by Vaughan Hunt | Apr 21, 2016 | Board Chair's Blog
The Board gave a unanimous thumps up to Bike Manawatu initiating the new “Monthly Friday Happy Hour” for members,volunteers,sponsors and their families to have some social fun together.
The plan is for us all to have some good quality social time together off the bike on the last Friday of every month as we look to build club unity across all ages in our cycling mad club.
Spread the word to your fellow members and bring your best yarns.
When; Next week Friday the 29th of April.
Where:Valued sponsor Hotel Coachman
Time; 5.30 to 7pm
Note: Hotel Coachman has kindly discounted Beer and Wine for Members down to $6.
We hope you can make our first Club Happy Hour.
See you their.
Event helpers needed.
And an important reminder to anyone who is interested in being part a helping out with our clubs seasonal cycling events.We would really appreciate your support.
Contact Christine Christie secretary@bikemanawatu.co.nz who will put you in contact with one of our many sub committees.
by Vaughan Hunt | Apr 14, 2016 | Board Chair's Blog
After two years on the Bike Manawatu Board I was surprisingly voted in Bike Manawatu Chairman at our recent AGM replacing Steve Stannard who was standing down after six years on the board.Steve has done and will continue doing great things for this club and cycling in New Zealand.We wish him and his family all the best and thank him for his amazing contribution to the club.
I have quickly learnt the success of Bike Manawatu has been all about the cross section of amazing club members,volunteers and sponsors that support one another, week in week out enjoying this amazing sport of cycling.What ever level you are at as a club member, think about how much more fun it is to be around like minded people from all walks of life riding or volunteering together, talking and sharing experiences.This is often how many of your friendships get started in this great sport.
Statistics recognise cycling is one of the fastest growing sports for people who want to stay fit and build great friendships as a recreational or race rider while taking in stunning New Zealand countryside which the Manawatu has plenty of.
We are wanting to grow our Bike Manawatu’s membership and build a club that we can all be proud of and spend more riding and social time together. As a club member, we ask you to talk to more people about the sport and get them along to experience our club bike rides together.Christine Christie will welcome them to the club and our organised beginners rides. We all have the responsibility to help new cyclist learn cycling protocols and we all must remember the embarrassment of our own first few rides.Not easy were they?
Our recreational membership is growing fast and for those who want to race a bike,a new Bike Manawatu racing events committee have exciting plans ahead. Over many years the Manawatu region has produced cycling superstars from school cycling through to masters riders on the road or track and the club have access to top coaches to help set new benchmarks for those riders.The best of our current crop of young riders are competing internationally for New Zealand this year which we are all proud of and the club support.
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by Vaughan Hunt | Apr 8, 2016 | Board Chair's Blog
Steve Stannard 5th April, 2016
Last year my report started with the observation that it didn’t seem like a year since the previous year’s AGM and that the year had gone very quickly. Well, I’ll start this year’s report by noting that this year has gone even more quickly!
Presenting this report is my final formal task as Chairperson of Bike Manawatu, as according to our club constitution, I must step down from the Board, and thus the Chair role, after six years serving as a Board member. I am the last of the original Board members who guided Bike Manawatu through its formative years, and I have been either the Chair or Deputy Chair during these six years. Through my time as a Board member I have learnt a lot about what it takes to run a club like ours, and even more during the last 18 months as the Chair. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank present and past Board members for their contributions; we have worked well together and that has enabled the organization to remain steady and financially sound.
My major achievement as Chair has simply been to keep things ticking along during the transition to a very new Board and a new administrator/secretary last year. With Paul and Glenys leaving in quick succession, we lost a lot of very valuable institutional knowledge and two very hardworking people. These were big shoes to fill and I’d like to think I managed the club through that period in a satisfactory fashion. That’s not to say that a few ball weren’t dropped and perhaps a few opportunities missed along the way.
Christine, of course, has been in the secretary/administrator role for a year now. I thank her for her hard work, long hours, and absolute commitment to Bike Manawatu. I know from my own experience that it’s not easy to pick up the myriad of tasks the role entails, but I think now Christine has settled in nicely.
The usual thing now would be for me to describe the highlights and lowlights of the last year for the club, and talk about the opportunities and threats to Bike Manawatu. Instead, I’d like to make a series of observations and give my opinion about a few things, partly because we don’t want to hear about the low-lights tonight and the highlights of our riders have been well publicized (though I will briefly mention these later).
