24-hour racing has to be one of my favourite types of racing to shoot. I love that I can shoot through all types of light and play at night with my flashes to get creative. I recently went to Canberra to shoot the World Endurance Mountain Bike Organization (WEMBO) World Championships.
It’s been a couple of years since I shot my last 24hr mountain bike race. I did shoot Wild&Co’s Top Dog adventure race last year which was full of its own challenges. The tough thing about adventure races is you are never sure how long it will be before the next competitors arrive at your chosen location if indeed they arrive at all. With mountain bike races run on a set track you can be sure that if you miss a shot a rider will be around again shortly so you can adjust your settings, particularly handy while shooting at night. It took me a few tries to get the night shots just how I wanted them.
I have long wanted to shoot a rider under the Milky Way. Balancing the various intensities of riders’ lights with the starlight was a challenge. It kind of seems like my recent trip shooting the stars at the Warrumbungles was a practice run but this was not the case. Until a couple of days prior it had been planned that I’d go to Orange to shoot the final round of the State Gravity series.
One of the main things I get asked is “Do you spend all 24 hours out on track shooting?” And the answer is no. I shoot until I have had enough and then get up and out before sunrise for some of that soft morning light. In my opinion, there are only so many night shots you can do before the flash irritates the riders and affects their night vision.
I’m unsure when my next 24-hour race will be but hopefully, it will not be another few years away. Maybe next year at the next Wembo if it comes around again.
My wife and I made the trip back up to the Warrumbungles National Park. I didn’t get enough the last time. I’d planned to do a few star shots and some more bird photography. Things didn’t quite go to plan.
Arriving in the early evening we set the tents up quickly. The plan was, to get the 500mm lens out, load it on the tripod and see if I could get any shots of a nebula or planet For the record, I’m not an astrophotographer. For me, it’s a case of playing with the settings until I get it right. There’s a lot of skill and dedicated equipment needed to get the real stellar shots (like that one?) but being such a beautiful dark sky park I figured I could still get something
All looked good on paper but it turns out I had three things worked against me.
I left my large lens at home in my other bag
I left the tripod mounting plate on my remote camera, again at home,
the moon was on its way to being a supermoon which meant the stars were nowhere near as bright as they’d been two weeks previous
Not a great start. Improvising where I could I gaffed taped my camera to my tripod and shot the landscape under the moonlight.
The lack of a large lens also limited my bird photography (as with the Astro stuff it’s half luck if I get a good shot). I had the 200mm with me so just shot and cropped where I could. there are so many little birds flitting around but I couldn’t get close enough to them to get a great shot.
In the end, I think it was all in my favour. I took it as a sign to put the camera down for a change, enjoy myself and be present. Too often I am running around looking for my next shot. We camped out at the wonderful Blackman camp, enjoyed the chilly nights and frosty mornings, did a couple of short hikes and some drives to explore the surrounding area
Mistakes were made but still…..trip number 3 to the Warrumbungles is already in planning. Hopefully, mistakes were also learned from.
Noisy Friar bird feeding on a grass tree
Superb Fairywren (Malurus cyaneus) at the Burbie Canyon walking track
Eastern grey kangaroo (Macropus giganteus) with joey
Spring Siding Observatory
Wildflowers, Warrumbungle National Park
Wildflowers, Warrumbungle National Park
Starry sky, Warrumbungle Dark Park
Wildflowers, Warrumbungle National Park
Last light hits the cliffs, Warrumbungles National Park
Looking towards the Warrumbungles from out west
Noisy Friar bird feeding on a grass tree
Eastern grey kangaroos (Macropus giganteus)
Sunset behind Split Rock at the Warrumbungle National Park.
Eastern grey kangaroo (Macropus giganteus) with Belougery Spire and Bluff Mountain in the background
Morning frost
Morning frost
The Warrumbungles as viewed from the west
If you are heading west then after the Warrumbungles the land goes flat.
The final round of the Enduro Gravity State Series was on at Mount Borah mountain bike trails near Tamworth. It was 1 day of practice and 1 of racing in warm conditions. These are great trails which somehow manage to be both flowy and technical at the same time. Although they are on a private mountain the North West MTB club holds regular shuttle days. If you are up this way I would recommend you check them out.
