MS150 2003
For some it was a ride, for us three, it was a championship race
The morning of the ride was cold with temperatures in the mid 50’s. As we looked around we noticed two things right off the bat. One, we were the only people not wearing team Jerseys, and two, we were the only people not wearing skin tight biker shorts. It would seem that once again, the hillbillies had come to ride. There were more than a few chuckles directed at us as we walked to the starting line. By the end of the ride, the only ones laughing would be us. There were over 525 riders in this years MS 150. The road was going to be crowded.
We talked about how to determine the winner. Since all of our odometers were a little different none of the output would match up. We decided to use the clocks on the bikes to determine riding time and use the race map to determine miles. The clock would not lie.
The ride started out full speed with Clint and Steve trying to kill us in the first ten miles. Steve would attack every hill and blow by Clint and I. I was beginning to wonder what he had for breakfast. We spent the first twenty miles in the top ten riders. At the five mile mark we lost the front group and continued on alone, often wondering if we were going in the right direction.
The pace was hard and fast. It was evident that both Clint and Steve were trying to drop each other and myself. It did not matter that this was a 157-mile race. They both wanted to win it all in the first twenty miles.
Once the pace settled down in the high 18’s (mph) things smoothed out a little. Steve was beginning to show his exhaustion and began falling back right before the second rest stop at 20 miles. Clint and I both needed to use the facilities and jointly agreed to stop. While going into the facilities we noticed that not only was Steve not stopping, he was accelerating and waving at the same time. It seemed the game was on, Steve wanted to win the race in the first thirty miles. If he built enough of a lead, we would never be able to catch him. He was counting on two things when he decided not to stop. One, Clint and I would stop at the next rest stop, and two, he would be able to keep the same pace for the next ten miles. He was wrong on both.
Clint and I talked about it. He and I were the first two people to stop at the 20-mile mark. We knew that there were only eight riders ahead of us and nobody that Steve could even hope to draft off of. We decided to take our time, eat some food, and then ride Steve down. When we left the rest stop Steve was at least 5 minutes ahead of us on the road. Clint and I took turns pulling over the next ten miles. We still had not decided whether or not to stop at the next rest stop or to push on, when our minds were made up for us. I was pulling at 18mph when a very quick rider passed us. I did not even think, I stood up in the saddle and grabbed his wheel. We were about two hundred yards from the next rest stop and we were doing 25mph. There was no way we were stopping now. As we came roaring by the rest stop, I would have given anything for a picture of Steve’s face. He was in total shock that we did not stop. None of us realized it, but at that moment, Steve was out of the race and it was down to Clint and myself. For the next ten miles we drafted off of this incredible rider. He pulled us to the forty-mile mark in no time at all.
When Clint and I stopped at the forty-mile mark, we took our time and decided to wait for Steve to catch up. We both had a nice “FREE” massage from a qualified professional while waiting. Steve pulled in and we checked our clocks. He was over seven minutes behind us at this point.
We told Steve about this wonderful massage. Steve asked Clint and I to wait for him while he enjoyed a quick massage. At this point we were all still in the top 15 riders. Steve’s ideal of a quick massage was ten minutes of full body attention. By this time Clint and I had been at the stop almost twenty minutes. We noticed a large group of about thirty riders approaching. We urged Steve to hurry up. We did not want to get behind this monster group. Clint and I went to our bikes and were ready to ride. Clint took off after the group and I raced after him, not wanting him to have any advantage. It took me about four minutes of hard riding to catch group. When I caught up my legs were burning. I had burned a ton of energy. When I looked back, Steve had not been able to catch the train. He was fading fast.
This group of about twenty riders would carry us to lunch at a nice easy 18mph pace. A couple of times Clint and I talked about going out on our own. We would pull out to start up the pace line and the head wind would slam into us. Knowing what was coming after lunch, I cautioned that we save our energy and ride with this group. Clint agreed that there was no need to try it on our own.
We pulled into lunch with at 11:00am. The first 54 miles were a walk in the park. Steve arrived a little while after we did, 10 minutes to be exact. Now he was 17 minutes back and falling fast. He had all kinds of reasons why he was late, “My bike is old, I am old, I am having leg cramps, Tanya told me to be careful, etc.…”
We ate a nice lunch and were back on the road by 11:30. This would give us plenty of time for the hardest thirty miles in the entire ride. We were going to ride across the damn and then up two damn hills. As we looked around the lunchroom, it dawned on us. Clint was the youngest rider in the room by far, I was the next youngest. Most of the riders were well into their late 30’s and 40’s. It made us feel good to know that we were the only young riders at the front of the race. At lunch, all three of us were in the top 50 riders.
