24 Hours of DINO

Funny how the Midwest seems to always get overlooked when people talk about the "best" mountain biking. Missouri has some awesome trails. Indiana will blow your mind with what they've done in the last few years. We rode some of the trails at Versailles State Park in the south east corner of the state. Even at 5 1/2 hours the drive would be worth making for a weekend getaway, all hwy. Brown County is another one I will be checking out in the next few months. The trails are narrow, fast and flowy.

This weekend Greg Ott, Todd Holtmann, Karen Holtmann and I went to race the 24 Hours of DINO-(Do INdiana Offroad). We left Friday morning hoping to get there, set up and pre-ride the course. We ran short on time and lap 1 of the race was our first look. It was the first race of its kind for them. This was my 4th 24 hour all in different states; Missouri, Ohio, Wisconsin and Indiana. Indiana was the best course, by far.

The race started with a typical short run to the bikes. What was not so typical was the required removal of a critical bike part to be carried with you as you "ran" to your bike. Front wheel seemed the most simple to re-install and nearly all agreed with the exception of a few Cannondale "Lefty" owners that opted to pull their seatpost in lieu of their bolt-on-and-then-retighten-your-disc-brake front wheels. This time I truly didn't run at all, just walked and didn't "run" into any bottle necks on the trail. The other thing that worked well for me was riding as slow as I could on the first lap, my avg heart rate was 142, really low for me. Not going anaerobic kept me from ever having the slightest hint of cramps and after the horrible cramps I had at Binder Lake, that was a welcome change.

Now that I had the pace set and had a plan for nutrition, all I had to do was ride and so I did. The laps were clicking off one after another with little pit time. The key to this trail was only giving gas when you needed it. I figured out how fast I needed to go so I wouldn't have to brake through the corners and carry as much speed as possible. You wouldn't believe how efficient this can make you. It is possible to go faster, but with a ton more energy expended. Let it all hang out on the faster sections and chill on the climbs. Even with this strategy a small chainring was never needed. The climbs are well designed in that they follow the contours, instead of short and steep they were long and gradual. Here is a video of the "Cliffside Trail". We rode up this trail. In the video, which doesn't do it justice, they are riding down it. I wouldn't call it a cliff, but it sure made you pucker up and I saw quite a few folks walking sections of it. Much of this trail reminded me of Roller Coaster at Castlewood, some of it Colorado. The bench cutting much like Love at Castlewood.

Mechanically, the only issue I had all day with the bike was a pin-hole leak in my front tire. I thought for sure the sealant would take care of it and hit it with some CO2. Lasted about 2 minutes. I pulled the wheel off the bike, found the hole and let the sealant pool. It sealed up and I aired it back up, manually. It held for the rest of the lap and as soon as I got back I hit it with the floor pump to my normal pressure. Todd had warmed up some soup so I took a dinner break. Tire seemed fine when I got ready to go back out. I was amazed at how much light my new Cygo Trion light put out. It's a 600 lumen led with a self contained battery, no cords. I rode it on the lowest and the medium low settings with no issues. Lasted all night with one quick recharge at dinner and a full recharge when I took my long break.

After 12 laps I had nearly an hour on second place but was getting really sleepy. To me it wasn't worth making a big mistake and getting hurt so I took that break. If I had stuck to my plan of a one hour break I would have been right with 2nd and easily ridden ahead, but I hit "snooze" and it turned into two hours. I was able to make up 25 minutes on him but once it started raining I called it, again not worth it. My bike was clean, I was still clean and dry. The winner came in about 30 minutes after I finished 15 on his 16th lap and went back out. It took him forever to finish that lap and he was covered in mud from crashing, blood visibly pouring out from his knee. He wanted it. He and I both got plaques, his said 1st, mine 2nd-that's all. He had a pit crew of 4 that fed him on the bike, gave him lights at dark, took them back when it got light, we did EVERYTHING on our own. So his times are essentially ride time with only a few minutes of stopped time. I was consistently riding between 1:02 and 1:10 laps but pitting between every lap. My 15th lap was 1:04 ride time, his 1:27. His crew was also keeping him updated on the other soloists. I was told after my 14th lap that I was 20 minutes behind Tim Mack, he didn't go out on 15 so I was told I had won. They forgot to tell me Martin Sanders was ahead of me also. At that point I couldn't have caught him anyway.



Todd crashed hard and called it after 7 laps, still 91 miles! Greg rode a great race finishing 4th with 13 laps and Karen finished 2nd to a seasoned endurance racer and did it all on her single speed. 585 miles ridden between the four of us, pretty flippin cool! Best part is that I feel totally fine a day later. It was 4 days before I felt okay after Binder Lake. It would be nice to race an entire race and not have rain play a part. A little hard to decipher, but here are the DINO lap splits. Find a rider, laps are in the right column, total time in the left.

The course was 13 miles, but the Garmin only picked up between 11 and 12. I attribute this to how tight and twisty the trail was. To keep the file sizes smaller the Garmin only makes periodic updates and on an open trail or the road it is very accurate. Not sure why I didn't get elevation until lap 5 but oh well. Around 800ft per lap X 15 = 12000ft. Lap one includes the run and a lap around the pool area. I started my lap at the start line each lap. So my breaks show up at the end of the laps, conversely, they show up at the beginning of the laps on the DINO splits. Next time I think I'll start it at the beginning of the lap, hit lap at the end of the lap and hit lap again at the beginning. That way I'll have accurate lap and break times regardless of whether or not my bike is moving.

"Backside" Race

The 11th race in the MWFTCS took place in the back part of Castlewood State Park. With the main artery severed a year or so ago many people have quit riding back there. Here is some history for those of you that have never been there.

