2013 Lake Keepit 100 – 14 December 2013

Post date: Dec 23, 2013 4:34:23 AM

So it is pretty flat around Lake Keepit? I heard talk such as, “fast and flow 29er territory”, it was going to be fast. Daniel Raffaele from Centaur 100% Outdoor Events and the course curator stated there were a couple of good hills, so it sounded like a fast slick blip!

The race kicked off at 7am to beat the heat that on occasions can be found around the Tamworth region. The start lead out along the lake edge doubled back before the first hill climb headed up behind the caravan park café. This allowed for good self-seeding of the field and none of those horrible traffic issues – NICE!!!

Centaur had managed to tie together all the surrounding hill climbs within a 10 km radius by piecing together stock tracks, fire trails and sections of freshly cut single track. In all the 30 km loop contained around ten 20 to 40m pinches grade averaging up to around 15%, while an additional 20km made up the 50km loop. It was a great opportunity to ride some private tracks that were normally out of bounds.

So much more than just a flat fast run around Lake Keepit! With challenging pinches and descents it was a little harder on some riders as their now mythical flat sprint mental model of a race was blown out of the water. There was so much more to this race than expected. In total the Garmin happily reported that there was around 500 vertical metres of climbing for the 30 km loop, while the 50k loop added a further 150m. As well as the two larger loops there was also a 10km loop ensuring everyone was catered for. So as you would expect there was a great and varied field enjoying their own choice of poison.

The Lake Keepit Caravan Park was a perfect start/finish location with the impressive lake vista and great atmosphere as riders arrived the night before and made the most of this idyllic location. Pauline and Nardeen controlled the timing to ensure the results were finalised quickly to make sure that the presentations were completed promptly following the event.

Dave Harris from Cycling Central on March was not only one of the sponsors but also added his usual banter as the race commentator and MC. Well done to Centaur who managed to carve out 50 km of track for this inaugural annual event.