24 Hours of Great Glen (Rain Edition)

This would be my 4th year doing 24HOGG, which is essentially the mountain bike version of Reach the Beach but logistically a bit more challenging. The work is harder but the down time is more enjoyable. In each of the previous three years, the weather over the 3-day weekend has been near perfect. The key being zero rain. The first year there was some serious mud in sections but trail improvements over the years had pretty much eliminated most of the junk stuff. Over the last 2 years I'd say the course has been nearly 100% ridable for a decent novice rider (aka me). The one thing I've said at the end of the race (every year) was if it ever rained this race would blow.
Oh did it blow.

Camp Wolfe

Of course just 'rain' would have been a blessing. What we got on Friday and Saturday was some of the hardest sustained rain I've ever seen. Flash flooding rain. I did manage to get my tent setup within seconds of the first downpour and surprisingly my stuff managed to stay dry all weekend (thanks to a water proof tent, screen room setup over my tent and two 10ft tarps over my screen room).
 A group of us headed out late Friday afternoon to pre-ride the approximately 9 mile course during a break in the rain. The course would be a mix of carriage roads (~60%) and single track trails (~30%) and grass fields (~10%). We were only a couple of miles in when the skies opened up again and it pretty much poured the rest of the ride. The trails went from bad to awful fairly quickly. Very muddy, lots of standing water and extremely slick (and these would be the best conditions all weekend).

aR-Black

My teammates this year would be Brayden Dunn, Kevin Tilton and Scott Mason. Kevin and Scott would be first time 24HOGGers (maybe last time after this weekend). I would lead off with the le mans start (approximately 1/2 run around the pond) before heading out on the bike. A few of us decided to start in the back, run easy and not get caught up in the bottleneck that happens on Blueberry Hill less than a 1/2 mile into the race. I should say we did not want to be the bottleneck. I guess we didn't think about all the other folks willing to step up and take this job from us. Sure enough, no sooner did we mount our bikes and we were all riding a conga line up Blueberry Hill (slowly). A little patience and eventually it opened up and crowded trails would become a non issue.

Heading up Blueberry Hill

Although the rain would hold off (mostly) for the next 24 hours, the presence of hundreds of mountain bikers riding lap after lap for 24 hours did unbelievable damage to the single track sections. By my second lap, most of the single track would be practically unridable. The course became 5 miles of speedy carriage roads mixed in with 3 miles of pushing a 26lb mountain bike through the mud. Serious mud. Fun was done.

Finishing Lap 1

Riding back to back laps at night (to give folks more time to rest) was a painfully long experience. Riding at night, with fog, light rain, slick trails and miles of mud really takes all the fun out things (really?). To top it off I flatted coming down a steep technical muddy section (at night of course) and had to fix a flat with my bike mostly submerged in mud. With all the mud that was inside my tire after I installed the tube, it's amazing I even made it back to the start/finish line. Joy. After a little midnight maintenance, I was off to bed for some much needed sleep.

I wouldn't ride again to nearly 7am, mostly due to my teammates having as much fun as me while riding at night (thanks guys, appreciated the sleep!). My 5th lap would be my last, and surprisingly would be one of my best. Some early morning trail work had removed several inches of mud from a few sections and actually made the course a bit more ridable. I probably rode 95% of the last lap and actually had some fun. Not enough fun to ride another lap but fun still the same.

Last Lap

24 hours of hike-a-bike wasn't really what I was hoping for but now I know what it's like when it rains. For the record, I was right.

Thanks to Gianna Lindsey for most of the pics.
Next up: Hampshire 100 this Sunday (100k mountain bike race).

24 Hours of Great Glen

Having done this race once (last year) and having significantly upgraded my bike, any anxiety I may have had (see last year) was non-existent. I was totally looking forward to this race and couldn't wait to get started.
acidotic RACING would be sending two 4-person teams to compete: aR-Black and aR-Grey. Hey, don't blame me on the names, blame Mr. Dunn.

