24 Hours on the Old Pueblo

Jesse and his four team members raced 24 Hours on the Old Pueblo about 10 days ago. The best perspective I can give you is that of a supportive wife! I didn't race, but I suffered right alongside this team!



A brief background: 24 Hours on the Old Pueblo is a 24 Hour race (go figure!), raced on a 16.1 (roughly) mile loop course. The course was built by snowbirds that really enjoy camping in the wilderness and biking all winter. It started 12 years ago with 170 or so Mountain bike racers, and this year, boasted 1,875 (again, these numbers are close, but not exact) mountain bike racers with a total of 3,500 people attending. Contrary to popular belief, it is not in Tucson. In fact, it's quite a drive when you're expecting it to be in Tucson! The closest town is Oracle, being an hour or so north of Tucson out in the desert.





To get there, you drive 20-35 miles off the highway on dirt roads out into the cactus-filled desert. The nearest human structure is a line of telephone poles and a gasline crossing the landscape. The PBAA establishes a campground area for the tents, campers, start/finish mark, and businesses to setup their wares. The majority of the people attending sleep and live in this "tent city" for three to five days surrounding the event. The 16 mile lap routes directly through the heart of this camp, flying past all of the tents, dogs, people, and food.










The race is a 24 hour mountain biking event. Based on the size, we were told it's the largest organized endurance mountain biking event in the world. I'm not an encyclopedia, so check your facts before you take my word for it! The event starts at noon on Saturday, and runs til noon on Sunday. Even though we arrived after noon on Friday, were given the boot and sent outside the tent city into 'overflow' camping because they ran out of room. "Overflow" camping was 3/4 of a mile down the dirt road away from everyone. I think there was only one other campsite near us. Guess the early bird does the get the worm! We were thankful for the seclusion though, because loud, blaring, upbeat music was blasted out of the main event tent throughout the campground all night long to keep the racers awake and pumped up. That would've meant less sleep than the little sleep we got!







Not every "team" that rides has five riders. They are in groups of 1-5 riders at most! You could tell it was the beginning of the event because everyone was excited and smelled like deodorant. After 24 hours of racing and sleeping in your own yuck, you don't smell deodorant as a rider walks by. Sweet pancakes and maple syrup filled the tent city from the vendors, and riders were working on tweaking the last noises out of their ride before it began.














You only compete against comparable groups of riders; i.e. five man teams against five man teams, solos against solos etc. The goal is to get the greatest number of laps in 24 hours.



At the start, the cyclists line up in the road with their bikes hung much farther away. At the signal, they take off in a foot race to get to their bikes first, hop on, and pedal off into the desert. This helps break up the large crowd at the beginning, and reduces injuries. The first lap time came in at just over an hour. When the race began, the wind had just started to pickup. After an hour, the winds were in excess of 40 mph gusts. After two hours, I was panicked our tent would fly away, with winds gusting up to 64 mph. This was quickly followed by driving, cold rain, 35 degree temps, and nightfall. Jesse's team lap times continued to come in around an average of 1.5 hours, which is great!

After the rains set in with the driving wind, Jesse's team members began to become very discouraged, and two other teams walked off with a DNF (did not finish). His would've nearly been that way if it weren't for their team captain, Brett Wham. On Jesse's team, each rider was supposed to take one lap, leaving four laps in between for their recovery. As night set in, and the recent riders were soaked to the bone with no dry clothes to put back on in 4 hours, they lost heart. Brett picked up three extra laps during the wee hours of the morning, 11 am, 2 am and 4 am I think. He was only supposed to do one, but the other two team members wouldn't ride again at night (one of them didn't have long pants or long sleeves to ride in, and the other had gotten the worst of the weather conditions and lost heart). After the sunrose, those members took their laps and then Brett finished the race. All in all, Jesse's team had 12 laps, with the lead team of five having 18 laps (the AZ Devo team, made up of kids under the age of 18). This put Jesse's team in 8th place out of 12 (with 2 teams not finishing).




We were tired, miserable, and cold, but every time Jesse or his mates got to do a lap, they got all excited again. Even though I froze to death, they all say they'd do the whole thing again if they could! That's hardcore....

But then we heard about the first place rider, who was a solo rider. He completed 18 laps in 24 hours with an average lap time of 1 hr 15 min per lap. Understand: 18 x 16.1 is 289 MILES on a MOUNTAIN BIKE in 24 hours. The farthest I have ever ridden is 112 miles, on a ROAD bike (which is much lighter and on easier terrain), let alone on a Mtn Bike with 64 mph wind gusts and rain for an entire 24 hours period.

And our family thinks we're the crazy ones? They are mistaken!

More adventures to come, thanks for the prayers and support!!

Kelly