September | 2022 | Mike's Outdoor Blog

Eastern Illinois is home to KMBC and Kickapoo State Park. Kickapoo contains over 20 miles of amazing MTB trails. For several years KMBC has put on a 6 / 10 hour entrance race. This race has been on my radar for a while but the timing has just never worked out.

A few weeks ago Trisha saw this race pop up on Facebook and asked if I was going to try it. She and the girls had stuff going on but it wasn’t anything I had to be involved in. Could it be that I was finally going to be able to make it to this race? After a few texts and emails to friends and team mates I found someone silly enough to join me.

Justin and I rolled out Saturday morning to head to what would be the longest race he had done to date. After registration we set up a nice spot in the shade for a couple of chairs and or coolers. For this race only laps that were COMPLETED under the 6 hours would count. Each lap was just over 20 miles long and ~90% singletrack.

As we lined up at the start line it appeared the 6 hour field was much bigger than I thought it would be. 54 people toed the line. There were only a handful that I knew, so I want sure where I fit in the pecking order. We set off up a quarter mile gravel road before diving into the woods. Our place up the road was high but not as high as I thought it would be. As usual there were folks going out way harder than they should, trying to get to a place in the line that they obviously had no business being in. I’ll admit I can be pretty judgemental when I see someone with a beer belly carrying a massive hydration pack trying to fight for a place at the pointy end of the race. After just a couple of miles Justin and I were safely by ourselves with a 15-30 second gap to the group ahead of us and about the same to the group behind. We set a place that seemed pretty sustainable but would keep us from getting passed. Justin was planning to hang with me at that pace for the first lap and see how he felt. Nearly 3/4 is the way through the first lap we caught the two ahead of us. One of them was Greg, a team mate of mine. The other was a strong looking fellow from Indiana. The door of us talked and stuck together for a couple of miles. As we came out to an open road section Justin came unhooked and dropped back a few seconds. Greg and I exchanged pulls down the road and I need him back into the singletrack. Indiana was just a couple seconds ahead of us and we caught him in short order. For the rest of the lap we worked together and I took the last pull into the timing/feedzone. Greg pumped a couple psi into his rear tire and I swapped out bottles. When we looked back Indiana was still checking out the feed table so Greg said to roll out.

Greg tucked in behind me as we started our second lap with a 30 second gap on our nearest competitor. At the start of the race I was concentrating on not getting taken out by an overzealous competitor to know where everyone was at. As Greg and I talked about our pace to ensure we didn’t get caught he informed me that there was only one rider ahead of us. Holy smokes, I was sitting in second place and riding with a team mate to work with! Half way through the lap we came to one of the longer climbs and Indiana was gaining on us. Greg said “don’t wait for me, Michael”. I dug a little deeper and began to walk away from Greg ever so slowly. I figured if I could get some separation Indiana would still have to get by Greg and cover the gap. I pressed on pretty hard for a few miles. In a few spots the trail doubles back next to itself and I got a good feel for my lead which was only 30-45 seconds. By the time I made the then and swapped bottles for lap three I only had 20 seconds on Indiana!

My mindset starting lap three was to open the gap or die trying. I don’t know what all happened behind me (I found out later), but by the half way point in the lap I couldn’t see any competitors in front or behind me. I kept pressing on despite the fact that my stomach wasn’t happy and my legs wanted to cramp. At one point I swallowed nearly half a bottle of Tailwind at once in hopes that it would get me moving again. 15 minutes later that Tailwind did it’s job and my legs came back. I was back on the gas instead of hanging on for dear life. I passed a few of the ten hour racers finishing their last lap and lapped several guys in my race that were still on their second lap. There was only one more section of singletrack left. About halfway through that section the trail passes near the entrance. As I passed I saw Justin enter and yell some encouragement my way. Several seconds later I saw Indiana. Justin had gotten past Greg and Indiana! Greg ended up sitting up and stopping after the second lap and Indiana was cramping so bad he was walking his bike up a climb so Justin moved into the place.

I crossed the line in second place a LONG ways behind Fader. Justin kept pace and took third.