Mountain biking Cairns

“The golden age of Mountain Biking”. A phrase that flooded my ear canals and wormed its way into my schema, for eternity … and I like it. We arrived in Cairns in 2000, however it took me a further 10 years to learn about MTBing in Cairns, the number of tracks within the region and the international quality of those tracks. WOW. This is a mountain biker’s dream. Half an hour from the centre of Cairns finds you at the Smithfield trails (Smithfield PDF). An hour south and up the hill will take you to Atherton (Atherton PDF). An hour west of Cairns and Davies Creek (Davies Creek PDF) is at your doorstep. Those are simply the official trails. There is sooooooo many more. These tracks are all individuals within the genre. Davies Creek, mostly flat(ish) more often than not, dry. Atherton, 50/50 dry and wet, wonderful views, massive hills to climb, sick downhills. The Cairns trails blow my mind. Settled behind the University and meandering through rainforest, the trails offer green to double black excitement. Kid-friendly through to 15yr old teenage boy recklessness. Whatever your choice, they are sick, gnarly and overall wonderful.

Crankworx Cairns

This is not next level mountain biking. It is so many levels up, you can’t see it from here. The riders are experts in their craft, wheelbarrow loads of guts and Swiss-precision timing. I mean being 30′ in the air, upside down and have the inclination to then kick your bicycle frame 360 degrees around in the air a few times just to add to the complexity.

I really like my bike. I like jumping it. If I lift launch more than two feet from terra firma, I’m stoked. If I actually land it, I’m even happier. This is not just another level, it is a UAE highrise level up.

Village

Ensuring guests, spectators and competitors are fully fuelled is vital. An array of Spanish, American, Italian and Australian offerings were available; of the culinary kind. It was great to see a free filtered water stand as well as coffee outlets and the of course, the bar.

Merch

All the big names were here. You could buy $10 000 mountain bikes, $20 000 ebikes and/or all the bits in between to build your own. All the brands, latest technologies, modern designs and disciplines. Drool time.

Apparel, trailers, parts, washdown gear, inner rim protectors, it just kept going.

Trail builders – World Trail

The heroes in my opinion are the trail builders, ‘World Trail’. You can even get a job with them. Next post will contain some action on the bikes.