Dan Booker: Mountain biker to ride World Cup on trails he built
One of the biggest events in world mountain biking is coming to Tasmania for this month for two legs. A rising Hobart star will be among 500 competitors, riding on trails he helped build.
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Thousands will descend on the mountain hamlets of Derby and Maydena in the next month for one of the biggest events in world mountain biking: the UCI Enduro World Cup.
That both Asia-Pacific legs of the cup are being held in one region – understood to be the first time that’s ever happened – is a sign of Tasmania’s burgeoning reputation as having some of the best mountain biking facilities in the world.
“It’s become the biggest destination in Australia now and I hear that when I travel internationally, they don’t talk about coming to Australia they talk about coming Tasmania,” said 25-year-old Sandy Bay biker Dan Booker, who is competing in the World Cup as part of his first year as a full-time professional.
The first leg at Maydena Bike Park, its debut hosting a world event, will be particularly special for Booker – he helped build the tracks as one of the park’s inaugural employees from 2016 onwards.
“Now that we’re getting these world events, it’s really cool to have been a part of it,” he said.
“I’m looking forward to having a whole bunch of the world’s best riders come here and see what we’ve created.”
Booker’s progression in the sport is in many ways emblematic of the progression of the wider Tasmanian mountain biking scene.
He grew up at Mt Rumney, falling in love with mountain biking from the age of eight as he explored his family’s ample property.
He represented Australia as a junior, but in his teens “fell out” of the sport.
“Tasmania didn’t have the facilities for me to keep going. I had to travel a lot to the mainland and internationally to compete,” Booker said.
“But through this place and Blue Derby, I had the facilities.”
Up to 500 riders and thousands of spectators and support staff will descend on the island state for the two legs. Many are already here, training and acclimatising.
After the Maydena Park leg on March 25–26, followed by Blue Derby on March 31–April 1, competitors will travel to Italy, Austria and France for the remaining five legs. Blue Derby hosted Asia-Pacific legs in 2017 and 2019. Both years it claimed the ‘Trail of the Year’ gong.
Maydena Park’s World Cup debut is the latest in a series of impressive wins from park owner Simon French.
The park has recently opened a third on-site food venue, The Local, a restaurant highlighting local produce and Tasmanian drops, while it will use this year’s winter break to construct a new commercial kitchen, with all three venues “at capacity,” Mr French said.
The park has released a new five-year masterplan to guide future development from 2023–24 to 2027–28, with an estimated $20m worth of upgrades in the pipeline.
COUPES SLATED FOR LOGGING CAST PALL OVER WORLD CUP
The tension between forestry and tourism in Tasmania has again come to the fore, with the owner of a mountain bike park due to hold an international event later this month warning that logging of an adjoining coupe is a “bitter and unnecessary distraction”.
Simon French, owner of Maydena Bike Park, in the Upper Derwent Valley, upon which the eyes of the world will be focused on March 25–26 for the first leg of the UCI Enduro World Cup, said recent activity at Sustainable Timber Tasmania coupe TN031B (a.k.a. Risby’s Basin) “could not have come at a worse time for our company”.
Community outcry has led to an STT commitment to delay harvesting the regrowth forest, last harvested in the 1940s, according to Resources Minister Felix Ellis, but roading and preparatory works to log the coupe will continue unabated.
Mr French said the coupe’s future harvest “will directly impact our uplift road, with harvesting planned right through to the road itself, and no currently planned buffer zone”.
The World Cup, which will subsequently move to Derby for the second Asia-Pacific leg before heading to Europe, will be broadcast globally via Warner Bros/Discovery Channel and is an “unprecedented opportunity to showcase the Tasmanian brand, and our booming mountain bike industry,” Mr French said.
“Much of the value of the Tasmanian brand is tied to our incredible natural environment, which is a major contributor to visitor attraction at MBP,” he said.
“At a time when the world should be focusing on Tasmania’s incredible mountain bike destinations, we instead risk the focus shifting to a bitter and unnecessary war between forestry and tourism.”
Wilderness Society Tasmania, which also has concerns over a second coupe near Junee Caves, wrote to Premier Jeremy Rockliff and Mr Ellis on Tuesday to express its concern.
“No one visits Maydena – or anywhere else – to experience forest destruction,” forest campaigner Alice Hardinge wrote.
“But this is about to be forced on yet another community at peak tourist season, no less. Another community denied a say about their local forest.”
Mr Ellis said it was a falsehood that forestry and mountain biking could not coexist.
“Obviously, tourism and forestry have coexisted in Tasmania for decades. In fact, forestry has been one of the major reasons why we’ve been able to get mountain biking happening in Tasmania and they’ve worked closely together as industries,” he said.
“I think Tasmanians get it, we’re a small state and to be able to support both industries is really important.”
He said the fact that regrowth forest was now beloved by conservationists was a “real testament” to the professionalism of Tasmania forestry industry.
STT’s southern operations manager Dave White told the ABC that the regrowth forest was not run as a “national park”.
“I think a reasonable person would expect to drive through production forest and see some harvesting of trees, growing of trees, trees of different ages,” he said.
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