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A jetlagged Huw Kingston

made the journey to South

Australia for a taste of the

inaugural Mawson Marathon.

It’s 11pm… Ready, so ready for sleep, I put my hand into the tent to climb in. My palm feels the pain of half a dozen thorny three-corner-jacks which pierced the �imsy

groundsheet from beneath.The last time I’d ridden through the

magni�cent Flinders Ranges in South Aus-tralia was at the fag end of a three month riding and walking journey from Perth 10 years earlier. I was primed and �t with no-one to race against but myself. This time, for the inaugural 360km Kona Mawson MTB Marathon, my preparation was a lit-tle less measured and a lot less than ideal. I’d not climbed on a mountain bike in �ve weeks, taking the time instead to drink ex-cellent French wines and �ne English ales. To get to the thorny business of pitching my tent, I’d �own in from the UK, spent a night unpacking and repacking, �own to Adelaide and sat on a bus for nine hours to Blinman, the race start point. My body knew neither time nor place.

The masseur’s table was tempting to ease muscles set rigid by plane and bus seats. But there was a bike to build, food to eat and a race brie�ng to attend… and a tent to re-pitch.

The Mawson Trail runs some 900km from Blinman down to Adelaide. Possibly Australia’s best known off-road cycling trail, it takes in a mix of dirt tracks, dirt roads and tarmac. Many other Austral-ian states could take a leaf out of South Australia’s book when it comes to trails. Trails SA brings together multiple agen-cies – land managers, local government, Sport & Recreation, cycling and walking bodies – to work together to develop and promote trails across the state. So often in the Eastern states these agencies work in isolation wasting not only resources but often reinventing the wheel (or the walking boots!) as they go.

With experience running tours on the Mawson, Bike SA decided to run a race along the most northerly 360km of the trail. For racers there was a choice to be made; the four-day stage race or the non-stop, straight through run. In the end entries were split pretty evenly between the two, with 45 or so individuals in the stage race and 22 teams of two lining up for the non-stop ride.

Hefty cash prizes in the non-stop, prob-ably as big as any offered in Australia (the �rst team took home $8,000), attracted some leading riders; Chris Jongewaard teamed up with fellow South Australian Brett Anderson, 24 Hour specialist An-drew Bell lined up with an in form Jason English, while veteran endurance special-ist Mark Fenner was taking up-and-com-ing rider Mark Tupalski under his wing. Stage racers would leave from Blinman on the Wednesday with the non-stoppers heading off on the Friday. A small group of 20 or so untimed riders would also fol-low the stages.

MawsonMorsels

Huw Kingston slogs into the headwind with nowhere to hide. Photo • Travis Deane

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It was a blustery and cold dawn at the tiny town of Blinman (population 20), as we lined up for the start. The �rst 20km set the tone for much of the race. Straight down the road into a strong southerly meant you were damned if you were left alone. Far better to enjoy the shared and sheltered embrace of fellow riders taking turns up front in true roadie fashion. Warmed up, we turned off the fairway into the rough to enjoy some great mountain biking through the ranges, passing the cutely named Mount Dib and Mount Dob.

FLINDERS MAGICThe core of the Flinders is indeed some

of the most impressive landscape in the country. Rocky red ridges and sharp peaks rising from spinifex country or cypress pine forest. The trail was fast and undulating with plenty of rocky creek crossings forc-ing you to maintain concentration all the way to Bunyeroo Valley Lookout, which deserved a long break to admire the vista but which for us signalled the start of a screaming fast downhill run to a feed sta-tion. The long roll I was handed would have done Subway proud and kept Gladwrap in business. It was all too hard, so I grabbed a banana, that nutritional delight of natural packaging, and rolled on toward Wilpena. By now I was on my own with dead legs on the ‘false �at’ 12km climb up Wilcolo Creek. It was a relief to crest the climb and hit up a couple of kilometres of singletrack through the cypress pines.

