This is our fourth time doing the Mojave Death Race. This year, we do the same 285 or so mile course that we did last year, except in reverse. Our first gathering in the desert was at the all-teams meeting at the start/finish line. Only a small group was there at this time. More of our team showed up at our team meeting later that evening.
My day started out with transporting Karen McBride and myself (and my bike) to our camp 5, which was at the exchange point between legs 4 and 5. Hendrikje was riding leg 4, a leg that starts on a steep downhill paved road, goes for about 3 miles before flattening out, then 6 more miles before it turns into dirt. Hendrikje would start with her road bike and switch to her mountain bike when the pavement ends.
We got to the camp, and met up with Steve Schlaifer, who's providing transportation support, and Ray Garcia, who ran leg 2 earlier. Karen started preparing for her run. It would start on the paved road going south for about 3 miles, where it will turn west into the power line road, which is mostly dirt and deep sand. Karen was saying that she may not be in the best of condition, so her performance may not be very good, especially if the course was really tough.
The temperature is around mid 80's at this time, and warming up fast. I tried to communicate with our SAS people to try to find out where they were, but was unsuccessful. At one point, Mike Keesey called back, and told me that Hendrikje was about 1/2 mile from the crest of the hill. This was about 6 miles from where the pavement ended, and from there on, the road is on a very slight downhill, and about 6 miles to the end where we were waiting.
Mike was closer to us and headed our way, and closer to line of sight, so he heard me trying to contact the SAS vehicle. He was able to also talk to the SAS vehicle, which was driven by Lloyd, and manned by Sam, so Mike relayed messages for us. Sam was gathering statistics, including terrain, elevation, temperature, and wind speed. He will use them to more accurately model our performance for next year.
As Hendrikje and Lloyd crested the hill, I was able to talk to Lloyd directly, and get status from him. Since I've ridden this leg before, I know exactly what Hendrikje was up against. It may be a slight downhill, but it was bumpy enough that she would still have to work pretty hard to keep moving.
As I was standing around waiting, I heard someone said that they had to beat the JPL team as their primary goal. They were the Dead Gecko team, who for some reason had some rivalry against our teams in the past. They also have one of our former team members, Susan Merrill.
In the mean time, Karen was complaining about shin splint pains. Wayne happened to be near by, and had lots of experience to offer. He offered to massage her legs, so she laid down in the back seat of my van and let Wayne do his thing. I captured most of it on video for showing at some opportune moment in the future.
Pretty soon, we saw a group of riders and support vehicles approaching, and Hendrikje was among them. Karen got into position to wait for the hand off. I did my best at keeping my camcorder on her through all the people and vehicles cruising by. And Karen was off.
My first leg in the morning is leg 6, following Karen's run. Steve drove me to the start of my leg down the power line road. My ride would be 18 miles of this sandy road with rises and falls and rolling hills. As I signed in at the check point, I noticed one of the other team members getting ready for his ride. He had a very nice bike that I was envying. It was a full suspension bike loaded with ELS (Expensive Lightweight S#*t). In fact, I noticed that it was probably lighter than the the hard tail bike I would be riding.
I warmed up while waiting for Karen. The exchange point was particularly full of loose sand, so I did some practice runs through it. The temperature was rising, probably into the 90's by now. I watched a couple of guys take off from the other teams that seemed to be way ahead of us.
Presently, I saw Karen and our SAS vehicle approaching. She was looking down, slightly ahead of her, and appeared kind of tired. I rode up to meet her, and followed along side so she could tag me off at the hand-off point. Then I was off.
These race segments are like time trials, where you push as hard as you can for the full duration, and hope you don't blow up doing it. And no matter how I try to warm up for each of my events, it never seems to be enough. I always start out with some pain in the legs and hips from the initial strain. These, and the discomfort of heavily breathing the hot dry air, are always forcing me to stop and take a rest. But because this is a race, I know don't have that luxury. And besides, the pain usually subsides in about 20 minutes. Part of my problems was that the conditions required my full attention, so it was difficult to drink some times. There was the wind that comes from every which way but tail, the sandy surface, and the rolling hills, all of which required careful bike handling. When you ride a series of rolling hills, there may be no net elevation gain, but the strain you feel is that of climbing the steepest of the uphills. Add to that some loose surface, and it can be very hard.
