Around 4:45am, 6 racers gathered outside the hotel, alongside the race director and another race official. 3 of us were doing 300 mi, the other 3 doing 500, all without support crews. Everyone had bags on their bike; some were carrying hydration packs. We got our GPS trackers, turned on our lights, and rolled out at 5.
The first 8 mi were neutral, and we were supposed to stick together and go an easy pace until mi 9. The other fields would have someone leading them out and keeping them together, but we rode into the dark without one. Everyone stayed together for the first 4 mi, then 3 people pulled ahead. A couple mi later, 2 dropped behind me. I knew that at least one of the people ahead of me was doing the 300 mi race, but wasn’t sure where the others in my field were. We left the neutral zone, already spread out. I could see one tail light ahead of me, and I didn’t know where the others were. I slowly gained ground on that tail light, closing distance on the climbs and maintaining it on the flats. When I passed him, he was not the one who I knew was doing the 300 mi, so that meant I had at most one person from my field ahead of me.
It was warmer than I’d expected for early morning, and as the sun rose it heated up slowly. Going through the city of Hurricane, I missed a turn by half a block, went back and made the turn, and then someone else from the 300 field caught up with me. We both missed another turn, then got back on the course and climbed out of the city onto Route 59.
Route 59 is one of the worst roads I’ve ever ridden on. The road wasn’t in terrible condition or anything, but it barely had a shoulder. On most of the roads I’ve ridden on like this, cars will pull to the side to give cyclists a little space. Despite the road being nearly empty with only the occasional car in each direction, the cars did not move at all for cyclists. A handful of cars going 50+ mph passed me within 2 ft. A semi truck passed me with less than 1 ft clearance, despite having a completely empty road that they could’ve moved over into. I later heard that a couple other cyclists had very close calls with vehicles on that road. The scary thing about getting passed at that distance is not just how close the vehicles are, but also that the aerodynamics causes the really large vehicles to suck you in closer to them as they pass. I nearly went off the road trying to avoid getting sucked in by the semi that passed me.
Everyone was so spread out at this point I was completely alone. I was hoping a shoulder would appear eventually, because so few of the cars on this road were giving me space. Route 59 dips down into AZ, into Colorado City. At the border, a nice shoulder that I could ride on appeared. It was much less stressful to ride on. The sun was fully up at this point and starting to heat up, but nothing too uncomfortable yet. There was nearly no traffic on this road. About 10 mi into AZ, I saw a car stopped in the lane on the other side of the road. They had rolled down their window and were looking down at something on the road next to their car. As I got closer, it appeared to be a rope. I passed them. It was a large, angry rattlesnake. I did not stop for a picture.
The course turned left to go back into Utah, and I continued at a relatively easy pace to the first checkpoint at Orderville. I got there just after 11am. There was 1 person in my field who had gotten there at 9:45, and the other one hadn’t been by yet. One of my friends texted me that the one ahead of me was averaging 18 mph while I was averaging 14. The guy behind me was averaging 10. I concluded from this that I was very unlikely to catch or be caught by anyone in my field, so I should just go at a pace that seemed sustainable for me. I refilled my food supplies from a drop bag I had there, and refilled my water. I had just gone through my 2 bottles and none of my hydration pack. I probably should be drinking more.
My saddle was starting to get uncomfortable. One thing that I’d figured out in RAW was that I could double up bibs to get more padding for my sit bones. I wasn’t sure if I would need it for this ride, but I’d put an extra kit in my next drop bag in case I wanted to do that. The kit I was wearing didn’t have as much padding as I would have liked, and I was looking forward to getting to my next drop bag so that I could have that.
The 50 mi to the next checkpoint were beautiful and uneventful. Someone from the 500 mi supported race passed me on a climb - they had started 2 hours after my field, but didn’t have bags weighing them down. As we got up near 8000’, I noticed I was going slower. I didn’t feel more tired, and it didn’t feel harder, but the speed my computer was reading was lower than I expected. A large portion of this was on a bike route separated from the main road, so there was no traffic to worry about. The next checkpoint was a gas station. I checked in, refilled my water, and kept going.
