It all started so innocently. I made a new cycling friend who informed me that he and a buddy of his would be riding the Hell’s Gate Hundred. I took a look at the profile and thought “Oh yeah, I will just take it easy and have a fun day riding my bike in Death Valley”. Oh, Marcus, naive little Marcus.
See his jubilant little mug on the drive to Death Valley:
Here I was, on my way to a fun adventure with new friends in a newish place. I was going to camp in my car, eat food cooked on an open fire, forge new friendships, and ride a fun little century.
I arrived at Furnace Creek, set up my car, met everyone and rode over to checkin with the AdventureCorps folks. Turns out that we were a little bit early, but they had CorpsYoga just starting and Chris Kostman invited us to join in “just grab a blanket guys!”. “Why thank you Chris, I do believe I will do that”.
I have never done yoga, ever. This was a nice experience. The entire week leading up to the event, I was having some wicked sciatica and this stretching would really help things.
Here is a shot of everyone else who apparently had done yoga before:
And here is a picture of me wondering what the hell “Dead Tarantuala” was:
After the yoga, things felt really great. I felt so relaxed I wanted to take a nap. Check in went fine, although initially I was expecting a bit more in the way of goodies in my race packet; the event was so well supported, however, that I understand that my admission fee went to good use. After exiting the registration room, I passed the line of other riders and noticed that it was in fact THE Ann Trason that was riding the event (I actually saw her during the ride as I was descending toward Ryolite). I didn’t say anything to Ann, as I know that she is a fairly modest and private person. It was exciting nonetheless to be in the company of such amazing athletes.
After check in, things were fairly uneventful. Just a hearty dinner of pesto pasta and sausage (thanks to Errin and Serbrina) and an early bedtime. 4:30 came fast and I was up in a snap. I was really well prepared for the morning, until the unforeseen happened. I went to pump up my tires and bayam, the tube was leaking right near the valve. I changed that tube out quickly and BAM! pinch flat. Shit! Another tube, and surprise surprise, it is a bad tube and has a hole. DAMMIT! The bike shop mistakenly gave me short stem tubes and I didnt have anymore that would fit. Luckily, Errin was prepared and gave me a tube to use. We were already late for the start so we hustled out.
We got to the start line just in time to go out in the third wave. Here is a picture of me at the start line acting like what I am about to do is going to be walk in the park.
Again, Marcus, little naive Marcus:
The ride started as normally as can be expected. I felt very excited to finally be riding my bicycle in Death Valley as we made our way out to Artist Palette. I was keeping pace with a group that seemed to be right inside my comfort zone. We were moving along at a pretty good clip and then in the distance I saw two guys riding Eliptigo’s. I knew one of them had to be Dean Karnazes. I have mentioned him before, and I wanted to talk to him. I pulled up along side him and slowed my pace. In my froggy morning voice I said “Dean, I am holding you responsible for this”, to which he replied “Uh-oh!”. I explained “I was perfectly happy smoking cigarettes, drinking too much and working my way toward an early grave and then I read your book and it changed my damn life. Now I am here, in this god forsaken place riding my bicycle, and it is all your fault”. He chuckled and said “Thank you! That is the kind of blame I will accept”. I chatted a little bit more with him and then we came up on Artist’s Drive and I had to surge ahead into what would be the first of several punishing climbs”. Artists Drive is not an incredibly long climb, but it gets up to 14% gradient for about a quarter mile, and that was a heck of a way to get warmed up.
I stopped half way up to take a picture of the breathtaking view:
All through the day, I would take pictures of the landscape and I finally had to give up, as there is no way to capture the vastness of Death Valley. That place is a geological wonder, it is so huge and so beautiful, it is something that can only be understood when you see it in person.
The climb up Artists Drive, while hard, was actually fun. It was stunningly pretty, there were lots of other riders to chat with and there was a water stop near the top. After a brief decent from the top of the climb, we ended up at the water stop. The support there was very good. There was a bevy of food, powders, gels and electrolyte pills. The staff was very helpful.
Just as I finished refilling my bottles, Dean Karnazes and my friend Errin came into the stop. I asked Dean for a picture and he happily agreed. Here are a couple things to note in this picture…
1. I am about the size of two Dean Karnazes’, to which he replied “You got a big frame to be hauling up these hills”
2. I look like a cat that just ate a canary. Goofy big white guy with a silly grin. My wife occasionally calls me Lenny (as in Lenny from Of Mice and Men) and in this picture I certainly look like Lenny petting a puppy to hard.
I also got a picture of Errin looking badass in his Death Valley Velo Club jersey
Errin and I made the descent and I realized I had forgot something in the car. I decided I would time trial back to Furnace Creek and grab my stuff and meet Errin and Bruce (Errin’s buddy) back on the highway for the ride to the Beatty cutoff. Our timing was impeccable. Just as I was rolling out of the driveway of the camp ground, they rolled by. At this point, I was feeling really strong. Errin and Bruce both were kind enough to help me out in the morning with my flat tire issues, so I told them I would put my face in the wind as much as I could for them. The entire way up to the Beatty cutoff I took the pull. We were eating up road like no tomorrow, passing a lot of people on the way. Errin later remarked that “It felt like I was the climber that the time trialist was dragging up to the climb”. It felt really good being a powerhouse, even if it was the last time I would feel that way on the ride.