Occasionally I would look up to check the landmarks. From the start of the race, the view is quite intimidating; a straight road that goes for as far as the eye can see, with the only change in direction being up. However, after a few ups and downs, I thought I saw a tiny spot on the road ahead of me. I didn't remember this from the pre-ride, so I wondered if it was a mirage. As I got closer, I realized it was the last team that took off before ours. I slowly closed the gap until we approached the rising side of a rolling hill. He was slowing down, so I was able to pass him pretty quickly. Too quickly perhaps, as I had to work hard to catch my breath. We ride up and down a few more ups and downs, when we approach a long up hill which was covered in gravel in its last upper half. That really sapped my speed, and I heard Lloyd suddenly close in on me with his truck. During my pre-ride, I actually had to get off and push my bike through this part. But this time, I was able to gear down in time and pedal through it. I looked back and saw that the team that I passed was immediately behind him. I was starting to worry that they might take back their position from me, so I went on just as hard as I could.
A few more ups and downs later, I come to a stretch of down hill, which led to a very loose off-cambered left hand sweep to another uphill. As I slowly maneuvered through it, I looked back to see that no one was behind me, not even Lloyd and Sam. They'll catch up soon enough, so I continued.
Presently, I saw another spot in the road ahead of me. I looked back to see Lloyd behind me, but the other team that I passed was no where to be found. I was glad that I got away from them, so I pushed on. Soon, I noticed that I was closing the gap to the next team ahead of us. These rolling hills must be hard on other people as well. Again, I approached that next team as they were slowly climbing a hill, and I was able to easily pass them.
Finally, the rollers were over, but I still had some climbing to do, and my right calf was starting to cramp. So I tried to stretch it with each down stroke, and it seemed to help. Then my left thigh started to cramp as well, so I had to be really careful with the strokes on both legs. There was about 4 miles left, and it was mostly down hill, so I felt I should be able to make it without a full blown cramp.
Then I started to see dust about a half mile ahead of me. It was the next team. Since we were both on the down hill, we were both moving pretty fast, kicking up the dust. I pedaled as fast as I could to try to close the gap, but it was not apparent whether I did or not. Soon, I saw that dust trail move off to the right, and I knew that they had reached the next exchange point. And soon, I found the turn into the exchange point, and turned in myself. The path to the actual hand-off point went by a loose off-camber left hand sweep, so I had to go slowly. I scanned around for Thierry, while yelling his name. I finally found him to my right, and went and tagged him off. I then realized how hard the hot dry air can be on the throat; every time I talked I made a raspy sound. It was high noon, and I managed to put us about 20 minutes ahead of Mark's schedule.
Ron and Feiming were there, and handed me a large bottle of Gatorade. It felt really good going down. As I was resting, I realized that my head was hurting. I must have been dehydrated, as I still had most of the water that I loaded into my Camelbak. My headband, which would normally be soaked with sweat, had a lot of salt encrusted on it, as did most of my skin and clothing.
Ron and Feiming were supposed to bring Theiry to camp 9, where Mike was supposed to bring him to this exchange point. However, when they got to where camp 9 was supposed to be, there was no one and nothing there. Not wanting to leave him in the middle of the hot desert, they brought him to this exchange point with their Honda. The road is pretty hard on motor vehicles, particularly if they are small with low ground clearance. Their car was also too small to carry my bike, so we asked one of the other teams nearby who were about to leave to take it to the road. It was the Dead Gecko team, and they were happy to do us the favor. Unfortunately, we could not keep up with their truck, so we lost sight of them soon. We passed Mike on the way, and sort of coordinated with him and Mark on what was happening. When we got to the road, the Geckos were just leaving toward exchange point 8. They left my bike against a sign post by the side of the road. I rode it the quarter mile or so to camp 9. It was surprisingly strenuous.
