DAY SIX – Stage 5: 86km, 2305m climbing

The last day. A day that we thought we would all look forward to. The profile looked to be one solid but rideable climbing, some smaller climbs that looked to be nothing to worry about and then a fast-flat roll into the finish. This was far from what we experienced. With Rohan and I sitting in 21^st we had some work to do to get into the top 20 on GC so we knew that we could not just cruise into Queenstown. The stage quickly rolled into the main climb of the day where I was feeling similar to yesterday on the climb, ready to smash it and move passed teams breaking their spirits. Rohan kept me calm which was smart as I had severely underestimated the smaller climbs that came later. Once at the top of the main climb, we once again went down one of the worst and roughest descents I have ever ridden. This one was different as it wasn’t as steep but to make up for the lack of gradient, they let us know that there were sink holes on the trail. When riding passed these sink holes, they weren’t just some holes that would make the descent even bumpier, they were proper holes that were deeper than we are tall. Safely dodging the sink holes and only just being able to keep grip of our bars we finally made it to the bottom of the descent where the aid station was poorly placed. We had come in at a high speed and passed the station before we even realised what it was. Deciding it was too late to turn around we decided to truck on to the next aid station which was not for another 30km. We turned into the second climb which looked like nothing compared to what we had just done on the profile, so I thought nothing of it. That is until it just kept on going up after turning each corner seeming like it would never end. Finally, we made it to the top and that was all the climbing done for the entire race. So, the rest was all on easy flat fast gravel trail into the finish, right? Wrong. After descending down to a river, we had a short jetboat ride across the river where we then got onto the Queenstown trail to take us back into town. Quickly, Rohan and I ran out of water and were still 10km from the last aid station. I quickly felt the affects of not having anymore fluid and I became weak and unable to ride on the front. Rohan had to do all the work to the aid station where we were overjoyed to be able to drink some fluids again. We quickly set off to complete the last 25km of the Pioneer. The fluids helped but unfortunately not enough. The entire week I had been so surprised and happy with how strong and fit I had felt but that had all caught up to me now. I was struggling to hold Rohan’s wheel as he was powering along the trails bringing us home strong. I tried to do the occasional turn to give Rohan a rest, but they were all short lived. Rohan proved to be the stronger man on the last day and carried me all the to the finish line where I didn’t even have the strength to raise the hands to celebrate what had been an amazing week. Quickly stuffing food and chocolate milk into me I congratulated friends who had also finished and debriefed my mum about how today went. Mum had been following the race, finding points along the course of each day to cheer us on and then providing food and drink at the end of each stage. I don’t know how I could have completed this without her help and support.

“Finally, we made it to the top and that was all the climbing done for the entire race. So, the rest was all on easy flat fast gravel trail into the finish, right? Wrong.”

As for results. We had bested our result from yesterday to claim 12^th overall on the stage and with the time gaps we created today we moved up to 19^th on GC overall. Mission accomplished. Well both missions accomplished. Rohan and I had come into the Pioneer with one goal, finish it. We believed this was going to be hard enough, but we quickly found ourselves at the pointy end of the field with an aim to get some results, and we did just that.

Wade (cycling tips), Alby, Me and Rohan after finishing the last day

Just like that our Pioneer journey was over. We flew home the next day and enjoyed that wonderful first night’s sleep back in our own beds. This has sparked a flame inside of me giving me a desire to do more mountain bike stage races as that was one of the most enjoyable and satisfying weeks of my life. But for now, the mountain bike will be put in hibernation as I get ready for my trip to Belgium to race Cyclocross World Cups and Championships.

DAY FIVE – Stage 4: 68.9km, 2519m climbing

I should mention that each night we get a race briefing for the stage to come in the morning. The briefing the night before for today’s stage was not an enjoyable one. After believing the worst was over with on stage 2, we got told stage 4 is going to be worst. With more climbing packed into over 30km less distance. Well actually even less as all the climbing was finished by the 53km mark. Not only did that information make the briefing bad but we also got told that the extra mandatory gear was required as we were going to a higher altitude. This meant instead of only having to carry a light rain jacket, a merino head warmer, spares and a med kit, we now had to carry a more serious rain jacket, merino tights and a merino base layer. So, on the day with the most climbing we had to carry the most amount of gear. There were many sighs in the crowd.

