[Event] Funky Fynbos 2 Day MTB

[Mamil]

I last did the funky fynbos in 2016 - I missed last year because of a busted hip courtesy of a fall at the Garden Route Trail Centre and so I knew the 2 day format and longer first day ride would offer surprises and I didn't expect all of them to be pleasant.

 

Day 1 was hard. Don't get me wrong it was beautiful but hard. Like being in love with a beauty queen who grew up tough kind of hard. Ecstatic highs followed by excruciating pain. I hadn't ridden the first singletrack climb before - I was a bit too ambitious in my pacing perhaps not realising or maybe forgetting how punishing the climbs to come would be. I thought of lots of things to call the fynbos besides funky. I had ungracious thoughts about the route maker. I was glad when it was over. 

 

Day 2 was a lot easier - many more free kilometers and treated us to some of the previous day's routes in reverse which was actually very nice. Did that first singletrack climb again, this time way slower and what a surprise, I enjoyed it more. With that out of the way I could feel the routemaker's mercy in his design of the route. Chatted to a chap on a 2018 Specialized e-bike - he had polio as a child - what a boon it is for someone with only a small percentage of muscle left in his legs to be enjoying the mountain. He dropped me at the first climb but ran out of battery shortly before I did on the last big climb up out of the valley.

 

Overall a memorable weekend's riding, I'll be back in 2019.