Nibong Tebal Jamboree-21 June 09

After the trial ride 3 weeks ago, finally it is time for the real thing(Nibong Tebal Jamboree). Meet up at 6 in the morning at Green Lane McD.

Starting and ending point will be at Sekolah Kebangsaan Jawi. Manage to finish the 46km ride in 4 hours.

There's around 1000+ registered riders according to the jamboree website.

Electrolytes and Power Bar for me...
Kiasu...

At the first water point

First Check Point

Somewhere with Hock's bike


Reaching finishing line, photo taken by
Seng Chiang

You are suppose to look at me,
not 041.

Went to Tambun for a delicious lunch after the ride. Eat eat eat after every ride. No wonder no matter how hard I ride, my weight will not reduce.

Photos from organizer: set1, set2

From Debbie's camera.

What happen in the past few weeks...

It's been a long long time since my last post. Was busy with this and that. Haha. That's what most people said when they neglected their blog for weeks. Actually I am busy with work but lazy to update my blog... at home. Hehe. Still finish work about the same time everyday and will go for evening ride at AID if the weather allow me to do so. But I don't have any time to snake this few weeks while working to update my blog. Sigh...

No ride for me on 17 May. I attended a course that day.

Bought a new tyre(2.35 Maxxis High Roller). Cost me 80 bucks. It look nice. There's some slant printing on it. Thought it is the design of the tyre. But I was told by my friend that it was actually a rejected tyre. It's ok la since it is a printing reject and it will not effect the performance. Don't think much people will realise about it either. But I will not go to this shop again forever and ever and ever. You guys too be extra careful when go to this bicycle shop which has a younger owner at Carnavon Street.


Was scratching my head thinking where I rode on 24th. Finally with the help of Debbie. I recalled. Should have thought of it too. Nothing special, went to Mt Erskine again. I manage to conquer the double jump(the small 1). Manage to jump over without endo. That's what I can say. Need a lot of practice to become like sifu Gee.

Try out the Nibong Tebal Jamboree trail on 31 May. We will only ride 50% of the total trail according to the organiser. Even 50% also feel like it is killing. Wonder how far can I go on the actual day. Hope there will be sweeper truck to pick me up. Had a delicious lunch at Tambun after the ride. Think the calories that I gained from the lunch were more than those I lose from the ride.

Now you can action,
later you know la.

Told you, now "Mo Ngan Tai"

Jerry also regret liao

Heckler Hock

Blind man asking for
direction
Don't know what are they doing,
guess they are differentiating
the shellfish.

Mt Erskine again on 7 June 09. But this time we explore new trail. It is call "Sa Liap Sua"(3 mountain). It was introduce to us by Teoh a.k.a Teacher. Totally different from the usual trail that we ride. There's no jump. The trail is steep with a lot of roots. Will try to take picture of this trail on my next ride there.

Penang Hill-10 May 09

My second ride on Penang Hill-Downhill Trail. Start from 168(Penang Hill Peak) and ending at No 3(Youth Park).

Go all the way up to Penang Hill by tram. RM3 + RM1 for the ticket. RM3 is for the one way ticket up and RM1 is for our bike to be carry by the tram carriage.

Riders: Hock, Kheng Hong, Jesse, Hotel Ghee and me.

It started to rain when the tram about to reach Penang Hill. While waiting for the rain to stop, we had coffee at the Penang Hill coffee stall. Waited for around half an hour for the rain to stop before we start riding down.

It was quite slippery. Ghee crash not too far from the starting point and hanging on the cliff. Luckily nothing serious happen. For me, of course never crash la(on the place where Ghee crash). Me pro ma... Actually I never ride down there, I push my bike down. Smart leh... Haha... After Ghee crashed, it was my turn to crash. Sigh... Tried to avoid some roots. But the avoiding attempt failed. Nothing serious happen, no scratches at all course able to jump off the bike on time. Lucky me.

After that, the ride(or maybe hiking down carrying a bike) was quite smooth all the way until No 3. Crashed twice there. Only me crashed. WTF... But luckily there was no hiker around the place where I crashed. At least can safe some face... Haha... The first crashed was when I try to make a drop. The second crashed was caused by roots(AGAIN) and it was in the chicken run. Ride in chicken run also crashed. Pai seh lo...

While on the way down, we saw a tortoise with a thorny shell. Saw a snake near 84(mid point of Penang Hill) too.

Kheng Hong posing with Mr, maybe Ms Tortoise

This is the nearest shot I can get,
ask Kheng Hong to take a photo with this
greeny creature, but he chicken out... haha...

3 May 09-Sunday Ride

Planned to go Penang Hill for some downhill ride. Have to cancel it due to heavy rain. I am fine with the cancellation because I don't feel like going there also. Don't wanna hike down the hill carrying my bike. Hehe... No ride on sunday morning, only dim sum at Weng Fu's place.
We went for a ride on Air Itam Dam and plan to ride up to Ngo Hean from AID in the afternoon. But damn "suay" ride half way start to rain again. We took a rest at the temple on the way to Ngo Hean. Anyway if it doesn't rain also don't think we can ride up, cause there was an auntie on motorbike told us that there was landslide on top blocking the way into Ngo Hean.

When the rain was not that heavy we decided to ride up again. Rode around 10 meters the rain start to pour again. This time we never made any attempt to wait for the rain to stop. Decided to go down. It is a disappointed Sunday for us.

Got some consolation at least, we saw a crab, yes crab, eight legged creature that walk sideway, crawling on the trail when we wanted to start riding down. Didn't know that crab do live on mountain. I was asking around my friends what crab is that. An auntie in the temple overheard me, she screamed from the temple "sua chim la, ha mi chim"(mountain crab la, what crab). Thank you for the information auntie.

