Tamworth Mountain Bikers twilight series round five wrap

Over 10 Gravity Groms/Dirt Masters attended this week's round and the consensus was to tackle Secret Valley Plateau in a short-track loop.

Kaden from the NIAS MTB 2021 squad led the kids around for their first lap with the support of the parents.

Rory Simm managed to set a series of solid goals including riding one handed around the track.

For the Lockwoods, Eliza and Callum, seemed to be just as fast as each other at times, which was exciting to watch. Jarrod Freeman is getting more experience every week and responded to feedback from the club coaches.

Biggest air goes to Harry Judd, and probably biggest crash too.

For the main race, after a 30-odd field mass start (and albeit slight confusion on turn one heading into Hillside), the field filtered into a rhythm of flow heading down towards to the South Park fork.

Solo female riders for their categories, Melissa Siddons (recreation), Lisa Roberts (B grade) and Laurie Willis (A grade) all worked hard in their own classes.

Willis put in the commendable effort of a double Pha Pha Pindari loop.

Roberts managed super-consistent lap times - with the latter five laps being within 10 seconds of each other.

Siddons seemed to find more energy - or perhaps more groove - as the laps clicked over, finishing with the last lap being the fastest.

C grade contained a full dozen starters and they are competitive. So much so that some of the guys seriously need to put themselves in the next grade up and challenge themselves with a little more tech in the race loop to match their pace.

With plenty afield for the short 'Hillside-Shortcut-Yellow Brick Road Return' there was much opportunity for place swapping, and with lap times being immensely low (almost beating the four-minute barrier), plenty of laps were to be had also.

After all the jostling carry-on between the consistent riders of the field, it was Mathew Burgess who managed to find a spot ahead of the field and even got to pass the timing mat in time to complete an extra lap and take out positional top gong for the grade.

Following in this field was Orlando Follington in second and Cameron McDonald only a few moments behind in third.

When Elsie announced the start of round five twilight race, it was B grader Ben Shaw who was on the ball and took off with a cracking pace to obtain and maintain a very respectable 35-second lead within the first 3.5 minutes, and kept the stamina going to take out the category.

Mark Follington and Kaden Thistle maintained pace also to take out second and third respectively. Nick Reid was on pace for a field lead if it wasn't for some chain challenges which result in repair time hindering overall race time.

Honourable mention goes to Thistle who braved the deadly treadly of his father, but kept it rubber side down.

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It was a hot start for the A grade field. Ben Marsh maintained a commanding lead all the way into Pha Pha Pindari before conceding to mass start lover Ross Aylwin who made a move with much panting in the process to take the lead.

A little more moving and shaking continued in the field throughout the first and second lap before everyone found their groove with most of the A grade field completing three laps of the gruelling Pha Pha climb.

Aylwin took category line honours, with the consistent effort of Terry Worboys netting second and Marsh finishing off with a great effort to finish third.

A notable "well done" also goes to Leon Hystek who not only stayed on the lead lap, but also endured the longest ride time in the process.

Elite took off as the lead train, and was a very impressing force to watch. One might even say a contingent of Roberts boys should have been the unstoppable force, but with one using the "forgot to start Strava" line, and another with a derailleur issue this was unfortunately not their day.

However, there remained a three-carriage train all the way to the finish - and a sepctacular photo finish it was with a near three-way tie after a staggering four Pha Pha laps.

Eddie Willis took out elite first place, with second and third being (sort of) shared between Lachlan Butters and Anthony Daniels both coming over the line just 0.8 seconds behind.

Michael Crummy rounded out the field, but the timing data does not reflect his performance - a solid effort in any case.

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