Sixty-year-old Megan Patey from Colo Vale, NSW is tuning her bike and packing her bags for the trip to Mt Buller in Victoria for this weekend’s Bike Buller MTB Festival. Patey is competing in the Sunday race only which is a tough 50km cross-country race over to neighbouring Mt.Stirling and back again. A big event for anyone let-a-lone someone who is considered a senior citizen!
Patey discovered a love of mountain biking 3 years ago at age 57 after watching her nephew, James Williamson, enjoy the sport. After years of supporting him and handing many a water bottle to him during his conquests, she decided that it looked like a lot of fun. One of his mates offered her a bike he was selling and she gave it a go. She has never looked back. With a previous sporting background in road riding and bushwalking she has taken to the sport with complete passion and enthusiasm, which she now does with her husband who she converted a year later.
Her home is about an hour south of Sydney in the Southern Highlands where there is fantastic cycling of all types. She has the support of a strong club and finds the sport very social. “The great thing about mountain biking is that you always keep learning and that you feel like you’re always improving”, she said. She laughed at the fact that, “the good thing about my age is that there aren’t that many women in the races so I usually get a place”. This is good motivation for her also.
This isn’t her first interstate trip for mountain biking either, far from it. Last year she travelled to Alice Springs for the 5-day Red Centre MTB Enduro. “It was a hard ride but fantastic landscape and country. I’m going back again this May”, she said, where she hopes that her experience will help keep her spot on the podium. Contrary to her relaxed attitude the Vintage category is hotly contested, particularly in the men where the competition is on par with the younger age brackets demonstrating that cycling really is the ‘new golf’.
Although not handing out as many water bottles to Wiliamson anymore due to participating in the same events, she’s extremely proud of her nephew who went on to win the World 24 Hour Mountain Bike Championships in 2008. I’m sure he’s equally as proud of her.