But, no, the construction of part of the cross-country track for this weekend’s Oceania Mountain Biking Championships has come through some good honest toil on Signal Hill, above Logan Park — getting out a spade or a grubber and just digging out the track.
The excavator has been brought in the odd time but for the most part the track has been made through manpower.
Mountain Biking Otago president Kristy Booth said work started in early December and had more or less finished in the past week.
There were some things to be done over the next few days but the new track had been given the big tick by cycling officials.
The newly built piece of track will cover about one-third of the 4.5km cross-country track for the championships.
The work was done every weekend over the past few months and workers from the Department of Corrections also helped.
Booth said it required a lot of toil and plenty of dedication by those in the mountain bike community.
"We put a call out for volunteers and had a good response. The first thing we had to do was all the gorse had to be cleared," she said.
"I’d say 95% of it had to be cleared by hand so it was a lot of work. Digging by hand at least keeps the natural features."
Using an excavator also had the disadvantage of making tracks too flat and wide in some places.
There were multiple paths on some parts of the track, with risk rewarded in taking time off a ride.
Booth said a technical delegate from the UCI had walked over the track during the weekend and said it was fine for the championships.
About 800 man hours had been put into the job and the track was now looking good.
One of the track builders, Hamish Seaton, said a fire at Signal Hill about a year ago had actually worked to the advantage of the track builders. It had burnt a lot of the gorse, making the ground easier to clear.
"That opened up a whole lot of ground and made us realise what we could do here, how we could stage the cross-country race here," he said.
Previous championships in Dunedin had the downhill race at Signal Hill and the cross-country race at Bethunes Gully.But the cross-country race would now take place at Signal Hill.
The course was now world-class and he hoped it may lead to a World Cup event coming to Dunedin in a few years.
The cross-country track features some steep climbs and riders would have to deal with a rise of about 250m every lap.
There were also some spectator-friendly areas to stand and view the riders.The championships start on Friday with practice for cross-country riders.
The competition begin on Saturday with two cross-country races and the downhill riders will be getting a feel of their course.
On Sunday the downhill race will take place.
So far 200 riders had registered in grades from under-15 to seniors.