There was once a trail that passed through a narrow piece of land between the Meramec River and the Union Pacific rail line. Always thought to be Castlewood land we rode through without care. After a few heavy rains and floods the river began to carve away at this outside bend and trees disappeared along with massive amounts of real estate. Soon signs showed up posting "no trespassing" and "Union Pacific-private property". This was our trail! WTF. Turns out the railroad owns an easement which now was being encroached upon as the pathway moved up the bank closer to the rail bed. I'm sure they were becoming concerned someone would get hurt and sue them. Funny thing is, that river bank is going to need serious repairs soon and maybe now the burden will fall upon the railroad and not Castlewood. Now the only way to legally get to the back section of Castlewood is to drive around to the town of Sherman Beach, or ride 3 miles of the Al Foster trail in from Glencoe, not very convenient. Some have chosen to break the law and continue to cross the private land. Either way the trails still exist and get more use than I expected to see.



Back to the race. With the first cross race today and a GORC workday the same day, turn out was not huge. There were 86 racers, well below the MWFTCS average, compared to 43 at the MOBRA race in July at the same place. Saturday races are always tough because those who work at a bike shop are generally working. We had 10 in the Marathon class for about 15 minutes, and then there were 9. Bummer Barry! No, the head tube is not supposed to come apart from the top and down tubes.



My plan was to just "ride" this race. I went a little harder than I wanted to, but it felt good. My hardtail is out of commission right now so I rode my dual squishy bike. Good choice for the roughness, just a little tougher on the steep climbs of which there were three spots that gave me trouble. Dwayne, now back from Denmark, left us behind at a 120bpm heart rate I'm sure. Eric Schuck led our group with Todd Holtmann following closely and me buzzing Todd's wheel. Jeremy Bock was the snake in the grass, conserving, calculating, ready to strike. Didn't take long for Eric to back off. We were all still tired from the 6 hour solo effort from last weekend. Todd and I cruised a few laps and I could see Jeremy behind us on the last climb each lap. Todd had a small puncture and was spaying sealant so I told him so. He stopped to check it out and I never saw him again. Wasn't my intention! I guess it sealed up and he kept going. I held Jeremy off for a while but soon he turned it up as I was turning it down. We rode together for a while until we came up behind a slower group. He had the gas to get around one of them and then run up the hill around the rest of them. I had to pick my way through the group and by the time I had, he was gone.



At this time I reverted back to my original plan to "ride". I had a lap and a half to go so I just gave it what I had on the flats and simply completed the climbs. I held on to 3rd and made my entry fee +$10 back.

Now for the real story. At 9, my son raced his 2nd mountain bike race. We've just started riding off road and I think he's doing incredibly well. We went out Friday night to get a feel for the terrain and there were many sections he wouldn't ride. In the race he blazed through a few of these sections like a pro. The kids race was on a modified course in the more flat part of the full race course. They did 20 minutes plus finish the current lap. Adam made it in 29 seconds before the cut-off and went back out for a third lap. He had just passed another rider and now had a clear trail in front of him. One of the hills he just barely made it over earlier he now flew over in 6th gear, he only has 8 and it's the hardest. He almost made it up one of the really big and steep hills that I never thought he would have even tried. In this very diverse group of kids ranging from first timers to 12 year-olds on adult bikes he got 6th and didn't get lapped, awesome! Most importantly, he had fun.

Binder Lake

Great competition, great conditions(2nd lap on), great temps, great people. With all the rain the day before it was iffy as to what the race day would bring. We set up for our 2nd Binder Lake 6hr with the threat of rain looming ALL around us. It did end up raining a bit before the race, but no worse for the wear. I thought about actually trying to run at the start to get a better position, not possible. I still had to pass a ton of riders on the first lap.

All was going well, I was keeping Dan Miller and Mike Best in sight for the first 5 laps. It was on lap 6 that I met my fate. A T-shaped puncture right in the center of the tread of my rear tire. It sealed up once I let the sealant pool over the hole. I thought I was in luck and whipped out my inflator and hit it with a blast of CO2, out came all my sealant like a garden hose. Now it was time to buckle down and fix it. All told the attempt to re-inflate, the repair and the cramps that came after I remounted the bike, I lost over 13 minutes. Doug Davis, Zdenek and Eric Schuck all got by me in that order. I quickly caught Eric and finished the lap with him. I had to stop and get another tube, CO2 and bottle-Eric didn't stop. I caught and passed him 2/3 of the way through lap 8 but never saw Zdenek or DD. Other than fighting cramps the race went fine after the flat. I missed going out on a 10th lap by 2:18, 10 was my goal but I'll have to wait for next year.

Jeff Winkler, what do I say? He was within 2:37 of the Cameron Chambers and Travis Donn duo team and only 13:34 behind the duo team of Chris Ploch and Tom Albert, the overall winners! Keep in mind that he was less than half a lap behind after 6+ hours, riding by himself! Dan Miller of Columbia in 2nd, was smokin' with 10 laps in 6:18:09, beating last years winning time. Mike Best in 3rd also beat last year winning time after a sub-9 hour ride at the Leadville 100, you've got to see his gold belt buckle! DD taking 4th only 1:09 behind last years winning time. Jeff lapped Zdenek in 5th place! I came in 6th, which would have netted me 3rd last year only 56 seconds behind last years 2nd place. Needless to say this year was faster with a slightly slower trail surface, albiet much cooler temperatures. Christian Stitz and Todd Holtmann rode a very impressive race finishing 9 laps. Karen Holtmann won the solo women's race. Massive efforts were expended by all. The only thing I missed was one of those flaming hot pork steaks!

Results 2008

Results 2009

*EDIT* After a closer look at the results, I was in 4th before I flatted, moved back to 9th and then made my way back to 6th. So 5 riders made it by while I was changing my flat and I made it back by 3.