Granby – Surrounded by the din of power generators, RVs and vast support compounds, Fred Wilkinson’s race camp is spartan.
A small table buried with tools, energy bars and power drinks. A floorless tent. No chairs. No stove. No lights. No support team. No luxuries.
“It can’t be too comfortable,” said the 37-year-old mountain bike racer. “The idea is that it needs to be inhospitable. I don’t need the temptation.”
Wilkinson obviously relishes hardship. To reach last weekend’s second annual Kona 24 Hours Global Series mountain bike race at Snow Mountain Ranch outside Granby, the two-decade mountain biker pedaled from his home in Moab. Three days, 300 miles. Virtually all uphill, including one mountain pass. Towing a 50-pound trailer laden with his humble race-support camp.
After punishing himself with more than 100 miles of nonstop racing through pounding rain, near freezing temps and gear-clogging mud, Wilkinson mounted his trailer-tugging Santa Cruz bike Sunday afternoon and started pedaling – albeit slowly – back home. Same route. Another 300 miles in three days.
No time for rest. He had to be at work on Wednesday. Back on the bike, guiding guests for the Poison Spider Bicycles shop in Moab.
“I try not to think about it all together. When I was riding out, I just thought about getting here. Now, all I’m thinking about is the race,” he said as he organized his barebones camp Saturday, one hour before the start of the daylong race.
“All I hope is to ride a strong race. I’m definitely not thinking about getting home. I can’t really. It’s too much.”
Last year, Wilkinson did the same thing, commuting some 300 miles to the 24-hour race. Earlier this summer he rode from Moab to Crested Butte for a 100-mile race.
“I just really like the idea of riding a bike to a bike race,” he said, admitting that many ask him the simple question: Why? “I tell them I just think it’s a cool thing.”
But the single-speed ride he selected last year proved too much. He struggled on the ride to Granby. He bonked hard during the race. This year he brought a bike with gears. He carefully sculpted a barebones camp that would not encourage lengthy respites between laps – the race- stopping siren song for 24-hour racers – with a cozy seat or a warm bed. It still wasn’t enough to fend off the dreaded midnight bonk.
Sometime around 2 a.m. Sunday, Wilkinson dismounted and collapsed into his dirt-floored tent. He was done. Not even his secret power ingredient (licorice) could entice him back onto his bike. He logged eight 14-mile laps in almost 12 hours of pedaling.
“It was not what I hoped,” he said Sunday morning as he somberly packed his camp into his modified bike trailer, made for toting kids. “I was just frozen.”
He sensed his cognizance slipping in the darkest hours. He was getting disoriented, hovering dangerously close to dozing while pedaling. And in the chilly dampness of lap No. 8, he violated his firm stay-in-the-moment rule and started thinking about the long trip home.
“The thing that kept creeping into my mind was that all my stuff, all my clothes, were frozen and muddy and I would have to get back into those to get home,” he said, describing the thoughts that led him into his tent. “I’m from the desert. This cold and rain and mud is demoralizing.”
Weathering demoralization is the name of the game in 24-hour solo mountain bike racing. It’s tough in perfect conditions. It’s tormenting when the rain is freezing on your eyewear and the singletrack becomes a muddy Slip ‘n Slide.
Success relies on an uncanny ability to forget. Solo veterans seem unable to remember the suffering of the previous race and even the previous lap. They vow, like Wilkinson, to never return. And they show up again the next year.
But even the solo riders thoroughly tapped from nonstop pedaling shook their heads in amazement as Wilkinson pedaled through the dozens of support camps on his way back home.
“It’s pretty normal for him to do crazy stunts like this,” said Marco Ross- Bryant, who took the Granby race off to rest for a big race next month. “I think he’s staying with the roots of the sport. It’s all about riding a bike. He’s keeping it real. It’s old school.”
Last year’s race winner, Josh Tostado, is renowned for his late kick – a rare ability to conjure power at the end of an endurance race and pedal as if he just rolled from bed.
“I got no kick today. If anything, I’m kicking the bucket,” said the mud- splattered Breckenridge athlete, who finished the race second with 18 laps, two laps behind 42-year-old Mark Hendershot of Michigan.
The labors and tribulations of the best made some question whether sandwiching 24 hours of nonstop pedaling between a pair of three-day, 300-mile commutes is even possible.
“It was a crazy effort. Last year I was certainly impressed, but this year, I don’t know. I think it’s just too hard,” said Nat Ross, one of the country’s most successful 24-hour solo racers whose Tough Guy Productions organized the race. “I’m not sure it can be done.”
Staff writer Jason Blevins can be reached at 303-954-1374 or jblevins@denverpost.com.