The 'Boneyard'

The course was a roughly 8.5 mile loop at the base of Mt Washington with nearly 1100ft of climbing...EACH LAP. You climb early and you climb often. I'm not sure what the breakdown is but I'd guess it was roughly 60% carriage roads vs 40% single track. The course was nearly identical to last year with the exception of an additional climb (go figure) up behind the Great Glen Center and a short section of single track that took some of the speed out of one of the carriage road corners. Oh, and the 'boneyard' or 'plunge' hill near the finish (popular with spectators because of the potential for crashes) was redone with the addition of a million 'stairs' on the steep hill (which made for a jarring ride each lap).

Blueberry Hill

The race itself goes from noon on Saturday to noon on Sunday. However, we all headed up on Friday and camped at the base of Mt Washington. Chris 'do you know who I am' Dunn was able to get a huge camp area reserved for us right at the base of the auto road. Although I think the effort is somewhat easier than a 24hr running relay (like Reach the Beach), the logistics are harder and the rest is shorter. We had roughly 2 1/2hrs between rides. In that time we had to get back to the campsite, change, clean & fix your bike, eat, change, check your bike and head back to the transition. The 'downtime' definitely wasn't relaxing. However, this year we made a change, actually two changes: we had a camp cook (Nancy Clark) and a camp mechanic (Jay Meyers). Both did a fantastic job keeping 8 hungry, tired, 'I don't want to work on my bike' guys happy.

aR-Black and aR-Grey

Mountain bike racing is weird from a runners perspective. They have a gazillion categories (32 I think), some folks are WAY too serious and most are WAY to into their bikes. Other than that I'd say most are a much nicer version of road bikers. One of the best features of this particular race is the real-time scoring. Each rider carries a RFID card and we scan in and out of each lap. Results are updated in real time throughout the race. So as soon as you finish your lap you can find out have fast you did, and where your team is in the standings. Very cool. This year there were nearly 200 teams, 28 in our class (Mens Sport..whatever that means??). In reality there is only one team though: the other acidotic RACING team. That's what makes this event such a blast. You're out there riding with 400+ riders but you pretty much ignore them all except the rider on the other aR team. Chris attempts to stack the teams, I mean match the teams evenly, each year. After all, we want to race head to head. We want it coming down to the last lap.

This years teams were:
ar-Black (Austin S, Chris D, Ri F, Steve S)
ar-Grey (Ted H, Jay D, Steve W, Brayden D)

Ted near the finish

Near the finish

Although there was some friendly trash talking going on between the teams, I'd say most was between Chris and I (probably started by Chris...as usual). As I wait for Chris to mature as a runner (and catch up), he is clearly a stronger mountain biker, kicking my butt last year. I had two goals this year: beat Chris on as many laps as possible and make sure aR-Grey takes home the acidotic Team Title. In addition to upgrading to a spanky new Trek this year, I've also put in a lot of miles on the trails. I was ready to challenge. As it turned out, Chris would be their 2nd rider and I'd be our 3rd. Therefore, we weren't riding head to head. He'd post a lap time and I'd have to go out and try to beat it.
On lap #1 Chris rides a  52:24 lap. As soon as I finished I check my lap time: 52:21.
On lap #2 Chris rides a 52:42 lap. As soon as I finished I check my lap time: 52:34.
Of course I wasn't rubbing this in his face at all...nope, not me. I was pumped.

My next 2 laps would be ridden back to back and at night. We do this to give everyone a little more downtime at night and hopefully get some sleep. The first lap went well and I felt good. Night rides are always slower (for obvious reasons) and my time was 58:47. My second lap was a disaster. Maybe not that bad but I was bonking badly. I had run out of energy and was literally struggling to stay on my bike. I crashed nearly a dozen times, coming completely off my bike every time but each time I landed on my feet. I guess if you're going to crash, this is the way to do it. I finally made it back in 1:05:56.
Lap 3: Chris 1:00:17 vs my 58:47
Lap 4: Chris 1:07:58 vs my 1:05:56

