Marshal Sam Greenslade checking
out the trails before riders arrive
with the bikes unloaded from the van I slipped into
my sleeping bag for a night in Chateau Transporter.
VOLUNTEER TIME
Woken at sparrow’s fart by a hefty bang on the
door of the Chateau and a cheery “Good morning,
best get up or you’re going to miss breakfast!” from
Warrick, I looked out of the window to see a literal
‘army’ of volunteers queuing for breakfast outside
the army-supplied olive-drab canvas volunteers’
tent. Looks like I was late for duty on my first day.
An event as big as the Tussock Buster – 1500
riders, 300km of trails don’t forget – needs a lot
of volunteers to do everything from registration,
track marking, campsite setup, manning the
food tent, medical care, display area setup as
well as marshalling out on the different courses,
not to mention the fuel depot out in the bush to
keep bikes fuelled. There are some 70 volunteers
needed to run everything and it takes a week
to get everything set up beforehand. They’re all
fed and watered by the NZ Army, with a series
56 KIWI RIDER
of hot boxes delivered morning and night from
the Army kitchens to keep everyone going.
For the keen riders who arrived on the Thursday
night and Friday morning, the tracks are open from
lunchtime for an afternoon of riding in the area
surrounding the campground. Hundreds are here
already and hundreds more arrive by the hour. At
0830hrs I’m assigned my first duty, to head out
onto a couple of the tracks further out to help the
marshals check and supplement route arrows to
prevent anybody taking a wrong turn. I’m pleased
to be teamed up with KR tester Sam Greenslade
who’s also volunteering for the weekend.
At this point I fire up our long term KTM 300 for
the first time. As it’s the fuel-injected model there’s
no oil to mix into the fuel, just pour it in straight
from the can and make sure the oil tank is topped
up. There’s only a little two-stroke smoke as the
electric starter fires the three hundy into life, and,
as I follow Sam out through the collecting area
and onto the trails, I realise the normal ‘clearing
the throat’ thing you have to do with a two-stroke