Bonk Hard Chill 2012

As you may know, Robin has been on a doctor mandated 6 weeks off due to a broken tailbone, this past weekend was the end of the 5th week. Because of this, Chuck had to get a new partner, which would be me, who wishes to stay anonymous, so to protect the innocent, I will be known as Lula for this post.

So this is how the adventure starts, I meet Chuck at the same park and ride lot that he always meets Robin at. As I load my gear, he says, where are your bike shoes, and I of course answer, why they are in my van back at home 45 miles in the wrong direction. No worries though, check-in is at a bike shop and I need new mountain bike shoes anyway, I will just buy a pair. As we head onto the highway, Chuck says “you have your paddle, right” and I say, why no, it’s back at home with my bike shoes. Now Lula never forgets anything, but today she has forgotten two important items. It’s just a good thing that the paddle is optional, if you don’t have one, you can use one of the crappy canoe company ones, so that is what I would have to do. So I sat there for a while and mentally ran through my gear, luckily I had not forgotten any other gear.

So we make it to the Ozark MO, and to the OZ bike shop to check in. When we go into the store we find out that they had been robbed just a few days earlier and they only had two pair of size 10 men’s bike shoes. Time to go to plan B, I bought a pair of used platform pedals for 5 bucks and Chuck and I tried to put them on, but were unsuccessful because my current pedals were on too tight. We took the bike into the shop where the mechanic finally was able to loosen the pedals up and get them swapped. That was a load off my mind. So we got checked in and then drooled over the rack of Swiftwick socks, they must not have been out when the robbers were there, because it was one of the few things left in the store.

After some dinner, it was time for the pre-race meeting. Gary the race director was throwing out prizes into the crowd of racers, when all of the sudden a water bottle was flying right towards me, just as it was about to drop in my lap a guy across the aisle from me jumps over and grabs it. Man, it was just a water bottle, but I think someone saw what happened, and just after that I caught a flying rubber chicken. Well the rubber chicken is the best thing you can catch because you get to trade it for a really nice prize, so I got a Kuat water bottle lock, a very cool prize. Next the maps were handed out and we found out that we had to plot 29 points, that’s a lot of points. We also were told that we had a bike drop, but needed to keep our helmets with us. Chuck and I took that to mean, we would be caving, and guess what for once we were right, I mean Chuck was right, this was my first time racing with Chuck, so I never guessed about this stuff before. You will hear more about that later.

So bright and early Saturday, we dropped our bikes at the bike drop and headed for the start, where we parked in a muddy field, we were pretty sure we would be pushing the adventure van out of the mud at the end of the race. I was just hoping I would have enough energy to do that, otherwise, we were sleeping in the van. We grabbed our gear and headed to the starting line, stopping first at the Johnny on the Spot, while standing in line, Chuck says “oh, I have to run back to the van” and he takes off, when he gets back, I ask, “hey what did you forget” he says “nothing important, just the map”. I could just see us at the start, the gun goes off and we are standing there looking at each other, not knowing where to go.

The first few legs were trekking, they were pretty long, but the orienteering was simple, I think Gary planned it that way just to spread the teams out. The terrain was beautiful, there were so many places where we were trekking though giant rock formations, it’s too bad we couldn’t take our time and look around more.

We had no problem finding any of the checkpoints, as we headed to the first canoe CP, we came upon Team Orange Lederhosen, we passed them just before the water and from there on, I think it became a race between ROCK Racing and Orange Lederhosen. We went back and forth all day long, discussing the finer points of life, like how thick bacon should be, what kind of priorities a girl should have if she wants to have an adventure racing boyfriend, oh and if farting during a race will draw or disgust potential girlfriends. It was all very important stuff.

As I tried to get my wet hands into my canoe gloves, it wasn’t going well, Chuck just watched me, wondering just how many teams would pass us before I finally got those gloves on. Of Course Orange Lederhosen passed us, and Chuck finally took charge and pulled my gloves over my hands for me. So into the water we went and we stayed dry, but that didn’t last for long, at least not for me, every paddle stroke Chuck splashed me with water, I had to put up my hood, just to keep my head dry. It’s a good thing there was a rescue boot in the area, because we had so much water in our canoe, I thought we might sink.