The route stayed on the bike path. The lack of traffic was nice, but about every 50-100 ft, there would be a crack in the pavement that would be an uncomfortable bump. I tried going to the far right to have less of a bump, then to the left, then tried riding over the spots where grass had grown in the cracks, but it didn’t help. The bike path curved back and forth, and that in combination with the bumps made it so I didn’t feel comfortable descending as fast as I would’ve liked. We were right next to a big, straight, empty road, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who wished we could’ve jumped over to that road for the long descents.
I learned from someone along the way that the one racer in my field behind me had DNF’d. And the one ahead of me was so far ahead I had no chance of catching him. I got into the checkpoint at Escalante around 6:30 in the evening.
One interesting thing they did for this race was that at 3 checkpoints they rented out hotel rooms that were open for any racers to use - to shower, nap, just sit for a while. So I had a hotel room here. The people who checked me in said I could have the room to myself, since Mark had already passed through, Chris DNF’d, and they didn’t expect the supported riders to want it any time soon. I took a quick shower and a 15 minute nap. I refilled my food from my drop bag. It didn’t have my other kit in it - I wasn’t sure if they’d accidentally swapped my 2nd and 3rd bags, or if I’d put it in the wrong bag. Before I left I was told that if I needed anything from a store, I should get it here, because everywhere else would be closed when I went through it for the next long while. I stopped at a convenience store to get chapstick.
From Escalante to Bicknell was another 75 mi, with 7300 ft climbing. But it was night and it was cooling off. My saddle was starting to get uncomfortable, and I was compensating by putting more weight on my hands, which was in turn making those hurt. There was a long climb - about 5000’ over 25 mi. With the pace I had been going, and the amount of time I had left, I wasn’t very tired and this climb seemed to go on forever but it wasn’t very hard. The night sky was beautiful, and occasionally supported racers passed me. Occasionally I passed them as well. The rest of the way to Bicknell was uneventful.
At Bicknell there was another hotel room. But they didn’t have my drop bag - it had somehow ended up at the next checkpoint. This meant that I didn’t have: an extra kit, food, sunscreen, extra powerbank. I hadn’t been eating as much as I’d planned, so I actually had a fair amount of food still in my bags and my pocket, but I was worried about the powerbank. The one I had been carrying was completely depleted, and I had been using my Garmin for navigation, which was also nearly out of battery. My phone was also low, and I knew one of my headlights (I had 2) and one of my taillights (I had 3) were low. The person staffing the checkpoint had a wall charger that he let me borrow to charge my GPS. I turned off my phone to save battery in case I needed it for an emergency. I figured my lights would be fine through the night, and I’d have batteries eventually. My main concern was my Garmin running out of battery and losing that source of navigation. I had paper directions, and a map on my phone, but both were substantially less convenient.
I showered. I took a quick nap. I asked if I could leave my rain gear there, since it clearly wasn’t going to be raining, and they said yes, so my saddle bag got lighter.
I put my Garmin on power save mode, so I could no longer see my speed, heart rate, power output… all the numbers that I could use to pace myself. But I had plenty of time to get to the end, and no chance of catching Mark, so maybe it didn’t matter.
Bicknell to Panguitch was relatively flat and easy. But I was worried about getting sunburned when the sun came up, so ended up keeping my leg warmers on and putting my sunsleeves on. I kept my neck gaiter around my neck and covering as much of my face as I could. I got hot. As I went through the various small towns on the way, I looked for open convenience stores to refill my water - I wasn’t running too low yet, but I was worried about the heat. Everything was closed all day, because it was a Sunday. Not even any gas stations. Eventually in Circleville I found a water spigot outside a post office and refilled my bottles. I was trying to avoid drinking out of my hydration pack because the water tasted like plastic - I had a relatively new bladder in it and hadn’t previously noticed how much weird flavor leeched into the water over time.
Throughout the ride I had been carrying a large saddlebag. The capacity for the bag was much more than I needed, but the bag could be rolled up to be smaller. After I had dropped my raingear in Bicknell, the bag was understuffed. This wasn’t initially an issue, but over time the contents settled and the bag slumped to the point that it was touching my rear wheel. I don’t think this would’ve been an issue for anyone taller than me, but I had to stop and readjust it a handful of times. Between this, the heat with my extra gear on, and the lack of info from my computer, it took me longer to get to Panguitch than I had expected.
