Team Commie Bar at the Big Bear 50 Eight Hour Race

Race Report

Well the whole week I was in NYC and got back  home on Friday.  It was only an 8 hour race the next day so I threw some clothes in the truck and went to eat pizza and drink beer.

Then I saw the weather forecast.........  Calling for 8-10 inches of snow!!!

Now the race was happening at Big Bear Lake which I venture to say is some of the most technical mountain biking in the east.....  It was always going to be a hump a bike race but with 10 inches of snow???  This could be quite sadistic....

I was racing with new Commie killer Kathy Meagher.  She's from Deep Creek and in killer shape.  We met up around 0700 and the overnight snow was really negligible.  A dusting....  Shouldn't be a problem....  We drove to the race HQ and got registered.  Snow wasn't bad but it was really, really cold.  24 degrees and felt like 8 with the wind.  I bundled up like crazy but was concerned about my feet.  We'll see.

The race started and after about 45 minutes in the biggest snow blizzard i've seen this year starting howling....  It was snowing sideways and sticking on the trails and covering all tracks.  On one hand it was beautiful but on the other hand trying to navigate and ride some of the toughest trails in the East was pretty difficult.

Our navigation was on and we nailed the first 8 points no problem....  However it was taking us almost twice as long because riding the bikes was basically not possible.  I had planned on around 4 hours or so to clear the bike course....  At 4 hours in we still had more than 8 points to go....  Decision.....

Ultimately we knew we could clear the bike course but probably not have a lot of time on the foot/trekking section.  If we decided to stay out and clear the bike course we were pretty sure nobody else would do that.  On the other hand if the trekking portion had a bunch of easy points we could be foolish for staying out on the bikes and not nailing a lot of foot points.....

So......  We decided to stay on bike.  It took us around 7:15hours on the bike to clear all the points and get back to the transition area.  That left us with 45 minutes on trekking.  Thankfully the trekking points were NOT easy or even close by meaning our efforts on the bike were worth it....  We were able to get one check point on foot meaning we cleared the bike course with 16 points and got 1 point on the trek.  Would it be enough for the win???

Yes!!!  Nearest competitor only got 8 points on the bike...!  Remember it was 8-10 inches of snow.  My bike shoes would not get into the SPD pedals because of the ice.  Our waterbottles froze at 3 hours in leaving us with no water for 4 hours....

So cool to be doing this stuff!!
Team Commie Bar leads the way....