Entries close on the 25th October 2024 at 5pm.

To secure the best spot for your team we recommend you enter as soon as possible.

The Hunter Civil 6 Hour Blast is a mountain bike event designed to be fun for everyone from corporate workgroups through to families and friend groups. The race is a 6 hour relay style race where one rider from each team is racing at one time. The race can be completed in teams of between 2-5 people or solo. The event has a friendly and relaxed atmosphere and is an opportunity to socialise with your team members and other companies.

The race duration is 6 hours and the team (or individual if racing solo) with the greatest number of laps being the winner. On each lap, riders will complete a lap of the course and pass through the team pit area to start and finish. When changing riders, the timing chip will need to swapped to the new rider to ensure the time/laps get counted.

The course is a flat ~11km circuit of the McLeans Island mountain bike forest, comprised of 4WD and single track, with plenty of room for passing.

This is entirely up to you. You can do as many or as few (minimum one lap per rider) as you want. You may want to do lap about, ride for an hour or do a certain number of laps each. The choice is yours.

The Race Village is the main centre on race day with food vendors, retail setups and the team pit areas. When you are not riding you will be able to relax, socialise and network with your teammates and other teams, indulge in food from our awesome food vendors and check out the retail areas. Your team/workplace is welcome to set up a team tent, bring food and refreshments if you desire.

Our official detailed event schedule will be released soon. A rough timeline for the event is as follows:

Friday 1st November:

Race Village is open for entrants to set up their team pit area.

Saturday 2nd November:

Race Village will be open early in the morning. We recommend getting in early to avoid the crowds/traffic.

There is a mandatory race briefing in the morning and then the official race start time will most likely be 10am with prizegiving ~4:30pm.

After prizegiving, all team areas need to be packed down and removed from the Race Village.

* Please note that these times are not final, and subject to our final confirmation.

Suitable bikes include mountain bikes, cyclocross bikes or gravel bikes. Your bike must be in good mechanical working condition. The course is largely flat and considered grade 1-2 terrain.

Hire bikes are available from our event sponsor Cycling The Dream who are based out at McLeans Island. Check out their website for more details http://www.cyclingthedream.co.nz

While the Hunter Civil 6 Hour Blast is a race by definition, the structure of the event is such that it caters for any ability of rider with a moderate level of fitness. Each rider completes a lap of the course in their own time (as fast as they are comfortable with). If you are unsure, we recommend going for a practice ride at the McLeans Island forest prior to our event (see attached course map for direction).

E-bikes are welcome. However, all e-bikes must be limited to 32 km/h. Any team with an e-bike rider is automatically in-eligible to place.

Goat Cycles will be on hand with their workshop repair stand to provide basic repairs. Riders need to be prepared with the correct tools and skillset to fix mechanicals while out on course. We therefore recommend you take a spare tube, pump and multi-tool. Once a rider leaves the event village, the full lap must be completed before returning to the pit-area.

If a rider on your team has a crash or otherwise stops racing and no longer continues in the race, you are not allowed to substitute this rider for a new rider (outside of your existing team). If you come across an injured rider, please stop and support the rider, and alert our nearest course marshal.

No. Once the race starts, all team entrants must compete with their list of registered riders. This is fundamental for our health and safety measures and fairness.

We have strict age restrictions for our event due to health and safety requirements. However, we appreciate there is a high calibre of capable young athletes. If you do not meet the age restrictions, please contact us directly and we will approve applications at our discretion.

The age restrictions are as follows:

• Solo juniors must be 15 as of 31 December 2023

• Juniors in a team must be 14 years as of 31 December 2023

Yes, any changes or amendments to team registrations can be made online through our entry system. However, entries will be cut-off prior to the event to allow us enough time to sort our timing chips, race plates and categories. Final changes to team structures can be made on race day.

All participants are required to familiarise themselves with our Terms of Entry and Refund Policy prior to entry. If you have any further questions, please contact us.

We are INCREDIBLY grateful to our sponsors for supporting us in delivering our 2023 event. If you or your workplace would like to be a sponsor of the event, please get in contact with us. We would love the opportunity to discuss how we can promote your brand/services at our events.