Wilderness 101 and h2h Mt Creek round #8 post race write up.

Dave Taylor

Rex kwan Do
I am sitting here with my Macbook in my lap reminiscing on an awesome weekend. I completed one goal and then a second that I didn't plan on until this week. I raced the NUEMTB Wilderness 101 mountain bike race on my single speed, drove to my parents in Bedminster from State Colleege, Pa last night and headed up to Mt Creek this morning.
I'll start with Wilderness 101. I first heard about this race last year from @Uzzi_SL because @Mitch and Schilling were doing it. I really didn't have an interest though until @Johnny Utah was planning to do it and then I kept letting @Mitch twist my arm into doing it. So, on a very buzzed night a few months back I registered for it. I took off work friday and headed out after stopping at @Mitch 's house and grabbing some bar ends(he swore by them for this race and now I do too) and some very helpful pointers. Got there around 3;00pm friday, installed the bar ends and went to pre ride a little with some dude named Greg. We ended up presiding the first climb which from camp is 6 miles or so to the summit. I came back to camp, grabbed my race packet and dropped off my drop bags to be brought to the aid stations. After that it was Elk Creek Cafe about 5 minutes away. I ate dinner, somehow avoided beer and continued to hydrate. I hit the sack at about 10 but between a screaming baby(why is this kid camping at an NUE race?) and a drunk track worker crunching beer cans and such I didn't fall asleep until midnight or so. That was the end of day 1.
It's now 5:30 am and the light gong is being hit by the promoter riding a bike around camp and everyone slowly rises. They supply breakfast and coffee and at 7am everyone leisurely lines up for the start. It's off! I tried to hang with some geared guys but the mile long spring to the first climb left my 34/21 geared ass in the back 100 or so of about 300. Going up the first climb which is just a dirt road I slowly picked rider by rider off. 6 miles later and at the top it's descending down the other side...for like three miles! This dirt road stuff goes on for the first 30 miles or so and then wham! Single track. The first single track was an overgrown jeep road with no less than ten minutes of wide open descent. This is sketchy but fun, just hold it wide open! Some more Mt Washington like fire road climbs and descents and overall about 20 miles of crazy single track. Two miles of Waywayanda type uphill tech and the craziest by far downhill, high speed rock garden trails I have ever seen. I almost ate shit like ten times on two trails. Everything from ass over the rear fender to sliding pebbles to boulders. They had them all and most of them were minimal 5 minute descents. Almost no uphill single track. Off camber Ringwood type trails too, all down hill. I would get arm pump, numb hands and white knuckles. I made all of the climbs minus one at 45 miles and one in the 50s because I had no clue how long they were so I road up about 75% and the last 25% of each was walk 100 feet and ride a quarter mile, repeat. The last climb about 3 miles from the last aid station is about 1.5 miles and I was able to climb without incident. Towards the end you have Fisherman's trail which is 1/4 mile or so of bike over your shoulder type boulder garden. After that it's some small single track coal or pete moss trail along the river for 3 or 4 miles, a bridge over the brook that you need to walk your bike over and then a mile or so of road to the finish at the camp. I saw someone in the distance on that single track so I was basically at a wide open 130 or so cadence for the last 5 miles and was able to pick two geared riders off right at the finish line for 12th in ss and 65th overall. I then proceeded to the brook and took a cool down dunk, took some protein and ate a crap load of food. I finished officially in 9:29 but my garmin says 9:20? whatever. I peed once during the race. I stopped at aid stations 2-5 and drank a lot of liquids. Equivalent to ab out 18 large bottles all filled with Beta Red or Skrtch labs. I consumed the equivalent of 2 pbj sandwiches, 1/2 banana, 16 salt pills, 12 sports legs pills, 4 advil and 5 gu gels. I won't mention the after race food frenzy I was on as you will probably get sick.
I drove to Mt Creek this morning and raced cat 2 ss. Pretty uneventful minus the sweet holeshot to fade that I pulled. I sprinted as hard as I could and pulled a 30' gap before the pine trees and led my legless body and everyone else out of that section into the field. I was then passed by everyone immediately and wasn't able to recover until that first foot tall rock up thingy where Mike and the other dude messed it up . I passed Mike back there and then the other guy flatted. Apparently mike flatted behind me too. I wanted to throw it in after lap one but powered through and ended up on the podium at the last race. I rode down the greenhorn trail to the lodge and ate lunch with Mike Grant and my buddy Tony and his wife. Congrats to my buddy Tony (@Riggedfmx ) on getting his first win today and also Kevin Curie, Mike Grant and all the others on a great season. I received my NJ State Championship medal today as well. I'm spent, can't lift my arms or legs and just want to curl up in a ball.
I tried with the paragraphs, grammar isn't my specialty, really because time is not on my side. I'll upload some pics later.
On a side note I would like to thank @Mitch , @pearl , Jeff Mandell and many others for the awesome Wilderness 101 support and pointers. Thanks to everyone on this MTBNJ site for all the help throughout the year and putting up with some of my dumb crap, hopefully I am improving. This season really boiled down to putting in a lot of riding (2700 miles this year so far) and many people helping to push me. @Uzzi_SL , @pooriggy , @jShort , @Kirt , @Clapper , @woody , @jimvreeland , @jimmy g ,@Norm @Johnny Utah , @UtahJoe and my buddy @Riggedfmx for almost making the riding fun. I'm sure I missed a few names, but rest assured I am grateful for all the help and guidance.
One more race at Stewart next week and the race season is over. Don't forget to come out and do the 5k for schilling in lincroft on the 21st of August.
 

