By Callum Ludwig
The Victorian Gravity Enduro Tour season wrapped up at the start of May, with a number of local mountain bikers taking top prizes.
Most notably, Ryder Rostron finished 1st overall in U15, Katelyn Baker took out 2nd in U19 Women and Rachel Hoare was 1st in the open-age Elite Women category.
Ryder said he felt like all his hard work had paid off.
“I had been riding basically every day when I could as much as I could, I’ve riding like my whole life but only started racing in 2019 and it got stopped because of lockdowns in the years after that,” he said.
“The next season after that also wasn’t that good, in the first race I crashed and broke my collarbone which put me out for the season. Last season I got some good results and finished 2nd overall, so it’s great to have done a bit better and come first this season.”
There were four races in the 2023 season: Mansfield on January 28 and 29, Mount Beauty on March 4 and 5, Bright on 30 and 31 April and Albury to close out the season on May 6 and 7.
Katelyn said while she was disappointed with the result in the final race because she had nothing left in the tank, she’s learnt a lot and will compete again next year.
“Hopefully with maybe a little bit less focus on school next year, being out of Year 12, I can put a bit more focus onto the bike time, I’ve only been doing it for four years now,” she said.
“I’ll be stepping up to the elites next year, and hoping for at least a third overall finish. I’ll be competing against Rachel, who is my coach as well, which is exciting but it will definitely get very competitive.”
The Mansfield races were in dry and dusty conditions, before a wet and slippery track in Mt Beauty, a track still recovering from the weather in Bright and picture-perfect conditions in Albury.
Rachel said her ultimate goal is to go overseas ad race in the Enduro World Cup.
“I want to be able to race on the world stage against the best of the best and the women who do this for a living and see how I stack up against them,” she said.
“For the last race in Albury, I crashed in practice and broke my hand, but still raced the next day and ended up coming second. Luckily, I was going to take a break anyway but it means I can’t go out on the mountain bike for a couple of months so will have to stick to the trainer, do a bit of running and stick in the gym.”
With the Warburton Mountain Bike Destination set to being world-class tracks to the Yarra Ranges in the coming years, the Upper Yarra could be set to produce even more extremely talented riders.
