Wombats and Kangaroos

Posted: 2 May 2008

By Peter Turnbull

Link: Part 1 of Turnbull Down Under

Gateway RT's Marathon MTB specialist Peter Turnbull reports from his latest event in Australia, where he found himself up close and personal with a hefty example of local wildlife.

"Are you ready to tame the Wombat?" asked the publicity for the BMC 100km Classic at Woodend, Victoria. I don't know much about Australian wildlife, but I thought that wombats were shy nocturnal animals. I encountered a wombat several weeks ago on an early morning road ride, but it made a quick dash for the bush as soon as I was in earshot. Kangaroos, as I found to my cost, are a very different proposition.

The week before the BMC 100km, I was riding the Commonwealth Games MTB course at Lysterfield where numerous kangaroos watch the local mountain bikers with a mixture of curiosity and disdain. As I sped down the final section of the course, I startled three kangaroos on the left hand side of the trail. Two hopped off immediately into the bush but the third took a couple of hops along the side of the trail before deciding to cross my path. An almighty "skippy stack" ensued, sending me over the bars and flattening the roo. My first thought was that I'd killed skippy, but as I looked back up the trail I saw the roo roll over a couple of times as it got back on its feet. My second thought was whether it might start a fight - kangaroos have a reputation for boxing - but fortunately it skipped off into the bush. I was skipping nowhere. In fact, I wasn't able to ride my bike for several days.

With a 7am race start, it seemed that the organisers of the BMC 100km Classic were doing their best to arrange a few encounters with the local wildlife. There was a real chill in the air as the elite riders assembled at dawn on the front of the grid, with more than 700 riders behind them. After weeks without even a hint of rain, the course was dry, dusty and fast. Above all, however, it was extremely technical, with endless kilometres of single-track that wound an intricate course through the Wombat Forest.

A frequent criticism of the "one big loop" marathon courses in the UK is that there isn't enough single-track. The BMC marathon was just the opposite, with occasional sections of fire trail, 4WD and dirt roads linking up a seemingly endless network of single-track. This made overtaking difficult along many sections of the course. The elite riders set off 5 minutes before the rest of the field, but after an hour the lead riders in the second wave were already passing the back-makers in the elite group. At 60km I was in 32nd place on the trail, but missed a turn and lost 5 minutes speeding down and then climbing back up a winding section of fire road.

With only one long climb in the entire 100km - just 2,000 metres climbing in total - it was difficult to catch those in front or drop those immediately behind. But over the final 20km I was able to work my way through the field to finish in 25th position overall, with only one minor crash along the way. On this occasion, there were no animals involved, just poor judgement on my part through one of the more technical sections of the course. There may well have been a few wombats lurking in the bush, but on such a technical course my eyes were fixed on the trail ahead. As for kangaroos, we ate them in a burger at the after race BBQ.