I have long wanted to pay a visit to the Warrumbungles. I talked myself into the broken logic that, since Mt Borah is Northwest of Sydney and the Warrumbungles are Southwest of Mount Borah I would be heading in vaguely the right direction if I paid them a visit after the event.
The drive out took way longer than it should have. It is a common issue for photographers and spouses of photographers which I call the photographer’s curse. Trying to drive anywhere new in a hurry is near impossible and I think you need to add 50-100% of the expected time onto the drive to account for the required photography stops. With the rape field all in bloom at the moment each one demanded I took at least 1 shot and put the drone up for a look. They did make for plenty of great colourful shots.
Warrumbungles
The Warrumbungles are a series of mountains left over from an extinct volcano. It was the first time I had been out there even though it had been on my bucket list of places to see and I wasn’t disappointed. It’s famous for its landscape of rocky outcrops and its spectacular night vistas. It’s known among astronomers for its lack of light pollution, higher altitudes, low humidity and clean air which all come together and make the Warrumbungles Australia’s first dark sky park. The stargazing is amazing!!! I enjoyed it so much that already a return trip is in the planning.
Below is a selection of images I took from over the 5 or so days.
The wind blows a tree under a starry sky in the Warrumbungle Dark Skies park
A red browed finch in Warrumbungles National Park
Looking towards Mount Baldwin from above Mount Borah
Looking down on the border of a rapeseed field
A panoramic silhouette the Warrumbungle ridgeline
Spring Siding Observatory in the morning light
An emu in the long grasses near the Mt Borah campsite
Sunset as seen from White Gum lookout in the Warrumbungle National Park
A campfire under the Warrumbungle sky
Ridges in the Warrumbungle National Park
Rape seed grown for its oil
A ridgeline at sunset in the Warrumbungle National Park
The Cartel Series from Greenvalleys has come to an end for 2024. Three races were held over a bunch of different tracks. There were supposed to be four but rain cancelled the first of the season. This year instead of just racing two runs on one track per race, riders could put down as many shuttled runs as they wished on two separate tracks.
Yet again another great series from the team at Greenvalleys Mountain Bike Park. I’m already looking forward to shooting the series and its new format again next year.
Underneath are a few images from the 3 races. All the series’ images can be found on the Outer Image website here.
I did the photography for this review of the Zenbivy 3D Flex last year with my friend Jason Lorch from Tyres and Soles. I ended up with this uber-comfortable mattress and have been using it lately when camping out of my car. If you have the space, as it’s big and bulky, then I highly recommend one of these things. It’s not something for your backpack though. The pillows? Well, I think if you have enough space from the mattress then you have enough space for a couple of normal pillows. I always find blowup pillows a little noisy under the head. Now on with the review!!
Cut to the Chase
Do you want to sleep like the dead? The Zenbivy 3D Flex Mattress is the comfiest basecamp mattress we’ve ever used! If you want an end to uncomfortable nights, painful hips or back and are thinking “If only I could bring my bed on these damn trips”, then look no further. With a supportive 4-way stretch design with a fully flat edge-to-edge surface so you won’t roll off the edge, and 3 inches of dreamy support with an inflation time of seconds, you really should stop losing sleep over it and join the Zenbivy (sleep-like the dead) army.
Pros: Feels like your home mattress 3″ Thickness provides amazing comfort Supportive 4-way Stretch Impressive heat loss capabilities (R-value of 7) Low-profile retains good head space in vehicles or low-pitched tents One-way reversible valve keeps air in while inflating Valve allows for customizable comfort with its slow-deflation “button”
Cons: Not cheap, but neither is back surgery.
Zenbivy 3D Flex Mattress – Review
Roughing it has its place, but once you get to a certain age you’ve been there, done that, and got the t-shirt, so now it’s a time for some luxury in your life. The Zenbivy 3D Flex Mattress is the luxurious basecamp mattress packing 3 inches of self-inflating horizontally-cored foam to give you the most comfortable night’s sleep possible. No peas were harmed during this test.
