The Powderhorn Cometh.

(All photos by Birgitta Anderson)

The idea of a 24 hour race has always intrigued me. A team, yourself, and bikes for 24 hours. Racing against the clock, laps upon laps upon laps. The idea had a certain appeal as an endurance test but the social aspect is equally appealing.

Last weekend I participated in my first 24 hour race, the Powderhorn 24. I was apprehensive going into it but I ended up having a blast. I had this idea in my head that it was going to be a big old hipster fest full of drunk and obnoxious people. While there were certainly drunk and obnoxious people, they were the minority, everyone there was really cool and I met and talked to a lot of very cool people.

I showed up Friday about 4:30 and I was hanging out at Freewheel on the Greenway talking to some of my colleagues. Around 5 I headed outside and started getting my tent set up. Around this time Birgitta and her boyfriend Bob showed up with their cute pooch Shamus. We were all getting set up and then their friend Dave stopped by, he was replacing another fellow who had to cancel at the last moment. After a little bit our other two team mates, Ebbin and Tiana, showed up and we waited for the pre-ride briefing. 

From left to right, Ebbin, Dave, me, and Bob.

Birgitta getting ready to ride.

Dave passing the manifest off to Tiana.

Shamus the team mascot.

We devised our plan for how we were going to break up the riding. We would split our six down the middle into two teams of three. Each team of three would rotate people in and out twice. So if the three people on the first team were one, two and three. The rotation would go one, two, three, and then one, two three, at which point the second team would be up. Each person did 2 - 3 laps per time they were up. This meant you didn't fully cool off when it was your turn to ride again and then when you did your second set of laps, you had roughly 8 hours to get some rest. This method ended up working out really well for us.

After the pre-ride meeting was taken care of everyone lined up for the race. Luckily we were near the front because we were one of the first teams to register. Ebbin, Dave, and Birgitta were on the first rotation and Ebbin was going to take the first laps. He lined up, the race started and they were off.

I have never seen such an odd collection of riders. There were people in full lycra kits, cut off jeans, lots of beards, lots of tattoos, no tattoos, big hair, no hair, sandals, road shoes, steel cargo bikes, super light weight carbon bikes, and so much more. It was really neat to see all the different types of folks who were all coming together to hang out and ride bikes.

Some folks wore costumes.

36" wheel unicycle?

Extreme lycra irony.

There was a team of 15 year old kids that crushed it.

Racing in a dress? Why not?!

The cutest little girl with a cycling cap. She's off to a good start.

The race was underway and we were having a good time. The first group finished up their first rounds of laps around 1 am or so. My first lap was at about 3 am. I headed out ready to kill it. I was so pumped I rode right past the first checkpoint. I looked at it as I rode by it and it just didn't register. I zipped down to the next check point, the guy punched my manifest and then noticed I had not had the first one punched. They sent me back to the first check point. I was so upset at myself, I got back to the first checkpoint and then got punched after explaining what happened, then I zipped back over to the second checkpoint, they didn't remember what happened even though it was only like 5 minutes prior. They sent me on my way and I was not thinking clearly I was feeling really rushed, so I blew up 10th and as I hit Lake, I realized I passed the 3rd check in. I rushed back down 11th, hit the check point, then rushed back up 10th and hit the Nice Ride bonus stop. You were to check out a Nice Ride and do a lap on it and then come back and get on your bike. The line was horrendous.

I finally got on the Nice Ride and took off, wow those bikes are heavy. I actually had a really good lap time for riding a 50 lb bike. Then I got back on my bike and finished the lap and did one more. The only way to win this thing was to do all the bonus stops. Each bonus stop was worth 2 laps. If you did all the bonus laps and your volunteer shift, you would receive and additional 8 bonus laps, on top of the possible 36 bonus laps from the bonus stops.

On my next rotation I felt good and the sun was coming up. I headed off into the sunrise and did my fastest lap. I did two more laps, on the last lap I had a bonus at the Powderhorn park where I had to bomb down the steep hill and do yoga. It was interesting to say the least. When I got back on my bike and took off my muscles were so relaxed I could barely even pedal. By the time I got to the top of that hill, my legs were screaming at me. Fatigue was starting to set in.

Sunrise yoga.

I finished my lap, passed off the manifest, crawled back to my tent and darkness warshed over the Dude.

I slept for about three hours and felt waaaaay better.

I awoke to the news that we were in second place. What?! We started off not even caring what was going on, we were just having fun, but someone had alerted us to this news and suddenly we got a little more competitive.

The rest of the event was pretty standard affair for a large group of tired and exhausted folks. Everyone was starting to get a little loopy and goofy. What happened next I could have never guessed. Everyone got up and started cheering for the finishers. EVERYONE. It was really cool to see so many people being so supportive of each other. 

Over all the experience was an A+ and I will certainly do it again next year, actually I am already looking forward to it.