A reflective look back on my first MONT 24 hour race...
This was the first moutain biking race any of us had done, even though we approached it with more of an "event" frame of mind than a "race" one, hardly there to win, more to experience mountain bike culture at it's best.
Entered as the Stinky Demons, in honor of Simons brother who rides a Kona Stinky... like a demon, we were a team of six, Justin, Tim, Simon, Neil, Drew and myself. We didn't train for the event, nor did we have any proper lights, instead we'd opted for home made ones that Tim and Drew put to gether, resistors and wire joins in full view, these suckers were held together with not much more than bumble gum and sticky tape :)
Tim took out lap 1, so he had to do the run at the start, Simon followed, then it was my turn, Drew, Neil and Justin followed, we all got our first laps out of the way with a minimum of fuss, and think eveyone was happy with their lap times and own efforts. Then night fell and things started to go wrong...
Of our two home made sets of lights, we were going to alternate them between the six of us, one set would be out riding, the other set being swapped between the rider that had come in and next to go out, this would have worked if the cabling was durable, it wasn't, it had exposed joins and components, even the batteries were from old R/C cars! They worked fine for Tim and Simon, but after being fitted to my bike, the dodgy joins had given in. 100m into my lap they went out, leaving me in darkness, I turned back for camp and Justin fixed them up and I was able to head out again, heading up the first hill I experienced something I never had before... cramping, my thigh was bunched up in a huge painful knot, and I couldn't pedal, it was awful. It was a new joy I would take me with me, all the way to the top of the big hill in the course, I had to walk all of the climbs due to the cramps. Going down the other side the course heads into thick bush, suddenly my lights went out. Although it was a clear night, it was pitch black in the bush, and I was rocketing downhill at speed... not for long, I hit something and took a nose dive over the handlebars. The lights were stuffed, but my bike survived enough that I could walk back up the hill and under the light of the stars, roll carefully back to camp on the firetrail, aborting my lap, cramped out with no lights.
On the upside, the organisers were after interesting stories about crashes, so we told them ours and I got a massage voucher, which was nice, I decided not to use it until tomorrow though.
The temperature was dropping, it got as low as -7'C in the city that night, so who know how low it got out in the moutains where we were, icicles formed on anything and everything that was left out! This took it's toll on us, I cramped out, as did Simon and Neil. Justin went out for his lap and the lights failed for him too. I decided to get some rest, when got into the tent where Simon was sleeping, as I was sitting down, wham!, another painful cramp, locking my leg up. It was just a terrible night.
Morning came and with the sunset, some warmth and a chance to go out, in daylight, and do a lap without lighting failure. I headed out with some hope I would be able to do a lap like my first, clean and fun. At the first hill, wham!, cramping set in, and it stayed that way the whole way around, I did my lap, but had to walk the hills, and often get off the bike and run next to it while cramping, it was horrible.
I made it back and Drew had pulled out, he was feeling too sick, Tim and Simon managed an extra lap, doing 4 each. A top effort!
Kylie came and brought the kids, so I was able to play with them while the others finished the race, it was great to have them there after such an ordeal, I headed to the massage tent and used the voucher, it was nice and helped my tired aching muscles, but it hardly made a dent in my recovery, I'd need to take it easy for a couple of days before I felt good again.
I had learned this was a tough event, and I respect those that compete well in it, it's as physically and mentally demanding as anything I'd done before. Now I want to come back and do it right, complete my laps cleanly without cramping, and maybe one day, compete solo, which has become my dream, something to aspire to one day...
The results are here. We came 65th out of 76 6 man teams, not bad for our first time I thought, espeically considering the fun we had with the lights.