weekends I am always at Bottelary as I am a cross-country type of rider. As Musashi said, there isn't really anything like "best". It depends on what you want to do. Go and ride the different trails and then decide which trails you like best. Bottelary permits are discounted to R240 for the rest of the year – price for 2013 will be around R400. @FanieFiets – You are going to use at least R50 of fuel to get to Schapenberg, so that R150 permit is not cheap. From Durbanville you can get to all the Tygerberg trails as well as Bottelary with your bike. @ Mulmi – all the starting points for the Bottelary Trails can be found on www.bottelaryhillsmtb.co.za. Your nearest starting point will be at Zevenwacht – the trail is signposted from there. Not sure how fit you are as a new rider, but you will need some legs to get up the hill!

Just an update on the status of the trails after that massive cloud burst of two weeks ago when the Bottelary Hills area was hit by close to 40 mm of rain in less than an hour. I am glad to say that damage to the single tracks was limited (we will take the credit for good layout and building!!). The last section of about 100 m on the green route was however basically destroyed, but has been rerouted by Adrian and his team this week . There is now a lovely piece of new ST – just be careful as it might be loose is some places. All the other sections of ST on the rest of the route have also been undergoing maintenance to eliminate any ruts and other damage – again just watch out for loose gravel in places. All maintenance will be completed early next week. The farm roads suffered the most damage, but I am happy to report that just about all the roads that form part of the route had been repaired by the farmers whose land the route traverses. One HUGE thumbs-up and a million thanks to those farmers! The section of road on the red route just past Goedehoop Estate (at the end of the red route shortcut from the green route) and after one turns right from the gravel road towards the vineyards, has however been totally destroyed and was yesterday still closed to vehicles. Truckloads of building rubble had been dumped there to built a new foundation for a road, but work was still in progress yesterday. You can get past there on your bike, but rather walk you bike for the 100 metres as there are a lot of broken tiles and bricks in the rubble that will cause serious damage to your tyres. Other than this, the whole route (except the blue route that is still closed)) will be ride-able by this weekend. With nice weather forecasted, head for the trails and enjoy!

www.renosterveldmtb.co.za

Have done the first two and is riding again this year. Year 1 had too much sand, but that was sorted out last year. There are still a few sandy patches, but nothing serious. They are tweaking the route every year to sort out problem areas. Don't expect much single track - most of the single track is on the last day when you do sections of the Tygerberg trails just before the finish. Organisation of the race is excellent - good food, water points, etc. It is not the Sani or the W2W as far as the route and single track is concerned, but I will recommend it as a race to do.

If you want to ride almost all of the single track, you must do the long green route - this option includes the 1,5 km forest single track on the red route as well (I assume you started at either Hazendal or Zevenwacht if you only did the green route). Best ride however is to do green and red combined from Hazendal - see website for distance and profile.

The new section of single track on the red route (just before the rocky climb) will be opened up for riding by Friday. As with any new section, it will need some compacting. Total distance of single track if you ride red and green toghether now exceeds seven kms.

Will discuss it will Hellwarp, but the current idea is to close the current path over the top of the hill, including the rocky climb. The rocky climb is not the big issue, but we have serious problems with erosion and water damage on the downhill on the other side, especially the last section of jeeptrack. It is just not worth the expense to try and repair that section, as it is too steep and go straight down - we will most likely dig a few trenches over the downhills to stop further damage . It was the only option available when we put the route together last year, but we are now looking to eliminate all high maintenance and/or dangerous sections as and when money becomes available. I have a black route in mind that will provide you with enough rocky climbs and rocky decents - just waiting till August to see if it will be rideable in winter.

The berms on the bends on the new ST on the green route received attention on Monday - the bends should now ride easier. Also note that a short piece of single track was built on top of the dam wall on the red/orange route (on the right just after you ride over the dual brick roads leading up to Koopmanskloof). It is not signposted yet, but it is easy to spot - please ride it so that it can get compacted. We also have started building a 600 meter section of new ST on the red route that will eliminate that rocky climb (where most riders have to walk) just before you get to the highest point on the red route. The rain that is forecasted from the weekend onwards will slow down the building, but if all goes according to plan, the section will be opened up before next weekend.

Please note that we have closed down the blue route for the winter period. It is too wet down in the kloof, but more important just too dangerous due to the "green death" on sections of the route. We are working on a possible new loop.

@ Dick Was nice meeting you. Agree re the berms - just waiting for soil to settle down and get compacted. If all goes according to plan and the weather plays along, we will start working on a new section of single track on the red route soon - will keep you posted.

Die nuwe single track op die groen roete sal môre (Vrydag) baie naby aan klaar wees. Sal Maandag afrond, sekere dele meer gelykmaak,"berms" en "run-offs" bou, ens. Die nuwe deel sal egter "oop" wees vir die naweek sodat die los dele kan kompakteer voor volgende week se reën. Ry dus asb die nuwe deel, maar wees versigtig - sekere dele sal redelik los wees - veral die "switchbacks" (daar is 5) moet maar eers rustig gevat word, want daar is redelik opgevul aan die onderkant daarvan. Gee ook kommentaar asseblief sodat die probleme Maandag uitsorteer kan word.