Rockstar Gravel ITT

First blog post since 2009!?

I've had Rockstar on my mind for a couple of years. It's the brainchild of some folks down in Virginia. I believe the original 'bad' idea was a 270 mile bikepacking route (mountain bike) from Harrisonburg to Roanoke Virginia. The first 'grand depart' was in 2018, with just a handful of crazy people at the start line. Since 2018, they've also developed a gravel route and a road route. I'm still not set up for bikepacking - never tried it, so I gravitated toward the gravel route, which, it seemed, might be completed in a day. The 'FKT' (fastest known time) for a solo rider was 24 hours and change, though Gordon Wadsworth and Eliott Baring had just cruised to a 20 hour finish as a team.

My family was headed to the Outer Banks for a week, the second week in June. Not being a beachy kinda guy, I decided this was my window of opportunity for a Rockstar attempt. The weather forecast did not cooperate, however. So I packed my car for every possible eventuality and headed to Hatteras, NC. The weather was pretty good down there, but the forecast in Virginia's mountains continued to be sketchy. Finally, at the end of the week, it looked like Sunday and Monday might offer a sliver of an opportunity. Temps in the mid 80's with possibility of afternoon thunderstorms. Not ideal, but I could work with that. I drove through a huge downpour, arriving in Harrisonburg. Things would be hot and steamy the next day.

Somehow, I convinced my friend Ben to run support for me (not sure he really knew what he was in for). Our previous adventures included beach trips to Vietnam and diving trips to the Philippines - in what seems like a different lifetime. Saturday, I headed for Harrisonburg, 6.5 hours from Hatteras. I booked a hotel a couple of blocks from the 'official' start of the ride - Black Sheep Coffee in Harrisonburg. I met with Ben to hash out the first couple of aid stops and was treated to a great meal at his friends' place. Back to the hotel, loaded my frame bag and feed bag and filled 4 bottles. In Bed by 10.

Alarm went off at 3:20. Was planning a 4AM start. Ben had asked me why and my answer was 'I have no idea.' Just seemed to be what other riders had done. The overnight desk clerk at the hotel was pretty confused to see me, with my bike, checking out at 4AM.

It took me a little while to find Black Sheep Coffee - the official start of the route. But I found it. Powered up my Spot GPS tracker and rolled out about 4:20. The initial miles out of Harrisonburg were pavement, some bike path, more pavement through farmland where hordes of cows were getting hooked up to milking machines. Route-finding in town was a little tricky. Made some wrong turns. The sun came up sooner than I expected and I powered off my light. 

milking barn at twilight

Before too long, I found myself climbing. The climb up to Flagpole Knob was brutal. I knew it was  big climb, but steep...so steep. And slick from the previous day's rain. Big chunky rocks. It was a 4x4 road. The 'Dry Run Rd Climb' Strava segment is 3.5 miles at an average 10% grade (1776ft) - and that's only a portion of the climb. It was slow going. There was walking involved.

switchback on the Dry Run Rd Climb

Some of the road up to Flagpole Knob reminded me of Hilly Billy Roubaix; lotsa mudholes, freshly filled. No idea how deep they were until I tried to ride them. After getting stuck in one up to the wheel axles, I became pretty tentative in approaching the others.

reminding me how slowly I was moving

Reddish Knob is the high point on the route at about 4400 feet. It took me 4.5 hours to cover the 36 miles from Harrisonburg. All down hill from here? Not exactly.

From Reddish, I had about another 30 miles to cover before the first planned meetup with Ben. I don't have too many memories of this section. It was pretty quick and I was just thinking how late I was going to be to our first meetup. I stopped at the Mountain View General Store - used the toilet and bought a sub, mainly because I though I should buy something. It was a slow slog 1000 ft climb up paved 250 with a bit of traffic. On the way up 250, I got passed by fast mtb dude, John Petrylak wearing a race number. I asked him what race was going on - it was Stoopid 50, a race I had done last year. Had no idea it was happening this year, with all the COVID precautions. It was nearly 11am when I got to the overlook (the Confederate Breastworks ? Interpretive Site). No Ben. I ate the sub and bummed some water off of some nice Harley-driving gentlemen, hanging around for 15 minutes or so.  Well - no Ben, so I decided to push the next 40 miles. I probably had enough to drink. Definitely had enough food. So I rode back down 250 and took a right on the gravel. There was Ben, hanging out at the Stoopid 50 aid station. I guess the map pin I gave him wasn't accurate. Since I'd already spent 15 minutes at the overlook, I wasn't keen on killing more time. So the list of things wanted to do - like lube my chain - was summarily dismissed. I hung around for a few minutes, filled my bottles and carried on. While I was there, the Stoopid 50 race leaders came through. I was a little jealous that they'd be done in an hour or two, and I still had 18 hours, or so, left.

