Father Christmas was kind to Connor Fearon with the delivery of his new Kona Operator! Talk about a good looking bike, all the descriptors you want to use go for it; ‘Blacks on blacks on blacks’ or ‘all black errrything’ or ‘Blackbird’ or ‘the Black knight’ or… well you get the point!
Check the style! Are we talking about the bike or Connor? Or both?
We caught up with Connor as he had just gotten delivery of his new bike which he gave us the run down on before we headed out to Kangarilla, one of the better riding spots in his hometown of Adelaide.
So what you see here is Connor’s personal World Cup rig but the good news is what you see here has the exact same angles, geometry and sizing as the public can buy from their local bike shop.The difference is that Connor’s bike is set up with sponsor/personal preference parts unlike the ‘stock’ build from your local bike shop.Regardless of whether it is a ‘stock’ build or a custom jobby pedals is always personal reference. On this day Connor was riding flats but openly admits he can see many of the benefits of clips…Something that you might want but you won’t be able to get, just yet anyway, is these prototype Maxxis tyres, ‘Spec C’ apparently… You know as much as we do!The only difference with this frame is a slightly different weave of carbon being tested by the guys at HQ, other than that as we have already said angles, geometry, size, etc are all identical to what you can buy.Carbon frame, carbon crank, titanium spring all exotic materials but who would have thought just a few years ago these parts would be as common as they are today, available for everyone?!
After discussing his bike Connor put it to use and showed us he is more than comfortable on it already which should be no surprise! You can catch Connor at the National rounds this year before he heads overseas to race the World Cups.
With this matching kit maybe we should start calling him Darth?Looking comfortable with two wheels on the ground, going past in a blur…!Weeeee!!Blackbird cleared for take off!Can corner.Higher!And more sideways…!
We also heard about a new enduro style bike he was waiting on….
Troy Brosnan looks down track through one of the first berms.
Welcome to Round 3 of the VDHS, hosted by Narbethong, a track that’s probably been around longer than you have. Not too far away from our last round at Granton, Narbethong promised to be a great track with plenty of good times to be had by everyone! The sun was shining and the track was slick, but as riders began descending the hill the sheen disappeared of the dewy ground the the magic sticky dirt came out to play.
Fabian Bill looking focussed aboard the new steed.Matt McCorkell dips into the same first part of the track.
All the riders were enjoying their time on track, with plenty of smiles at the finish line. Everyone was reporting the track was amazing fun, with the high speed sections pushing them as to how much they want to be wide eyed and let the brakes go. The track consisted of plenty of roots, small tree stump booters and drops, along with some solid, confidence inspiring berms.
Harry Ewings throws in some style through the woods.Angus Jackson pushes through the sun drenched fern forest.
As the sun set on Saturday there were smiles all round, with the track getting a thumbs up from all. Sunday rolled in with another cracking day, Practice started, and then rather quickly closed due to an injury down track that requried an ambulance, this in turn caused a sizable delay which meant event organisers took the step of cancelling seeding for all categories, this meant that practice would run a little longer to allow everyone to get a bit more track time, this would of worked fantastic if there wasn’t another injury soon afterwards, the track wasn’t entirely closed, it was left open on a yellow caution, however many riders on track opted to push and section the track as they rode down, this reduced the risk of missing further shuttles due to the ambulance being on track.
Ben Hill appears in a scene that could easily come from Life Cycles.
After the rider was cleared and the track re-opened to finish practice it all came to an end with plenty of the riders feeling a little odd with all the extra energy usually reserved for a qualifying run still in the tank. This meant for close racing, but Troy Brosnan was a step above the rest; putting in a sizable 10 second margin o his closest competitor. At the end of the day the podiums looked like this:
Trent Piribauer struggles with a nasty surprise that caught him off guard.
