A supposed to be an easy ride in Sungai Petani, 16 December 2001

I was told that the ride in Sungai Petani was going to be an easy one. You know, Kulim High Tech Park like riding. "It's just a walk in the park for tengkars like you!" You know lah, people like to be praised. I am just a normal human being what, so no exception! Okay enough of bs, the real attraction to me is it is a totally new trail. No mountain bikers outside of SP have ridden it before. When I asked around, it seems like those people who would be joining the ride knew nuts about the trail. Some even suggested we might be riding on a cross bike race track!

21 riders showed up at the meeting point, the Sungai Dua NS Highway Toll Plaza. All riders showed up were from Kulim Lee's, Mervick's and Michael's riding groups. The islanders decided to give it a pass since it was "too far away from home". Out of town ride man, don't play play! Anyway, I told Michael not to wait when the time hit 8am since we might expect a long ride. If they wanted to join, they would call me or him already. We hit the road after Michael decided to delay the departure for two more minutes!

We did not stop for breakfast since majority of us already had ours before we met at the Sungai Dua Toll. We went straight to the trail head, which was in a housing estate called Taman Perdana("the Prime Estate"). This is a fun group to join if you don't mind the topic they are talking about. Lady riders might find the way their language offensive sometimes but what the heck, this is the 21st century. I just like the way they express themselves: bold, straight forward and no pretending. If they like you, they show it. If they don't, they just don't talk to you. I find joining them is really carefree. I do not need to keep on reminding me that as an "educated and intellectual individual", I should not use certain words in my conversation(the four letter word lah!).

The weather was really nice to us. It was shady and breezy. The view to the trail was simply breathtaking. It did not take us long to hit the dirt. We were greeted by a flat double track in the rubber estate. I felt familiar. It looked similar to some section in the Parit Buntar's five hills. It was just a dessert before the main course. When I saw the slope ahead of us, I realized why the leader was having an evil smile on his face!

Frankly speaking, the gradient of the slope was okay. Any riders who have been riding on the Bt. Gambier or Gertak Sanggul trails would have no problem to tackle it. The problem is the loose gravel. I had to dismount and push my red devil after the rear tire skidded off. Luckily, the push was only a short distance, when I had an opportunity to climb back to the saddle again, I managed to clear the rest of the slope.

But my triumph was short lived. After a sweet downhill from that loose gravel slope, I was greeted by another greater slope. Again, soft compound and loose gravel, and it really looked scary. I took a deep breath, shifted to the granny gear and hit the slope again. I was not that lucky this time. The surface was too loose for my Velociraptor to get the necessary grip. This time I had to push all the way up to the end of the slope. I hate pushing. I find it more energy demanding than pedaling up. But the slope was too steep for me to start the climb again. I found out later that most of the riders needed to come down and push. Although we had to push our bikes most of the time, we only took half an hour to clear the first hill.

It was a fast ride. Since there were no newbies around, there were hardly any rest stops. The regrouping was only done at the major junction. Instead of catching up with them, I decided to take my time to enjoy the view instead of spinning my heart out to catch up the front pack. Yeah, there are actual bunch of riders who really do that. They go all out no matter what. If you ask them how beautiful is the valley, they will give you a look like you are talking to a wrong person. Come on lah, this is not a race okay?

The climb at the second hill did not start until we entered another rubber estate. One thing I like about this ride is it was done under the shady trail. The riders do not get tired because of hot scotching sun. I managed to check my watch before we hit the climb again. It was merely 9.30 in the morning, exactly one hour after we started the ride. The climb at the second hill was little bit better than the first one. But I already saw some riders started to push their bikes. Maybe they had already taxed out after the first hill. But don't worry, yours truly was still going strong. I managed to clear it without much effort. Actually it was a long detour to the connecting trail we were going to ride. I was wondering why bother to pay extra energy to do the climb. My doubt was cleared when I reached the peak. There was this long descending slope down to the connecting trail. There were huge bumps on the way down. We would have to go over the bumps when going down. There were already few riders cleared. Mervick was with his Bianchi DH rig. We were discussing how to go over the bumps. Apparently, the best way to do it was to gain enough momentum before hitting the first bump. He went down first and he made it. I came later, and too bad, I did not make it. I applied brake too early before hitting the first bump. And I would have to forget about clearing the second and the third!

The third hill was interesting. It is supposed to be the easiest one to clear, according to the ride leader. But I found it to be the hardest one. Reason: Soft compound, loose gravel and long climb. The soft compound made it difficult to pedal even on the flat trail. I found I had to spend extra pedaling power to maintain the speed. The climb was even worst. I thought it was going to be effortless since the gradient looked gradual. But by the time I reached a quarter of the climb, I was already panting like a fish that just came out from water. Man, I had to stop at the mid-hill pretended that I was not sure which way to go(It was only one way to go to the next regroup point, up!). Apparently, others had the same thought as well. So we decided to wait for the sweeper so that we could "asked for his direction"! As we thought we had done all the climbs after we clear the "last" climb in the third hill. We were surprised by the ride leader: We did not really reach the third hill yet. The climb we did a moment ago was from the second hill! "That's relief. And I have to tackle another god know what slope before I can go home having my coffee". Surprisingly, it was not as bad as the first few!

There are a lot of supposes in the ride: It was supposed to be an easy ride. We suppose to have riders from the island. The third climb was supposed to be an easy etc. So what is my point? My point is we had an one hell of the ride. I am planning to come back again!

Stay tuned!