The climb away from the aid station was brutally steep. Sustained 15% for a while. Soul-sucking. My gearing wasn't ideal, with a 40x36 as my lowest gear. But a hell of a lot better than my usual 40x20 singlespeed! I made way for a few racers bombing down the hill, but I was soon off of their course and back in solo sufferlandia. Near the high point, there was a singletrack connector that was a cool little stretch. Somebody had recently cut some trees off of this little-used trail. Thank you!

After the descent and a short stretch of pavement, I hit the 'Sugar Tree South' Strava segment. Sugar Tree Road is a gravel super-highway, so unlike anything else on this route. I'd been on poorly maintained (unmaintained) jeep and ATV trails, singletrack and pitchy, twisty forest roads (15%). This one was over-constructed by someone to take out all of the steep grades (max 7%) and have wide, sweeping turns instead of hairpins. If any of my Japan-based buddies are reading this, it's really similar to Tanba Rindo, but no pavement. 18 miles of fun. I was most impressed by the engineering of the road where it crossed streams. The streams were usually run through culverts that were 50 feet, or more, below the road surface to allow for the sweeping bends in the road. Still wondering 'why' it was constructed this way.

Pretty exposed = really hot

I found Ben waiting around mile 105. I ate the Egg McMuffin that was to be my 2nd breakfast. Yum. I refilled bottles, changed my forever-drenched socks (this was a losing battle on the day), re-lubed vital areas, including my bike chain which had been screaming loudly since just after I stopped the last time. I had just over 40 miles to the next stop, so the halfway point would occur somewhere in this stretch. After 15 minutes of restocking and re-lubing, I was getting ready to get back on the bike when the first huge raindrops started to fall. Already moving slower than anticipated, I didn't really want to delay, but the storm had other ideas. The first big lightning bolt hit nearby and we took shelter in the car, for what ended up being about an hour.

Riding away from Ben, the world was soggy, but at least it was cooler. Already difficult conditions were a little more so. Soggy, mushy gravel made it seem like 50% more effort was required. But it was beautiful. This section included a nice stretch of gravel that bypassed Douthat State Park (great place to mountain bike and home to the infamous Middle Mountain Momma Race), though the rolling nature of the terrain got a little tiresome, having ridden 110++ miles already. The rollers were followed by a pair of substantial climbs (1000' and 700') up and over Middle Mountain.

freshly graded peanut butter

From Middle Mountain, it was a cruise into Covington, VA, and then 7 miles of frontage road next to I-64 on the way to Love's Truckstop in Low Moor. Here I did a complete costume change, reapplied lube in all the necessary spots and bought a footlong sub from Subway. I ate 2/3 and saved the rest for the 'last' resupply spot. I had a coke and some chips - the sugar and salt hit the spot. I grabbed my lights and extra batteries, just in case and pushed on. I make this sound like a quick stop, but in reality it was almost an hour. Moving too slowly...and happy to be off the bike for a while

From Low Moor, I had about 45 miles to the last resupply point at mile 190. That would put me about 65 miles from Roanoke and I figured I could ride through the night and carry enough food and gear to survive those dark hours. 

The first 15 miles out of Low Moor were paved and included a 900 foot climb and similar descent and some flat pedaling along Craig Creek. It got dark soon after I left Low Moor. I was still feeling OK, given the punishment sustained, so far.

Remember this road from exploring the area during my time at VT. Still baffling.

The next 30 miles had some sustained climbing, but low-grade stuff. Not too taxing, until the climb up to Ben at the final aid stop - another 900 foot, 6% push. 190 miles down. Roughly 65 to go. I was feeling a little loopy at 12:30, having woken up at 3:20AM - working on 4 hours of sleep or so. I ate the rest of my sub, had a coke and made a futile change of socks. More lube. Ben filled some bottles for me and I was out of there just before 1AM, thinking a 7AM finish would be about right. 

