The Five Hill Climb! 03 June 2001
It was an awesome ride. I thought I would not have made it to finish the all five hill climb. But I made it. And it was good! The Penang folks did not make it. The missed all the fun, especially the ones who enjoy torturing themselves in climbing steep and long hills. These five hills are no joke. The mental plays a major part. If you don't want to do it, you won't.
I met the Parit Buntar folks at 0815hours, 15 minutes late than the supposed 0800 hours. I was too lazy to get up. Thanks to Azmi, his phone call woke me from my usual Sunday wet dream. I was about to make a move at one of that sexy office girls in my office(it's a dream lah!), and his phone woke me up. $@&*! Annoyed, I was about to shout at him for spoiling my sweet dream. Instead, I answered his call with my sexy sleepy sound(yeah, my fiancée likes it, weird!). He told they could not make it because of the terrible traffic jam. Faz was the only one who made it to cross the straight but he decided to turn back. I cursed under my breath but hell, I could not make them to come. We are living in a democratic country right? To show him that I understood his/their situation(yeah sure. I was about to kill him for spoiling my dream!), I told him I would tell Maverick about the bad news. Apparently, he made the first move. He called first! There was a point of no return for me. Having no choice and the dream was already gone, I called Maverick and told him that I would be 15 minutes late.
With my head still pounding because of the stuff I drank a night before, I felt like shit to ride this morning. The presence of Alex Ooi was a welcoming site. He came back from Texas for his summer vacation. That means he would have two plus months to ride with us. Sharing his experience in Texas with me, it made me to forget the pounding head for a moment. After a short breakfast stop at Nibung Tebal, we proceeded to the trailhead, a 5 minutes drive away. Without wasting any time, we fixed up our rig and began the ride of the day.
A roll call at the trailhead showed that there were 29 riders, which consisted of riders from Kulim, Parit Buntar and Penang. The majority of them were from Kulim. They made the largest presence. Of course, all asked what happened to the Penang folks. Well, they were stuck in that puny island. The bridge was close for the bridge run, and the ferry was jam packed. So they could not make it lah! Anyway, we were warned that the trail was going to be muddy. I did not realize that it was that muddy! There was this god forsaken laterite trail with 80% of it soaking wet. The Mythos XC comes into play at this kind of situation. Though I do not like the way Mythos XC 1.95 handles technical downhill, it rolled better at muddy track than Velociraptor. I saw a lot of riders stopped half way to get rid of the mud, I just kept pedaling without any trouble! But I think skinnier Velociraptor will out perform any 2.1s as well.
The group started to thin out as we approached closer the first hill. Some stopped because of cloaked tires. Some left behind because we went faster and faster. Until the first climb, the first group was within my sight. Maybe everyone was cautious not to puncture themselves before the climb! We had to turn back at the first climb because of bees. There was this fallen tree blocking the trail, and one of the riders got stung when trying to go across it. It was quite a sight. He was jumping up and down, threw his bike away and you can't believe that those four letter words could come from the mouth of this innocent looking kid. Luckily, there was nothing serious. The trail master, Maverick decided to use the another slope. I started slow since I did not feel like going. Others started to wonder what had happened to me. Well, lack of training since I got my wrists bandaged for three week, that's why. It was my second time to visit this trail. Last time was two years, which I started to climb to saddle again after the absence of ten years. It was considered to be the super tough climb. Two years later, with much fitter self, I found it to be of moderate climb. But my mood made me the slowest rider of the group. Even those who were on feet were faster than me! My familiarity with the trail ended when we all went to another side of the first hill. It was a wide doublestrack. I decided to go slow since the nightmare of somersaulting at Kulim High Tech trail and the fall that almost took my life in Singapore still haunted me. The new Judy XC gave no help in boosting my confidence. It was probably the slowest downhill I had ever had. Whenever I wanted to go faster, I immediately looked at my still recovering right wrist. I would slammed both brakes to slow me down to a crawling pace.
We continued to the second hill after I met the rest at the foothill of the first. This hill is steeper than the first. Again, I had no problem to tackle but I was still the slowest rider to reach the top. I did not have the mood to continue. So I stopped at mid way and took some pictures. The urge of finish the ride was huge in my mind. I wanted to stop and go home. Everyone was waiting for me at the peak of the second climb. Then after a brief stop, we went down to the foothill and went for the third.