We paddled our way to the next CP where we found out that we would be doing some caving, it was in the Bridal Cave, the name right there scared us, there was no way Lula would be marrying anyone in that cave. So with our helmets and head lamps on, we headed into the cave. It was about a quarter mile back in some really small areas and as we went, my headlamp kept getting dimmer and dimmer, I knew I should have changed those batteries. I was navigating with the light of Chuck in front of me and another team behind me. It’s a good thing I am short or I might have smacked my head on one of those stalactite rocks, like Chuck did, good thing he had a Hardnutz helmet on to save his head.

We made it back out of the cave, grabbed a honey stinger and ate it on the run back to the canoe. We then headed to CP 10, which was back near where we originally put the canoe in, as we rolled up to the floating dock, Chuck could see an orange jeep in the parking lot, he just knew it had to belong to Orange Lederhosen. Emma, who is either, the girlfriend, wife or groupie of one of the Orange Lederhosen guys was there taking photos, so Chuck yells is that your jeep. Chuck can’t help himself when it comes to Jeeps, he is one of those Jeep guys. It didn’t belong to Orange Lederhosen, but to another volunteer who was on the dock, so Chuck yells, “man that’s a nice jeep”. About 30 minutes later we made it to the canoe take-out and had to carry the canoe over a wall and up a hill, I think that was the hardest part of the entire race, but what made it worse was after huffing and puffing and almost killing ourselves to carry it up to the parking lot, one guy sitting in the parking lot, walks over, picks up the canoe, puts it over his head and carries it to the trailer and throws it on top, show off.

We head out to CP12 when we get to it, there is a note that says it’s at the top of the stairs, they were stairs that climbed up the side of a long rock face, there were 316 steps with some long walkways to get to the top. It’s a good thing I was Chuck’s teammate and not Robin, this would have killed her tailbone.

Soon we were at the bike drop, I was ready to go in no time since I had platform pedals and didn’t have to change shoes, Chuck was taking a little longer to get his shoes on, so while I waited, I ate a turkey sandwich, I was so hungry, it was like having king crab legs. We took off down the road, which was a good choice, we cut off the road and crossed a field, where we ran straight into the CP. Next we had to ride through some tough mushy terrain and then bike whack to the CP, we were passing teams that took another direction to get to the first bike point and of course we ran smack into Orange Lederhosen again, we just couldn’t shake them all day. Once we got back out onto the gravel roads Chuck stops right in front of us and jumps off his bike yelling something that we couldn’t make out, then he grabs a hubcap laying on the ground and says, this is the hubcap like the one missing on my van. Orange Lederhosen said they had duct tape and could tape it to his pack, but he declined saying we would drive back and get it after the race. So he throws it in the field and Derrick says “hey put it against the tree where you can see it” and Chuck says “no way, someone else might get it”. I’m pretty sure no one was going to drive by and take that hub cap. Then as we rode further I saw a Red Solo cup, oh and I bet you can guess what happened, that stupid Red Solo cup song was now stuck in my head.

We continued through the bike CP’s riding gravel and hills, it was almost all hills, We ran into a few dogs, they didn’t really chase us, just barked and ran in front of us mostly, except for the three dogs laying on the chewed up truck seat that was sitting in the front yard of what I would have thought was a condemned trailer, but someone was actually living there, it was just east of GOA WAY rd. The dogs barked, but I’m guessing they had chased enough adventure races that by the time we got there, they were too tired to chase us.

We also came across a few horses and one in particular did not like bikes or maybe he just didn’t like me and Chuck, but he was just jumping around making all kinds of noise, I’m glad he was in a fence, all the other animals we passed weren’t. By the time we hit CP29, both Chuck and I were ready to have our butts off those bike seats. We had figured that we would be given another O section and then a bike to the finish, but once again, wrong. The O section led us to the finish on foot. I have never been so glad to hear that I didn’t have to get back on the bike.

