Warning: This post may contain graphic accounts of racing. You have been
warned.
A few weeks ago my young friend/son of friend Garrison asked if I be
interested in being a team for the 24 Hours in the Sage with him. I've
only sort of participated in this before when I did a single lap for a
really big team a couple of years ago. This time I'd be on a four man
single speed team, and I decided to give it a try.
In preparation I've been trying to ride my single speed a lot, and have
some days with multiple rides in a day. Oh, and I think my son when he
was a baby was pretty good training too. I came up with a name for our
team at the last minute because I was the one who put the paperwork
together at the end. So we became the Sage Junkies. I thought it seemed
fitting for four locals who see each other regularly getting our fixes
of sage out at Hartman's.
The other teammates were all guys I knew, at least a little, and two of
them have been pretty successful racers around here. Garrison had been
at a wedding out of town until early that morning and was driving back.
The three of us who were there on time wondered for a while if we would
make it in time. He arrived during my lap, which was third and made it
in time to start the fourth as I finished.
The course was about 13 Miles and a little over 1000 Ft. in elevation
gain. Not terribly hard, at least not the first few times. For some
miraculous reason the rain had stopped and gave us a nice 24 hours of
weather. The first lap was a little hot but everything after that was
pretty nice.
We all rode hard, and we overcame a couple of mechanicals (a flat and a
dropped chain that I had to readjust my wheel for) but never had any
really time consuming problems. Early on we started getting a lead on
the other single speed teams and our member with the most racing under
his belt rallied us to go for it. We started just wanting to have fun,
and Mike, once he could see the possibility of a win, now got us psyched
up for it too. It put a whole new twist on the experience.
The night was long. I did two laps in the dark and my first dark lap at
about 11:00 was a little rough. Twice while passing other riders I wound
up crashing. Once I just lost a little skin but once on Rocky Ridge I
slammed pretty hard and got some painful bruises and that sick "punched
in the gut" feeling for the rest of the lap. Those were my only crashes,
and my 3:30 lap, as painful as it was to get up and do, ended up being
not so bad and uneventful.
I wound up doing five laps, and the team did 22. We won the single speed
four man and were the third team overall. I've been eating a sleeping a
lot ever since.
It was fun in a sick sort of way and I could see myself doing it again.
I don't think I'd really do many, but with the right group of friends an
an interesting course it was a good time.
Matt