25 times Round The Lake and no signs of stopping

It’s no surprise Sheryl Duncan refers to cycling as her ‘happy place’. A self-proclaimed late-starter to the sport, she has more than made up for lost time with an admirable list of event accolades and highlights. 

This year, the 58-year-old Taupo local will head to the start line for her 25th Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge event, which begs the question, what is it about this event that keeps her coming back?

“This is my local, it’s the one that started my whole journey, the one that kicked it off for me. It has evolved so much over the years, there is just so much you can choose to do if you want to. I don’t know where 25 years has gone, it feels more like 10 but there you go,” she says.

Rewind 25 years and Sheryl can still recall her first Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge event. Entering as part of a relay team she has never looked back. “You get the bug,” she says.

The next three years saw her take part in the relay event and then, as the team dropped away and her interest in the sport continued to grow, she seized the opportunity to complete the full 160km course on her own. 

Despite comments from a couple of ‘disbelievers’ who said they didn’t think she could do it, she used the opinions as motivation and plowed on with her training. 

Taking part in the Round The Lake event with a friend for the first time, Sheryl makes no secret of the fact there were tears. 

“We cried, we cried really hard when we got over the finish line because we’d been out there for something like 7 hours and 40 minutes. We were exhausted and I think we’d stopped somewhere like Motuoapa and thought, " I don't think we can do it, it’s too hard,” she says.

But it’s the high of the achievement, the absolute sense of accomplishment, the endorphin rush that comes from setting a goal and achieving it that keeps her coming back.

“Just that feeling you get when you cross the line and you’ve done it, you’ve ticked it off and it’s just like wow, I actually did it. What a cool feeling.”

It was at that point that the rest became history, in her own words, she “just kept riding”.

Clocking up 100km on her weekend rides with friends, she joined the Taupo Cycling Club and got to know a whole new community of people who were ‘really cool and really friendly’.

She continued taking part in Cycle Challenge and watched as her times continued to get shorter and shorter, which prompted her to tackle a sub-five hour personal record.

On the back of taking home places in various national, regional, age group and club champ competitions, and regularly clocking up more than 300km in training rides in a single week, she thought, ‘I’m going to bust five hours on this thing (LTCC). I’m not going to be out here all day”. And as she says, so matter of factly, ‘so yeah, I did it’.

Her involvement with the event has also evolved over the years. She’s been the minute taker and later a member on the Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge Board of Trustees, an opportunity which allowed her to understand the inner working of this iconic event, the largest of its kind in New Zealand. 

When speaking with Sheryl it’s obvious there is a real sense of community among not only those taking part, but those behind the scenes and the wider cycling community and to her delight, slowly but surely more female riders are popping up.

“I feel that women cyclists are increasing, it’s slow, but I do see more ladies out there, more ladies on bikes, more ladies on e-bikes, they are getting out there, definitely,” she says. 

So with her 25th event coming up in November, I’m curious, when does it end?

“I have no plans to stop. I have slowed down, but there’s a draw there. I still really love this. It’s my happy place. You don’t think about anything else. The stresses of what’s going on in your life suddenly disappear, all you’ve got to worry about is turning legs over, enjoying the scenery,” she says.

As we wrap up our conversation, I’m curious, what are an event stalwart’s parting words for those curious about taking part in the event and to quote Nike, she simply says, ‘Just do it. Get out there, just start riding and begin your own journey’.