Graeme Simpson: Club lures women into Super action

Former World downhill and current Enduro World Series champion, Tracy Moseley on the bike trailer, checking her phone during the festival. PHOTO/AGNES ARNOLD

It is Super Saturday and Sunday this weekend.

Revolve Rotorua are organising the women's Super V with shuttles up Katore Rd and runs down Tokorangi Trail, Turkish Delight and Challenge on Saturday.

Revolve are new to the local scene, making an instant impact, successfully encouraging more and more women on to bikes, and our trails and roads. Agnes Arnold and Nadia Coombes describe Revolve as a "down to earth cycling club for women". Truth in advertising.

Revolve was an important part of the Rotorua Bike Festival this year organising woman's road and mountain bike rides. They also ran the South Star Ladies Shuttle night.
The festival media team was stretched with 30 events over 10 days. So it was great when Leisa Tocknell and Agnes offered to shoot Revolve events themselves - with excellent results.

Agnes shot the shuttle evening and I suggested focusing less on riding and more on the women involved. When the photos arrived via Dropbox there was fist-pumping.
The first image was former World downhill and current Enduro World Series champion, Tracy Moseley, sitting on the bike trailer, checking her phone.

She had only just arrived from Britain, jet-lagged and keen to stretch her legs. The final photo was the back of the bus and the trailer loaded up with bikes as it headed up Hill Rd.
Not a riding shot in the lot. The gallery on Facebook still told a great story of camaraderie and love for biking.

Hopefully, Revolve will be back for the festival in 2016 (Friday, February 12 to Sunday, February 21).
The Super V will be a classic Revolve-style event - if you want to race and go hard, no worries. If you just want to cruise in a friendly and supportive atmosphere you will be more than welcome.

For more information about the Super V check out Revolve Rotorua on Facebook.
The next day it is Banshee Sunday Super D, run by Tim and Belinda Farmer at Nduro Events. Super D is mainly downhill with some short climbs so it is a test of technical skill, stamina and strength.

The course starts at Billy T, then into G-Rock, down Chestnut Link and into Roller Coaster and Moonshine, finishing with Chop Suey.
Entries are going fast. Check out ndurosuperd.com for more.

Nduro is a company that has been around since 2002. I am writing a profile of founder, Dean Watson, for Irish Triathlon magazine. He lives in Ireland, now, with a new business, Sports Timing. It has been a pleasure catching up with him and reminiscing. We were both involved in the 2006 UCI Mountain Bike & Trials World Championships and the more eccentric Singlespeed World Championships.

The singlespeed story began in October 2007 as a vague idea about a NZ Championships. Three years later we were running the Singlespeed World Championships. When we started talking about that first NZ champs in April 2008, we would have been happy with 100 entries. I mean, how many singlespeeders could there be in New Zealand?

Two-hundred-and-fifty as it turned out - then 600 Kiwis among 1000 riders in 2010.
The Anzac Singlespeed Championships cap another remarkable month in Rotorua mountain biking on Sunday April 26. See www.rotoruasinglespeed.com