Elite Men:
1 Troy Brosnan
2 Liam Panozzo
3 Dean Lucas
4 Jesse Beare
5 Joel Panozzo
Elite Women:
1 Sarah Booth
2 Tegan Molloy
3 Carrie McLachlan
4 Anna Pauly
5 Ellie Wale
Grant Weighton peaks over the crest at speed.Dean Lucas hangs loose the finals drops into the jumpy section.Through the drops, always calm and collected!Kyle Coutts pushes past a massive tree, quite a cool feature!The rocky shuttle road took its toll on the shuttle vehicles, with many tires deciding they’d rather not stay inflated.Theres always a smile from this man, Jesse Beare pushes up track after the rider injury.Dean Lucas pushes hard through one of the longest berms on track.Clint White shows us some of the skills he acquired from running CWR.
As worn by some of the fastest riders in the world, the best media crew and now available for you! The downhill247 factory T-Shirt is back in stock in Small, Medium, Large and Extra Large. All available here; http://www.downhill247.com/store/ for $25 plus postage and handling, a perfect Christmas present…
A different kind of start gate with an urban feel, as riders departed through Mt. Buller Village before dropping into the lush wilderness.The forested areas made for an excellent shady retreat with awesome riding, solid berms and great scenery.
The 3rd round of the Alpine Gravity All Mountain Series had us arriving at Mt Buller, a venue that has had its fair share of mountain biking events over the years. The weather was looking fantastic for the weekend, and as we arrived there was a small sense of delight as there was small patches of snow hidden in the shadows, and while there wasn’t any to ride through, it was a lot of fun to throw at passing riders (Media is allowed to have some fun right?!).
Karl Peel shows us that just because there is no berm doesn’t mean a corner cannot be slayed!One of the more picturesque crossings, this time theres no getting wet while crossing one of many bridges on the Delatite River trail.
As riders started flowing past and we made our way down track, we realised we were infact making our way up track, with the first section of the track being a slow, but steady climb, out of the village and along the ridge of Mt. Buller, slowly snaking our way towards the Delatite river and the aptly named Delatite River trail. After a leg burning climb, the trail slowly started dipping downwards again into a nice flowy section with berms and a traverse along the hillside. It then hit some very fast and loose fire road sections, though just a fire road, your amount of dedication would make or lose time here; if you were confident to let go of the brakes and put full trust in the bike there were valuable seconds to be made up.
More amazing views along the trail, it hard to keep the concentration on the track with views like these.
The fireroads opened up onto a valley with the Delatite River at its base, as we traversed along the walls of the valley we began getting closer and closer to the river, and then started snaking across it over some awesome bridge crossings, and occasionally we got wet, crossing a small tributary feeding the river. These small river crossings were much welcomed as by this time most riders where pooped, with this being a very long track, taking it out of alot of riders, and also the media crew.
This time its full scale wetness……not just for the cyclist.And then we decided to get a little bit arty.
Just when you thought the track was done there are also two pinch climbs to push you over some small but tough hills and then eventually to the base of Mount Buller and the finish. Queensland’s Michael Ronning took the Elite Men’s title, while Victorian Jo Wall claimed the Elite Women’s podium.
One of the final river crossing bridges delivered us out of an amazing valley along which the Delatite River flows.‘Hux’, a name very well known in the Vic riding scene for photography finds himself on a bike for once!Oskcar White looking right at home on the opening section of trail.‘Leachy’ on the hunt for the Alpha Wolf title over reigning ‘Nato’.Can you say, perfect riding weather?
The classic race venue, Thredbo, had a few tweaks applied for the race, many involved getting more air which isn’t a bad thing as Connor Surgeon shows! Image: MBN Photography
Here in Australia we are really starting to see an explosion of these one off events, which combine a few different race styles, a range of non bike riding related activities (we know right?!) and relatively good prize money! The Thredbo Cannonball Festival had all of this, with names like the Hannahs, Brosnan, Moir, Eaton, Crimmins,A�Boyer, McMillan, Cory, Lucas, Molloy andA�Beecroft all on hand to get some of the $13,000 in prize money this was always going to beA� big event!
There were a large number of pros on hand, here Troy Brosnan throws down a bit of style. Image: David Blucher
The track for the main downhill race received some tweaks before the weekend and also used more of the high speed fire road near the top of the track, one of the biggest challenges though would be the weather wit snow covering the top of the hill!
Sean Martin near the top of the track, you can see the snow behind him, fortunately by race time it wasn’t as much of an issue as it could have been! Image: MBN Photography.