We quickly plotted the points and chatted for a minute with Orange Lederhosen, they had missed one CP on the bike, I guess they were riding too fast to see it. We headed out to the next O section and found ourselves trekking across some burned terrain, it was very rocky and black from fire, and it reminded me of the terrain that the tributes were competing in, in the book Catching Fire. If you haven’t read the Hunger Games series you should, so much of it will remind you of adventure racing. I’m glad I had on Swiftwick socks, if I hadn’t my socks would have been full of rock dust, but with these socks when I take them off my feet are as clean as when I put them on.

We picked up the first CP without a problem and headed to the next, it was a reentrant and there were about six teams all looking in the same place, it took about 10 minutes to find it, but we did. This was the only CP we had any problems with at all. It was starting to get dark as we headed to the next CP, so we pulled out our headlamps and I changed my batteries, since they had just about died while we were in the cave.

Another team was near us and we were all watching the time and contemplating if we could pick up both CP 34 and 36, and still make it to the finish line in time. Even with my newly bright headlamp I was having a hard time seeing, that usually happens when I get really tired. I had really been conscious of eating all day, I usually forget to do that enough and then end up bonking, but that wasn’t the case in this race, in fact, I had eaten two turkey sandwiches, HS waffle, HS Rocket Chocolate, Kind bar, two peach cups, and two V8 fruit juices. I probably ate more calories than I burned, but still I was body tired, but at least not bonking. We chose to go after CP 34 and then head in, the CP was out on a spur and we had to climb over a very large downed tree that was completely rotted out in the middle. After getting the CP and heading to the finish, I tried to get over the tree, but ended up just rolling over it on my belly. Chuck looked back, I can’t imagine what he was thinking, but he said, “what are you doing” I said “trying to get over this tree and I’m stuck” instead of pulling me over, he just says, “don’t fall into the rotted middle of that, you don’t know what could be living in there”. Shoot, here I am in the dark, I’m dog tired, stuck on a tree and he has to tell me something may be living right under me. Well, I did roll off that tree pretty fast after he said that. As we made our way down a jeep road headed for the finish a team came up behind us and Chuck asked them if they thought there was still BBQ left at the finish line. They said “We hope so, that’s why we are trying to pass you, we want to get to the food before you do”

The team passed us and finished and we were just a few yards behind them, then we turned in our passport and had our photos taken, we had finished! Oh and the food, Chuck and I both had some BBQ, but it was the bottom of the bucket and Orange Lederhosen got the rest, we barely made it in time for the food and it was totally worth it. Emma was looking for Orange Lederhosen and asked if we saw where they went, we said nope, they just got their food and were gone. Emma says “You give them whiskey and they just disappear”, we are still laughing about that.

We look pretty spiffy in our new Team Cyclery jerseys, I mean I (Lula), look pretty spiffy wearing Robin’s new Team Cyclery jersey. I know, I look incredibly like Robin, we might be related somehow. And we didn’t go get the hubcap, because Chuck is trading in his adventure van for an Adventure Jeep. Which is a whole ‘nother story……

Favorite Things - Gear Review

By: Robin Rongey with Chuck's Comments in Red

Every year Oprah has a favorite things show, so I thought I am the Trek Mountain Girl, and half of ROCK Racing, so why shouldn’t Chuck and I have a favorite things Post. We lean somewhat towards gear when we talk about our favorite things, but we do stray a bit. So let’s just say this is a Favorite Things – Gear Review. We hope you find this interesting and that you may even want to try some or our Favorite Things out.

Trek Top Fuel

One of my favorite mountain bikes is the Trek Top Fuel, I know that it is the age of 29er, but there is still a place in my heart for the old school 26er. My TF rides smooth, shifts so well that I hardly even here a chain click, it is super maneuverable and the front shock lockout on the handlebar is a feature I can hardly live without. It’s kind of like upgrading in a car, once you have the extra’s you never want to live without them again. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not knocking my Superfly, it has its place in my heart, but my true love will always be my Top Fuel.

