Two Mount Gambier local riders have put their downhill mountain biking talents to the test against the best the nation has to offer.

Shane and Justin Dejong recently travelled to Mount Baw Baw to compete in the Victoria Downhill round three, and then to Thredbo to compete at the Cannonball Festival

and National Championships downhill competition.

Shane Dejong said the duo was met with challenging track conditions.

“The track was very rough with rocks and loose gravel corners, with a combination of high speed, but it was awesome fun to ride on,” he said.

The wet weather meant the brothers rode fairly conservatively with a long week of competition in mind.

In the final Justin finished 13th and Shane finished 18th in the premier elite men’s field.

However, Shane was not happy with his efforts.

“For me, personally my ride was rubbish, I rode too conservative,” he said.

After competing in Mount Baw Baw they headed to Thredbo and made the most of the only chair lifts in Australia used for mountain biking based on Mount Kosciusko for some practice runs before the competition kicked off.

The week-long Cannonball Festival staged various events, with the Dejongs competing in the amateur category as the premier class was stacked with internationally recognised riders.

They competed in the Osprey All Mountain race, a 3.6km course with plenty of technical features and uphills.

The course was tough with Shane coming in 10th with a time of 7:37.8 and Justin 13th with 7:40.

They lined up the next day for the Fox Flow Motion Cup, which Justin described as “less technical features with more of what we’ll call a roller coaster type of track with beams and rollers keeping you on the track”.

Both were very competitive with Justin finishing ninth with a time of 9:17.3, while Shane was not far behind finishing 13th with a time of 9:22.4.

Some unpredictable wind on Thursday meant Justin and Shane decided to pull out of their pump track racing they had entered and instead focus on practising for the main event, the downhill track.

The pair competed in the Oakley Australia Open downhill practice and seeding to determine the order for the finals and create excitement with the faster riders going last.

Shane was surprised by the tough track and the hazards it presented.

“I did not even realise there were so many rocks on earth let alone one downhill course,” he said.

“It is absolutely brutally physically on your body, really hard on your arms and being such a long course, by the time you’re half way, everyone is feeling it.”

Shane was not the only one to find the course tough, after chatting to a previous National champion in Troy Brosnan he described it “to be harder than most World Cup courses”.

The seeding race proved disappointing for the brothers.

“We both had disappointing runs, with Justin having a bit of an off track excursion after a mis-jump in a rocky section,” Shane said.

“I personally just had a few near misses then decided to tune it back and save myself for finals.”

Justin finish in 4th with a time of 6:5.8 seconds, while Shane finished two places behind at sixth in 6:19.4.

The tough terrain did not just affect their bodies; both Shane and Justin found issues with their rear tyre after the seeding races.

“We both dented our rear wheel to the point the tyre did not stay on the exact same rock 20 seconds apart from each other,” Shane said.

“It was a bit of a mad rush scramble to get the bikes fixed for our timed seeding run, lucky the local bike shop had the part I needed, and luckily my tool box had a hammer in it to remove the dent out of Justin’s wheel to get him back on track.”

Due to severe winds the finals field was cut down to just the pro classes, unfortunately for Justin and Shane that meant they were unable to compete.

Therefore the results from the seeding run were used as final placings, which Dejong was displeased with.

“It was definitely annoying because we both had more to give after both having issues the day before but it is what it is,” Shane said.

“The organisers had a stressful day so I believe the right call was made.”

Dejong was also thankful for the community support from Reckless Racing Australia, Gordon Refrigeration and Callum Morrison Construction.

After a strong week of completion both Shane and Justin will travel to Adelaide in March to compete in round three of the national series.