Labour Day Ride

Went for a ride with a group of downhillers. It cover AID-IronX-Titi Kerawang-Teluk Bahang-batu Ferringhi-Bla Bla Bla-Ayer Itam. Total distance is about 40km(according to 1 of the downhiller). This is one the longest ride I ever had so far. More than half of the distance was on the road. So it is not that bad.

We meet up at 6.30am at Asia Cafe. I was a bit late, reach there at about 7am. Our normal group was spread into 2. Me, Jerry and Hock together with the downhillers rode to IronX. Jesse, Ghee, Tan Sri Yeoh, Debbie, LiGirl and Olivia took the tram up to Penang Hill and rode to IronX through Tiger Hill. From IronX we rode together to Titi Kerawang.


Debbie, Ah Ghee and another guy from the downhiller group crash due to slippery trail. Debbie was right in front of me when she crash. I think she love the trail so much so that even when she falls off her bike, she try to kiss the ground. But this is not the right way to show your love Debbie. Luckily she was not seriously injured. Only bleeding on her knee. Don't know how Ah Ghee and the other guy fell, but according to them it was also due to slippery trail.

We pass few vegetable farms. The scenery is fantastic. Have to ride this trail again.

Other photos can be view here and here

Protective Gears

Had always wanted to get a better protection gear(especially body armour) for myself when going for rougher trail. Feel that it is safer to ride with it. What to do, skill no good have to depend on protection gears to avoid injury. So when Boo Leong came back for Cheng Beng last month, I ask him to smuggle in one body armour and few other things for me.

It is very uncomfortable wearing this ironman suit especially when going uphill. But this uncomfortable feeling is nothing when you fully UTILIZE it. No regret even if you need to pour out extra few litres of sweat.

My other protective gears are fullface helmet and shin guard. The next thing I am going to get is goggle and a better shin guard.

Email hoax on earthquake, tsunami in Asia on July 22

Received an email from a friend of mine with the title "Email hoax on earthquake, tsunami in Asia on July 22". Attached together in the mail is the link to the article publish be Channel News Asia. It explained the credibility of the original mail.

Penang Mt Erskine Trail...

This trail is situated right behind the Mt Erskine market. Guess it should be consider a freeride trail. There's a lot of artificial and natural jumps that can be found here. One of our favourite trail so far.

When I started cycling about 6 months ago, I only plan to do cross country. Never thought that this trail can be one of my favourite. Please don't get me wrong. Favourite means I like this trail, not that I am an expert here. I pushed my bike quite a lot of time during my first ride here(pai seh, dare not to ride down the rock gardens).

After that ride, I started to google for more freeride and downhill videos in youtube. With the help of the videos, I became more confident compared to my first ride. Went faster this time. It is true that wacthing more youtube will make you become more daring(in hokkien, I call it khi siao). I figure out a new mathematics formula on my second ride:
Daring + No Skill + Paria Bike = Crash

And here's my reward.

Crashing is inevitable for beginner like us. All of my friends crashed before. The most serious one is having to get more than 10 stitches on his head and getting fractured rib. He got this when he tried to do some difficult jump on his first ride. His name is Gee(maybe spell as Ghee) and he is one of the best "jumper" among us. He can do almost all the jumps in Mt Erskine.

If you don't wanna get serious injury, it is better to get a sifu or get advise from the expert. They will tell you where you can practise your jump and which jump to avoid. We got a very good sifu. His name Ah Gee aka Ah Pnia another Gee, not the one who got fractured rib. He is one of the rider who constructed this trail. Don't know how come all Gees are good in riding. Another one is Gee Atherton.

This is one of jump that we should avoid.
There's no proper landing ground.

Frequent Mt Erskine riders will not jump here. You cannot get a proper landing ground. We don't know about this until Ah Gee told us. So you see, if you can get advise, you can prevent injuries.

Ah Gee showing us how to jump the roller coaster.
The one in front is Ah Gee(aka Ah Pnia aka sifu)
Followed by Azril.

More photos here and here.

July 22nd 2009 another Tsumani... ***Fact or Hoax***

There's a lot of us who received this forwarded email with the subject of July 22nd 2009 another Tsumani. There's no clarification on how the originator of this mail manage to find this info. To those who don't receive it, below is a copy that I received.
**{Hi,
Please be more cautious as the warnings has been given.
Attached a photo for u.

I just received this message from a colleague. I don’t know the source of the message; I also don’t know the credibility of the content, but just beware.

Below is the content on the message:
“Hello there. I just wanted 2 let you know that please stay away from the beaches all around in the month of July. There is a prediction that there will be another tsunami hitting on July 22^nd. It is also when there will be sun eclipse. Predicted that it is going 2 be really bad and countries like Malaysia (Sabah & Sarawak), Singapore, Maldives, Australia, Mauritius, Si Lanka, India, Indonesia, Philippines are going 2 be badly hit. Please try and stay away from the beaches in July. Better 2 be safe than sorry. Please pass the word around. Please also pray for all beings.”

Thanks and have a nice day.

Bless you~}**
Thanks to those who forward this mail to me. Could it be another hoax? For me, I will choose to trust this mail. It will be an easy task for me as it will not affect me. I am sorry to those who are staying or plan to visit the area that might be hit. It will be a tough decision for them to make. Imagine if you plan to have a vacation in one of the island in Philippines. And you had already paid everything and it is not refundable. Or if you stay there, will you pack all your belongings and flee?

By the way I found this http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEmono/TSE2009/TSE2009.html.

It only explained about the eclipse. It is up to you to decide whether to believe or not to believe. As for me I chose to believe. Cause I kiasi ma...