Ben and I chatted for a bit about which direction he should head out of the woods. He could follow me on the route, or head back the way he came. Good thing he turned around, or he might still be out in those woods. He headed to Roanoke and his well-deserved bed.

The next 12 miles took an hour and a half. The afternoon rain had made all of the stream crossings pretty exciting. And deep. My dry socks were dry for about 10 minutes, I think. The road was slick from the rain and it was stop/start and up/down the whole way to Rte 311. On 311, the major route from these mountains to Roanoke, I passed old haunts - the Dragon's Tooth trailhead and Catawba Grocery. Even made a lap around the parking lot of Catawba grocery - not sure why - feeling nostalgic? Rolled past 624 to Newport and Blacksburg Rd. Lots of time spent on those roads - but not on a bike, haha! Rolled by The Homeplace restaurant; memories of stuffing myself and feeling sick on the ride back to Blacksburg. Continuing on toward Roanoke on 311, I saw perhaps the strangest thing in all of the dark hours. I came upon a cop car with lights on on the shoulder of 311 at the McAfee's Knob (AT) parking. But when I passed it, I realized that there were 15 or 20 police cars in the lot. Some kind of shift change? Not sure what was going on, but there were groups of police standing around talking - at roughly 3AM.

If you've enjoyed all of the sunshine and positivity to this point, you might want to stop reading, because shit's about to get real. :)

The last 50 miles of the course were mentally brutal. 210+ miles in, I just wanted to be finished. 

At this point, began the most ridiculously circuitous tour of all of the cycling attractions Roanoke has to offer - starting with Carvin's Cove. I've ridden Carvin's Cove before - raced the Creature a couple of years ago. I loved it. It's gonna take a while to get over this most recent experience. Six miles of paved rollers led to the "Happy Valley Trail," a rutted, rough, slimy-from-rain slog that didn't, at all, fit the name. Had to get off the bike innumerable times. But it got worse. The Happy Valley Trail connected to a singletrack connector trail to get away from Carvin's. It was overgrown and nearly impossible to ride. All of the vegetation hanging over the trail was sopping wet from the rain. It took about an hour and fifteen minutes to navigate less than 7 mile around Carvin's Cove, with almost no climbing. It almost broke me, mentally.

From Carvin's, the course led in a distinctly indirect way to the Roanoke River Greenway. The Greenway was made more exciting by massive flooding the day before. Debris and deep sand was encountered frequently. Felt kinda like cyclocross for a while. I think I was falling asleep on the bike at this point. After 5 or 6 miles of CX, I made my way to the base of Mill Mountain. There was a bonus singletrack hike-a-bike section for a little while. I totally gave up trying to ride it, complete exhaustion setting in. It was about a half mile, but felt like 20 miles. The trail popped out on the road that led to the top - a 400 foot, 6% climb that might as well have been Mount Everest.

Somewhere in Roanoke (?), crossing the river

Roanoke is a cycling town

Mill Mountain Viewpoint

Texas Tavern - open 24 hours

I topped out on Mill Mountain a little after 7:30AM. Knowing that all the work was done, I actually enjoyed the last couple of miles to the Texas Tavern - the 24-hour greasy-food-slinging establishment that is the official endpoint of the route. The route down was a closed, paved road with impressive switchbacks. Felt kinda like Japan, again. I ate a cheezeburger and a sausage egg and cheese sandwich, had yet another coke and headed to the hotel for a 4 hour death-like nap.

Epilogue: 

I'd been wanting to do a huge ride like this for a while. Maybe since last year's 200 mile gravel adventure, the Dirty Double-cross, up in north central PA. The amount of climbing in this route is a little bit nuts and I totally underestimated the difficulty of some sections of this route - in terms of grade and surface. My ride time wasn't too far off what I predicted, but I feel like I was stationary for too long (5+ hours). I went into it thinking...maybe... I could match the fastest known time of 24 hours, 3 minutes. I probably could have, with better planning and slightly better conditions.