This third was even steeper than the second hill. It seems like the climb was getting steeper as the ride went on. I had the strength to climb the slope but my heart was not there. I kept had the urge to finish the ride as soon as possible. I decided to tell Edward, the twin brother of Maverick that I wanted to go back to trailhead with him as he was taking one rider who could not make it to the third climb to the trail head. But when I was about to follow him back to the trailhead, I realized that I could not follow him and abandoned Alex, who was already on his way to conquer the fourth climb. I told Edward to carry on his escort to the conked out rider, and I would try my best to catch up with the rest. Since I was in no mood to climb the third hill, I decided to push my bike up the slope. Believe me, it was harder to push the bike than to pedal up. Stay on saddle and you will have time to catch a breath. Pushing will be more taxing! Lee was on the top of the climb. He was jovial when he saw me decided to continue instead of chicken out after the second climb. Thanks to his encouragement, I decided to try my best to stay on saddle no matter how tough the climb! I wonder where had he found a way to be so cheerful. Maybe a successful life makes a happy man. I am in the stage of losing my job, and I really cannot cheer myself up! We had cut into rubber estate after the climb on the third hill. The descent after the third climb was even more interesting. The trail was slippery and wet. There were moss on almost every single inch of the rock. I got chicken out again. I really pity those who followed me at the back. They would have to be patiently follow me at snail pace. Sorry lah, the SCRAM unit don't work today. I had to overcome my fear first and regain my confidence to go anything faster than 1kmh at downhill!
After the downhill, it was this shady, undulating trail that led to the fourth climb. Luckily, it was not as tough as the previous three. We covered the fourth one without any difficulty. I don't call it a climb. It was a bump! The difference is this "bump" has longer slope, that's all. We met the rest of the group at the entrance to one of the rider's uncle fruit orchard. This was the easiest part of the ride. It allowed me to catch some breath after all the "torture" I had been through.
The last hill climb was less expected. I thought it was going to be the toughest one. In fact, it was not. Maybe the term "last" boosted me up. The gradient was similar to the third hill and longer. I had not problem to stay on saddle! How the hell did I do that? I used the bungee method that I read on the March issue of Mountain bike mag - you throw an imaginary bungee to one of the trees and mentally pull yourself to that tree. It worked on me. My mind was nothing but the determination to finish this last climb of the ride. My heart was panting like it was going to come out from my mouth. My gasp was so intense that one would think I was going to be short of breath anytime soon! Along the way, I saw more and more riders climbed down from their machines and pushed their bikes. My confidence increased as I was approaching the peak. And you know what happen? I fell just few feet away from the pit stop! There was this godforsaken rut that ran across the trail. My heart was panting, my breath started getting shorter. I took a mental note of the presence of the rut. The fork did not have any problem to go over it. It was much better than my previous Jett T2. The oil bathed suspension and rebound worked the magic. But I forgot one thing. I was using 22-32. I did not realize that. No wonder I could clear the trail. When I was putting my last effort to do the last ascent, my bike lost balance due to insufficient momentum. I was thrown over the bike but there was not enough momentum to throw me completely off the bike. So I landed on the bike with my gut hitting the tip of the handle bar! Can you imagine how painful it was? I hardly came out a voice. I was totally speechless. The pain was so intense that I curled my body and I swore that tears came out from my eyes. One of the Kulim riders come to me to find I were okay. I assured him I was okay but the pain was so intense. I lied there for a couple minutes and got up. With all the concern from their eyes, I showed them I was okay by standing myself. I could see the relieve from their face. I later checked what happen to my gut. There was a red ring mark on it! We took a slightly longer break so that I could recover from the pain. And then it was the highlight of the ride, the longer downhill on slippery singletrack!
It was really not my day. I fell just few feet from the last pit stop, and I chickened out at the descent. It was no exception at the last descent. I could not take it when I went down half way. Again, the image of me flying over my bike at Kulim High Tech trail and pounding on the ground vividly display in front of me in slow motion ! I have to overcome this fear or my days of mountain biking are numbered!
It was one hell of the ride. If I were not in such a bad shape, I would have enjoyed it, especially the downhill! It was my type of downhill before that terrible falls and IRC Mythos. Don't tell me how good is Mythos. They are not my type of tires. Why I still use them since I whine every now and then is because I cannot find it in all the LBS I am familiar with.
We did not go trying the famous Beef noodle at Parit Buntar. We went back to the breakfast place to have a quick lunch. Was the lunch as good as Pelita? Well, if you think cold rice is your type of taste, I have no comment!
Stay tuned!