On my way to Seattle I decided to look for races or other cool places to do some mountain biking. Well, just so happened that the 24 Hours in the Sage race was being held in Gunnison, CO on August 20-21 so I figured that would be a good first stop. The race course was in the Hartman Rocks Recreation Area. This looked like a pretty damn cool event. They even tout it as the “24 Hour Solo Townie Bike World Championships”. Yes, there were guys riding single speed “cruiser” type bikes with fenders and bells, and in costumes.
I’m not sure 18 hours of driving in a Jeep before a 24-hr solo race is such a good idea, even with a full day of rest. I would also be self-supported. I had low expectations though, and was doing this race for fun. I didn’t really train for it like I had for other endurance events, and got shitfaced the weekend before with some friends in Dallas. I researched the venue and course (Endomondo map here), and thought I could maybe get in 10-12 laps pretty easy. Hahahaha!
Each lap was about 14 miles. My bike computer was around 14.3 per lap. I tracked the course on my phone and got about 14.2, with ~1,200 feet of elevation gain. Looks like my phone lost GPS signal at 2 points where those huge dips are, so it threw off the total elevation gain. Starting elevation was a little over 7,000 feet.
View 24 Hours in the Sage 2011 Course in a larger map
The first 2 miles was riding on the road to get to the trail. Then the climbing began. We were told that Dave Wiens marked the trail and helped lay it out. Pretty cool that I got to ride a course that pro mountain bikers are riding and racing on. The course was well marked but it was dry, sandy and dusty. It reminded me a little of the race at Palo Duro Canyon in Texas, but with absolutely NO shade and a lot more climbing.
I went out on my first lap with my camera. Remember…this was a “fun” race for me so I wanted to document this “adventure”. The start of the race was pretty tame, we ran about 50 feet to our bikes and took off. Lots of racers at this event, and lots of female racers too. At the end of each lap just past the timing station they setup a fire-pit jump…which I did not attempt, but did see some guys jump it.
This was the first race I had done at elevation. I was taking Acli-mate for about week before the race and during the race. I also had the normal nutrition setup – Infinit, Accelerade, Cytomax, PB&J, bananas, apples, Clif bars, etc. I didn’t seem to be affected by the altitude, but I was surprised how hot it felt. I left Texas to get out of the heat and was assuming temps in the low 80′s would feel great, but being blasted by the sun for the entire 14 miles absolutely sucked the life out of me. The mountains also blocked any wind, so it was very stagnant on the climbs. Everyone was really cool in the pit area and always offered assistance (and beer).
My 3rd lap was the most difficult. I was working hard over ~75% of the course, which is the most I ever felt worked (out of any of my 24-hr races). I was grinding out the long climbs in granny-gear. I was drinking 40-60 ounces of fluids per lap. Near the end of the course you get to a section called “The Notch” which was large technical slickrock formations. I walked several parts of this section on every lap, but did see guys clearing it. I thought about attempting some parts, but didn’t because I figured I’d eat it bad and didn’t want to ruin my road trip.
Whenever there’s climbing there should be some kind of downhill reward. There were some nice fast flowy smooth downhill sections through the sage. This was pretty cool, except for the sand pits that made you stay focused. They seemed short too, probably because the climbs were so damn long. I certainly didn’t want to wreck doing 20+ mph into any rocks or sage brush. I ran a Panaracer Rampage up front and thought that tire helped me keep control in the sand, but was probably overkill for the course.
The start of the 4th lap had thunderstorms roll through. I had a nice headwind doing some climbs, got rained on, and temperature dropped at least 20 degrees. This felt awesome! Finally some cool weather, and the rain packed down some of the loose sand, and didn’t rain much. The overcast skies were certainly welcome. Guess I’ll like it in Seattle! 
After lap 6 I talked with Tim from Back of the Pack Racing. He pit next to Paul and Karen who were pitting next to me. Tim and his other BPR crew were also at the 24 Hours in the Canyon race at Palo Duro back in June, when Mike Frazier and I went to do that race. Those guys are F’in cool dudes…you need to check out their website! After talking with Tim for a bit, I decided to take a shower and take a nap. This was at 10:30 PM. Bad move.
I ended up not committing to the ride. I’m ashamed. I was beat down. I had been sucking down a lot of dust and was coughing a lot. I felt that I could have pushed myself, but would have ended up getting sick and didn’t want to ruin my road trip. Oh well, everyone has their “bad” races. I ended up doing about 86 miles in a little over 8 hours of riding time.
I’m glad I threw in the towel early. I slept pretty good Saturday night, got up around sunrise on Sunday and watched guys (and gals) really racing. There was definitely a higher caliber of racers at this event than others I’ve done. This was definitely a “big boys” race. Even though I quit at 10:30 PM with 6 laps, I still wasn’t DFL.
It was a well organized event with great people and a great course. Would I do it again? Hell yeah, if I’m ever near Gunnison around this time again.
Since I got some good rest, it’s off to Fruita to ride and camp out there!