My planning for this ride was pretty half-assed. Didn't think real hard about food. Probably didn't eat enough (2 subs, 2 bananas, a bag of chips and an egg mcmuffin, plus maybe 8 gels, a couple of stroop waffles and a package of shot blocks - oh and 4 cans of soda). I was definitely dehydrated at the end. I think I only drank maybe 2 1/2 bottles the last 7 hours. Not the best strategy...

Well, there is always next time. Who wants to keep me company? Already thinking about the next one...

Dirty Bird 15km trail race, French Creek State Park

My kind of race with a very reasonable start time of 11am. This means that I can roll out of bed and have a couple of cups of coffee before I hit the road for the hour long drive to French Creek.

My training has been pretty non-existent. I've been luck to get out of the house a couple of times a week. Although I put in my longest run in a long time on Friday. I intended to go out for about an hour, but after twisting an ankle about 10 minutes in, I found a cool new trail to explore (I got lost) and spent about 2 hours on my feet.

The ankle was a little bit stiff and sore on Saturday, but not enough to keep me out of the race. Getting ready for the race on Sunday morning I debated wearing an elastic ankle brace, but didn't feel like looking for it.

I got a late start on my drive and arrived about 30 minutes before the race started. I registered quickly and managed to find a toilet - good thing... Race started about 10 minutes late. We were warned at the start that we had about a quarter mile of road to spread out before the race turned onto a trail for a long slog up the hill. I tried to keep a good pace on the stretch of road so that I wouldn't be stuck behind too many people crawling up the hill. The climb was about 15 minutes of moderate grade. People jumped on and off the trail and jockeyed for position for the first 5 minutes, but then everybody calmed down as fatigue set in and we shuffled up the hill. The nearly 500 foot climb was followed by a 400 foot descent that took half as long.

French Creek State park is a rocky and rooty place. Footing was made especially difficult by the slick cover of leaves on the trail. There are many opportunities to trip, fall and roll your ankles. I tripped too many times to count, rolled my dodgy ankle 4 or 5 times and executed a graceful fall (no damage done). The entire route is challenging, whether climbing, descending or flat. My ankle can attest to that, today.

The field of 250+ spread out a bit after the initial climb and descent and I fell into line with 4 or 5 other guys running about the same pace. There was Clemson shirt guy, shirtless guy, knee brace guy, guy with huge thighs, 11 year-old boy guy, and black spandex guy. This was my crew for the race. We traded places occasionally, but generally stayed within sight of each other. At one point, Clemson guy got heckled by the race director because South Carolina put a beatdown on Clemson on Saturday (football) and also because he trailed the 11 year-old. Luckily, I was trailing further behind the 11 year-old and spared the heckling.

At this point, about midway through, the course goes into an out-and-back section with couple of tough hills and a loop at the end. I continued to trade places with people and stumble down the trail. It was on one of the downhills that I had my fall. As I got up and immediately started running again, the guy behind me, the heretofore unmentioned running club singlet guy, insisted that I make sure I was OK before continuing - but I think he just wanted to pass me, so I put the hammer down (well, I continued to run, at least).

My Hong Kong hill climbing experience came in handy on this section (being able to walk quickly and efficiently uphill). I passed people who were running - one of them the 11 year old - and saved a little energy for the last 2 miles of flat and downhill running. Actually, come to think of it, maybe I only passed the 11 year-old on that hill. Details are a little sketchy, but I don't think I knocked him off the trail or anything.

It took me about 13 minutes to cover the least section and I passed all the guys mentioned previously, so felt pretty good about myself as my heart threatened to leap out of my chest. Finished in 1:20:07 in 39th position. Got a sweet blue pint glass for my trouble. This is the second race I've run that's organized by Pretzel City Sports. They run a quality show, with a nice spread of food at the finish. I drove home through beautiful downtown Coatesville on a beautiful sunny day.

Dancing

Not the greatest video in the world - Kate has put on much better displays - but I just happened to have the camera on hand. The music is from a homemade musical that was made by our World Challenge leader, Vicky.

Indonesia Adventure

Just realized I wrote this back in April and never finished or posted it. Since I'm just too lazy to finish, I think I'll post it as-is.

Just back from our Indonesian adventure. April 6-13 in Bali. April 13-19 in Java (Nate and I).