Apart from the downhill race there was also a flow race on the single tracks lining Kosciuszko, a pump track challenge as well as a whip competition so plenty to see and do. Add to this the Potbelleez and DJ Nino Brown on hand in the village to keep the tunes flowing and you have set the scene for a pretty epic event! In fact all the riders we asked were raving about the event so let’s hope we see more and more of these events all year around.
You can do better whips then your mate?! Finally a chance to prove it with the whip comp.
Troy Brosnan took out the opening event which was the pump track challenge. David McMillan and Luke Ellison were the two winners in the whip off competition, Ben Cory won the Flow racing showing all the youngens he still has ‘it’ whatever it is!
David ‘The Whip Doctor’ McMillan shows us why he took the watermelons ($100s) for the whip competition! Image: David Blucher
For the big event seeding revealed who would be in the mix, Troy Brosnan topped the time sheet 2 seconds ahead of Mic Hannah with ‘local’ Andrew Crimmins in third. For the women Tracey Hannah had a formidable 12 second advantage over second placed Tegan Molloy but with racing anything is possible!
Tegan Molloy second in qualifying. Image: MBN PhotographyNothing like chairlifts to smash out the runs! Image: MBN Photography
Moving on to finals and Tegan Molloy brought the gap down to under 10 seconds but Tracey showed her experience by taking a strong victory, Tegan second and Danielle Beecroft was in third.
Tracy Hannah, a resounding winner by nearly 10 seconds in Pro Women. Image: David Bluchar
The Pro Men’s class was always going to be a hard one to call such was the depth of the field! Mic Hannah brought home 5th saying he had a good run but simply left too much in the tank, Josh Button showed us he still remembers how to ride despite taking the season off from international competition with 4th, local Thomas Crimmins took out 3rd. We definitely saw a competition of what a lot of people already knew, Australia has another real Junior World Champs contender in Andrew Crimmins, the young rider from Bredbo beat out Troy Brosnan to first place by just over 2 seconds! Troy said he was simply beaten byA�a faster rider, exciting times for Australian downhilling! Well done Andrew, enjoy the $5000!
Second place for Troy Brosnan. Image: David Bluchar.On a new bike Andrew Crimmins managed to show his skill and took out the numero uno position, what a great result, look out for more from Andrew as we have a chat with him soon. Image: David Blucher.
Thredbo put on a great event and we can’t wait to head back for the next one!
Images: David Buchar and MBN Photography (facebook.com/MBN-Photography)
Ricky Boyer has been racing downhill for longer then some of our readers have been alive! A true legend of the scene.
Lusty Industries is increasingly well known throughout the Australian action sports industry as a distributor of gear. From GoPro to Troy Lee Designs, Downhill to Moto and beyond. We got an interview with Rick Boyer, Australian mountain bike legend,A�to gain some insight on his role, what it’s like to work at Lusty Industries, and how the company has grown from a Vegas idea to a household name. Read on…
How did you become involved with Lusty, you have previously had/have a mountain bike related import business?
I have known Johnny (Lusty Ind Director) for some time now. It all really kicked off when we caught up in Vegas many years ago, with different business agendas. It wasna��t until a few years later that the hangover wore off and I started repping Lusty bicycle with the other programs I was running. I then moved to Newcastle and while doing some work at Drift bikes ended up helping out at Lusty HQ and it progressed from there into a full time gig. I still run Orange bikes on the sideline which pumps along under its own steam as it has done for over 10 years now, we have a great Lusty / Orange bikes partnership. A lot of that experience and years of retail translate directly to my role at Lusty.
What is your job at Lusty and what does this mean you do day to day?
My official title would be Sales Manager, but my role is pretty diverse. I help out with most stuff but lately its more focused on building the bicycle program at Lusty. Customer service is one of the main areas I drive at Lusty but I do a mix of everything from dealing with suppliers and product orders to keeping the reps informed. It’s exciting to say the least and have not had 5 spare minutes since I started working here nearly 5 years ago. Im the longest serving employee other than Johnny and watching the evolution of Lusty has been an amazing experience. Its a great gig to be a part of.
