Subic Bay—Off-road enthusiast Kimi Grande and Jeffrey Tendero conquered the challenges in the short, but sweet 2.5-km Le Charme Fitness Center FRIKE (Fun Ride Bike) mountainbike races at the Paco route of the Pamulaklakin Forest trails here on Saturday.
Grande, who is from Sta. Rosa, Laguna, dominated the full-suspension category, after going two downhill stages in five minutes, and 39.9 seconds.
Tenedero, who hails from Porac, Pampanga, outpaced his rivals in the hardtail (no suspension) action in 6:15.8.
Competitors were released individually at 20- to 30-second intervals, from a downhill starting area and timed individually.
The eco-friendly competition was done inside the Aeta tribal reservation located inside the Subic Metropolitan Authority grounds.
Le Charme CEO Josephine Floresca said they had a turnout of more than 50 enthusiasts who wanted to join, but they limited their entries for the event for the meantime.
Floresca hopes that they have more entries next year as they plan to hold it during the long weekend associated to Labor Day on May 1 and in an eco-friendly manner as well.
“We aim to have lighter race, and not much of a hardcore enduro race. Because this race that we had was meant to be done for fun,” said Floresca.
There are two mountainbike routes along the Pamulaklakin area. The first is the Paco trail, developed in 2015 by Romeo “Paco” Tagle, a local mountain bike enthusiast.
And then there’s the Makoy Trail that was forged back in 2012.
These routes are among the pathways that many mountain bikers usually traverse when inside the SBMA.
Floresca said their activity was done with the support of SBMA, the Aeta community and the staff at Le Charme Suites, which has developed facilities to accommodate athletes and people with bicycles through the years.