Trans Iowa Stories: Changes And Evolution Part 1

Riders follow me out in the Europa Cycles shop van as the first Trans Iowa got underway. Image courtesy of Dave Kerkove

The first Trans Iowa started out right out of the gate with a controversial decision by Jeff and I to announce a "checkpoint cut off time" in Algona. This decision was met with a LOT of grumbling, especially when it was discovered that the day was going to be hard and elimination of numbers of riders from the event was going to be high due to this imposition. So, before the event was even over, it was decided that we wouldn't do that again. Not the cutoff time, no- that was staying. It was going to be announced well ahead of time if we were ever to do this event again.

Now, you might think having any cutoff is unfair, and not "how you or anyone would run an event", and that is perfectly valid and good reasoning for you. However; I will remind you of the influence of Mike Curiak again and tell you that "this event wasn't for you". So, with that said, here's why we had that set up.

Jeff Kerkove, as stated previously, was a 24hr endurance racer and as such, was very familiar with cutoff times. In fact, Trans Iowa was at first possibly going to be a 24hr event, but a quick session of math in the very beginnings of the event's life made us realize that was "super-human" territory. So, we had to rely on Jeff's knowledge of what it took to complete a 24hr MTB event, what sort of mileage was possible by the average finisher in the solo category, and then extrapolate that over our initial course length, factor in weather, cue sheet navigation, time for stops, and possible mechanical repairs. We arrived at a "ten miles covered every hour" formula to figure what time to set for the half-way checkpoint cutoff and for the overall time stamp of the event. Since T.I.v1 was shorter than any Trans Iowa afterward, the cutoff overall was 32 hours.

The cutoffs also did two other very important things- It kept riders moving, no time for sleep, and less temptation to cheat. Secondly, and most importantly, it kept us from hanging around all weekend and into Monday waiting for riders to finish. We had jobs to get back to, and vacation time wasn't a thing for either one of us. We already were spending a lot of money out of pocket, and losing a day of work? Not happening.

Drop bags, used for one year at T.I.v2, were an influence from the Dirty Kanza 200.

Another change or two happened due to my participation in the inaugural Dirty Kanza 200. That event, which had the original working name of "The Flint Hills 200", sent one of its co-founders, Joel Dyke, to T.I.v1, and both he and Jim Cummins, the other co-founder, strongly urged Jeff and I to come to their event. Jeff couldn't make it due to previous commitments, but after I experienced their "loop" style course, I advised Jeff that we should adopt that element into our Trans Iowa.

 We did not agree to use a loop course until v3 simply because the first DK200 happened after T.I.v2  However; I think the DK200 announced the drop bag thing ahead of T.I.v2 and we could see why drop bags made sense. For us, this eliminated the "pit crew" style support we observed during T.I.v1, and how some folks had escalated this into a highly organized part of their rider's experience while others did not have any such support at all. This disparity was a negative in our view, and we could see that if we allowed the practice to go unchecked, it would quickly become an outlandish situation. We already had folks running food orders, massaging riders, tuning up bikes, and swapping out clothing and gear. Jeff realized immediately that this was like the "best funded solo 24hr racer pits" and that this sort of thing was a clear advantage to have over those who couldn't afford such amenities. So, a simple drop bag was all the support you could have at v2. Whatever fit inside the drop bags we provided was what you could rely on.

Volunteers were another sorely needed addition to v2. Obviously, with Jeff's parents running the show at the checkpoint, and with Jeff in the event, I was left alone to run interference for the riders on course, looking for possible issues, and also to be a course observer in the end, with little to no sleep, and absolutely no experience in the matter at hand. This led to a very personal self-criticism when I felt I had fallen asleep briefly and allowed the winner, Ira Ryan, and second place Brian Hannon to go by me at my observation point without notice. What I didn't know, and would not ever have known without stumbling upon an obscure link on Ira Ryan's old custom bike website, was that he and Hannon did not go by me. You can read the details in my old post on Trans Iowa Ten Years Of Tales #4.

This fact led to all sorts of issues with myself and the Decorah folks, namely Richard "Deke" Gosen, who was pretty upset at our lack of organization. It should also be pointed out that had we been on the ball, like we eventually were for T.I.v14, Ryan and Hannon would have met the same fate as Gleason, Zitz, and Tomasello did. It wasn't that we were unwilling to enforce the rules we had, it was that we were incapable of doing so. That was on us, as I have said many times, so the results of v1 are official and only by hindsight and enlightenment from the participants after the fact do we get the true tale.

Anyway, I was impressed upon by all of those folks, by my experiences, and by my own pride to take things a few steps higher for v2. In fact, I had arranged for two folks to be "course watch dogs" nearer to the end of v2. I also had several folks lined up to be our finish line volunteers, but as everyone knows now, that wasn't necessary. Despite that, I knew that future Trans Iowas would need more folks to facilitate the running of a quality event. Thus the small crew we had at v3 and that continued on and grew until the last Trans Iowa where I had over a dozen volunteers.

Next: Changes And Evolution Part 2