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by Vaughan Hunt | Mar 25, 2016 | Board Chair's Blog
It’s great to see that yet another Bike Manawatu rider has been named in a National team going to a World Championships. Emily Shearman will be accompanying seasoned internationals Campbell Stewart and Michaela Drummond to the World Junior Track Cycling Champs later this year. When about 20% of a World’s team is from the one small club, then something good is happening there! Really, the genesis of our junior and senior successes in competition starts with the parents, and their encouragement and commitment in getting their kids onto bicycles. Often that is simply that the kids follow their parents lead and ride because their parents do or have. After that, it’s the activities of school-level cycling which give the kids their opportunities to compete and socialise with their peers. But it is then the responsibility of the club to nurture the young riders’ skills and provide the next level of competition so that they can complete their cycling “apprenticeship”. This really happens when the youngsters can race against older, more experienced riders, some of who (myself included) must seem ancient to the kids. At our track and road racing competitions, including the time trial series, we encourage participation from young and old and participation together. For me, a highlight of racing is seeing a bunch of riders of all ages battling it out, maybe helping one another stay away from a chasing group, or sprinting against each other at the line. So may this continue, but to do that, we need all ages to turn up to events. The oldies will often learn something too!
The next big event on the local calendar is the Manfeild 6 hr challenge in early May. If you haven’t organised a team and entered, do it soon. It’s a great event, lots of fun, and safe to boot. Best part about it is that you don’t have to ride for the whole 6 hours (unless of course you want to!).
National Club Road Championships are in a few weeks, and a good contingent of BM riders will be heading down to Central Otago for the racing. If you are going and would like to be the BM team manager, please give me a call. Let’s hope for lots of green jersey’s on the podium.
Daylight saving ends soon. Apart from the recognition that shorter days are coming, it means that you’ll need some good lights in the later afternoons and early evenings. I like to see riders with two rear back (red) lights, one on the bike and one on the person. Of course you need a decent light on the front of your bike to see where you’re going, but also to warn other road users you are coming. Better still if you have some reflective clothing on so that you can be seen by car headlights and streetlights. Really, there is no excuse for not being highly visible.
This will be my last Chairman’s Blog, as I will be stepping down from the Board at the AGM on the 5th. I will write a Chairman’s report looking back on the year, but also looking forward. I hope to see you all there at the AGM to support the running of the club and also to celebrate the track riders at their prize giving, which is on the same night at the Marist Clubrooms. Come along at 6:30 pm for a 7 pm start, and bring a plate of food to share.
Safe riding,
Steve.
by Vaughan Hunt | Feb 11, 2016 | Board Chair's Blog
This is an exciting time of the year for cycling. As I write this our best U19 and Elite track riders are doing their thing up at Cambridge against the rest of the best in NZ. I wish I was there watching… Meanwhile the first Pro Tour race, the Tour Down Under has been run and won (not surprisingly by an Aussie), and after the cascade of Middle East and Southern Hemisphere Tours, the European Spring Classics get underway.
Meanwhile, back here in Palmerston North, as the track racing calendar enters the home straight, road racing starts to get underway again. We have already started the Wed Night TT series, and with the fantastic weather we’ve been having, times are fast. Robert Stannard notable broke the course record by a relatively large margin last week. Now, to get the record you’ll have to be able to ride the 12 km course faster than 14:51.
On the 27th of Feb we are starting a series of races which will have an attractive prize pool. More information to come, but they are now in the Calendar. However, we can only do these if there are people to help. So, only those people who assist during one of the races will be able to collect their prize money. More details on that to come, including what the prize money schedule will be. So, we are looking for people who will be willing to be the race organiser on the following dates:
Race Series #1 Kermesse 27 Feb
Race Series #2 2 up TT (handicapped) 5th March
Race Series #3 Graded Handicap RR, 12 March
Race Series #4 Handicap RR, 19 March
Race Series #5 Graded Road Race, 2 April
Please get in contact with Steve Stannard if you can help 021809597.
Once we have a race manager for each, we’ll be asking for around 3-5 others to help marshalling and entries etc. and you may get tapped on the shoulder.
Stay tuned.
Anyhow, while the weather is good, I’ll be on my bicycle as much as possible. Hope to see you out there on the road enjoying the Summer warmth as well!
Cheers, Steve.
by Vaughan Hunt | Nov 13, 2015 | Board Chair's Blog
It’s great to see the participation we are currently experiencing on Sunday track afternoons and Wednesday Night road time trials. Track nights have a great organizing team led by Ian Gray and a group of willing volunteers, often parents of riders, for each occasion. The riders, of course, need to appreciate this volunteer support and make sure they regularly thank Ian and his team for their hard work.
Organising races on the road brings different challenges, because we need to deal with Manawatu wind, cars, road rules, and the odd dog or cow which get on the course. There is also little opportunity to watch the race unfold, and partly because of that, we don’t have a “captive” group of spectators from which we can request event helpers on the day. With Katherine’s organizational skills, and a bunch of helpful parents, the Wed road TTs are running smoothly and the results are being posted regularly to the webpage. Much to Katherine’s delight however, Tom Pirie has offered to take over the second TT series starting in January; her delight because taking the lead to organize a race series is a commitment and takes time. Therefore a big thanks must go to Tom for his willingness to shoulder this responsibility.
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