Northeast 24hr Challenge: Riders Wanted

[Hyde]

Hawk, were you at the Dayton enduro this last weekend ?

[GMP]

Entry for this opened back in the winter sometime, and holding off as long as I could I enterd a team spot in the 40+ class with only three commitments. I figured it would be easy to get three more guys into it but everyone was either going to the ECEA series race that weekend, or just not into for it. Some guys, including one of my best friends, were interested but would just not commit which sucks trying to plan something like this. Hammer almost joined us but couldn't clear his schedule, and I thank him for keeping me posted early. Since you have to enter the team at the level of the strongest or youngest rider, I decided to switch classes to allow my nephew to ride with us. With that my brother was in so we are a five man team in the large and tough A/B class with the cards stacked against us. It was either that or do a three man team in 40+ which we decided might get old fast especially at a first attempt. So, its going to be for the learning experience and to have fun. If we like it, and they do it again next year, we can do it in the proper class or classes if there is more interest. Hell, even 40+ for me is improper!

Typically, central/western NY is just about perfect black loamy dirt (think Unadilla). Its been dry, but not ridiculous dry. T storms today and maybe tomorrow, then dry through the weekend. So I would not expect a lot of dust, some mud if anything. Hope it is drier as the course could get destroyed with all the constant traffic. Course is supposed to be fast and not technical, not really my preference or strength, but I guess you can't make it too hard considering the length. At 23hrs it might seem like Erzburg!

[Hawkeye]

Hyde, that was my brother at Dayton, he won the masters class. Heard the course was pretty good.

Glenn, good luck, sounds like right attitude going in.

[twowheels]

I'll admit I was a little on edge about doing 24 with only three guys, but how hard can 5-6hrs be in the span of a day?

That said, this race has me more nervous/excited/anxious than almost anything in the past ten years, mostly because I've never ridden the terrain. Or at night. That being said, most of you know I hardly sleep so the night-time laps could be perfect.

Lots of time sweating the details of tire selection, light mounting, camping prep etc.

Looking forward to teaming with Glenn and Jim and the crew - full race report when I'm fit enough to type again.

[Mslow]

Good luck Glenn and the rest of the team, if I can make it out there to hang out I'll text you.

[GMP]

Jim and I have been doing some riding at night from my house this summer, but in technical terrain with canopy and no other riders so very dark. First, a helmet light in mandatory and will be your primary light in all but the more open straights. It goes where you look, into and through the turns. In singletrack, which there will be some, the headlight or light bar is almost insignificant. In fact the light bar can be distracting as the spot beam dances over the brush a few feet from the bike, especially if its rough. I have a switch to turn it off if I prefer. It did spook a big bear so he crossed the trail well ahead of me rather than directly in front.

Steve is the first guy I thought of when I heard of this event, and the first to commit he was in. We will be heading up tomorrow and set up our pit, a 40'x15' area for each team. We have a 5K generator, compressor and air tools, lighting, the works. If cell service is OK, even a way to track the rider on course with a pair of iPhones.

[twowheels]

What? Bears ?????

Brackets for the handlebar mounted light bar are in place (thanks Jay!), mount for headlamp is tucked away under visor, 14 gallons of race gas ready to go (!!!), gearbag packed, goody box with shifters and brake pedals, levers, tubes, lots of brake pads etc set and ready to go ... still need bear repellent ...

[GMP]

No, the bears are by my house! Common site on the streets of the lake community. Leaving by 9:30.

[Hyde]

Good luck guys, I should have fixed you all up with the push to talk radios we use for the ice endurance races.

Steve, you could wear bear bells just in case.

Hawk, cool for the bro, I won Sr A, it's always a good course down there.

[twowheels]

We made it, and we got miniature pit board finishers mementos to prove it!

Glenn deserves a lot of credit for pulling our race effort together (and out of the fire a time or two), but it truly was a team effort to cross the finish line 24 hours after the whole party got started.

Entries ranged from the very serious premiere class (four teams of six, each of which raced only a single bike) to 'The Worlds Most Interesting Man' as one Ironman competitor dubbed himself. Each entry was assigned square footage in the pits based on the class entered - our pit area had a workmanlike appearance, with bonus points for the collection of three Betas, a yellow and blue Husky, and a latest generation GasGas marking the perimeter. I will admit being jealous of the teams that brought their own motorcoaches and cooks.

Old age and treachery couldn't make up for a rough Le Mans start, so after the first lap our team was sitting in 17th place. The 11ish mile course seemed fast on the face of it, but forty minute laps for us (Premiere teams were clocking low 30s) calculated out to about 17 miles per hour. Terrain varied from grassy fields to hard-packed lanes to exposed root pine sections, to (flat) rocky extended climbs and descents. The grass and wooded areas started out slick from rain and heavy dew leading up to the event, and some areas of the course were reasonably soft.

Glenn took us to the 2 hour mark, then his brother Craig took over. Craig was followed by Jim, then I had a turn in the saddle before handing the lanyard to Kyle to round out our five man rotation. The course was getting somewhat hacky in the woods and generally whooped out and nasty on most of the straights by the time Glenn mounted the helmet light and light bar and started the night laps.

The most challenging times seemed to be as the sun was setting and again as the sun was rising, as natural glare washed out the course and blinded riders. Not having ridden at night I found the experience fascinating, but only when the light bar was still running. Don't believe the lighting vendors that say you can run for hours on end from the bike battery. That was far from the only nighttime issue. Numerous riders entered the scoring chute with expensive lights dangling from expensive cords, sometime in the wheel tracks of a bike with still-functional lights, and sometimes just emerging from the darkness like some kind of 2 stroke Viking ship.

I'm going to copyright the statement "You can only go as fast as you can see" if it isn't already in the lexicon. Weird stuff happened at night that affected vision, like goggles suddenly fogging when going from an open to a wooded area, light brackets vibrating loose, dust that appeared like a snow storm in the beam of the helmet light. Long after the sun came up helmet lamps remained critical for lighting the wooded sections. It was great being able to see every bump and rut in the middle of the night, and choose lines accordingly.

Contrary to popular belief I do not hate rocks, nor am I afraid of them, but given my druthers I'd pick Michigan trails over a rocky state all day (and all night) long. For whatever reason moisture came out of the mountain in the night and made the rocky uphills extremely challenging. The 350 climbed like a billy goat, and that was one of the reasons I chose it over the 300. The descents with loose, flat rock actually got better as time went on as the majority of the loose rocks got pushed off line.

We had battery problems, light problems, and crash problems throughout the race, but no mechanicals to speak of. Twenty four hours after it started a cheer went up for the KTM-2T-mounted Southern Stars team as they claimed victory. Five slightly sore and tired sets of hands busted down the pits and off we went, happy to have met the 24 hours Northeast Challenge.