A lot of people were hanging in and around Randy's camper; the air conditioned interior was a nice escape from the 100+ degree heat outside. I ate and drank some stuff to try to replenish, and shot some more video. Occassionally, I would try to call Lloyd, but had no success. Once I heard him faintly in the noise, but could not understand anything.
Steve drove up at some point and said that Thierry finished in pretty bad shape. We figured we may have to have someone else run his second leg. Wayne offered to do so, but we would have to have Chris ride his second leg, another combination road/mountain bike segment. So that would be our Plan B.
We had no real word on how Thierry was doing, as we still could not contact Lloyd on the radio. Wayne and I decided to go meet them and maybe help with communications. We met them about 5 miles from the end, and Mark looked like he was doing a pretty good, steady pace. On the way, we passed a couple of other teams whose racers looked like they were hurting. We also passed the Morgans in their Honda, bringing Thierry back.
Wayne and I suggested that we took over the support for Mark, and sent Lloyd and Sam on to fix or replace their radio. We paced Mark the rest of the way uneventfully. He asked for water, Cytomax, ice in his cap, and Super Soaking his legs in cycles. During that time, I heard Randy installing a spare radio into Lloyd's car, so he was back on the air.
When we got into camp 9, Mark tagged off to Chris, who started his 42 mile ride into Kelso. The temperature was around 105 at this time. Now our team was ready to break camp and move on to the next site in Kelso. We moved stuff from cars to cars to make sure everyone had what they needed going to where they need them to be. I was going back to the hotel.
I went into Baker to get some gas and lunch before heading back. In the restaurant, I saw a couple other teams having lunch. When I finished, I went to one of them to talk. They told me that they were a bunch of guys from the same graduating class in San Diego. I couldn't remember their team name, but they only had 9 members and no additional support. They were saying something about a message they had received from another member that was not clear but did not sound optimistic. I wished them luck and returned to the hotel.
When I got back, the first place I went to was the net control center of the race organizers. They had been recording results all day, and I wanted to see how we did. I was particularly interested in how I did in my first leg. To my pleasant surprise, there was only one other team who completed that leg in a shorter time than I did. It was a new team that called themselves the Apple Valley Vipers, and their rider finished about 4 minutes faster than I did. They must also be used to the desert conditions, as they are putting on a very strong challenge to the fastest team, the Arizona Trail Blazers. We were in about 10th place at this time.
I then checked with the Morgans to see how Thierry was doing. He was still feeling sick, and had not been able to eat anything since his race. We decided that we may need to pursue our Plan B. However, Chris and Hendrikje planned to return as soon as he was done with his ride, so he would not be out there to ride Wayne's leg, and may not be able to return in time. So we tried to find a way to let Mark know the situation; he may have to run Thierry's leg.
I went to the net control to see if they can pass a message to Mark, but they were unable to reach anyone on our team, even through relaying. However, I was able to find out that Chris had finished, but his time was a lot longer than expected. I suspected that he must have had some mechanical problems, until another team member came by and said that their rider on that leg suffered a lot due to the wind changing directions. So Chris must have had to fight hard to ride against the wind as well.
As I got back to my room, the phone rang. It was Hendrikje. She and Chris just got back, and Chris is in very bad shape. He had hit the wall and cramped up badly about 2 hours into the ride. There would have been no way for him to ride Wayne's leg even if he had stayed out there. So it was more important for us to contact Mark to let him know that he may have to run Thierry's leg. I tried the cell phone numbers with no luck.
