Graeme Simpson: Biking styles again on similar track

In the early days of mountain bike competition, the distinction between cross-country and downhill were often blurred. And bikes were similar.

Then the disciplines diverged and became more specialised.

XC riders were known for legs, lungs and fitness. Climbing was the key. Downhillers had a reputation for being the rowdies, the outlaws.

That has changed. Now XC riders have excellent technical skills and you won't succeed as a downhiller if you're not fit and focused.

The gap between the style and design of bikes has also converged again. Long travel trail bikes that are lighter and can climb like whippets are the norm.

Enduro is the latest form of racing to embrace the changes. Courses are longer, mainly descending and without the dramatic, fall-off-a-cliff characteristics of shorter, downhill race venues.

Rotorua has its own version. The first 2W Gravity Enduro was one of the headline events of the final weekend of the Rotorua Bike Festival in February.

The Gravity Enduro will be back at the festival in 2014 on Saturday, February 5, and also features on the Rotorua calendar again this year on Saturday, October 5.

Entries are open for both: www.2w.co.nz.

The men's category of the first 2W was won by local young gun Sam Shaw with one of New Zealand's top XC riders, Rosara Joseph, winning the women's.

Shaw should have "can do anything" on his CV. This year, he won the Huka Challenge and featured in the National Cross-Country series and championships. Close to home, he competed at XTERRA and won this year's Triple Crown run by the Rotorua Mountain Bike Club.

"Winning the Paddy Avery Trophy for fastest down Hot X Buns at the Triple Crown was my favourite result so far this year," says Shaw from Germany, where he's about to launch his World Cup cross-country season.

He'll also race rounds two and three of the new Enduro World Series and the Mega Avalanche from the top of Alpe d'Huez. He hopes to represent this country in cross-country at this year's UCI World Championships.

"After that, it will be all the fun races I can find back home like the Magellan Whaka 100, 2W and Huka Challenge," he says.

Shaw a serious racer and also enjoys his riding. Like Joseph, he made his singlespeed race debut at the Pig & Whistle New Zealand Championships at Anzac Weekend. "They were awesome and I will definitely race them when they come back to Rotorua in 2015," he says.

Rotorua is described as the eighth best mountain bike destination in the world in the latest issue of the international edition of the Red Bull magazine, Red Bulletin (with audited readership of 2.2 million) - and number one in the Southern Hemisphere.

Great news and there were lots of high fives. One of the people responsible for the accolades is Rotorua-based photographer Graeme Murray.

Murray has pushed the message and image of Rotorua as a mountain bike mecca for many years. His photos contributed to the success of events like the 2006 UCI Mountain Bike & Trials World Championships and the 2010 Singlespeed Championships, among many others.

There is a reason Rotorua gets such great coverage in Red Bulletin. Murray is their official New Zealand photographer. High five him the next time you see him.