Karen, Nate, Kate, myself and my parents set off for Bali after some unplanned delays. We showed up at the Airport Express station in Hong Kong to check in for our Cathay Pacific flight to Jakarta. Everything was going smoothly until the agent started flipping through Nate's passport, noting that he didn't have any empty pages left in his passport. This is a problem. Indonesia applies a large visa sticker that covers one whole page in your passport, so you need at least one page for them to allow you to travel. F**k.

We decided that I would stay back with Nate to go with him to the Consulate on Monday to get pages added, but after dicking around at the counter for 20 minutes, the agent informed us that we could no longer check in at the train station and had to go directly to the airport. Long story short - everyone else missed their flight to Jakarta.

Cathay flights were changed fairly seamlessly to Sunday for Karen, Kate, mom and dad. Problem was that I had paid for all of the Jakarta to Bali Garuda tickets on my credit card. Another long story, a trip out the the airport Sunday morning, a couple of hours on the phone, a couple of hours at the Garuda counter in Jakarta, and the flights got changed. Nothing is easy, but they made it on Sunday.

Nate and I are not so lucky. After a quick addition of pages on Monday morning, there are no Cathay seats available on the afternoon flight at 4PM. We ask to be put on the waiting list and wander around Hong Kong, buying Nate some new shoes (his feet are growing again). About noon, I got the bright idea to try to go as standby passengers. How full is the flight, I ask. It's completely full - oversold in fact, they reply. How much oversold? About 5 percent. Is that a lot? Not really.

I'm convinced. We head off to the airport, arriving about 2 1/2 hours early. I haven't ever tried to go standby, but 9/11 has made things more difficult. No longer can you pass security as a standby passenger. We hung around the counter until 25 minutes before the flight, when they start barring passengers from checking in. Then we're told to follow a lady through the crew security channel at a jog. It's a long way to the gate, and we only make it a few minutes before they push back from the gate, but we're on our way.

I have not idea if I'll be able to change our Garuda flights again, but there's a flight leaving Jakarta at 9PM, and I'm prepared to buy new tickets if necessary.

We have a much easier time with the Garuda staff in Jakarta. We change our flight in a matter of minutes for about $10 each, and we're on our way. Only annoyance is that an Indonesian guy that pays our airline fees in rupiah for us and then tries to scam me out of double the amount in US dollars. I will come to expect this later in the trip, but it surprises and annoys me.

We manage to board our flight and arrive in Denpasar Bali around midnight, with an hours drive to Ubud where our gang has checked into Ketut's Place. Nate and I are relieved to have arrived - and almost a day earlier than expected. Bonus!

Ubud is a town in the south central interior of Bali, surrounded by art industry (furniture, batik, wood carving) and rice fields. It is truly a beautiful spot and I'm a little disappointed that I can't talk the gang into spending another night there. We spend Tuesday driving around looking for the places where they manufacture silver beads, but are instead led to the places where they sell crappy jewelry to tourists. The driving tour is a bit of a disappointment, but we'll get over it. We have a nice lunch at a tourist joint of the driver's choosing, on the second floor overlooking the rice.

Wednesday, we packed up and headed South to Sanur in order to catch the public boat to Nusa Lembongan, an island off the south coast. Karen, Nate and I had been there in December 2002, just after the Bali bombings - our first trip as expats in Hong Kong. Fitting that we revisit the place on our last holiday as Hong Kong expats. The island is known for it's seaweed farms in the broad shallow bay, its surf breaks, and is increasingly becoming known for it's diving. I think I'll stay away from the surf break called "lacerations", and the surfing in general, for that matter. We stay at a place called OKA bungalo No. 7, the more upscale version of Bungalo No. 7. The rooms are nice, but the staff are not very helpful. Our room has air conditioning, but the rooms are not designed to keep the cool air inside, with many openings to the outside. The AC can't keep up with the heat of the days, so we spend most days wandering the beaches, the town and hanging around the small, but beautiful pool. I have to acquaint myself with the location of the circuit breaker for our room, as it gets tripped intermittently and we wake up in a pool of sweat in the middle of the night.

