2012 24 Hour Solo Nationals

“Anything’s possible in Human Nature,” Chacko said in his Reading Aloud voice. Talking to the darkness now, suddenly insensitive to his little fountain-haired niece. “Love. Madness. Hope. Infinite joy.” 

There are a lot of weird quotes that surround ultra-endurance racing, and particularly 24 hour solo mountain bike racing.  That you come “face to face with your very soul”, or stare oblivion in the face during the darkness of the night.

Pit lane at night. Photo by Russ Baker

There’s no doubt in my mind that the confronting, life-changing and mind-breaking aspects of these sort of races recede with experience.  It becomes less about pushing limits, and more about chasing marginal gains, thinking about your food, and simply riding fast.  I don’t think I had a single interesting thought out there on race track, let alone some startling revelation about myself or the universe.

But, for all that, I think 24 Hour solo racing still holds up an interesting mirror to life, like some strange form of bike-racing art that involves a sore derriere, too much singletrack, 400kms of racing, and somehow encompasses the full spectrum of Human Nature.  To experience Hope, Madness, Love and Infinite Joy in one intense microcosm of endurance.

Hope

The lead-up to this race could be described by “hope”.  A mild summer provided the opportunity to lay down some big weeks and build a good platform of endurance to get through the 24 hours without my legs falling off.  February saw the start of racing, and some continued building of form.  In March, the wheels utterly fell off the preparation.  After losing somewhere between 4 and 7 kgs in the disastrous Mountains to Beach gastro affair, my body’s reserves of more or less everything were gone.  Every week for the following month, I got sick, felt exhausted, and couldn’t put good days of riding together.  The notion of being prepared for the race turned from “peaking” to “surviving”.

Madness in the transition with Jase and Stu. Photo by Kevin Wells

So, I fell back to Hope.  I had no idea whether my body actually had 24 hours in it this time.  Other things looked good.  I had two identical Trek Superfly hardtails, a great course around Majura with loads of climbing, swooping corners, tricky rockgardens and loads of flow.  I had amazing support from a bunch of great friends.  I also had plenty of fun times to look forward to on track with guys like Brett and Andy, and the usual globful of pre-race smack talk.  In the spirit of Hope, on the morning of race day, I took out the permanent marker and wrote a one-word motivational slogan (stolen from Trek’s emotive American marketing) on my right arm: Believe.  I’ve never really gone in for motivational slogans before, so it was pretty amusing when it smudged with my suncream and resembled either an atrocious tattoo or nightclub entry stamp.  But what can you do before a 24 but hope that things will go to plan and you’ll ride to the best of your ability?

Madness

The start of every 24 hour race is aptly described by “madness”.  Although the race is extraordinarily long and everything will sort itself out in time, put a bunch of boy racers together and they will invariably try and tear each other to shreds.  Although the first part of the “Hope” plan read “don’t do what you did at the Sydney 24 Hour“, I couldn’t resist slipping off the front on the first descent and taking the #PRO first lap (imaginary) prime prize.  I tried to restrain the madness though, and soon found myself back in the folds of the lead bunch on a beautiful, sunny afternoon on the fun trails.

Photo by Dan Mackay

On the fourth lap, Jason went to the front and madness ensued.  All the talk became very, very quiet as everyone scrambled to hang on to the wheel and not to blow.  Sam Chancellor launched a huge counter-attack and the chase group was whittled down to last year’s top three: Jason, myself, and Stu Brown.  In the madness of rolling transitions and trying to keep the fuel and fluids up and establish a rhythm, we eventually caught Sam.  Jason cheekily suggested one of us counter when we caught Sam, and Stu obliged with another searing acceleration.  In the process of clinging on for dear life, I made a very stupid line choice and ended up face-first in the dirt with a taco’d front ZTR Crest rim.  It was rideable, if very sketchy on the descents, as Jason and Stu drove a torrid pace.  I began to ping-pong off the back, and soon found myself doing something I do very well: going backwards.

Photo by Dan Mackay

This at least provided an opportunity to escape the madness and try to establish a rhythm at an easier level.  The sun set, and golden illumination through the forest was replaced by the eerie glow of a full moon and the cold brilliance of LED light.  Struggling for motivation, I rolled around, trying to establish a good tempo while Jason began to pump around 2 minutes per lap into me and Stu.