Right after lunch, Clint and I tried to get onto a fast group to help us climb the six miles to the damn. I was pulling and got to within 100 yards, I told Clint that I could not bridge the gap and was spent. Clint stood up in the saddle and took off. I had nothing left to follow with and watch him grab a wheel at the back of the group and take off. I would not see Clint again until the top of the first damn hill in ten miles.
The hill was a killer. I was reduced to riding up it at less than 7 mph. All the time asking myself what was I doing. My legs kept burning. It was all I could do to get them to go around one more time. Last year I was to stupid to quit, what was my excuse this year. If I had not been clipped into the bike, I would have put down my feet and stopped. I do not know how I got up this hill last year on my mountain bike. I also realized that my training had not been enough.
When I got to the top of the hill, Clint was waiting for me. We both waited for Steve and enjoyed the extra rest time while he caught up.
When we left the 6th rest stop, Clint caught onto another fast group and again, I lost him prior to the next hill. When Clint went up the second long climb of the day, he passed five riders going up. I saw five riders, I was passed by Steve, and I passed Steve, but there was no way I had any energy to pass a real rider. I was weaving all over the road. If you did not know better, you would have thought I had been drinking.
At the last rest stop of the day, I was
beat. Nothing left in the tank. We started the last six miles into
Day 2
It was a beautiful day for a ride. We started the morning with ten easy miles
down the hills and back into
We caught up with three riders going through
When we stopped at the twenty-mile mark, I had gained 30 seconds on Clint. A few more stages like that one and I might get back into the game. I now took to carrying my bike with the front wheel off the ground so I would not add any more seconds to my time by accident. Clint and I were very interested to see if Steve would ride by this rest stop or if he would stay with the group today?
When we left the rest stop we immediately had to climb one more hill. I was feeling pretty good and decided to take it pretty fast. When I got to the top, I noticed that Clint was not right behind me and Steve was way behind Clint. I decided to make a run for it and try to make up more time. I took off down the backside of the hill and set a blistering pace. I was passing riders left and right. I made a turn onto the main road and looked behind me, nobody was in sight. I knew that I had to catch a group of fast riders if I was going to have a chance of making up any time on Clint.
Once on the main road I spotted a group of riders in the distance, about half a mile ahead of me. I turned on the speed and started closing the distance. I was about a hundred yards behind the riders when Clint pulled up behind me. How he made up that gap I do not know, but this is something that he would do all day long. Come out of no where to keep me in sight.
Clint and I grabbed on to the back of the group and coasted into the 3rd rest stop with them, well ahead of Steve.
One of the big questions throughout the entire day was, when will Steve call for SAG support? It was not a question of will he call, but rather of when he would. As we rode towards the third rest stop it seemed like a matter of minutes before he called it a day. He was falling farther and farther behind and eventually he just dropped out of sight. When he pulled up, we thought for sure he was going to call it a day. Then something strange happened, Steve smelled Chocolate.
Now this was not just any chocolate, but rather an assortment of homemade cookies and brownies. You would have thought the man was starving the way he kept shoveling down the cookies.
The Legend Returns
After the stop, we started off behind a pretty good group that was doing 18mph. Clint and I were just content to let them pull us the rest of the way. Steve was not content to sit there. Something came over him and one mile after the rest stop he came from the very back of the pack and passed the lead rider. He was not slowing down as he came to the front. Steve kept pulling farther and farther ahead. Clint and I decided that we had better grab onto his wheel and see how long this madman could keep up this pace. We went from 18 to 22mph in a matter of seconds. When we would come to a small hill, he would start a rebel yell that would make the hair on your arms stand straight up and then he would start going faster up the hill. It was all Clint and I could do to keep up. We kept waiting for him to get tired but he kept getting faster.
While riding up a slight slope, there was a sign that said, “GO FASTER!” Steve went faster. At this pace, he was going to burn us out pretty quick. Clint decided to end it once and for all. He stood up out of the saddle and started going even faster. I looked down and we were doing 28mph on a slight incline into a head wind. There was no way we could keep this up. When Clint started pushing the pace even faster, Steve started yelling again and went even faster. Clint looked up, and could not believe it when Steve went screaming by him, pulling me. Clint could not keep up and began to fall back. I looked back and he kept falling farther and farther behind. This was my chance. I told Steve that we were dropping Clint. Steve picked up the pace. Now if you are wondering how I was able to keep up, just look at my drafting explanation above and think about that big mirror.
Steve kept this up for over ten miles. When we pulled into the 4th rest stop, I thought for sure he was going to call it a day. He was jumping off the bike, talking about how great he felt, what a wonderful day for a ride it was, and how good the cookies were. He asked Tanya if there were any cookies left because he wanted another one.