 

Our biggest day of climbing, with 2500m of climbing to do which was all completed by the 53km point. This was the stage everyone feared. You could sense the nervousness of people not knowing what to expect or how they are feeling. We quickly started a small climb of about 300m climbing where Rohan and I lost contact with our group, but we knew that there was not point riding hard to stay with the group early on as there were some monster climbs to come. We rolled through some undulating terrain before we hit our first big test, a 10km climb that ascended 1000 metres. I begun today’s stage feeling absolutely crap, I was finding the pace hard even in the 2km neutral section, so I thought I was in for the worst day of my life. Once we began climbing though, something clicked inside me and I started feeling the best I have felt all week. Rohan and I were passing and dropping teams left and right. Our plan to hold back early on worked perfectly! After cresting the top of the first big hill we descended for a bit before our last climb of the day, Mount Difficulty. The name wasn’t too confidence inspiring. As per the last climb Rohan and I just found our tempo and picked off teams moving up places. After about 4km of climbing, looking at the barely readable profile stickers given to us, Rohan and I thought we had a short flat section which we could see before we climbed what looked like a wall to the top of Mt Difficulty. Obviously, our eyes were deceiving us but in a good way as we turned right instead of left which was to go further up and we begun our descent. This isn’t to say the climb was easy, I was glad the climbing was over earlier than expected as I didn’t know how much longer I could go for.

Displaying some serious pain face as we get close to the peak of Mt Difficulty. Photo credit: Tim Bardsley-Smith

Shortly after we began descending, we wished we were climbing again as the descent was the most rough and steep trail we had ever ridden. Constantly on the brakes, getting bounced around everywhere on our hardtail mountain bikes, we were not enjoying this descent one bit. Finally, we made it to the aid station at the bottom. Stopping to grab some food and complain about what we had just come down we quickly left with another team to ride the last 10km together sharing the work. This was a perfect situation for us as we still go to go fast but we had more time to rest off the front as there were now two more people to ride on the front for us. The last 10km flew by and we were turning into the race village before we knew it and unknowingly rode to our best result yet with 15^th overall. We were quite pleased with that and rather loudly celebrated our achievement. This put us into 21^st on GC bringing back our hopes of a top 20 GC result.

DAY FOUR – Stage 3: 79km, 2203m climbing

I woke up, walked over to the bike yard where everyone’s bike is kept overnight to find my bike and see a note saying my back wheel had been replaced. I was not completely surprised about this as I knew my wheels were old and the hubs were in bad shape, but I was hoping to make it through on it. Oh well, they had transferred all the parts on my old wheel onto this new one. The new wheel made the bike feel as good as new so I was ready to get started with today’s stage.

 

Today’s stage was supposed to be an intermediate stage that could be taken easy(ish) to let the legs have a break. The profile looked like one solid climb then cruising trails to the finish so once at the top of the climb then you could recover to get ready for the last 2 days. Similar to other days, the day started with some fast trails where we could just sit in the bunch. This was probably the fastest section and it was early on so our entire bunch was still together and it was much easier to sit on than drop off and work in the wind. The road widened for a short section and I thought I would take this opportunity to move up to my partner who was 4 or 5 people ahead of me. So, I click up a few gears into my biggest and wrenched on the pedals to overtake the riders. My bike just felt like it snapped instantly, and pedalling got me nowhere, so I assumed my chain had snapped. I look down and see my chain still fine, but my cassette lock ring had popped off letting my small cog spin freely meaning I now had no big gear. This was a problem as we were still on the fast section, so I was spinning like crazy trying to get back onto and then hold on to the bunch. I was frustrated, and Rohan asked if we needed to stop but I said there is nothing we can do as we needed a cassette tool, we needed to get to the first aid station where a mechanic would be there waiting to hopefully fix my bike. So, as we climb the main climb of the day, I go harder than I probably should have out of frustration and desperation to not lose much time. We make it and it takes longer than I had hoped to fix the bike, I stand there watching rival teams ride passed and out of sight only adding to my frustration. Finally, we get going again and slowly ease into a solid tempo trying to bring back some time. Not long after we begin a very rough descent, I hear my bike rattling again, but this time it was my chain guide that had come loose. Hoping I can roll down to the next aid station with it rattling there is moves back towards my rear wheel meaning I had to stop to take it off or it could’ve caused serious damage. More time lost. Not long after this while still descending a rocky trail my back tyre starts making the sound no one wants to hear, air leaving the tyre. I got a flat. We stopped to try plug the tyre which ultimately did not work so we were left with one choice, put a tube in the tyre and hope I don’t get a pinch flat for the rest of the day. Normally this would be easy enough, but these trails were rougher than anything I had ridden before. We finish the descent safely and ride to a solid pace moving through teams to finish to end what was the most frustrating day of the race for us. We rode in for 43^rd which bumped us down to 23^rd overall on GC. This wasn’t many places down on what we were previously, but the time gaps were quite large now. Before this stage we had looked and believed a top 20 on GC was possible but this brought that down to a slight possibility.

My face here pretty much sums up how I felt about today’s stage. It was a day to forget about and move on. The thing about stage races is that days like these happen to almost all times some time throughout the week so ours was over with and we just had to capitalise on others having a bad day as well.

Luckily, I had booked the mechanics package as it had proved its worth multiple times already this race. I handed them my bike to work on overnight to replace the rear tyre and make it tubeless and to also fix the chain guide back on. For anyone thinking of doing a race and whether to book the extra packages, do it. I didn’t have to clean my bike after each stage as they did it for us which meant I didn’t have to stand for 30 minutes waiting in line for the pressure washer. Instead I was able to relax in the social zone and recover as best as possible while telling stories of the day with other riders.

