The new book of Melbourne MTB rides (Off Road Cycling Adventures, Keiran Ryan) is already on sale at VicMTB, and Rich bought it last weekend.

Tonight we tried it out, and conclude that it seems to work quite successfully, as we managed to find our way back to where we started, and had a bit of fun in the meantime.

The loop we did is called "Smith's Gully Sauter". It starts between Panton Hill and St Andrews (which are between Eltham and Kinglake for the lost), and goes kinda via One Tree Hill and Sugarloaf Reservoir.

The book grades the rides with a letter (A-D) for technicality, and a number (1-4) for fitness level required. This loop was a B2, making it moderately easy on both counts. Quite a fair call: the grading seems to be fairly accurate for folk who ride regularly; first timers and clueless eXtremists might get a bit of a surprise. All was fair to good firetrail (except for the optional ST extension at the end, which was cool...), and we did the 20-odd k's in about 1.5 hours without killing ourselves.

Rich's front deraileur self-destructed on about the second corner of the first big descent (why does Rich regularly destroy XT and LX bits while my STX-RC survives unscathed?). Anyway, he pulled it off and shifted by hand for the rest of the ride.

We skipped the optional schmoad climb to sugarloaf reservoir so we'd have time to do the optional ST descent to St Andrews before the light died.

I'm surprised that bikes are allowed on the ST: lots of steps (although I think they might all be ridable with practice) and very tight in places. Definitely not included in the "B" rating for the rest of the ride. If "D" is more technical than this track, then I'll have to try some ;-)

In all, there seemed to be more descents than climbs, which makes for a good ride even if it defies the laws of nature.

Oh, the book review: looks pretty good, written by serious MTB riders for MTB riders. We took 2 wrong turns, but that probably says more about us than it does about the book's directions. Good piccies, the obligatory 'emergency repair' section (with some really good ideas, like kludging a stuffed freewheel by lashing your cluster to your spokes with cable-ties and making it a fixedwheel), access issues, enviro issues, yada yada yada. Think I'm going to get me one.

Back to the bike page