In a ‘bonus’ option, riders could climb three peaks along the route of the race. First up was St Mary Peak, the highest in the range. Only a hardy few gave their walking muscles a hit out. This was understand-

able given the time taken was not deducted from their race time. That didn’t deter one of the non-stop pairs, Steve Partridge and Tim Smith, who not only climbed St Mary along the way but also did the race on sin-glespeeds. Talk about stacking all the cards against yourself!

A slog into the wind from Wilpena led to a respite as we turned toward Rawnsley Bluff and the �nal 7km of rough, rocky track to the night halt, after 93km, at Rawnsley Park Station.

I’d stayed awake and my pre-booked mas-sage waited as reward. The healing hands of Hazelene were nothing short of mag-ni�cent. A Coopers Sparkling regeneration drink further helped. I’d almost cancelled my entry when I’d read the original ride information informing racers that whilst a bar was on hand for the non-timed riders, all racers would be disallowed from the bar and would be expected to race with a blood alcohol reading of zero. Fortunately internal lobbying had that particular rule struck out!

Day two, 92km to Hawker, took us out of the big ranges via the Moralana Scenic Drive. I couldn’t keep up with the big boys on the �at run leading into the Drive but was grateful for this 27km of fast, twist-ing track. As two of us turned south onto the blacktop we were more than happy to be picked up by a train of riders for the headwind ride south. From the feed station we headed across the rocky plains of Mt Little Station to where the trail reared up to cross for what was, for all but one rider, an unrideable climb.

This was great country again. I settled in for a steady pedal and dreams of good cof-fee in Hawker. Dreams that were answered in Hawker General Store where I caught up

with Brett Bellchambers, Jason and Kylie Macavoy. They were en route to Blinman for the start of the non-stop ride the follow-ing day. Two days driving from Canberra, a planned 15 hours on the bikes, then two days home.

Despite the caffeine, jetlag �oored me at last in Hawker and I was only just able to crawl out of my sleeping bag to eat dinner at the presentation.

Grey skies greeted the dawn on day three, a 107km run to Quorn. Even a small amount of rain in this part of the world can totally change things. The red soils can turn to concrete slurry which is impossible to ride, clogging wheels and drivetrains within metres. We were lucky. Today was �at and fast, mostly on good road. As we sped past the turn off to Buckaringa Gorge I remem-bered chatting to a local farmer 10 years before. With every second word being an F word (which wasn’t Flinders) he good-naturedly told me that someone should run a bike race in that part of the world. I wondered if he was around to witness us speed past?

Trains formed, unloaded carriages at times and picked up more at others, occa-sional shunts causing consternation. Dana, an American lady and one of the non-timed riders, was interested in none of this. Her goal was to �nish each stage, and to �nish carrying an extensive make up bag to ensure that, before the �nish line, she could reapply lippy to wind chapped lips and founda-tion to perspiration and red dust blemished cheeks. She might have been disappointed at Quorn Caravan Park to discover a sign in the showers stating that ‘the use of talcum powder is prohibited’. Why?

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South Australian locals Ollie Klein and Andrew Field pick their way up one of the more technical climbs. Photo • Travis Deane

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Winding dirt road beneath the spectacular Flinders Ranges. Photo • Travis Deane

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PASSING SIDESHOWThe non-stoppers were chasing us down

now. At Quorn anticipation mounted as we waited for the �rst riders to come through just after dark. Our dinner was interrupted numerous times �rstly as Jongewaard and Anderson powered through the checkpoint without stopping, in less than 11 hours for the 290km. Then came Bell and English, taking time to down some food and pick up supplies. Five minutes behind came Fenner and Tupalski. Mark one, cockney chirpy as ever and Mark two looking like death warmed up. Most non-stop riders leap-frogged past us as we slept that night.

