The 24hrs of Cumming Report Part 1

The front of Sam's place in the DSM.

This past weekend was the annual 24hrs of Cumming, a gravel event based upon what the old 24hr mtb races were like where a team, or a solo rider, does a prescribed distance (or as many laps as possible in many cases) over a 24 hour time period. The 24hrs of Cumming is set up such that there are 4 loops of approximately 60 miles each. Sam, my Gent's Race teammate, invited me to partner with him in the 2 Man/400K challenge.

The weekend started off with my heading down to Des Moines, Iowa to hook up with Sam Friday afternoon. When I arrived at his casa, he gave me the tour and we downloaded my stuff into his Sprinter van for the trip the next day to Cumming, Iowa, which is just Southwest of Des Moines.

But first, we had to get ourselves checked in at the race headquarters, which was located at the Cumming Tap. There are bike paths right from Sam's place all the way down to the tap and it is about a 12 mile ride one way. It was great to get down there and back with Sam. We had a lot of time to chat and catch up. After we got back it was time to get vittles at Sam's own Krunkwich Ramen House. I highly recommend it if you are ever in Des Moines.

I decided to "eat like Sam" for the weekend and be vegan. It wasn't hard to do, and it was very tasty! You do have to think past your usual conventions and habits, which can be a good thing to make yourself do, I think. Anyway......

Then we had an "endurance podcast" session. Sam has his own podcast called "Cyclist- Not Biker", and I was his first guest! (NOTICE- this podcast is a bit "sweary", so you may not want to play it out loud in front of certain folks.) Sam doesn't have the marathon podcast up yet, but when it goes live, I'll put a link up. We didn't know we were going to record for two hours, in fact, we didn't really have a clear idea of what we were going to say. But it came out well. I covered Trans Iowa, promoter woes, the gravel scene as it stands today, and what I think will be its future and why. It's all in the unvarnished, raw, opinionated format Sam is known for, I think some of you might find it interesting.

The DSM skyline as seen out on Sam's balcony.

Afterward we chatted a bit more and then we hit the hay. No big rush, since the event didn't start until 11:00am. We would have plenty of time in the morning to get down to Cumming, set up, and then wait for the start, which Sam was planning on taking. He was going to do Leg 1 and Leg 3, while I would tackle 2 and 4.

 Our place of abode for the weekend's activities was a huge open area above the building the Cumming Tap is in.

 

 

Breakfast was had and we moseyed on down to Cumming and downloaded our stuff into the huge area above the Cumming Tap. Then Sam got kitted up and at precisely 11:00am he headed on out to tackle the first leg of the event for us.

Stay tuned for the Part 2 of this report tomorrow.