Over dinner, I told Chris and Hendrikje the situation, and they said that one of them could run Thierry's leg. It was right after Hendrikje's second bike leg, so they would drive out there together. I relayed this to Ron, who was having dinner with Thierry in the coffee shop. Thierry appears to be feeling better, as he was finally eating. He said that if he could keep the food down, he will try to run his leg. I told them to call Chris at midnight before they went out to let them know as well. We decided to meet a little later to head out ourselves. We would do the last 2 legs in sequence.
Of course it was difficult trying to sleep, but it felt like I had just fallen asleep when Ron knocked on my door. It was about 20 minutes to 1AM, and we had to head out. I over estimated the time required to get out to Thierry's starting point, but the extra time was needed. We got stuck by train that stopped at a railroad crossing. We were worried about how long we would be stuck there when a conductor separated the cars right at the crossing. The front section moved far enough out of the way so that cars could cross, and the conductor waved us on.
After Thierry signed in, we waited about an hour before I heard anything from Lloyd. His signal was broken up again, and again, it was difficult to communicate with him. Mark showed up with Eileen and Ross, and then Steve showed up with a couple other people. Then we saw Hendrikje and Lloyd approaching. Hendrikje came in fast, and tagged off Thierry, and off he went. The previous team came in not too far ahead of us, and Ron noted that their runner did not look like she was going to be very fast. He was right, Thierry passed her pretty early on. We went on to the start of my second leg, and I got ready to ride.
As I was waiting for Thierry, I saw other teams come in and go out. Soon, their support vehicles turn into faint red glows in the distance, to eventually disappear. As I went on another warm up ride up the road, I saw another runner and car approaching, and and he yelled "hi" to me as I passed. I suddenly realized the truck was ours, and Thierry had taken off his shirt so I did not recognize him in the dark. I quickly turned around to catch up to him just as he crossed the exchange point, and I was off again.
This is another power line road, but it was at one time paved, so it was much easier to ride than my first leg. The first part is a gentle descent, with some loose sand and really broken pavement along the way. It rises gently before ending at railroad service road. I ride on, and pretty soon cross Nipton road. In another mile or so, I would hit the deep sand, the hardest part of this leg. Soon, I saw the red glow of the truck of the next team in front of me. I was slowly reeling him in. I passed him just before we got to the sand, and my speed dropped while pedaling effort rose. I keep moving on, and soon I start catching up to the next team. He appears to be stopped on the road, so I pass him as well. However, now the sand becomes really deep, and I am forced off my bike, and have a very hard time getting back on. I am breathing really hard as I try to push my bike through this part. I find some stiffer surface, and manage to get on the bike to ride for a short distance, but very quickly get forced off again. Now the last team that I passed passes me back. I managed to find some more stiff surface, and tried to ride again. I managed to pass the other team again, and seem to make some headway. But I am forced to get off again and run a couple more times.
Finally, the sandy surfaces give way to hard pack, and I am able to continue riding more normally. The sun was starting to come out now. Off in the distance, I saw the red glow of the truck from the next team. But they were too far off to catch.
Soon I got to the next exchange point where I tagged off Ron. I did not see the last team that I passed until they came in a few minutes after Ron took off. I congratulated their rider on a great ride, and an exciting race. Thierry handed me some Gatorade, and I downed it pretty quickly. We packed up and headed for the finish line to wait for Ron.
At the finish line, a number of teams were waiting for their racers to arrive. First one, then another, then another. I heard Lloyd on the radio reporting their current position and speed, and I knew they were close. Feiming got her camera, and I got my camcorder ready. Ron came in fast, giving everything he had at that moment. He actually finished several minutes before Mark's prediction. We were all elated. After a few rounds of congratulations, we all headed back to the hotel to have some breakfast, and get some much needed rest. I took a quick detour to the net control to look at the statistics. I found out that again, the racer from the Apple Valley Viper team edged me out of the fastest finish, this time by 4 seconds.
Sleep was difficult, as we each took turns coughing up the desert dust that had accumulated in our lungs. It wasn't long before we had to get up again to check out, head out to the awards ceremony, and then drive the long way home in the weekend rush hour. Some people actually want to do this again next year.
