North Island XCO Champs 2018

Anton Cooper won the Elite Mens race
Anton Cooper won the Elite Mens race

Last Sunday Rotorua Mountain Bike Club hosted the New Zealand North Island XCO Champs 2018 on tracks in the Redwoods. The week had ended with a huge storm that had caused a lot of damage to the forest with numerous trees down. I had spent over 3 hours riding tracks on Saturday and they were littered with broken branches and debris and occasionally blocked by fallen trees. Contractors and volunteers from the Rotorua Trails Trust had been out early clearing away the worst of the blockages on the main trails. They do an incredible job maintaining the trails and I would strongly suggest joining the trust, which at $5 a year has to be one of the best deals going.

Jessica Manchester won the Elite Women’s race

Racing on Sunday had the U23 and elite men and women scheduled for a 2pm start so I headed over to the Waipa end of the track system to find a spot to watch and photograph. A small stream crossing near the end of the lap was a popular spectator spot and having taken my gumboots I was able to get a nice low angle standing in the edge of the stream. This risked some splash and mud splatter but gave an opportunity for some slow shutter speeds to get some sense of motion. We had intermittent rain but I was well sheltered under a tree fern.

Anton Cooper was incredibly smooth and fast through the challenging terrain.
Anton Cooper was incredibly smooth and fast through the challenging terrain.
Rotorua local Samuel Shaw was 2nd in the Elite Men’s field
Rotorua’s Sam Osborne was in 3rd place

I had anticipated low light levels in the forest so decided to use my Nikon D3s which has excellent high ISO performance along with 9 fps frame rate to catch the action. I began with some high ISO high shutter speed shots to freeze the action but then decided to change to panning with slower shutter speeds and some flash to get a sense of movement.

Charlotte Rainer came 2nd in the Elite Women's race.
Charlotte Rainer came 2nd in the Elite Women’s race.
Cosmo Bloor won the 19-22 class and finished 4th overall.
Cosmo Bloor won the 19-22 class and finished 4th overall.
Taylor Johnston put on a good show whipping over the stream jump each lap. He finished 2nd in the 19-22 class and 5th overall.
Taylor Johnston put on a good show whipping over the stream jump each lap. He finished 2nd in the 19-22 class and 5th overall.

For a keen MTB rider it was great to see athletes of this calibre riding our local tracks. Their skill levels and sustained power output was something to marvel at and envy. 

Photos with Nikon D3s, Nikon 24-120mm f4 lens and SB900 flash with SD-9 battery pack for rapid recycling. TTL flash with -1.6 stops of exposure compensation. Camera exposure set manually to avoid the dark background from causing overexposure of the cyclists in an automatic exposure mode. Images processed through Adobe Lightroom CC Classic and Athentech’s  Perfectly Clear plugin for Photoshop.

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