Jase tearing away at night. Photo by Dan Mackay

Midnight eventually rolled around.  This is the point where the investment you’ve made in the race is sufficient motivation to keep on going.  The night was warm, and the pace still reflected some sort of madness.  Before the race, I had anticipated night laps blowing out to 45 minutes – they hovered more around 40.

I need more motivation than purely madness – and, to be honest, I think caffeine provided it.

Love

Around 2am, a magical mental switch flicked in my head.  I fell in love with riding and racing bikes again in a way I haven’t experienced in a long time.  The singletrack began to flow beautifully, the night was still and timeless, and every lap was actually great fun.

Riding love is something I’ve experienced all too often at Majura, particularly at night.  Somehow every single line works, every rock garden is enjoyable, every climb is rewarded by a great descent, and the world collapses into one single blissful blur.  I guess the long and the short of it was that I found the Happy Place.  Every lap, I picked up a new song coming through transition, and was singing away happily on track.

Andrew scorches the night. Photo by Dan Mackay

Racing love is something quite different.  Somewhere within each racer is either a ridiculous ego, or smoking mojo, or whatever you want to call it.  It’s potent motivation, if somewhat elusive in races this long.  Around 3am, I caught Stu – who had begun to suffer debilitating back pain, ruining what was a fantastic performance – and came into the pits with adrenaline pumping.  All of a sudden, I could think of the race situation in terms of motivation and relish the challenge of racing a bicycle.

Sure enough, dawn rolled around with a soft light slowly filtering through the pine trees.  Unlike previous races, I was keeping just below my maximum rhythm to allow scope for a late-race acceleration to retain 2nd, if required.  This is a tricky mental equation, and one that requires some pretty solid motivation.  Riding love and racing love certainly do the trick.  I relished the opportunity to push the descents harder with the rising sun, and enjoyed every bit of hero grip provided by the trails.  Although Jason was way too far up the road to catch – hovering between 20 and 25 minutes – I had the prospect of a charge on 2nd from Mark, who came as close as 10 minutes.  Riding love prevailed though, and I was able to keep a very consistent pace just under 40m as long as I needed to all morning.

Infinite Joy

At about 10-30am, I was informed by Brendan Den, roaming around the course, that the gap was totally safe behind me.  With Jason utterly unassailable in the lead, it was time to turn off the pace and try to cruise to the finish (as easily as anyone can cruise after 23 hours on a bike).  I was lucky enough to have some great company in these last couple of laps, first from Dave Coyles, and second from Jason McAvoy, who had wrapped up 2nd in the 6 + 6.  This meant that the last couple of laps were rolled along merrily with plenty of laughs, jokes and pleasant banter to get us through the climbs and rockgardens of the course.   On the last lap, all the COGs folks had gathered through the swoopy part of Telemark, and riding through the cheers led to a feeling of elation and achievement that is hard to match elsewhere in life: infinite joy.  After crossing the finish line, this quickly gave way to infinite exhaustion, but the endorphin high should last a little longer.

Cruising with McAvoy, photo by Dan Mackay

A huge thanks goes to Stan, Adam and Phil for the amazing support.  I would estimate that, before the last two hours, I spent about 2 minutes stationary in the whole race.   It was more of a team effort than a solo 24, and they were certainly the stars of the show!

I also need to thank some sponsors – On the Rivet for rebuilding my Superfly from the ground up, and Trek Australia for providing a second almost identical bike from the demo fleet.  The bikes performed immaculately and handled impeccably – G2 geometry and stability is a life-saver through rockgardens when you’re massively fatigued.  Despite racing for 24 hours on hardtails, I got through with no significant back pain due mostly to the compliance in the frames.   The other thanks is to K-Lite for the amazing lights that performed absolutely flawlessly, even when I pushed way over the specified runtimes (oopsies).  As an (almost graduated) engineer I can appreciate just how good these are – and for balancing reliability, power and light weight, you simply can’t do better.

Photo by Dan Mackay

A huge congratulations goes out to Jason English on a 5th straight national title, and to Liz Smith on a much-deserved women’s title.  It was also great to see Andy Hall and Brett Bellchambers make the overall podium with characteristically consistent performances.

Riding bikes is fun!