When I got to Panguitch, Mark was still there. Apparently he’d arrived over 10 hours before me, but had gone so hard that he wasn’t able to keep going. He had been planning on taking a longer break and then continuing, but had ended up just staying there. I was relieved to get there and be able to recharge my various devices, take off my leg warmers, get a cold drink, and refill my bags with food. There was a Subway across the road from the checkpoint, and I went to go get a sandwich there. They were out of veggie patty sandwiches, though, so I ended up eating froyo and soda instead. I had two drop bags there, so more food and other supplies than I could use for the rest of the ride, but it was nice to have. I took a 2 minute shower to wash the salt off me, and another woman - racing the 500 mi supported - came in to share the room with me. We both took quick naps, and I repacked my bags with food, and covered myself with sunscreen. I left my hydration pack there along with some of my warm clothes - it was 1pm and I had 150 mi to go, with a time cutoff at 7am. Plenty of time. Mark dropped out of the race. I wasn’t racing anyone anymore. 2 bottles seemed like it would probably be enough, given that there were places to get water along the way.
After a short flat distance, the route had a very long climb up out of Panguitch. Fortunately it wasn’t too hot. The climb consisted of short, steep climbs, that would seem to level off but keep climbing at a lower grade, interspersed with occasional short dips. There wasn’t an obvious peak that this road was going up, as it twisted and climbed. But it was easy to just keep going.
On one of the short descents, at the very bottom, I tried to shift across a lot of gears. My chain slipped off. A split second later, it caught on the front derailleur. It snapped.
I didn’t have a chain tool.
I pulled off the side of the road to look at it. It had snapped right next to a master link - if I had some way to get the master link off, I could connect the two ends again and keep going. I looked at the tools I had available and couldn’t make anything work.
It was hot. There was no shade. There was no phone signal. There was no traffic on the road. I could walk my bike out of this small dip in the road, but there was nowhere to go after that. I had water, but I had no way of getting out of this situation. This was probably one of the most potentially dangerous situations I had gotten myself into biking.
I sat there for 15 or 20 minutes. The sun seemed unbearable.
Eventually there was movement on the road. Another cyclist was approaching, followed by a support vehicle. I flagged them down, and they stopped for me. As an unsupported racer, I wasn’t supposed to receive help from any other crew, but I was allowed to in situations like this and would receive a time penalty. I would take a time penalty to get out of here. They had a chain tool, and it took me a few minutes to remove a link from my chain and reattach it. Then we both kept going. I would stay close to this Brian the rest of the race - we both seemed to be going similar speeds, with one of us pulling ahead of the other depending on the grade of the road.
These people saved me!
Just a few minutes after fixing my chain, it started to sound weird. Like when you try to shift into a different gear, but the chain didn’t actually shift. I had a Wolf Tooth Roadlink attached to my derailleur hanger, allowing me to run an 11-32 cassette on a short cage. The bolt holding it in place had come loose. An easy fix, I pulled out my tool and tightened it, and got on the road again.
A little while later I noticed a quiet almost hissing noise. I stopped again. The saddle bag didn’t hold its shape as well when it was understuffed, and had slowly settled and slumped so that it was just barely brushing against my back tire. I repacked it, made sure I had a few inches clearance, and took off up this endless climb.
A half an hour later, or maybe an hour, I don’t know, I had to readjust the bag again. And then again after that. This climb went on forever, and the various gear issues were causing it to take much longer than I expected. The roadlink came loose again. I kept passing Brian, then I’d have to pull over to take care of something, and he’d pass me. I stopped to turn on all my lights. Then I stopped to switch my sunglasses to clear ones. We were over 9000’ up and still climbing. The road would go up and level off so that it looked like a summit, then tease with a short dip before starting to climb again. It couldn’t be too much further - I knew the route didn’t go over 10k ft.
We passed 9500’. It was twilight. I hoped I could do at least some of the descent before it got completely dark. We kept climbing. And my headlight went out. I pulled over. It was out of batteries. This was fine, because I had another headlight that I could use in its place, but now I was worried - this light didn’t give any warning sign that it was low on batteries before just turning off, and my other light was also a Niterider Lumina. What if it ran out of batteries and turned itself off in the middle of a steep descent at night? There were no streetlights, and the moon was not full enough to light anything. I doubted I could stay on the turns of the descent if that happened. This light should have lots of batteries, but still…
My saddlebag was rubbing on my wheel again. I fixed it.
