weight . The extra inertia in the bike actually made that harder to correct . That happens ten times in a row and you ’ ve lost momentum , where the two-strokes keep on going . So , even though we had all that power and all that torque , it was hard to keep it on balance and keep it moving forward - so the two-stroke guys would just ride away from me on those climbs .”
WINNING WASN ’ T THE PLAN “ The whole thing was just so much fun . I ’ ve only ever ridden Romaniacs in the Gold class . In Gold you get into the open , easier flowy stuff , which is really good fun , but you ’ re always trying to hold back and be conservative in those areas so that you ’ re prepped and ready for the next onslaught of terrible stuff . I had that mindset for a while , thinking ‘ don ’ t get too carried away here , the next terrible bit is coming ’. “ But being in Silver I realised after doing it for a bit that I could actually ride it all , so it was still really challenging and difficult , but I wasn ’ t having to push , I could actually ride it all . So I was like ‘ okay , I don ’ t have to worry about energy conservation quite so much , I can just enjoy every trail and enjoy the whole thing ’. “ So it was like ‘ this trail is really fun , let ’ s hook into it ’ and I had that freedom to get into it without that feeling I was burning too many matches and needing to hold back . The whole thing was just way less stressful . “ After the first day I was like ‘ oh no , I ’ m competitive , that wasn ’ t the plan !’, the plan was just to go back and have some fun ; these days I don ’ t really enjoy getting into the whole racing mindset . I don ’ t like the stress that comes with racing too much and I was thinking ‘ God , we ’ re back into that again ’.” At the end of day four , and despite never intending to have a serious attempt at the event , Birchy climbed the final hill climb to the top step of the podium . He might not have been on the optimum bike for a hard enduro , and he certainly didn ’ t start out with aspirations to win , but Chris Birch has proved that you can have a lot of fun and still win at the end of it all .
KIWI RIDER 63