Pearl

THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING
killer stuff man. on my drive up when i saw the state college exit i thought of you and if you were dying.

that fishermans trail at the end is so silly, i dont even know how they call it a trail!

this is probably the second craziest double ive heard, Ryan H's Mohican 100 (i think)/bearscat 50 is still #1 i think!
 

Mitch

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Great job, great write up, great season.. Congratulations. Thats a tough race in 91' but you held your own...
the 9:20 on your Garmin is your "moving " time. the 9:29 is your overall time... Check your Strava , same numbers there.

Now that you popped ya cherry next year will be more funner...
 

xc62701

Well-Known Member
Ryan H's Mohican 100 (i think)/bearscat 50 is still #1 i think!

Yup that was a hard weekend. The events were hard enough and the 8 hour drive between made it ridiculous.

Good work on the double Dave! For me the worst part is getting out of the car to get ready for the second one. Kudos for sticking it out and getting some more rock practice in. The 101 has plenty of those too.

What do you say to those that call the W101 an easy race now? It's solid MTB territory.
 

Dave Taylor

Rex kwan Do
Great job, great write up, great season.. Congratulations. Thats a tough race in 91' but you held your own...
the 9:20 on your Garmin is your "moving " time. the 9:29 is your overall time... Check your Strava , same numbers there.

Now that you popped ya cherry next year will be more funner...
I thought if I didn't have auto pause on that was my actual time?
 

Dave Taylor

Rex kwan Do
Yup that was a hard weekend. The events were hard enough and the 8 hour drive between made it ridiculous.

Good work on the double Dave! For me the worst part is getting out of the car to get ready for the second one. Kudos for sticking it out and getting some more rock practice in. The 101 has plenty of those too.

What do you say to those that call the W101 an easy race now? It's solid MTB territory.
Bull shit!
 

Dave Taylor

Rex kwan Do
I'd say the heat never got to me. Maybe it was the last minute decision to take sodium tablets and all the bottles I kept refilling but in hind site I could have pushed harder. I think sub 9 was totally doable. I kept telling myself to conserve and then at the last aid station I just went all in. I lived in fear of cramping a bit, despite carrying some mustard packs with me. Next year I will be 20lbs lighter, a gear taller and rigid.
 

Pearl

THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING
LOL rigid, i think the heat got to you! did you forget about the Croyle Run descent? The ones that make your index fingers hurt? screw that!
 

Dave Taylor

Rex kwan Do
LOL rigid, i think the heat got to you! did you forget about the Croyle Run descent? The ones that make your index fingers hurt? screw that!
I know the decents would suck but I'd just do them slower. Judging by the amount of rigids in the top ten they obviously made up for it in climbing.
 

pooriggy

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Congrats Dave. You should have no problem getting sub 9 hour next year. You have kicked ass this year.
 

Mitch

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Wadsworth was top ss guy this uear with 7:11 vs overall winner st 6:57. Craziness!
And Quadsworth runs a fork. Just saying... don't get ahead of yourself here macho man.. I will tell you for a fact that you will make up more time descending with fork then not and the trade off for climbing would not equal the gain.. First you have to beat my times on this course then you can start dreaming big. You did great for your 1st run at it. Now you know how hard you can push next year. Try the NH100 next and see how that goes.
 
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