Coming off Blueberry Hill

Wow, this was going better than I thought (at Chris' expense of course).  Well it wasn't long after that our little fun and games would come to an end. As I was coming into the finish of my 5th lap (58:51) I came across a biker pushing his bike....with no chain. The racer was Chris. I was totally bummed. I think one of (if not the biggest) fear of all riders is getting a mechanical failure. It's one thing to lose on ability or skill or training but nobody wants to lose on a bike failure. The same failure would plague him on his final lap as I passed him again around mile 6. Although rideable, he couldn't really climb well with the chain. I tried to get him to ride with me (mostly down hill at this point) but he clearly wasn't in it anymore. Within a 1/2 mile he was out of site. My last lap went well as I finished up in 54:55. In the end aR-Grey crushed aR-Black, finishing 2 laps ahead. It's not the way we all wanted it to end. I mean, I knew aR-Grey would kick butt but we wanted to compete on ability, not on who had the better running bike.
I had a fantastic time regardless. I was happy with most of my riding (except the climbing..I still stink). The course was rideable and in great shape and I barely had to get off my bike for anything. Can't wait until next year!

Final results:
aR-Grey was 18th in the Sport Class and 40th overall (with 26 laps completed)
aR-Black was 22nd in the Sport Class and 49th overall (with 24 laps completed)

24 Hours of Great Glen

Sometimes it's best not to know all the details when you decide to do something different. If I was a little more informed about 24hr mountain bike races I probably would not have ventured outside the comfort of my nice little running world....and I would have missed one heck of a good time!

UPDATE: I've added some random video I took during the first lap of the start, blueberry hill and the boneyard.



This past weekend I headed up to Mt Washington for the 14th annual 24 Hours of Great Glen mountain bike race, part of a 4-person relay team. acidotic RACING had two 4-person teams competing in the Sport Class, but really we were there to compete against each other (in theory). Chris Dunn claims he setup two evenly matched teams, one called acidotic RACING and one called acidotic RACING B. That's right, not an A and B team, just a B team. Let the head games begin. Me thinks me smell a rat!

Chris has an excellent write up on his blog about our 24hrs of head to head racing so I won't rehash that part again. Check it out, it's a great read.

The acidotic RACING B team (shown below) included yours truly, Austin Stonebraker, Nick Pennell and our capt Steve Sprague. The actual racing order would be Steve S, Austin, Nick and finally me.

Now a little perspective from a non-biker about the dark side...I mean this festival called a mountain bike race. Everything (except the riding) takes place in one big area. Most riders come up on Friday night and camp for the entire weekend and we were no different. The actual race starts at noon on Saturday and ends at noon on Sunday.

The start was a Le Mans start, with the riders forced to run (gasp) maybe a 1/2 mile before mounting there bikes and hitting the trails. The course was an 8.3 mile loop, mostly on the trails of Great Glen. Each loop had approximately 1,100 feet of climbing, and was a mix of carriage roads (60%) and single track (40%). Each rider was given a RFID card which was scanned before and after each lap. The race used a fantastic timing system called Realtime Scoring which allowed us to check our overall position, class position, lap time and more importantly monitor where the other acidotic RACING team was at any time during the race via monitors setup in the scoring tent.

Chris' son Brayden and I rode the course on Friday night shortly after we setup camp. This helped a great deal with my nerves since I knew what to expect now. Although I couldn't ride 100%, I estimated I could ride 85% or so and 'hike a bike' the rest. I'll take it!

The Course
Most of the first mile was climbing up through the blueberry fields next to and behind Great Glen, with a lot of it on decent single tracks. A couple of narrow bog bridges would test your ability to ride straight.All but maybe 30yds (steep uphill prior to the cottage) were rideable, even by me. The second mile was a chance to open it up a bit and catch a breather on the mostly downhill carriage road. Miles 3 and 4 were a mix of rideable short single tracks and hilly carriage roads. Miles 5 and 6 got a bit more interesting and challenging for me. First, there was Whiplash, a hellish single track that literally beat the heck out of my legs (from falling/crashing several times on the rocks). Each time through I'd try to ride further than the last but never really managed to ride more than a 1/3 of the trail before bailing ship and pushing my bike the rest of the way. It was way to technical for me to even attempt to ride. After jumping back on some carriage roads again the race jumped back onto the longest section of single track on the course. My guess is most riders were able to ride the majority of this section, at least early on. It had a little bit of everything. It started out as a nice rideable rocky single track, climbed a bit (maybe even a lot), had a fairly technical descent and then went through the muddiest section of trail I've ever seen. This was that thick, black, wheel sucking mud which was nearly impossible to walk through, let alone ride through. I think they buried rocks and logs in the mud just to add to the difficulty. Early on I tried to ride as much as I could. Actually, I tried to ride more than I could. I eventually swallowed my pride and went to the ole standby, hike-a-bike, mostly through the mud sections. Finally it was back on the carriage roads again for some fast downhill riding, sprinkled with some 90 turns at at bottom of most hills. A Couple of short single track sections and we were onto mile 7, the most technical section of the course. Not a single time was I able to ride more than 50yds of this single track. I pushed my bike up and down this difficult trail, ending at the bone yard,