We made the turn up the Beatty cutoff, and after a brief water fill, we started up the climb. This climb goes up to Hell’s Gate, and then eventually up to Daylight Pass at 4317′. I don’t really know how to describe this part of the event. At one point during the climb, I saw Chris Kostman on the side of the road taking pictures and I yelled out “This is just like Kelbaker” (a famous grade from the 508). He then said, what I thought at the time was, “Yeah, but this is steeper”, however later in the day I reflected on his comment and figured out that he said “Yeah, but this gets steeper”. This is because when I saw him, it was ticking along at about 4% or so, and was easy going, but it got steeper up the road. I think the climb can best be summed up by Chris’ comments before the ride “Basically, today, you will ride up Artist Palette, then cut across to the Beatty cutoff and just climb for several hours non-stop”. Boy, was that an accurate description. This grade was unforgiving. It was just straight up hill for 16 miles. There were no downhill sections, or flat spots, it was just uphill on crappy pavement. At some point I quit looking up the road for the Hell’s Gate water stop. I just looked 5 feet ahead of me at all times.
Here is me looking rather unhappy:
Finally after making the Hell’s Gate water stop, I was totally demoralized. This stop is where quite a few people turned around. From this point, it would be a metric century if you turned around and headed back to Furnace Creek. I waited a little bit, ate some bananas, and Errin appeared. He looked exactly how I felt, like hell. I could see the exhaustion on his face, and I feared he was considering the same thing I was…heading back down the hill. He and I both sat in total dismay, totally hurting and not knowing how to continue. The ride sheet said that the grades up to Daylight pass were steeper than the last section we had done. I was considering quitting when the words of my friend Charlie Engle sprung into my head, words I had shared with him on the Jubilee climb at the 508 this last year: “Don’t take yourself off the course, make someone else do it”. I chewed on those words for a second, looked around for someone to say that I had to quit, but dammit, there was no one there. Errin and I mounted our trusty steeds and proceeded up the road. There was a 12:30 cutoff at Daylight Pass and we both agreed that we could live with it if they turned us around at the pass, but we wouldn’t do it to ourselves at Hell’s Gate. At this point of the ride, by body had clicked into climbing mode. I didn’t really notice the harder grades, I just kept ticking over the pedals. My cadence remained smooth, but my spirits were in the dumps. At one point Errin and I passed a woman pushing here bike. We said “Hey, you found your lowest gear, just spin up this”. She laughed and said “I have never met a hill I couldn’t walk up”. This woman showed more spirit than I have every myself expressed. At the end of the ride, I found out that she walked a total of 6 miles up hill to get to Daylight Pass. As I neared the top of the climb, I saw George Vargas tearing downhill toward me and he yelled out “MARCUS!” and pointed at me. It really raised my spirits to see someone I knew.
I got to the top of climb and I felt pretty rough. I had just made the cutoff, it was 12:25. I refueled and waited for Errin. When he arrived, I could see in his eyes that he had enough. He was pushing a 40 pound Salsa Casseroll up these climbs, and he was totally beat. I knew how he felt for sure. He said that he was going to turn around and didn’t have any more climbing in his legs. He looked at me and said “You gotta go for it man”. Hah, thanks Errin. I foolishly said “Well, I am gonna go get it done for all three of us, someone has to finish this ride”.
I jetted down the other side of the hill toward what would be a defining moment in my cycling life. Mentally, I knew that I was standing on one side of a line that I had never crossed before. At the top of that climb, I could have descended back down toward Furnace Creek, I could have backed away from the line I had never crossed, but Charlie’s voice rung in my ears. I was so cooked, I was at mile 50, I had climbed roughly 7200ft, my sciatica made it hard to mount or dismount the bike, my arms were so tired I could barely hold myself up and I had very serious numbness (down there). If I descended down toward Ryolite, it would mean that I would have to cross an open windy valley, by myself, make a climb up to Ryolite, descend back down, cross the valley again, and climb back up to Daylight pass to make the final descent toward Furnace Creek. This was something I wasn’t sure I could actually do, I knew I was risking a DNF if I made the descent, but I thought to myself “Well, I didn’t come here to be comfortable”. As the wind rushed past my face, I felt like I was crossing a line that would change me somehow.
The ride across that valley was lonely and cold, but I was making good time. It was finally a flat section (my specialty) and I just ate up those miles. I arrived at Ryolite and once again felt awful and again entertained the idea of a ride back to Furnace Creek, after all Kostman was heading that way in his AdventureCorps van. I saw that they had banana walnut muffins and I thought “I will hold off on making that decision until after I eat a couple of these”. Here is a picture of me not enjoying Ryolite:
After wolfing down the muffins, I finally felt like I could imagine myself returning to being a human being at some point. I figured that was good enough, I mounted my bike (slowly) and headed back. This next section was my darkest hour. The road was incredibly rough, I was pushing a headwind the entire way, the numbness was getting really bad and my right knee was experiencing shooting pains. For the millionth time, I considered stopping, but decided to just quit thinking all together. I was totally miserable, and there was still a climb in front of me. Somehow, I was actually able to turn of my brain and just pedal. I arrived at Daylight Pass without even thinking about it. Now it was home sweet home. It was downhill the entire way home, right?
The decent down to Hell’s Gate was fast and actually kinda fun. Being a big guy, I descend a lot faster than a lot of people, so I passed many riders on the way down. The descent from Hell’s Gate to the highway was awful. The road was littered with tar snakes which made for an exceptionally bumpy ride. The ride back to Furnace Creek was the last straw. It was a headwind the whole way back, I was tired, and there was no one to trade pulls with. Finally I arrived back at Furnace Creek; beaten, battered and humbled by the mighty Hell’s Gate Hundred.
Here is the proof, a photo of me looking like 100 miles of rough road:
There will be a part 2 of this ride report, that will be the part where I reflect on the things I learned. That post will hopefully have a happy cheerful tone.
