With MTB-Orienteering in its early stages in NZ, an exciting development overseas has been overlooked. NZ's first international representation in MTB-orienteering took place at a World Cup event held in Finland last month. National (foot-orienteering) Squad member Greg Barbour, who works for Shell in Holland, rode the MTBO World Cup held in conjunction with the World (foot) Orienteering Championships.
Barbour who lived in New Plymouth before postings to Aberdeen and then Holland has wide sporting interests not confined to traditional orienteering, and these include kayaking and mountainbiking. Selected for the World Champs in Finland, he sought the approval of the NZ selectors to ride as well as run. Here is his brief report.
Yes I did ride only one of the two races (team management preferred that I didn't ride the other as it was to close to WOC.) I came 36th which was a good result, at least I felt pleased.
As you may know MTBO is very different in each country at the moment as there seems to be no recognised format. The result of this is a large home ground advantage and the need to familiarise at the first stages of the course.
I was slow at first due to caution but eventually started to go faster and taking more risks. Made a mistake at the second last control of around 3 mins and this cost me 7 places.
The map was very detailed and essentially a ski O map the scale was 1:10000 and as you would expect the courses good. I was not really restricted by biking ability as technically I could hardly keep up on such a large scale and complex map. Overall it was more fun than foot O normally as it had both technical challenge , physical challenge but also adrenelin from some steep descents.
Organisation was a bit Mickey Mouse but the whole sport is at this stage and it suffered in comparison to neaby WOC. As far as I know I was the only competitor in both.
On Saturday I am in the Belgian MTB O champs and I guess I am a chance of a win? I will also probably go to the World Cup final in France later this year to start to build some experience.
This page was written by
Greg Barbour and
Michael Wood,
and was installed on 14 Sep 01.
Back to the MTBO home page.