MY FOCUS is glued to the wheel in front. Left, then right. Over a log, a quick stop. Then go! Through the next gap and carry on.
Georgina and I have flown to Adelaide to come and see what the trail riding is like near town and up at Fox Creek Bike Park. We are determindly following our ride guide Joe Mullan’s wheel as we scythe our way through the back streets of inner suburbs of Adelaide towards the hills via parks, laneways and local knowledge. Adelaide is a lot like Brisbane where I call home as there is plenty of easily accessible riding close to almost all suburbs. In fact, if you’re a mountain biker and don’t have trails about 15 to 20 minutes ride away, you probably made a poor choice when choosing where to rent or buy.
We’re making our way towards Belair National Park, and roll into a train station to meet up with Adelaide local Jack Fletcher, playing the role of additional guide, local knowledge provider and photographer. It’s started raining pretty hard, and although we could easily keep riding singletrack to the top, the train line also runs all the way up the hill.
‘Belair laps are certainly a thing’ Jack confirms, as we see a train approaching the platform. ‘There’s a KFC at the bottom of the hill, and you always see a bunch of bikes parked there as young riders refuel after doing runs all day.’ None of us are too excited about a Zinger Tower challenge at this point, and we jump on the train and buy our tickets.
As expected, there are half a dozen kids with mountain bikes on the carriage, loaded with stoke and probably sugar as well. We discuss the relative merits of riding trails to get up to the top compared to catching the train, which is a way of saying old school rider Joe disagrees with gravity fan Jack... but we disembark before things get
