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Look who's turning 30: a Bit of History


Flynny's picture

By Flynny - Posted on 09 February 2014

NB: Originally posted elsewhere on the Global Riders Network and appears via syndication.

Hopefully Watto doesn't mind me reposting but when he linked me in on the book of faces and JohnH added a few of his own I realisied the 2014 marks the 30th year for the Central Tablelands Mountain bike club.

We formed way back in April 1984. I think it was us and Hunter become the first stand alone mountain bike clubs in the country, with a few road clubs such as Manly having an "off road" division.

any hoo a bit of local history, some old faces, most of who still ride with us from (not that far) back in the day.
I know Barnsie has some early clippings too and I'm Sure Richard has a clipping from the first ever clubbie. Hopefully we can get some more posted up

grantd's picture

Awesome, I hope our club (CWORBC) lasts long enough to have such a rich history.

I see you raced at Clarence then, was there any single track there then?

Flynny's picture

Pretty sure they raced what is known as the enduro track. Perhaps barnsie could say for sure as it was way before I got involved in the club

Barnsy's picture

The clarence classic was a little before my time Flinny, but from what I know it was a loop out of the current motocross at Clarence.
Snowy raced it so I'll get some details off him. Meggs might have some idea too.
From my time with the club we raced at the common across the road from Bathurst golf club before moving on to Lidsdale state forest and now onto Rydal.
Dh was the gun club track, state mine and now pony express. Interesting to note, we did once think about a 4x track behind the Donnybrook pub for the oceana champs but never got off the ground.
I'll dig some pics out in the next few days and post up.

Flynny's picture

4x was a major hurdle. Brett Barnes plans drawn up and got people keen on what would have been a unique trail in the old power station ruins across from state mine.
Council started insisting on tarred park park and full toilet facilities, fenced so it only be used by club members.

So we changed tack and redrew plans to have it with in state mine. Despite the site being rehabilited by council and us stating the full track was to be capped with virgin soil they wanted full soil sampling work carried out.

Then while we were arguing over that we lost access to top of the dh trail and 4x began to die a slow death....

Ah the joys.

Flynny's picture

According to Richard the clarence races were all fire rd and double/wide track

Ray R's picture

Congrats to CTMTB on 30 years! Great effort. WSMTB can't be all that far behind - I'm trying to gather as much WSMTB history before it disappears.

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