12 Hours of Mesa Verde

Last weekend Russ and I headed down to Cortez, Colorado for a 12 hour endurance mountain bike race (12 hours of Mesa Verde). We were entered in the "Geezer Duo" category (average age of 50) as "Team Stunt Double".

Pre-riding the course was so fun that it was hard to go easy.

Miles and miles of buffed out single-track.

                               

A great view that I never saw during the actual race

                 

                     Here is an interactive map of our pre-ride.

The venue was a fairgrounds with ample room for over 300 teams.

Russ was the Team Captain so I was assigned to start first. It was a LeMans start with over 300 crazed cyclists in cycling shoes running a few hundred yards to our waiting bikes. I dreaded it, but it was actually really fun.

 

2-way traffic in the tunnel was interesting. So was the Pirate theme. I did see a plastic pirate sword out on the race course. No doubt lost by a pirate biker.

Lucky for me, Russ is one helluva fast biker (and I don't mean geezer biker). We won our class by over an hour.

Here's a tip: don't let Durland run free with your camera. You will end up with some interesting pics!

Bonus! I saw the living legend John Tomac milling around the crowd after the race and asked if he would pose with me for my "wall of champions". He told me he wasn't in good shape and I believed him until I saw his lap times. Once a champion....

Stay tuned for the live action view of the race course. I wore my helmet-cam for an entire lap (lap 3)...............