Knowing that the head of your bicycles division is a rider/racer is a good indication of the culture of the company.
Ita��s great to see an Australian company picking up speed in the sports industry, how has Lusty Industries grown to what it is today? Has it been a smooth ride?
Lusty has grown to what it is today from the hard work and dedication we have put in to bring Australia the worlda��s best brands. Johnny McLean founded Lusty Industries based from a Moto heritage and has always had the insight to diversify into all areas of the Action Sports markets and more, and quite considerably Bicycle of late. We have tried to work with brands globally that are just as passionate about the sports and products that we are. You cana��t make an omelet without cracking a few egg shells, but the ride has been positive the whole way. We have been faced with the usual highs and lows, but ita��s how you recover that says a lot. The evolution of Lusty is continually moving to another level.
Working with the Lusty family would be pretty special; whata��s the workplace like? Wea��ll try not to drool thinking about all the awesome gear you handle daily..
Yes ita��s not your usual office, shiny pointed shoes, ties and suits are banned. The Lusty office is fitted out with some vintage MX Bikes, Race Jerseys, Athlete helmets, paraphernalia plus photos and posters signed from some of Australiaa��s and the worlda��s best athletes. Ita��s a great vibe to be a part of. Ita��s never quiet and there is always something to do. We aim to work with market leaders in all of our brands. The look on some peoplea��s faces when they walk in is great!
Within the action sports industry gear and brands often cover a few different sports (eg Von Zippera��s snow, moto and bike goggles). Does having a diverse range of customers ever make things difficult?
Definitely, having such a diverse customer mix is a real challenge, as trends and styles change over varying disciplines. Different industries also need to be catered for differently with seasonal buys as well as industry expectations. You always need to remember that the customer is always right!
Lusty Athlete Graeme Mudd on the pace in Lithgow for the NSW State Championships, 2013. Photo/JB Photo & Media
Gravity mountain biking is ever-growing in Australia, especially since Cairns 2014 was announced. Will you be doing anything special with that in mind in the lead up to the event next year?
MTB and Gravity MTB is a focus at Lusty, we have had the Lusty MTB team running for a number of years now with amazing success. We will have a presence at the Worlds, thata��s a definite! We will be looking at some special events to coincide with the World Cup and World Champs.
Troy Lee Designs is one of the biggest names in action sports a�� what does this partnership mean for Lusty Industries?
This amazing new partnership is the most exciting news we have launched to date! To partner with a business that shares the same drive and passion for its athletes, market and sports is crazy. There is so much buzz with all of staff and in the industry ita��s hard to focus on emails sometimes. It is definitely the next step in the evolution of Lusty Industries in so many aspects; it solidifies us even more as a bicycle distributor but is massive on a whole new level.
GoPro went from sponsoring no events or athletes, to covering the industry in only a couple of years. I remember when they were few and far between in the country. What is it like to be a GoPro distributor, and to be connected to such a phenomenon
Being a GoPro distributor is a wild ride. Having a product that is in such high demand presents its own problems but being a small part of a global revolution is something that will never be easily repeated. It brings so much to the business and ita��s nice to have a product that in some cases keeps our dealers afloat in a tough retail climate. We get so many sponsorship enquiries each and every day it is unreal. Ita��s easy to get caught up in the whole GoPro phenomenon but sometimes you just have to sit back and just take look at it all and take in how incredible the brand is.
The camera everyone is talking about. Photo/JB Photo & Media
2013 is blazing past, what has Lusty got in store to finish the year and soar into 2014?
We are going to keep working on the same program that has got us to where we are today and then push that a little more! Marketing and social media are a significant aspect of the business and will continue to strive to stay on top of the social media beast. We will keep working with the worlda��s leading brands and try to secure more partnerships that the Australian market will hopefully benefit from. You will see a press release shortly announcing that we are the new bicycle distributor for Five Ten shoes which is another exciting program to be a part of!
Lusty Athlete Blake Nielsen riding for Norco Australia at Round 2 of the NSW State Series – Del Sin, Del Rio. Photo/JB Photo & Media
Keep in the loop by following Downhill247.com on social media:
