Queenstown - The Mainland...
Anzac Weekend... 

Bragging rights for 2010 plus the tattoo on the line...
5 laps of a 6 kilometre course at 7-mile Reserve. 330 metres of vertical climbing each lap.
A kilometre long run to start...
and beer! 

Garth Weinberg from Rotorua rode his big Bike Vegas Niner to victory to add to his 2008 tattoo and 2009 Aussie title.
Garth was one of the inspirations or the RSSS and the NZSS Champs (and getting the Worlds to Rotorua) so a great result. 
Anja McDonald, a former UK SS champ, won the women's category. Anja is now living inChristchurch, but comes from Rotorua so we are claiming her as 1 of our own.
Anja's a lovely person, too - so we're stoked for her. (Photo: Derek Morrison/Adventure Media Group)
Her comments on the race: "I've gotta say that you guys put together one hell of a course!  It was awesome fun, but man, it broke me."
Both Garth and Anja are entered for SSWC10NZ in Rotorua and will be able to show-off their tatts!
The organizers were very proud that, apart from Garth, all the titles went to mainlanders.
Tony Moore from Queenstown and Alexandra's Denise Thorne, won Old Bugger's Men & Women. And Tony Greig from Queenstown won Retro. 

The weather was a test for all the racers but the rain held off for the event
and didn't put a damper on a fun day.
Carey Vivian and the Queenstown MTB Club were very pleased with how everything went.
"We had a really cool weekend and amazingly the rain eased off for the race," says Carey. "The trails were mint and everyone said the race was brilliant, but hard. At the last minute we decided to reduce the length of the course and just as well, it was tough enough."
A couple of grand was raised that will be invested in developing a growing trail network around the Queenstown Lakes District. Result!

The Rotorua Singlespeed Society will announce the location of the 2011 NZ champs soon at a North Island venue.
However, QMTBC have already put their hands up to run the event again in 2012. 

Once Garth got his breath back and returned home he filed this report:
A brutal race on a wicked course.
Not wicked as in 'awesome', but wicked as in 'evil'.
Loved every minute of it.  

This years NZ single speed champs were held down in Queenstown at the 7-mile reserve next to Wilson Bay.
There are several hand made tracks on the side of the hill (mountain) there and we used 6km of them for the race course.
Five laps with 330m vertical metres of climbing per lap meant it was a brutal race.
The race started with a 800m long Le Mans run round a loop and back to our bikes.
We had to remove our front wheels beforehand and carry them with us which was very interesting.

I ran really hard from the gun and came into the start area first, but fumbled a little with my front wheel, leaving the area in 2nd position.
Once I got my breath back (which took ages), I got back into first on a downhill section and then relaxed and rode my own race to win by four and a half minutes.

There was an option on 2 of the 5 laps to take a "beer shortcut" by sculling a beer and taking a shorter section of track.
Without taking the drinking time into account it was worth about a minute. Which lap(s) to take it on was optional and quite tactical.

We also had two other Scion (Rotorua's Forest Research Institute,
where Garth works) employees representing us, Dr Karl Murton and Dr Chris Lenth. Karl came 29th and Chris 17th (on a fixie).
Anja McDonald won nicely. 
This is the 2nd time I've won the champs. The 1st being in 2008. Last year I was totally outclassed and came 5th.
I was pretty serious this year and out for redemption. The field was very competitive at the pointy end and included some national cross country reps and former legends.

Winning this race means a lot and gives me some confidence in approaching the world singlespeed champs coming up this October here in Rotorua.

_{This photo: Murts goes hard!}

Other Rotorua rider's Ross Dittmer,  Peter Fraser, and Jason Birchall also did very well....

• More photos...

• Check out more on Garth's win and see his tattoo in the
Rotorua Daily Post... 

• Bushlove Race Report on VORB