2019 Singlespeed MTB USA champs
The Singlespeed MTB champs. If you’ve been, you know what it’s about. If not – well, unlike most national championships (or worlds – there’s an SS MTB world champs too!) there are no qualifying races, and in fact most people at the event are definitely NOT racing, and are probably stoned, hung over, on their way to getting drunk, or some mix of all of these.
By 9AM many of the riders were already chugging beers, harder alcohol, or smoking stuff.
It’s more of a party than a race. And “organization” is a bit lacking. In the days before the race I had messaged the organisers several times asking how many laps / how long a lap was, or even what the start time was. Best I could get was “It’ll start around 10AM, and should be one long lap between 20 and 30 miles.” And that info was when I checked in at the venue at 9AM on race day!
There are bonus points for costumes, and for drinking booze at the “aid stations”. More on those in a bit.
Like most races, online registration before-hand had several categories to choose from. Unlike most races, they ranged from “In it to win it” to “Is it still Friday night?”. I chose the second-most-aggressive category – “Team Kit” or something like that – thinking I’d not be as competitive as the fast folk, but would treat as a fun fast training ride.
Oh yeah I forgot to mention. I don’t own a singlespeed MTB. So the day before I “ghetto-converted” my MTB to SS, and did a quick half hour blast to make sure it didn’t immediately fall apart.
Should be good enough.
So, before the start they lined us all up by category – fast guys at the front, right? Then the announcer said “OK everyone, now turn your bikes around and face the other way!” Remember – it’s a party not a race.
A few of the competitive guys quickly biked up to the new start line accompanied by heckling from the masses, but that settled it for me – I didn’t want to be on of THOSE guys and just decided to have fun. I started from literally the very back, behind the costumed apes, nurses, ballerinas, and whatnot.
Race started, and I was feeling OK. SurprisingLy OK, as the last two weeks since a cold front (ie temps below 75 F) hit Austin I’ve been feeling pretty shit. Passed a bunch of folks – which is actually pretty hard on an SS as you are all pretty much geared the same, and there’s no dropping a cog or two and sprinting to overtake.
The first 25% or so of the course is mostly the same as the 24 hour race I did a couple of weeks ago, so I knew those trails. I wasn’t too sure about the new stuff added to get to “20-30 miles” for a lap.
Following the theme of “lack of organization” the trail marking was pretty lacking. It seemed that anywhere you might have a question about which way to go – at trail junctions for example – there was minimal to no marking, but when you hit a solid bit of singletrack with NO options other than “keep going fast straight ahead” there would be multiple layers of tape on both sides of the trail! Reminded me very much of some of the MTB races (which they strangely called “jamborees”) in the vast palm oil plantations of Malaysia.
At about the midway point I reckoned I was maybe in 20th place, judging by my estimates of how many people I had passed and how many I thought might still be ahead of me. There was one guy right behind me I had just passed, and we were on a nice bit of double-track, when we came across two guys who had been ahead of us, now coming the other way, telling us we were going the wrong way!
So we turned around, followed them, and picked up another four or five riders who had also missed the turn. After about a mile or so we found the correct turn, and the pace quickened quite a bit. I hung on – and in fact found myself near the very front of the group – when we hit the “aid station”.
Normally you think of an aid station as water, maybe some gel hand ups, etc. This one had beers, wine from a box that you poured straight into your mouth, PBJ sandwiches, and (apropos of the PBJs) an Elvis impersonator!
In the spirit of having fun I chugged a beer and a mouthful of boxed wine. While I did so, three or four of the guys I was with blasted on through – the total wusses! They WERE racing!
Chugging complete (only took one song – “Sweet Caroline”, covered by Elvis in 1970) I raced off to catch up with those FUCKERS that didn’t stop, and treated this as a race.
We were back on trails I knew, so I knew there was only about 3-4 more miles to go. The problem was two-fold: 1) these were the most technical portions of the trail with boardwalks, drops, and what in the UK are called “bomb holes” – and 2) I was now drunk.
My bike-handling skills went from bad, to “oh shit I really hope I don’t die here”.
I caught up to the group that (again – wusses!) blasted through the aid station without imbibing, and then hung with them to the end. I could have passed, and in fact at about a half mile to the end the guy right in front of me pulled aside and waved me to pass, but I took the moral high ground and decided #itsnotarace and there’s no glory in pipping a guy for a place at the end. We’re not racing for money or anything, right?
Once again, the spirit of “lack of organization” raised its head at the end – standings were based on signing the “leaderboard” yourself. You’ll note that the group of us that all arrived together all forgot to put our time down!
A brief aside… When I lived in Beijing we went to a dinner party that had a Russian couple attending. They didn’t speak any English, but fluent Chinese. I spoke no Russian, but enough Chinese to chat with the husband. After we had been drinking beers and whisky for several hours and I felt pretty damned drunk, he brought out a large bottle of vodka and said basically “Now we start drinking”.
So at the end of the SSMTBUSA2019 champs, the drinking began. Free-flow beer, as well as (actually really tasty) Texas Vodka and Texas Whiskey.
Unfortunately, I had an hour drive back to Austin so couldn’t take full advantage of this. I hung out a bit more to absorb the atmosphere, and rode back up to the “Elvis Aid Station” to heckle some riders (“Only three more laps to go!”) then made my way back to my boring and non-counterculture life as a Dad and a wannabe entrepreneur.