an evil downhill that took out more than a couple riders (including our capt on lap 1). Once past the bone yard, and within sight of our camp area and finish area I was able to get back on the bike and ride most of the remaining mile or so through some nice single tracks, carriage roads and finally the field to the finish line.

Logistically, this race was much harder than a running relay (like Reach the Beach). Most of us were taking approximately an hour per lap so we'd ride every 3 hrs or so. In that 3 hrs you'd have to

• wash your bike because it was trashed after each lap
• wash yourself
• change your clothes
• eat
• fix your bike
• get ready for your next ride
• sleep?

At night each rider would do back to back laps, riding for 2+ hours which gave us nearly 6hrs of downtime and did allow more time to rest. Once the sun came up we were back to the short rest. In fact, Nick was spent after 4 laps so the last few laps were done with 3 riders, reducing our down time to under 2 hrs.

Although I wasn't the fastest, I never really felt fatigued, staying hydrated, eating as much as I could and popping Endurolytes before and after each lap. I ended up riding the last 2 laps of the day for a grand total of 7 laps, 58.1 total miles, 8,295ft of climbing and 7hrs and 18 minutes in the saddle.

Nick and I took a few photos early on in the race which can be found here. I have a bunch of video from the start that I'll post to Youtube eventually.

A couple of random thoughts to leave with:

• It gets cold at night
• Even without rain the trails get greasy at night with the dew
• Get the best light you can afford. I thought mine was fine until someone rode by with a spanky HID light. Wow. NOTE: Night Rider was renting for $40.
• Plan your food carefully. Not a lot of time to cook.
• Bring a generator if you have one. You can use it except between 11pm and 7am.
• Bring the best bike you can, full suspension if you got it.
• Where the heck can you wash your dishes?
• A camp fire is awesome at 3am (although it needs to be contained, no open fires)
• Take more pictures, further out on the course if possible
• Need a bigger (or is it smaller?) granny gear. Those hills were tough.
• Two pairs of shoes would be nice
• Plan on mechanical failures (chain, flat, etc)
• Shower early, the hot water runs out
• Get to the BBQ early. It was terrific. Hot food and plenty of it.
• The volunteers were great, especially the folks in the timing tent
• The $5 breakfast was worth every penny.
• Have a plan between legs, you don't have a lot of time.
  

Next year we need a camp mechanic and a camp cook! Wait, did I just say next year?

Try, Try Again

If at first you don't succeed....
As promised, I got back on that 2-wheeled horse called a mountain bike and headed over to Massabesic again. This time I adjusted the tension on my pedals to make it a little easier to get out of prior to hitting the ground. It's one thing to crash and fall, but it's embarrassing to fall and still have your feet firmly attached to the pedals. Technically, I only fell once in about 1 1/2hrs of riding but had MUCH more fun this time! Lots of new trails, some I could actually ride, what a concept.

With my newly restored confidence I now began to wonder about the difficulties associated with riding a mountain bike at night. With no firm plan yet on what the heck I'd do for lighting I decided to take a trip to my local bike shop. The first light he shows me costs $450! Hey buddy, my bike doesn't cost that much, are you friggin serious? I'm sure these lights are bright and all but I'm thinking my night mountain biking days may come to an end sometime on Sunday. Let's face it, I can barely ride during the day, why would I want to ride at night...on purpose?

