Rotorua's Cameron Beck is never far from his bike.
It is no longer a surprise to look up mountain biking results and find the name Cameron Beck somewhere near the top of the list.
The 14-year-old John Paul College student has been a permanent fixture on podiums during the past year, the majority of which were cross-country and enduroevents.
At the National Secondary School Mountain Bike Championships, which were part of Crankworx Rotorua last month, he won the under-15 boys' cross-country and finished third in the downhill. He also competed in the Air DH and Crankworx Rotorua Downhill in his age group, but crashed out.
"Crankworx is awesome, it's such a good vibe and always such a good time. I usually tend to race more cross-country and enduro, a little bit more physical stuff than the all out downhill," Cameron said.
Earlier this year he was the under-15 champion at the Oceania Cross-Country Championships in Dunedin and the National Cross-Country Championships in Wanaka.
"They were definitely my best races to date. I really loved the courses at both of them and had good starts, I got out the front early and didn't have to fight in a sprint at the end.
"We went down the day before and had two laps around the course to see what it's like and zone in on all the technical parts, what lines you should take on the technical parts and where you can pass. There's a lot of strategy involved."
Rotorua's Cameron Beck is never far from his bike. Photo / Ben Fraser
He said he enjoyed the longer disciplines because it took a mixture of skills.
"It takes a lot of endurance and being good at everything. Rather than four minutes to race down a track you've got a whole hour and a half to work with it. They can be really technical as well."
If you are visiting the Beck household do not expect to find Cameron in front of the television, the young rider spends every moment he can riding in the forest.
"When I was about 8, on my birthday, we went for a ride in the forest and I just loved it. I started going back and it just went from there really, I'm here pretty much every day now. There's always new trails, we're so lucky here. There's nowhere else in the world you could find so much variety in one place."
He does not plan to slow down anytime soon.
"I'd definitely like to try to go to the world championships and race a few of the Enduro World Series rounds when I'm old enough, that's a really big goal."
There are plenty of local riders racing throughout New Zealand and overseas for him to learn from.
"I talk to Daniel Self and John Richardson [of Rotorua] a lot and also Lewis Ryan, the Xterra athlete, I'm also good friends with him. It's really good to see how well they're doing.
"I just need to keep training hard, keep improving and keep having fun."
