By Jim Smart, March 29-30, 2003
So I decided to do a little ride last weekend called the Oachita (pronounced wash it aw, with the accent on the first syllable) Challenge. This is 60 miles through the mountains of Arkansas. I would guess that about 40 of it is singletrack, a higher percentage than just about any other mega distance ride.
I decided to do the ride in December after visiting Arkansas to ride the Womble and other trails. It was a blast, some of the most fun riding anywhere. By the time I got home, I had to fedex my entry in, it filled almost 3 months before the event, not bad for an event with almost no advertising. The field limit was 250.
As the time was rolling up, the weather didn't look so great, and the drive looked really long (~14.5 hours from Gainesville, with a stop in Tallahassee
on the way up), and I started to waffle. I ended up figuring what the hell
and got in my car and drove. Am I ever glad I did.
I took my fixed gear hybrid piece of junk bike that is an absolute blast to ride. This bike is probably about 10-12 years old, had the dropouts hacked
to make is ss, and I decided to run it fixed. It has an 11 inch bb, so it can be a bit tricky to ride.
I arrived in Oden, AR the afternoon before the race and hooked up with a guy from Ohio to ride for a few miles. We rode up the starting climb (easy) and
a section of trail (tougher) and then turned around for a fun run back into
the race hq. The course was in prime shape, the weather turned out excellent, if a little cold for my blood, and I was stoked.
I tried to go to sleep early, but slept in the bunkhouse (mistake, don't do it, don't it). Finally fell asleep at 9:45 and was awoken repeatedly by
snoring and for good at 4:45 by the next guy's alarm (for an 8am start).
Ugh. I laid in bed for another hour and then chowed on pancakes and coffee to get ready. I rolled down to the start with about 15 minutes to go and
met up with some other ss'ers and people I had met the last time I was
there. People were pretty incredulous at seeing someone with skinnyish tires, a fixed gear, and drop bars (WTBs). Many told me later that they
didn't think I'd finish. I made a dash for a preride pee, and of course the ride started as I was jogging back to my bike.
I hopped on and started spinning away. The start was somewhat controlled and I was running a fairly big gear for offroad, 42:20, so I moved up to the
front by the time we hit dirt. We cruised up the fireroad climb and I went into the singletrack around 8th or so (out of 217 official starters). I
knew this wouldn't last long. The first singletrack was a steady climb, so
it was easy to stay with the two guys in front of me. There was some confusion at the next intersection as the course wasn't marked, but I quickly realized that if there was no person to direct us we were supposed to go straight. I lost some time on a long downhill, but made it up when some guys got confused at the next singletrack.
The singletrack was awesome as I knew it would be, but then we hit a long stretch of forest road where I lost time having to spin like crazy. A steep
climb back up and we were on singletrack again. I was following three guys
and we kept yoyoing for the next several miles, they would get a bit away on fast sections, and I would make it up on the slower bits. A couple of guys
caught up from behind and I let one pass, but the other guy, a singlespeeder
chose to stay behind me. It took him a couple of miles to realize I was on a fixie, I was proud of that.
We cruised into the first real aid station at about 20 miles and I slammed a banana and a soda. Another ss'er caught us and the three of us cruised
together for a while. There is one section where the trail comes out on a river bluff about 200 feet up and it is beautiful, but unfortunately I was
really starting to lose focus. I think it was the lack of sleep. This section of trail is really narrow and the consequences of a mishap could be
pretty big, so I was really careful, and a bit nervous. We finally got to a bit of an overlook and I just pulled over to eat. I was so out of it that I
didn't realize the fourth person in our train (who we had been talking to for a while) was also an ss'er until later when someone commented on how big
he was. I hadn't even seen him when he went by.
I sat for about 5 minutes or so and pushed up the next hill and to my surprise the two guys I had been riding with were waiting for me. Talk
about ss commaraderie. I've never had a gearie do that. We rode together to the next major road crossing, I had a bit more food and then one of them
was gone. He probably ended up sacrificing 10-15 minutes by hanging out with me, but he didn't care, he was having fun, and enjoying riding with the
crazy fixie. The next section was a bit slower for me and the remaining ss'er (Dean) until we got to the remaining sag stop where I got a turkey
sandwich delivered. That hit the spot.
The next section felt much better, being rolling with one moderate hike a bike and a fun switchback descent, mmmm switchbacks on fixed gears. We then
headed up the big climb to the Ouachita Trail, which had hike a bike for
everyone, and lots for some of us (me). As I was hiking I heard "hey jimbo", it was my AR buddy Jayson who had finally caught up. He had warned
me about flats at the beginning because of my skinny tires, and the karma
got him good. He had a flat while still on the opening pavement and had to wade through all the slow people on the beginning singletrack.
I stayed ahead to the top of the hike a bike and then hopped on and started cruising. I figured Jayson and his buddy would catch up as this section of
the trail was supposed to be rougher. This was also the last I saw of Dean until the end, he was hurting. I stayed ahead for a while and was cruising.
I even caught my first people in a long while. Then Jayson finally caught
up. We hit the long downhill a bit later and I figured I'd seen the last of everyone ahead of me. Well the course finished with 10 miles of road, 8 of
it paved and I just cranked up that fixie. I motored up the climbs and passed four people and caught my friend Jayson. I ended up finishing in a
bit under 7:30. I was pretty psyched. I finished 29th out of over 150
finishers.
This was one of the best run events I've done. $25 is a huge bargain for an endurance event (compare to $170 for Leadville, Vail, Brian Head, CCP, and
$100 for Shenandoah). If I had any complaints I would only wish for a
memento (like a t-shirt) and two sag stops in a tough fifty miler seems a bit sparse. You have to ride the toughest 20 miles after the last sag.
The drive back was uneventful except for the fact that I drove 9 hours straight without getting out of the car (ah the
wonders of a diesel Jetta). I was happy to be back home and happy for the experience. If you get the chance, do this ride next year, but just don't sign up
before I get my entry in.