DAY THREE – Stage 2: 104.7km, 2223m climbing

Today was a big one. The Queen stage with 104km ahead of us and over 2000m climbing it was on a whole other level to anything I have done before. This would be my longest day on the mountain bike ever and it was only 1 part of multi-day event, so I was justifiably nervous. Luckily, after yesterday’s shoe problems I had packed both my pairs of MTB shoes I own so after giving my bike to the mechanics overnight to get the cleat out of the pedal, everything was ready to go.

We again set off on some fast gravel trails just trying to hold onto the front bunch while not using up too much energy. The bunch quickly split into the top 12 teams or so and then our group which was led by the leaders in the mixed pair category. With one person being a local to these trails and the other being an Olympian athlete, we were in good hands sitting behind them. We then began what was the nicest single-track climb of the whole week. Winding, flowy trails all the way up to the top of the hill. The pace that the mixed pair leaders set was hard for me but not too hard that it broke me for the rest of the stage, but it was faster than I would have liked to go. We made it to the top and stopped at the aid station for longer than the other teams, so Rohan and I were now left to our own devices. With some rolling fire trail climbs and 4WD track where we passed some teams and got passed by other, we turned into our last big climb of the day. To put it nicely, this was a b*tch of a climb. Really steep bumpy fire trail meant a lot of hike-a-bike. After 45 minutes of climbing (some riding, some walking) we finally reached the peak and descended into a town called Clyde. Once at the bottom there was a long section of flat sealed road and gravel road. Rohan and I caught up to the leaders in the mixed pairs who were coming 2^nd in their category at the time. We activated roadie mode and got low and powered passed teams taking the mixed pair leaders all the way up to a group with their rivals in it (not sure whether to feel good or bad about helping the leaders not lose time, sorry other teams). We caught up to some guys who we thought we would ride with until the finish as we were all working together nicely. With about 5km to go I was riding with some strong Belgian guys powering along a flat section before I here one of them yelling my name with a Flemish accent that I almost didn’t understand. I look back in confusion and see that Rohan my partner, is not with the group. Rohan hit a wall (figuratively) and was feeling today’s effort so he had to back off the pace to the finish as to not ruin his legs for the rest of the week. We rolled into the race village happy to have that monster stage over and done with. We bumped fists across the line and thought the worst of the Pioneer was done as that was the Queen stage. We were wrong. Keeping the result similar to the day before we got 21^st overall which made us think maybe yesterday wasn’t a fluke and we were actually strong enough to be in the mix this far up.

DAY TWO – Stage 1: 69km, 1636m climbing

The first few days of the race looked to be heavily focused on single track as we were in the Queenstown area and not out in the middle of nowhere, yet. This was a good thing for Rohan and I on our hardtails as we were dreading the rough 4WD tracks to come. Stage 1 began with a fast section along the Queenstown trails which we had ridden on before the race began. This was hectic as it was the first bunch start so everyone was a bit on edge and there were bollards in the middle of the track along the trail. We quickly turned off the trail and into some single track which created a bottleneck affect as a massive bunch had to squeeze into single file. We then began the day of climbing by going up the side of a cliff. Yes, I mean that quite literally, riding up narrow rocky single track with no land to break your fall to the right. With a bit of running with the bike (no problem for my CX background) we made it to the top without falling down and then descended into Moke Lake. This was followed by some rolling fire trail climbs, some of which were very steep, but we managed to ride it all. After the fast fire trail riding, we rode into 7 Mile Track for some amazing single-track riding which was a relief as it gave us a break from the climbing. Coming out of this we rode up some steep roads in the suburbs around Queenstown thinking we were almost home and just had to descend down into the finish. We were very wrong. Turning into a forest we then climbed some stupidly steep fire trails to get to the top of the skyline. We then finally descended into the finish down some awesome trails that are more or less made for enduro/downhill bikes but we still enjoyed it.

 

The end of this stage was made more stressful as the cleat became loose in one of my shoes. I thought nothing of it early on and kept pushing thinking it would be fine. It was not. Down a crazy descent I had to stop to get off, unclipped one foot but the other wouldn’t come out. I panicked twisting my leg trying to get out before Rohan and I agreed, my cleat was not coming out. This meant from here to the finish anytime I needed to walk the bike (which was 3 or 4 times) I had to take my shoe off and run with one shoe on and one off then put my shoe back on every time. Finally, we got to the finish and twisted the cleat bolt off my shoe releasing the shoe but leaving the cleat in the pedal. Because of my irrational panicking I had now completely ruined the soles of a beautiful pair of blue Shimano MTB shoes. Not how I wanted to start my Pioneer journey. Despite the shoe problem, we got 19^th overall on the stage which was awesome for us but made us think, had we gone too hard too early in the race?