We climbed past 9800’. It was starting to get cold. I hadn’t expected to take so long on this climb, so had left all my warm clothes except for my wind jacket in my last drop bag.
9900’. The sign for the summit was visible in the darkness at 9930’. I pulled over to fix my saddle bag again. I started the descent. I went slowly, wanting to know that if my light went out, at any point, I’d have enough road and be going slow enough that I could safely stop. When the occasional car passed me, I’d speed up with the temporary added long distance visibility from their lights. As I descended it got warmer. It continued heating up past where I was most comfortable. This descent was long and steep - down 4000’ in only 20 mi.
The descent ended in Cedar City. There was a checkpoint at a gas station, and Brian’s crew had just gotten there. They were wondering where I was. We chatted a bit, and I mentioned being nervous about my lights. They offered me an extra headlight just in case. I readjusted my saddle bag to stop rubbing on my wheel. I had a lot less time to make it back the rest of the way before the time cutoff than I had anticipated, but was still confident I could make it in time.
The rest of the way back was relatively easy - no big climbs and little traffic. Smaller climbs kept teasing, making everything seem like just a little more work than I expected. There were occasional jarring cattle guards. Bumping over them shook my saddlebag, and I had to stop to fix it. And the roadlink.
Many of the times I stopped to fix the roadlink, there was nothing to lean my bike against, and I ended up keeping it upright with the chainrings pressed up against my right leg. There was a large and growing number of black prints on it. I don’t think I’d ever gotten that much chain grease on me before.
One thing I’ve noticed I do when going long distances over relatively flat ground with no one else around is slowly lose speed until I am going a very easy, very slow pace. This may have been exacerbated by putting my Garmin on power save mode again, as it was starting to run low, and I’d used up the power in my power bank to charge my lights. I pushed up to a moderate (on a shorter ride, “easy”) pace again. Getting to the end before the cutoff shouldn’t be an issue. But I had to fix the roadlink. And my saddle bag.
The stars were amazing. I wish I had had more time to look at the stars.
The lights of St. George became visible on the horizon. The route went on to city streets, with stoplights, and cars going wherever they go at 2am. 3 mi before the finish line, my headlight went out. There were enough streetlights and I was wearing so much reflective stuff that it wasn’t really an issue for visibility, but I didn’t want to roll across the line without a light and risk a time penalty. It was a little over 48 hours in, with a 50 hr time cutoff, and I already had a 1 hr time penalty for receiving help with my chain. I wasn’t sure if it would still count if I finished in under 50, but the time penalties put me over. So I stopped and swapped out the light with another. And fixed my saddle bag.
I rolled across the finish line at 5:26. 48 hrs, 26 min. With the time penalty, 49:26, just under the cutoff. I won, but only because everyone else DNF’d. The 153 mi since the last bag drop I’d averaged just over 10 mph due to the frequent stops to fix stuff. I expected to be able to finish in closer to 40 hours, and still think I could have if it weren’t for the issues with the drop bag and the gear.
This race actually ended up a lot easier than I expected. Dealing with the gear issues was the most trying part, and that was mostly just frustrating. The climbs were long, but not exhausting, and, aside from needing sleep, I wasn't that physically exhausted at the end. I could have gone harder, and would have under better circumstances.
I think I ate about 5000 calories during the race (this could have been a few thousand higher without the drop bag mix-up), and Strava estimates I burned 11,200. I could eat more.
Brian rolled across the finish line a few minutes after me. I got a hotel room to shower and nap for a bit before the awards ceremony.
Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/2654630079
Epilogue
Several people came up to me before the award ceremony in the morning to chat briefly. One conversation didn’t have anything to do with the race. A woman came up to me and asked:
Her: Are you flying or driving home?
Me: I’m driving.
Her: Oh good, do you want some shots?
Me: Um.
Her: We have some extra, you can have them.
Me: You… what?
Her: We have extras, do you want them?
Me: …?
Her: We can’t take them on the plane with us, but you can have them if you’re driving.
Me: …?
Her: The little shots.
Me: …?
Her: You know, the little sprays? The spritzes?
Me: Er, no? What?
Her: The little sprays!
Me: Uh…?
Her: Here, I’ll show you.
And she reached into her bag and pulled out a couple CO2 cartridges and handed them to me.
