The Lake

Mountain Biking

I was out of the front door as soon as Noah's battered yellow truck pulled up outside our house, grabbing my bike and slinging a pack with water, spare jumper, map and food onto my back.

"Here, I'll help you with your bike," said Noah, coming round to help me.

I gave him a weird look.

"Are you ok? You look... frightening?"

I shrugged. "I'm not one of your helpless damsels in distress. I can handle my own bike."

Noah turned faintly red.

"I, uh, was only meaning... I wasn't suggesting.."

"It's fine," I cut him off, "You were just trying to be polite. I'm sorry."

I lifted my bike into the back of the truck, beside his, before we both jumped in the front.

"Where am I heading?" asked Noah, starting up the truck.

"The edge of the forest, beside the track heading to the lake."

His face lit up. "Are we going to the lake?"

I shook my head. "Sorry, no. It's a bit far at the moment and the track down is quite hard. Maybe next time, depending on how today goes. There's some nice trails leading east from the track, though."

He nodded and set off.

***

After an hour of quiet morning roads and Noah's surprisingly good taste in music, we pulled up onto the forest track leading to the lake.

I grabbed out our bikes and asked, "How much cycling have you done before?"

"I can ride a bike," he said, looking slightly hurt, "I did my cycle training in elementary school,"

"How often do you ride?"

"I've been riding once a week ever since my brother first mentioned this competition, but I haven't known where to go to try riding off-road."

"Perfect," I said, swinging my leg over the saddle and setting off.

***

I showed Noah the basics, like where to have his pedals when he was standing, and how to use his body weight to push up hills, but to be honest, he didn't really need it. Most of mountain biking is very instinctive, all he really needed me for was to pick tracks that were safe but challenging enough.

We were flying through deep pine woodland, the trails narrow and exciting. Noah was ahead, taking things slowly, but in general biking with reasonable style and balance. I followed a few metres behind, just out of range of the mud spraying up from his back tyre.

We were almost out of the woods when he screeched to a halt. I laughed when I saw why.

"You didn't warn me that there were cliffs on this path!"

"That's not a cliff," I laughed, "that's a mildly sloping rock."

He looked at me. "No way am I going down that!"

"It looks steeper than it is," I said, "I'll go first. Just keep your weight back and don't go too slow."

I carefully biked to the top of the slab, before standing in the pedals and riding down. Mud sprayed everywhere as I hit the puddle at the bottom, before I pulled up and turned to watch Noah.

"Trust the bike!" I called, and he started the descent. Two seconds later, he was braking to a halt beside me.

"Pretty good," I said, holding up my hand for a high five.