The ride started at 1010hours after we took a group pix before the ride, shook hands, exchanged name cards, admired each other machine etc. You know, usual stuffs lar. Everybody was fresh and casual without knowing that the ultimate torture was just minutes away from us. We exchanged jokes and most of us thought that we would be able to finish the whole thing by noon and went home hugging our love ones!

The honeymoon came to the end all the sudden when we stopped by in front of a long, steep uphill! "Very steep but very short! Not to worry, most of you will be able to climb up to the top.", assured Kar Hong. Boy you have to be there hear all the whining, cursing, complains, mourns....anything! The slope was steep and rocky! Being the slowest knight in the K.O.T.R.T, I decided to be the last one to climb up but when I motioned Fatt to go ahead, he hesitated, "No, no, no, you go first!". Hey, I am not pushing you into the crocodile pond okay? "No, no, no you go first and I will follow you." Since he insisted, I had no choice but to proceed. The rocky surface was terrible. I lost grip of ground after merely 50 feet from the foothill. Seeing that most of the riders were pushing, it made no sense for me to continue peddling up. You might think pushing is easier than peddling. It wasn't! It was quite a taxing job! I'd rather cycle up then push my Diamondback on the way up! Of course, sometimes we will have no choice but to push due to the not-ride-able trail. We finally reached the top minutes later. I thought this was the end of the climb and the rest will be a smooth sailing down to the other side of the hill. In fact, Kar Hong proved me wrong by pointing me to another climb! Another climb! "Don't worry, this one will be less torturous than the one you just did! Promise, there will be a downhill after this!" That means it was still torturous but less painful than the first one! Fatt shook his head like he was going to shake his head off. The Kedahan riders were about to turn back to the trailhead but decided to stay after seeing the steep descent and the rocky surface of the trail!

It was quite a technical descent due to the rocky surface. Most of riders decided to walk down the slope since they did not have the confidence to ride down. It surprised me when I saw one Kedahan rider pushing down his bike also since he always gave me an impression that he was going to be the one I would have to look after if I were young, fit and in the race with him. It seemed like clipless was not suitable for the ride we were having! Anyway, we all reached the first pit stop without any casualty.

The second descent was proved to be very technical for most of us. We were forewarned by Kar Hong to be extra careful when going down but still we saw falls on the way! Gary, our sweeper who rode a Honda Reflex 200 was the first who kissed the dirt. I didn't see it happen but according to Leong, he fell when he was trying to descend to the very steep slope. When I was there, his bike was on top of him and Azmi and others were trying to help him to get him out of the bike. The second occurred yours truly. Yeah, the Turbo Snail who was praised for his daring downhill speed finally performed the most spectacular fall that the KOTRTs had ever seen! It happened when I was trying to tackle a not so steep downhill gravel slope. Actually, there was a sign already before the fall. I suddenly lost confidence to go down on saddle and yielded to the next rider to go down first, who was cOOOl kNIGHt. He was laughing like hell when I told him that I did not have confidence to go down! Shit I'll remember that! After seeing ST going down so easily, I decided to try again. I climbed back to my Diamondback and started going down as slow as I could. Suddenly, the rear wheel locked and started to slide to the front. I knew this would be the critical moment: If I didn't stop the sliding, I would be history. So I went panic. Instead of loosing my grip on brake lever, I increased the pressure! Big mistake! The rear wheel finally swayed to the front and I was thrown off from the bike. The first thing I remembered was to make sure that my head would not land first! Instinctively, I twisted my body in mid-air and my left shoulder slammed to the ground. After two somersaults and a spinning sensation, I lied flat on the ground with my mouth wide open! Luckily, nothing happened to me except a dented helmet and few scratches on my left hand and left leg(Wei Beng if you read this, get me another Bell helmet in UK okay?). I fell again on the way down to ground. The loosing gravel was the culprit. I heard someone was laughing when he saw me fall. Hmm...I wonder who was that bugger? With all the curse that I could spell out, I got up and continued. Next thing I knew, Azmi had the most terrible fall after me. It just happened that he jammed his bike's front wheel, the bike went endo and he slid down on the ground! His Cannondale jersey was torn open, and later we discovered that his Giro crash helmet was also bye-bye!

The ride didn't end when we reached the trailhead after all the difficult climbs and descents. Some of us decided to continue instead of finding one nice spot and enjoying icy cold 100 Plus. Fatt was already changed his apparel and ready to go home. He was virtually dragged back to his trustworthy Le Run Mountain series by us to continue the adventure! Although Kar Hong kept on assured me that this would be an easy XC ride, I think I would have to consider his assurance next time! Sup was like a chunk of jelly on his newly acquired Stumpjumper after the torturous and windy so-called "easy XC ride! Fatt was already in the stage of fighting mood if someone told him that we would go another one after this recce! The terrain was as rough as the first one but not as acute as the first in terms of climbs and descents. The problem is the hot scotching sun and windy day! I was virtually hold still by the strong blowing wind in some portions of the ride. It was the first time my bottle went dry before the ride was finished!

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