Mid South Report: The Race: Part 1

The morning of Mid South finally dawns.

We wanted to be up and moving by 6:00am, but I did not awaken until about 6:20am. Our start time for the 50 mile course was to be about 8:10am, so we had a little time to get things done, which included some breakfast. 

Ben took it upon himself to cook all of us eggs and rice. Once we were all fed and ready, we piled into the truck which was pulling the trailer with our bicycles inside of it down to the start-finish area. 

I have not officially "raced" my bike since the 2023 Gents Race, and well.......I still haven't. Bobby Wintle has a certain number of free entries he holds back for special people/athletes. He had offered me one of these to get into the event. This is nothing unusual for me, I get offered to come to events with a comped entry all the time. The thing is, I almost never accept those invitations. 

I get that people have feelings about me and those are valid. People in charge of events sometimes want to express their feelings of thankfulness towards me via these comped entries, which I also understand. I just seem to have a problem with that when it comes to myself. I feel I would be taking away from the possibility that someone more deserving than I could get that entry. I also just don't feel "right" about it. I don't know that I deserve even more than I've already received from the gravel scene. Maybe I need to let that go...... There is also the obstacle of my Saturday work schedule at the Collective too, so even if I wanted to go partake in a free entry, I probably couldn't.

But the point is, I was not "on record" as a racer. Yes.....I rode it "bandit".  

The 100 milers take off as King Cabbage plays on the bandstand.

The Northfield crew is on their way.

Bobby had a great start set up. The band was playing, whose name is "King Cabbage", and they have a stout horn section. They played Rage Against The Machine's "Bulls On Parade". It was hair raising and fun. The band was also playing some good tunes as we left for the 50 miler. 

After leaving the noisy start-finish area, we meandered through the business district and eventually to the fringes of Stillwater. First gravel was on some rollers and on narrow, tree-lined roads. There were lots of folks around us so it was "be careful" time and I wasn't pushing the issue at this point. Just cruising along with the river of cyclists. 

It was chilly to start out, but I chose to go minimalist and only wore a long-sleeved wool jersey and bibs anyway. My toes were cold, not bad, and 100% tolerable, but my fingers were frozen. I was hoping the Sun would come out, but it never really did and overcast skies were the norm for most of the day. 

The weather! I'm telling you! Most times it is an issue for some reason or another, but the weather was 100% a non-factor at Mid South this year. No wind! None! The temperatures finally got to around 70 degrees, and I only felt hot for about an half an hour on the entire ride. I am of the belief that Mid-South will never again have such a perfect weather weekend, but I could be wrong.

Then there were probably more course-side spectators than I have seen at an event in a long while. Some especially cute young children were cheering us all on with their 'You can do it!" shouts of encouragement. They were my favorites. 

First gravel and a lot of riders

More of the initial miles of the Mid South

Things were going great so far with my Honeman Flyer. The gearing was perfect. I could climb and I could hold my own on the flats. I had the ability to sprint short distances to get around riders if necessary. I was pretty happy early on. 

There were two things that happened that morning that affected my race. One was "positive" and one was a negative. The "positive" one could be debated, but I'm saying this was good. See, Oklahoma is a legal state for marijuana products. Marty, who grabbed some "dosed" chocolate squares at the party Thursday night, handed me a half a square before we started. I did not know it was a dosed candy. I'm not mad about it either, and the thing did make me feel like I could ride like the wind, which is what I ended up doing, and I dropped the guys like a bad habit. 

I tried to rein it in, but the bike was so easy to pedal and I felt great working the hills. Anyway, the second thing, the negative thing, kind of took care of that. 

I was on my own at this point.

I was descending one of the rock-hard, cobbled up sections of the course when I heard something rattling on the bike. The seat tube mounted bottle cage was loose! I swung over to the right side of the road to address the situation. 

I had an issue with this before I left for Mid-South but I thought I had addressed it. The lower bottle cage bolt seemed to have bottomed out on something inside the seat tube and so I just put in a shorter bolt and it seemed tight, but apparently, it wasn't. I took the bottle off and put it in my jersey pocket, tightened up the bolts as good as I could get them, and then I remounted and moved on. 

Of course, by this time Ben, Michael, Marty, and Justin had all passed me by, along with probably hundreds of other people. Oh well! We were not looking to go fast, Ben had lots of stops planned, and I was sure to come across the guys at some point. Besides, I always end up riding alone at these events. So, what's new about this time? Same-ol-same-ol. 

A rider adjusting his bike along the course of the Mid-South event.

These roads are very unique.

So, a few words about Oklahoma roads around Stillwater. I'd never ridden there before and I was excited to see what the fuss was about with Mid-South and the course. I'd heard and read plenty over the years and so this was a real treat to finally do this thing. 

I guess I'd call the terrain a mix between Iowa and what I'd find at Gravel Worlds. Lots of punchy, shorter climbs but not just a few longer hauls with gentler grades as you might ride around Lincoln. The dirt was gritty and in places, blown out like powder. A red powder that was being whipped up by our bicycles and making strange rouge-like deposits on cheeks, noses, and arms and legs. 

There was some crushed rock, which seemed to be white, like Iowa's and only used for certain things like repairs or bridge approaches. This stuff was 100% familiar to me and I took to it like a fish in water. There were sections of grayer gravel which was sometimes pushed into the road's center lane, or would be humped up in between the classic three-tire clearings on your typical crushed rock roads. 

Not a lot of that is unusual, but what is different is how hard and rough the dirt road beds are. The descents are many, fast, and combined with the roughness of the roads, you'd better have everything battened down tight or it will vibrate loose! 

The "conga line" waiting to cross about five yards of wet mud.

I finally reached the checkpoint at about 28 miles into the event.

I rode alone through to the checkpoint where I hoped to find the guys I had been separated from. The racers had spread out a bit more as I was coming toward the checkpoint, but keeping track of where to go was easy. Just follow the leaders! 

The course featured lots of shorter climbs and descents which suited the single speed. I was still trucking along fine, but something was lost after the first time that I stopped and I no longer felt quite so invincible. 

At the checkpoint I ran across Rob Evans from Nebraska and some Cycle Works riders. They invited me over for some snacks.  I left to use the porta-potties and I realized that Ben and Marty were trying to find me. They were on the roadside where I eventually saw them. I told them what had separarted me from them and Ben offered some split washers he had which would secure the cage better. That worked out so I could carry the water bottle as intended. With that done, we readied to go again. 

The courses for the 100 and the 50 split off here. 100 milers went straight, 50 milers towards camera.

Even though we started together, I was off the back and seemed to be slipping back from the Northfield group. Then I made a wrong turn, or rather, no turn instead of turning, where I ended up having a half mile round trip correction. 

The course had a lot less riders on it since the 100 mile folks peeled off, and with no directions, I was left to see if I could either read the trail or watch other cyclists. That's the price you pay for riding bandit! 

I did get back on course and I eventually found the guys resting around a corner. Then we were off again, only now I found myself off the front again, and not being able to ride slowly enough to let them catch back on. 

We reached the point where in 2023 Ben and crew had a ditch-side oasis stop.

Ben had been talking up this stop he had done the year before where they had whiskey, snacks, and shade to share with riders. He wanted to do something similar again for 2024. Once we found the spot we planned on at least staying for an hour, maybe more. 

Next; The Race Part 2.