Dad and I make a game out of finding the coldest bottle of Bintang beer on the beach. The place with the coldest beer, also happens to have the cheapest. Double bonus!! We also sample the food up and down the beach, from the cheapest of cheap to the 5 star place a couple of doors down. The five star place wins, hands down, with amazing tuna and swordfish steaks...and the Bintang's pretty cold too.

On a couple of days, we rented a pair of motorbikes for us to zip around the island. This set us back about $7 per bike per day. On our scouting trip, dad, Nate and I take a few wrong turns, explore a few distant beaches and make it most of the way around the island, leaving Karen and mom wondering what happened to us. It's about a 45 minute loop all the way around, and the bikes also make it easy for us to get to Mushroom Bay. A load of day trippers from Bali get dropped at this beach every morning, but other than the banana boats zipping around, they aren't too irritating. On 2 days we had a meal at one of the local restaurants and set up in their lounge chairs. Kate is becoming a real water baby, enjoying both the pool and the sea. We also explore the neighboring island, Nusa Ceningan, which is connected by a wooden suspension bridge to Nusa Lembongan. Quite a thrill to ride across. Ceningan has a little bit of elevation to it, and some of the roads are quite steep, affording a good view of the sunset from the top. Karen and I headed up there on my birthday, to the west end of Ceningan.

One morning, we left Kate with grandma and Karen, dad, Nate and I headed out for a couple of dives. First stop was a place called manta point on Nusa Penida. When I asked Rudy the dive master what the chances of seeing mantas was, he told me that normally he would have said 100 percent, but on his last dive he hadn't seen any. I was a sceptical, but my skepticism proved unfounded. We dropped onto the relatively shallow (max. 12m) dive site with a warning to watch out for stingrays. They were obvious from the moment we got close to the bottom - a hundred or more, dashing around and piled up on top of each other. Just a few minutes into the dive, the divemaster started pounding on his tank frantically to signal us - Manta! Such a thrill to see this 3-4 meter goliath cruising slowly past us through the murk. I would have been happy had we not seen anything else for the rest of the dive. BUT - there were probably 10 - 15 mantas circling around a rock outcrop in 6-10 meters of water. When we arrived, we pretty much had the place to ourselves. There were two other boats and 4-5 other divers there. I was so transfixed by the mantas, and snapping away with my camera, that I didn't really notice other divers arriving until we were completely surrounded and it was getting difficult to tell the members of our group apart from the rest. It became a total cluster@#(&. After about 20 minutes of watching the mantas, our divemaster led us away - I was a little annoyed at being told to surface with 120 bar in my tank (more than half), but in hindsight, it made more sense than battle the hordes. Back in the boat, we counted 16 other boats that had arrived (mainly from mainland Bali) since we had gone in. There must have been more than 50 divers on the site!

Our second dive site confirmed that my blood has become very thin during our 7 years in Asia. We dove a spot called Crystal Bay on Nusa Ceningan and within 8 minutes I was shivering and hugging myself for warmth and ready to call it a day. The water was 24 degrees according to my dive computer. I think the coldest I had dived before was about 26. As we descended the sloping reef, I watched the temperature drop to 20. The dive master later said his computer showed 18. Freezing. When we got to about 20 meters, Rudy started banging on his tank again - this could be good! He led us a bit further out and down and pointed to a large, hovering shape. It was a Mola Mola (giant sunfish) - just about the strangest fish I have ever seen (see video).

It was about 2 meters in length, and suspended vertically (facing up) in the water. Several bannerfish can be seen cleaning the mola mola - this is why it makes appearances on reefs - it is generally a pelagic fish. I almost forgot about the cold water for a moment - it had continued getting colder as I descended to a maximum of 32 meters. The rest of our group was waiting a bit shallower because of the cold.

Rudy later told us that it's pretty rare to see a mola mola at any time of year, but particularly in April, when the water is generally warmer. We were pretty lucky.

A video of Nate and I lost on Gunung Batur...

OMG

We're in trouble now.

Mobility Part 2

She's getting close...

mobility

A couple of people have asked what the bait was. Kate, I think, is a little overwhelmed by all of the plush, colourful, noisemaking toys that she sees every day. She prefers muted with a touch of flash. Her favourite objects right now are the computer mouse, my black watch and my cameras. The bait was the camera with which the video was shot. That's not an inept videographer swinging the camera around at the and - that's Kate!