Getting a good night’s sleep is crucial to the way you feel the following day. This is even more important if you need to be at your peak performance for a race. Sleep has been linked to performance levels and if you simply can’t sleep due to crappy mattresses, then this needs to change.
Fortunately, Zenbivy is the master in making bedtime a very comfortable experience for campers. If you’re a car camper looking to upgrade to a superior mattress for those weekends away or someone who’s taken to the van life and on the road for weeks, months, or years at a time looking for a reliable and consistent good night’s sleep, the Zenbivy Flex 3D mattress is one to check out.
We’ve reviewed their Zenbivy bed in the past and it has become our go-to sleeping bag (bed) for all our overnight adventures. More on that here. When you combine the Zenbivy bed with the 3D Flex mattress, it provides the same levels of sleep you would find at home in your own bed, and there’s nothing like sleeping in your bed.
Features
The Flex™ 3D Mattress is the ultimate ultra-comfortable basecamp mattress.
The Zenbivy Flex 3D Mattress has been designed to look and feel just like your home mattress. The 4-way stretch knit top provides excellent support combined with a luxuriously soft flat top surface that is usable from edge to edge cradling you just like your mattress at home.
The 4-way stretch fabric allows the mattress to “flex” with your shape and movement, so the top feels softer and more supportive than other camp mattresses—even at firm air pressures.
Hip comfort is crucial for a good night’s sleep so Zenbivy made sure to eliminate hip soreness with the vertical side walls providing 3 inches of self-inflating horizontally-cored foam to raise your body from the ground to give you the most comfortable night’s sleep possible and still low enough in vertical height to fit into any vehicle.
The R-Value is a measure of the transfer of temperature from one side of a material (in this case a mat) to the other. Eliminating heat transfer into the ground is an important part of how a mattress retains its heat and how quickly you can lose body heat into the ground. The Zenbivy Flex 3D Mattress delivers an impressive R-value of 7 due to the horizontally-cored foam design which drastically reduces cold spots found on most vertically-cored mattresses.
A one-way reversible valve keeps air in while inflating and allows for customizable comfortwith its slow-deflation “button”. When it’s time to pack up, the entire valve pops out for an instant, hassle-free deflation. Then pop the “deflation” valve side back in and the air stays out as you continue to roll.
Set-Up
Setting up the Zenbivy 3D Flex mattress is a very simple affair. It took us no more than a minute or two from unpacking to fully inflated. The carry sack doubles as an Inflation Dry Sack for fast manual inflation and doubles as a storage bag for the mattress.
Simply roll the mattress out onto the ground, connect the carry sack, to the one-way reversible valve, close the top loop of the carry sack to capture some air, then push down on the inflated carry sack and all that air forces its way into the valve, filling the mattress. It only took us 3 bags of air to fill the Zenbivy 3D Flex mattress. This is very fast! Faster than any foot pump we’ve used. It’s also silent so it won’t annoy any nearby campers.
Note, be sure to close off the other valve on the opposite corner of the mattress, or you will be there for eternity trying to inflate it, just like we did the first time, ahem.
It only took us 3 bags of air to fill the Zenbivy 3D Flex mattress. This is very fast! Faster than any foot pump we’ve used. It’s also silent so it won’t annoy any nearby campers.
The Zenbivy Flex 3D Mattress has the appearance of a traditional home bed.
We tested the largest of the three sizes. A fully inflated size of 52″ x 78″ (132 x 198 x 8cm), and a packed weight of 7 lb 11 oz (3.49 kg). The tester is 6′ 2″ and weighs around 86kgs.
The Zenbivy Comfort Factor
Talk about crying yourself to sleep. We almost cried ourselves to sleep with tears of joy on the first night. The comfort levels with the Flex 3D mattress are so close to the bed you would sleep in at home that it’s a joy to sleep on. It has a supportive, yet soft firmness which evenly spreads your body weight to prevent the build-up of pressure points, particularly in your neck, back, and hips, similar to an orthopaedic mattress.
