http://www.ambmag.com.au 37Jacinta: “Well, you’re riding by yourself.”
Jade: “So we put that on Facebook and called it
‘Girls’ Adventure Group’ and then it just grew.”
Cass: “We started doing rides once a month.
We’d get 12 of us and do these epic downhill
rides. Then it started getting to be more and more
rides. So we all went, ‘Why don’t we get everybody
in on this?’ and Jade put together the TNQ
Women’s Mountain Bike Group page.”
CREATING A WOMEN’S
ENDURO SERIES
Jade: “We all ride for a bike shop called Discovery
Cycles. Larry and Stacey [Lanza] own it and
Stacey is the busiest woman I know – she loves
riding but needs something to look forward to and
train for. She said she’d love to race but the only
thing she was doing was Triple-R every year, so I
said, ‘How about we create a race?’. We made a
plan, spoke to the club and that created the girls’
enduro. We did three races last year, each three
stages.”
Cass: “We had way more people than we
thought we’d get.”
Jade: “We had 35 riders!”
Cass: “We were thinking,
‘Where are these women coming
from?’”BUILDING THE
SKILLS BASE
Jade: “I wanted to get the girls
riding particular sections of
each race because if you’re not
riding with people who push you
it’s hard to ride anything new
and out here [Smithfield] most
of it’s technical. So the plan
was to do a skills clinic on a
particular technical section and
get them riding it comfortably
so they could race it. That led to
Cass doing her clinic and she
now has a business.”
Cass: “Yeah, it’s called Ride Fundamentals. This
other chick Ret [Lauretta Howarth] was doing a
lot of cross-country stuff and when I got my MTBA
coaching certificate she said, ‘Come and give me
a hand’. But I was like, ‘Nah, let’s push these girls
and get them doing cool stuff rather than just
riding on the road and up dirt trails’. So we help
women get to the enduro level.”
Jade: “We’ve all been beginners. I was a
complete beginner when I moved here. I had my
husband, and he is an amazing rider, but learning
from a guy is completely different to learning from
a girl. That’s why it’s so good Cass and Ret are
doing what they’re doing.”
Cass: “Girls get so intimidated riding with men
when they’re beginners and we really want to pull
that back. They’ll get pushed down something,
break their wrist or collarbone and then you never
get them back on again.”LOOKING AHEAD
Jacinta: “The normal enduros are pretty gnarly
and it’s only been us riding them, so we hope
getting the girls confident enough for the
women’s enduros might start them onto doing
full enduros. It’s all about building confidence.
We have lots of girls who haven’t done the
enduros who are capable of doing it, they’re
just lacking confidence. The word ‘race’ makes
it scary but they just need to see it’s really
just fun.”
Cass: “The plan is just to keep building the
community. Last year was the tip of the iceberg,
this year we’re gathering troops and by the end
of next year I’m hoping we’ll have a solid crew
of girls that we’ve really pulled up to the next
level. That’s what it’s all about – getting women
confident, happy and keen on bikes.”
Jacinta: “Forcing them to! Building an army!”WOMEN’S MTB GROWTH