OzHPV Canberra Challenge, 1999

Moz's View - may not conform strictly to events as seen by unbiased Ians. There's a more official website somewhere

The event is held at a driver training track near Canberra, in the Australian Capital Territory, Australia. There's a 2.5km loop ofroad with a bit of up and down, some corners and a straight bit. There is car parking and connecting roads, a skid pan and various other bits. It's enough variety that we can get all sorts of practical tests for an HPV in a very compact area.

The complete event has ten races in it, a hill climb, road race (25km), 200m drag races, rolling start time trial and slalom, shopping race, criterion and an off road event. Plus probably some that I've missed. I suck at sprinting, so anything less than 10 minutes long I tended to finish well down the field. But my trike turns very well, and I can drive so I did OK in the road race and criterion. The drags were a joke for me, I have a nice powerful start so I was ahead for the first meter, then it was basically all over. So in the slalom I went for the humour award, which seemed to work.

The event is at least as much about seeing other people and their cycles, and a lot of that went on. The photos below show little racing because I was in most exciting things, and most racing is tricky to photograph well, let alone with a disposable camera.

I spent a lot of time riding all sorts of things. It's important to note that I'm long in the legs, and I have a lot of force but no real sprinting ability. So my reviews tend to emphasise adjustability and frame flex, as well as cornering ability. Rather than things like weight and comfort. And most people have trouble riding my trike because it does not adjust easily so they end up lying way, way down looking at their knees instead of the track. And I like low, solid trikes that corner as though they're on rails. Someone somewhere must have a photo of me on my trike doing the criterion, as I'm told that I had my head within 2" of the curb on one particularly fast corner. That's hiking right out the side and getting *low* for the corners.