Brook Daly | Marketing

Brook cracked out a great lap in 2023, but he’s hungry to go again and do better this year. Brook is literally hungry almost all the time and gets through more calories in a day than your typical marketing guy, so a solid nutrition plan to fuel this year’s effort has been a priority. He's been working on homemade rocket fuel formulas and attempting to acheive World Tour Pro levels of carbohydrate tolerance, and while I shouldn’t give too much of his strategy away, I can reveal it involves heavy bags of powdered sugars being concocted into big sticky bottles of syrupy liquid. It’s not for the faint of heart, nor those with weak stomachs.

The Yeti ASR that Brook rode in 2023 has been retired and replaced with an Epic EVO (11.6kg as pictured). Notable upgrades include the ENVE M5 carbon bar, shedding weight and adding comfort over the alloy one it replaced, and Goodyear Peak SL Race 2.4” tyres. The Peak series is preferred choice of rubber among the team. It’s a firm favourite thanks to its handy balance of high-volume grip and quick-rolling speed, and Brook is following Caleb Bottcher's lead to run the ultra-fast SL Race version. An Apidura Backcountry Frame Pack keeps spares he hopefully won't need tidily tucked away.

Dean Cameron | Sales and Tech Support

Dean’s jumped on board Team Whaka this year with an entry in the 50km event. His plan was to put a set of Peak 2.4s on his trail bike, a 2024 Stumpjumper EVO, and run that, as it’s a setup that serves him well for long days in the forest covering a variety of distances, trail types and elevation profiles. That all changed with the early arrival of his new staff bike, an Epic 8 EVO. This bike follows a format that has all the things you’d look for in a Whaka rig, and you could make a solid case for it being the ultimate Rotorua bike in general. It’s got enough travel to be dangerous on the descents, and it doesn’t give up much on the climbs against a ‘pure’ XC bike. It basically makes a good job of everything, and it’s the kind of bike that feels exciting underneath you when you pick up the pace.

Dean’s one is kitted out with ENVE M630 hoops on Chris King hubs, an ENVE Cockpit, SDG Tellis V2 Dropper Post, Deity Supervillain pedals, and Goodyear Peak 2.4” tyres. An Apidura Backcountry Top Tube Bag keeps nourishment easily accessible for in-flight refuelling. As with all of Dean’s trail bikes, you’ll find ODI Longneck Lock-on grips finishing the cockpit.

Bevan Whittleston | Workshop

Bevan was one of the first to sign on for this year’s 100km event. Bevan likes to stay busy in the hours that follow work and stretch late into the night, and with a belated start to training he’s now investing time that was previously spent taking things apart and baking cakes to undertake long night excursions in the forest. In the months prior to daylight savings kicking in, his Knog Blinder X 2300 lumen lights played a critical supporting role in this approach.

Another Epic EVO owner here, and Bevan’s one has lots of the upgrades you might expect to see from someone who’s making a career out of working on bikes. M630 rims on silver Chris King hubs step up the performance and look sharp. Bevan runs a Wolf Tooth Resolve dropper/lever combo and full ENVE cockpit, a Wolf Tooth Drop-Stop chainring on his fancy titanium crankset, and he's another Peak 2.4" fanboy.

Kris “Grom” Withington | Area Manager - North

Another veteran of the 2023 event, Kris is back for a 2024 campaign. Kris clocks up the most mileage out of all of us, riding the roadie consistently year-round. He regularly gets out super-early on the weekends while you’re tucked up in bed to square away several hours in the saddle before family commitments kick in. He’s also been logging some long trail rides lately to sharpen up.

Kris rode an Epic EVO last year, and like Dean he’s rolling the new version for 2024. Kris is running a 9.5mm rise (basically XC flat) ENVE M6 bar and stem, ODI F-1 Vapor silicone grips, and we’ve kitted him out with a Stan’s Flow MK4 wheelset featuring their trick M-Pulse hubs. Goodyear Tanwall Peak 2.4” tyres look just right against the moss-green paintwork, and the dropper post has been upgraded to a new SDG Tellis V2. Kris has an Apidura Racing Series Top Tube Pack loaded up with his race nutrition - its magnetic flip-closure gives speedy access to take advantage of brief refuelling windows.

Jordy Castle | Area Manager - South

Jordy committed to the Whaka 100km shortly after he joined the Wide Open team earlier in the year. Spurning the sensible option of riding a geared suspension bike like everyone else, Jordy set about converting his Norco Torrent to a single speed, adding conversations about things like gear ratios and cartilage to the punishing group chat. Then just weeks out from the event he was just out for a cruise, on the one day he decided not to wear his knee pads, when things abruptly deviated from the plan. Man down! The news was accompanied by gory social media images of the mutilated internals of his left knee (the kind you wish you could un-see). After a couple of days in hospital and a minor surgical procedure, Jordy limped home with a pair of crutches, a course of Tramadol and stubborn optimism about his chances of racing. It's looking unlikely from over here on the sidelines, but team spirit is running strong here, so we'll post his bike check anyway.

The Norco just happened to accept Jordy’s chosen gear ratio without a tensioner (single speeders call this a ‘magic gear’; useful jargon to know if you find yourself cornered by a group of them in a pub and need to make conversation). He’s using a Wolf Tooth chainring and Remote Pro dropper lever, SDG Tellis V2 seatpost and Bel Air V3 saddle, and an ENVE cockpit and AM30 wheels. Jordy is based in the South Island and has done most of his riding down there on heavier-duty Goodyear Newton MTF/MTR tyres (because knee-eating rocks), with the view he'd be unlocking next-level speed when he aired up this set of Peak 2.4s for Whaka’s hero dirt. Here's hoping for a speedy recovery Jordy!