Day four was a 70km dash to the moun-tain bike mecca of Melrose. A stiff climb early on led to a rolling trail to Wilmington in full sunshine. From here we plunged into a freezing fog reducing visibility to 20 metres or so for the �at run into Melrose where the curtain lifted on the stage for the �nish. The �nish was timed to coincide with the annual Fat Tyre Festival in Melrose; a laid back celebration of all things MTB. Mawson stage riders merged with festival goers whilst tired non-stoppers wandered in search of food and beds.

The Kona Mawson MTB Marathon is another great addition to the growing stage race calendar in Australia taking you through some unique country. Do it sociably over four days or enjoy your own little world of pain with a team mate. Combined with the Fat Tyre Festival, it’s another great reason to visit South Australia—a State committed to cycling.

Article by Huw Kingston

Go to www.bikesa.asn.au for results and information on the next Mawson Marathon.

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Going non-stop in

the Mawson Marathon

is a unique mountain

biking experience as

Arran Pearson tells.

What? 367km non-stop! In the mid-dle of the South Australian bush? Unsupported? That sounds nuts.

Where do I sign up!”Thus began the conversation that ended

up with me wandering the streets of Mel-rose SA slightly dazed, sore and confused, at 7:30am in search of food after covering over 360km in some 18 3/4 hours in one of the most satisfying races I’ve done in a long time.

What made this race especially interest-ing was not so much the distance – with experience in solo 24 hour riding 360-odd kilometres in itself is not that daunting – no what made it challenging was knowing that unlike a 24 hour race you weren’t going to be seeing your support crew every hour.

Bike SA had prepared a pretty compre-hensive packing list, with all teams being required to carry spare tyres, tubes, �rst-aid kit and a shelter. Gear carrying for this type of race was new to me and provided an interesting learning curve.

In the end, the biggest challenge was �nd-ing somewhere to stash the large spare tyre for my 29er! My set-up involved stashing the �rst-aid kit in my hydration pack, spare tubes into a large seat bag and strapping the spare tyre around my frame. Food went into my jersey pockets so I could graze while on the go. However, the range of packing solu-tions was as varied, and a number of teams opted for lightweight pannier systems—such as the Freeload rack used by my team mate, Craig Armour.

But carrying gear proved to only be half the challenge… in any endurance race, what you put in your gob is probably

Big Day Outmore important than what you ride, or even how �t you are! For us there was around 3.5 hours between feed stations so carrying enough food was going to be dif�cult, and then there was the issue of what to eat… Almost all the teams I spoke to had tummy issues as we all tried to adapt our existing nutrition plans to this different style of racing.

The racing itself was fast, with the awesome Flinders Ranges landscape forming a terri�c backdrop, allowing you to see teams far into the distance. Chris Jongewaard and Brett Anderson launched an attack in the �rst 10km and were followed closely by Jason English and Andy Bell, Mark Fenner and Mark Tupalski, Brett Bellchambers and Jason McAvoy, as well as a number of other teams. Craig and I elected not to follow and spent the �rst half of the race catch-ing teams burnt out by the high pace—some of which we had in our sights for more than an hour!

Once night fell, we slogged through the dark just trying to make sure that we kept a reasonable pace and didn’t miss a trail marker. Pulling into Quorn after riding 107km mostly in the dark we were treated to one of the best volunteer stops I’ve ever experienced; hot pasta, heaters and even a quick leg massage made it dif�cult to leave for what would be a cold trip to Melrose and our eventual �nish at about 2:15am on Saturday morning.

Up front, Jongewaard and Anderson set a cracking pace gaining a sizable lead over the English and Bell pairing, but in the end less than 40 minutes separated the top three teams after over 14 hours of racing.

So, the real test of any race is, would you do it again? The general consensus was that the race was exciting, unique and provided a welcome change to 24 hour lap racing. Craig and I had a great time and we’re already super motivated to go under 16 hours in our next attempt!

Chris Jongewaard steams through to the stage riders’ overnight camp at Quorn with 70km to go. Photo • Huw Kingston

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