Pump up your tires, polish up the chrome and get ready to hit the Tampines Mountain Biking Trail this February 28th to March 1st for Singapore’s First 100km Night Mountain Bike Marathon!

The action-packed day ends off with Singapore’s first 100km offroad enduro night mountain bike marathon, and the adrenalin-pumping action will run into the early hours of Sunday, 1 March! Racers can race solo or in teams, and have to complete 10 laps of 10km of offroad within 9 hours, with only their night lights and the stars and moon to guide them.

There will be some amazing international athletes attending, like Tinker Juarez (the reigning US 24hr Champion, 2-time Olympian and an inductee to the “Mountain bike and BMX Hall of Fame”, and also last year’s reigning 100km champion) who will once again be taking on other regional and local national athletes for this night marathon.

Japan’s world ranking downhiller, Mio Suemasa is expected to awe her male counterparts in the Super D (downhill) race. Hundreds of local and foreign participants are expected to participate in one or more events.

We're most excitied about a special appearance by the legendary Gary Fisher, considered the founder of mountain biking. From the early 70’s to today Gary has developed the sport, the technology and the organizations to make mountain biking the world wide sport that it is today.

But this event isn't all just superstars of sport and gear cranking, check out the Summerfest Night Festival and Carnival, an event which will also feature a mini night music festival showcasing the musical talents of young, edgy Singapore bands in a unique and stripped down setting, followed by a late-night chill out dance party where young DJs, King Mob & Jack Frost will play a mix of classic indie tracks.

Rider, supporters and spectators can also enjoy the carnival section offering food and drinks throughout the race, and the goal is to have good healthy fun, even if you're jsut watching! The spectator-friendly Tampines mountain biking trail is Singapore’s designated mountain bike race venue for the YOG2010. The 10 km trail was designed and built over the last 3 years by RMC Pte Ltd working hand-in-hand with DirTraction.

When asked about DirTraction’s role in the sport of mountain biking in Singapore, Max Mager / Lim Huimin from Dirtraction commented, “DirTraction has put in a lot of effort in the creation and extension of several mountain biking parks in Singapore, and have organized races attended by top regional bikers, and most recently, legendary Tinker Juarez. We aim to improve the quality of our trails so that we can provide an avenue for our homegrown talents to cultivate their skills, and the competitions organized by us will hopefully form a platform for our local riders to pit their skills against overseas competition.”

We wondered if our local athletes stand a chance when their skills are pitted against a field of international athletes? In the words of Tinker Juarez in his blog, “I think there is a bright future for the athletes there - and I raced a lot about half my age. It was fun racing and it showed the talent of the folks there. It is so nice to see the upcoming talent. It keeps me motivated and one thing I strive for is to make an impact and hopefully motivate them to keep on trying. I know dreams do come true.”
We certainly hope that our dreams will come true in the upcoming YOG2010 as far as mountain biking is concerned.