Mountain biking at school
Snowy Mountains Grammar School (SMGS) is a school in Jindabyne that’s seeing a huge increase in participation when it comes to mountain biking. Martin Philpott is SMGS’ Director of Sport. He says SMGS has programmes from Kindergarten through to Year 12 aimed at supporting students in their mountain biking endeavours.
‘At SMGS there’s a huge variety of programmes designed so that students of all abilities can try mountain biking. We start off with our K-4 ‘learn to ride’ programme, aimed at enabling children to move from the tarmac to the dirt. For years 5-11 we have mountain biking as a part of our Wednesday sport programme, where 80-90 riders participate weekly.’
The SMGS junior program runs every Wednesday from 1.30pm to 3.40pm in three school terms out of four. Martin says the programme focuses on different riding disciplines and trails every term.
‘The programme starts in Term 4 with XC, when we might do the Thredbo Valley Track and Tyrolean tracks. Term 1 for us is a combination of XC and Downhill, including an introduction to Downhill. We normally take about 50 students up to Thredbo for our Downhill sport time. Term 2 is back to XC again, when we take them to the Bungarra trails.’
As a result of the popularity of the programme, SMGS is assisted by the Jindy Girl Riders and Thredbo Mountain Bike coaches to make sure the children get the most out of the sessions.
Martin says the ambitions of the students involved with the programmes are mixed, but at the end of the day it’s all about having fun and being active.
‘We have our racing programme, which focuses on the gravity and interschools series. Support comes in the form of staff attending the races and arranging transport, and providing academic support when students are away competing. For those less serious, we also have a social ride one afternoon a week after school. This picks up some of the riders who aren’t focused on performance. They don’t have to compete and just have great fun being out exercising’
The ability to take the children to varying trails is made possible by two bike trailers, each carrying approximately twenty-five bikes. Martin says when a trailer was required some years ago, senior school students designed and made the second trailer themselves as a major work project in Design & Technology, and Martin says it is great to see it being used every week.
Female participation is increasing within SMGS’ programmes. Martin says the mountain bike programme had two girls participating in 2016/2017, and now there are thirty to forty girls involved. There’s also a girls’ mountain bike retreat, which Martin says is a great way of getting girls into the sport.
‘The idea of the girls’ retreat is around skills development and the aim is to get them riding in a supportive environment.’
Similar to Bright, Martin says that owing to the popularity of riding, bike storage has become something the school has had to address.
‘Mountain bike storage for us is a big issue. We’ve built custom-made bike racks around the school, which are arranged in order of height from junior through to senior. There is also lockable overnight storage. We are now heading towards fifty per cent of the school being involved in some sort of mountain biking programme.’
With the growing popularity of riding at SMGS, as well as in Jindabyne more broadly, expect to see the growth of mountain biking in this beautiful part of the world continuing to rise.