Undoubtedly, the Flex 3D is the most comfortable camping mattress we’ve ever used, and we’ve used quite a few over the years. Previous car camping mattresses were double the height and 10 times as noisy with comical support levels. You know the types, where you move, and your partner gets ejected into the air.
A 3-inch thick mattress is a perfect height. It provides enough thickness for the mattress to feel bottomless in almost every sleep position and doesn’t take up too much headroom in your tent or car. It works everywhere! Even in low-pitched tents.
The 4-way stretch fabric allows this mattress to “flex” with your shape and movement, which evenly spreads your body weight to prevent the build-up of pressure points, particularly in your neck, back, and hips, similar to an orthopedic mattress, even at firm air pressures.
The Zenbivy pillows offer a luxuriously soft cover for your face, and good levels of head and neck support. It also packs down into a teeny-weeny sack.
Another plus is the flat surface of the Flex 3D mattress. This means you use the entire surface area and never feel like you are about to roll off the edge. The flat surface, even under firm pressures, remains flat which is perfect for stretching.
What amazed us is that the height is only 3 inches, but the support is almost equal to that of our orthopaedic mattress at home, which would be closer to 6 or 8 inches. The 4-way stretch 50d polyester knit provides a soft comfort to the surface and the Urethane foam gives it a supportive, yet supple cushioning.
The low height of the mattress is also a bonus because it doesn’t overly reduce the head height in the vehicle or if you have a low-pitched tent.
Packing up
When you’re all done and ready to pack up, just unplug the two-way valve, allow it to deflate, then roll it up and store it in the carry sack. For what the Flex 3D provides, it doesn’t take up that much space (66 x 20cm packed size). You can easily store it in the boot of your car or under the storage shelving in your van.
It’s not cheap. But how much do you value your sleep and your body? If you compare it to a home mattress, how much would you spend on one and what’s the lifetime of those? 5 or 10 years? I know our parents had the same mattress for double that. So if you take that into account, and do a lot of car camping, and do put a value on sleep and body health, then we think it’s definitely worth the dollars.
We’ll say it again! The Zenbivy 3D Flex Mattress is the comfiest basecamp mattress we’ve ever used! If you want an end to uncomfortable nights, painful hips, or back in the morning and are thinking “If only I could bring my own bed on these damn trips“, then look no further. With a supportive 4-way stretch design with a fully flat edge-to-edge surface so you won’t roll off the edge, and 3 inches of dreamy support with an inflation time of seconds, you really should stop losing sleep over it and join the Zenbivy (sleep-like the dead) army.
Where to Buy
You can purchase directly from theZenbivy website.
I was born and grew up in Wales but I’m now a fully-fledged Aussie: a passionate mountain biker, hiker and general nature addict. I’m also a bit of a muso and enjoy a good craft beer now and again (probably too often). I hope what we do here at Tyres and Soles will inspire people to get out there and experience first-hand, the natural wonders surrounding them. So, pump up those tyres, and don your favourite boots. Grab a mate, a partner, or a pet… and head out into nature. But tell us all about it when you get back.
I recently started diving again. So in between races, I decided to do an underwater photography course with my local dive shop Dive Centre Manly. They got on board the talented Pete McGee to run the course. Pete put the course together, which went from photography fundamentals and touched on the more advanced topics of strobes.
Whilst I knew the fundamentals it is always good to have such things reinforced and explained from a different viewpoint I believe. The lessons on strobes underwater were invaluable to me though as strobe placement underwater is quite different to how I would use strobes on dry land.
I missed the first dives due to being ill but Pete kindly let me do the dive section at a later date. While the water quality was rather poor with lots of sediment floating around making visibility limited the dives themselves were fantastic. the 2nd dive was my longest dive to date being 98 minutes underwater. What bliss!!!! Nudibranchs, Wobbegong sharks, Giant cuttlefish, the big Blue gropers and even a Banded Coral Shrimp were all out to play.
If you’ve got an interest in learning about underwater photography I’d highly recommend this course with Pete. Since it’s not a PADI course, Pete can be more flexible with what he teaches and can, to a degree, tailor the course to your skill level.
