26 Jan 2007. MTB group ride Yarra Flats. (BV).

I tagged along to a social MTB ride around the Yarra Flats organized through Bicycle Vic (http://www.bv.com.au/forums/ ). Meet was @ 7am at the Fairfield Boathouse (Melways 30 J12), I convinced Paulie to come on his Giant Trance as well. So we drove up to the meeting point in Paulie car, my Specialized on my rack & Paul’s Trance inside the Hyundai.
I haven’t ridden with this group b4 so I wasn’t sure what to expect. One on them races – competitively – as apart from blokes like myself who race ‘less competitively’, & I had no idea about the others.
There were about 9 starters at the car park, one of the riders was Johnny from Thursday night dirt crits, it seemed a mixed bunch but as we headed off the pace overall was OK with me. Tim – the faster one from our group lead us out over the pipebridge & the looped under the bridge & followed a trail upstream. The pace was good, I was just behind him but I couldn’t effective bring in the 8 meters he had on me without putting in an disernable effort. I hadn’t ridden this part of the trail before, which I later realized why as we emerged under the Chandler Hway bridge that it was signed ‘no bicycles’. Very nice piece of track it was though, hugging the steep gully alongside the river with a sheer drop off on the left, rock wall on the right & parts of shale rock & & sharp pot holes in the middle to keep your eye busy.
At a short time for a regroup Tim headed us further upsteam, hugging the river on the singletrack on a trail I’ve ridden heaps of times before. It was dead-dry & hardpacked in places so it easy to get a good clip going backing into the sweeping corners like a motorcycle. From there we crossed the main Yarra trail (sealed) & rode the singletrack hugging the slope up to the freeway. From there we joined the main path to for a short climb until we dropped into the singletrack longside the Kew golf cource boundary fence. This singletrack weaved in & out of the bushes & trees which didn’t give you much space but genrally it was a steraight run down until it stopped, leaving up to hoist our bikes over the log fence onto the main path again.
From there it was up on the fenceline again, down the steep drop onto the main path & then after crossing the bridge over the river near the Eaglemont tennis club, Tim took us for a lap of the ‘Tuesday night’ Delux club dirt crits course. This was followed by the trails of the Yarra Flats area.
At Banksia St Tim, his wife & another Victor headed for home, as the rest of us continued to Bonds street.
One of the riders Steve had as GPS/data tracker thing on his bike that logged our progress, details of the ride are at: http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/1963865

It was a good ride, the pace went well with everyone, although Victor came off a few times. I’ve been down these trails a few times on my own but having other there certainly add the extra dimension to it all. Made going for a short road ride the following morning seem like a real bore, almost.