In that fourteen-mile stretch, Steve rode like he did last year and like we all expected him to this year. That was the ride he had wanted all day. The question was, how long could he keep this up.
It was not long after the 4th Rest Stop when Steve gave out going up a hill. He tried to grab onto the back of the group but kept falling back. Clint and I continued on alone. At one point I looked back and saw Steve drop even farther back. He looked to be finished for the day. I looked like that earlier stretch of superman like pedaling had done him in.
The rest of the ride into lunch was pretty uneventful. Clint and I kept to a pretty easy pace. At one point Clint wanted me to take the lead and pick up the pace. I told him no way, I was happy with the pace and we still had almost 25 miles to go for the day. Not to mention that I did not have anything left after riding behind that madman for 14 miles. When we made the turn to lunch, Clint and I had a sprint to the line for the video camera. I will let the video speak for who crossed the line first.
The Train
After lunch Clint and I started off pretty quick with a fast group and dropped Steve right off the bat. We talked about how hard he had rode the bike that morning and how he must have emptied the tank out.
Clint and I continued to pull away from Steve and eventually he dropped from sight. That is why what happened next was so surprising.
A rider came by on my left, then another, and another, and another, the line of riders whizzing by just kept going. And then I heard the music, talk about a nice beat. One of the riders had mounted a speaker above his back wheel and was playing 1980’s dance music. The beat was great and the tempo was incredible. This line of riders was doing over 24mph. I could not wait to get on the back of the train. You would never guess who was riding at the back, Steve. He comes riding by us telling us to grab on boys this is going to be fun. If you can imagine, riding at 24-25mph for the next ten miles with incredible music to keep the tempo, this was the best part of the entire two days. We passed people left and right. The train kept getting longer. At one point there were over 30 riders in this chain, each rider getting a little help from the one in front.
I knew it was too good to last. We came around a corner and there was a nice little hill. Steve looked at Clint and I and told us it was fun but there was no way he could keep up the pace going over that hill. I told him to suck it up, stand up and pump over that hill. The train that had 30 people in it dropped to less than 10 at the top of the hill. All the riders that slowed down coming up that hill fell off. The three of us made it up and over and still managed to hang on to the back of the train. It was a smaller group and the leaders managed to pick up the pace even more.
It was at this point in the ride that it started to rain. It was not much, just enough to get the ground wet and have every rotation of the tires throw water up into my face. My glasses were useless after a few minutes. I needed wind shield wipers to see. If I had been further behind Clint, I would have gotten into the truck and ridden the last ten miles in. The only reason I would go on was that Clint was going to finish.
The Last Rest Stop
The three of us pulled into the last rest stop at almost the same time. We wanted to make sure that we left at the same time as the lead riders did so that we could take advantage of the fast pace over the last ten miles. Steve confirmed what I had thought, he was going to withdraw from the race for the last ten miles. According to Steve, this was a tradition, he did not finish (DNF) last year, there was no reason to break with tradition. After hearing the news I asked him where Clint was, Steve told me he thought that he had already left. I could not believe what I had heard, left, I had to catch him. I looked up the road and saw the lead group about 300 yards down the road. I jumped on the bike and took off, trying to catch up to the leaders and Clint.
As I was pulling away I thought I heard Steve calling out, not knowing for sure I kept on going. I was focused on catching up to the leaders.
The lead group had the music going again. I was going to catch the music. I pushed it hard, but the music kept growing fainter, they were pulling away and there was no way I was going to catch them. If Clint was ahead of me, then he was going to win. I was still over taking other riders, but none of them was Clint. He must be way ahead of me. At one point I tried to save a little energy and draft off another rider, but he was too slow. I could not catch the fast group ahead of me, and all the riders that I was catching up to were going way to slow to benefit me. I ended up riding almost five miles on my own. It was at this point that I heard a voice behind me say, “So is that the guy that left you?” I knew then that Clint was behind me and not ahead of me. That made it even worse. I had finished that last rest stop almost 40 seconds ahead of him for the day. If he had caught me, I had lost all of that time and then some more. I ended up finishing the day :37 seconds behind Clint. One nice thing that did happen in that last stretch was the lead group of fast riders falling apart. As we rode closer to town I started hearing music again. It kept getting louder as we caught and passed the group of riders that had started out ahead of us. It seems that pace was too much for them and they burned out.
We crossed the finish line under four hours for the day. It was a wonderful day and a great ending to the ride. There was no doubt that Clint was the strongest rider out of the three of us. His conditioning really showed time after time as he made up ground and kept up that tough pace. I could keep up, but I did not have enough to pass him. I can tell you this much; I am already looking into my training for 2004. I need to drop 20 pounds and add another 2-3mph to my time if I want to have any chance of competing next year. The biggest question is, “Which Steve is going to show up?”