I left without a light, but not empty handed. I bought some new cleats for my shoes, multi-directional release cleats. Anything to make it easier for me to get out of is a good thing. When I got home I found out one of my RTB teammates (Douglas) was letting me use his bike light, via NYC. Phew, one less thing to worry about.

Later in the day I decided I really needed to get at least one practice ride in at dark so I duct-taped a flashlight to my bars, a headlamp to the front of my bike and tie-rapped another headlamp to my helmet. At 8pm I headed over to Horse Hill for a ride. Well 50 minutes later I made it back to my truck, unharmed. Imagine that? It ain't easy but it is definitely doable, even with crappy lights. As it turned out, the flashlight pretty much just came along for the ride. My Petzl running headlamp mounted to my helmet was really providing all the light. By the way, my new cleats were awesome!

Confidence fully restored, I'm ready to go!
This might actually be fun after all.

Dare Stupid Things!

Last winter I joined acidotic RACING, an adventure racing team founded by Chris Dunn. The motto of the team (and the title of Chris's blog) is Dare Mighty Things, part of a famous quote by Teddy Roosevelt.

And I thought I was joining a snowshoe racing team....HA!

2 weeks ago I responded to a team email from Chris looking for one more teammate for a 24hr relay team. Awesome, I love relay teams, especially 24hr ones. This one was slightly different though, it involved those 2-wheel contraptions that I rarely ride, mostly because I stink at it - the dreaded bike (or more specifically the mountain bike). I'm still not sure what possessed me but I decided to sign up for a 24hr 4-person mountain bike race at Great Glen, at the base of Mt Washington called the 24 hours of Great Glen.

Up until yesterday I was pretty excited about it. I still am, but I got a dose of reality yesterday while practicing my mountain biking skills. You see, I'm not really a mountain biker. I really don't even own one (if you don't count the rusted rigid in the shed from the mid-90's). Thankfully, others in the family have them (come to think of it, everyone but me has one). I do take this event seriously and I'm generally intimidated by the whole thing. I know I won't master mountain biking in 2 weeks but I wanted to give it an honest effort and not let my teammates down. So I've been practicing (aka riding) in Horse Hill (my local stomping grounds). A few days ago I upgraded from plain ole pedals to Shimano SPD clipless (and shoes!). Yesterday I decided to ride again with my new pedals and headed over to Massabesic, armed with a trail map. I clipped in and headed to the first single track I came to (Fireline trail for those familiar). No more than 5 minutes in I got myself stuck on some rocks, failed to unclip in time and down I went (still firmly secured to my new clipless pedals). I successfully split open my elbow on my first try.
&%#$@! did that hurt! I saw a little blood but couldn't really see the damage so after stomping around for a few minutes I got back on the bike and continued. I swear, I didn't go 10 more minutes before I friggin did it again, this time on the other side. Ah, but I was smarter this time, I saw the obstacle, and assumed I'd screw it up and get stuck and immediately looked for an out. An out meaning a place I could fall without causing too much pain. Down I went. I knew I was over matched and I knew part of the reason. The tension was WAY too high on my pedals. Easy fix, head back to the truck, make an adjustment and I'd be back on the trails in no time. My second mistake (wait, maybe it was more than that...) was thinking this trail was only 1 mile long. I'd just ride the rest, grab a fire road and swing back to the truck. Turns out I was mistaken. Fireline is 3 miles long, and in my humble opinion, is not a learning trail, especially with tight pedals.
Well long story short, I made it to the end (after falling no less than 3 more times), started heading back and decided to try ONE more trail first (Ladyslipper), since it was only a mile long (I checked this time). Although slightly better to ride, this mudfest trail still offered enough obstacles to humble me once again, taking me down one more time, conveniently on the same injured elbow from my first spill. As I limped back, lacking confidence and dragging my pride behind me I began to wonder what exactly I got myself into....

I'll shake it off and I'll get back on that horse (after I adjust those stupid pedals). The Wolfe will ride again Bwah Ha Ha!!! Ok, the Wolfe will most likely ride, fall, ride, fall, repeat again.

Kids, don't try this at home.

PS: thanks Mike Wade for my blog title!