Trek Superfly

So Robin still likes 26” bikes. Not me. I’m sold all the way on 29ers. And the top of the line 29er is my Trek Superfly. It is light, fast, and maneuverable. It climbs any hill I point it at. It’s tough too. All that talk about carbon frames not handling crash damage is wrong. I’ve crashed it several times and the only damage so far has been a bent hanger and a crushed rear derailer. I can ride this bike for hours and hours, it is hard to believe it can be this comfortable on top of the speed and toughness. I have only made a few mods over the year I’ve owned it. A wheel and tire upgrade and a carbon handlebar, just improving on perfection.

Ice Breaker Everything

I can’t even begin to tell you which of my Ice Breaker gear I like best. I might say the base layer, the bike shorts, the running shorts or the socks, but then I would be lying because I can’t live without the running shirt, bike jersey, hat or gloves. Still I can’t say they are all my favorite, because I wear my IB casual v-neck t-shirt every time it is clean. The Marino Wool is so soft and doesn’t itch at all, and if I were to see this gear on the street, I would not even know it was wool. This is not your old school wool, but your new high tech wool, that is warm in the winter and cool in the summer, while wicking away sweat and never feeling wet and slimy. There is nothing I would rather workout and race in than my Ice Breaker gear.

She is right on about IB. My favorites are the 200 base layer and the bike shorts.

Honey Stinger

Waffles, Waffles, Waffles, that is all I have to say, I could eat them for breakfast, lunch and dinner, add a little ice cream in-between two waffles and you have dessert. I still love my Rocket Chocolate and everything else Honey Stinger, but Waffles are by far my go to food, anytime, anywhere.

The waffles are amazing. They came out with some new flavors this year. I wasn’t sure about the strawberry flavor when I first saw it, but after I tried it, I like it too. Not a fan of the vanilla though.

Ultimate Direction Water Bottle

When we decided to do a post on our favorite things, I started thinking about which gear I use the most. Socks, Shoes? Yeah I use those a lot, like everytime I run, but I switch off between road and trail shoes. My Ultimate Direction hand held water bottle goes with me everywhere. We are always told to buy new shoes every 400 miles or so. This bottle has outlasted multiple shoe trades. I can’t even begin to guess the mileage this bottle has on it. 2000m, 3000m, or more, and still going strong. The 20 oz BPA-free polyethylene molded bottle fits my hand perfect and the adjustable strap with the small pocket keeps it all secure. But the best part of the bottle is the leak proof Kicker valve. All this mileage and still no leaks.

Hardnutz Helmets

Unfortunately, a helmet is something you don’t always want to use, but you have to. I never ride without one, no matter how hot it is. Here’s the thing, I don’t mind wearing my Hardnutz Rock Hard helmet because it is so breathable and comfortable, and because of that I have to sometime reach up to make sure I have it on. Besides that, it is a really cool looking helmet, with a marbleized stone look to it, which makes it the perfect helmet for ROCK Racing.

Nike Cycling Jacket

This has to be the single most used item I have. I received this jacket as a Christmas gift about four years ago and let me tell you, I have used it to no end. It is great when it’s super cold outside, I wear a base layer and a jersey under it. When the temps fall between 30-40 degrees, I wear it with just a base layer under it. This jacket has been washed about a 1000 times and still looks as good as it did on day one out of the package. It is warm, yet breathable and although it is not advertised as wind proof, it sure does a great job blocking the wind. Unless I get too fat to fit in it, this jacket will be a staple in my winter wardrobe, at least until it falls apart.

XX2i Sunglasses

These glasses are not only cool looking and make the ROCK Racing girls look hot, (the guys are something other than hot) but they are also functional, comfortable and crystal clear. I love the styling of the USA frame, not as much for racing as for just wearing around, I wear mine everywhere. For workouts though, nothing can beat the France frame. What I like about the France frame is that it has an open bottom that lets air circulate and my glasses don’t fog. Another great feature of the XX2i is the ease of swapping lens, I can pop out the clear lens and put in the yellow lens, in just seconds and that is all the time I have while out on the trail. With adventure racing you are out day and night, you need to be able to have glasses that adapt easily to the changing light and these glasses do. As far as safety goes, let me tell you this, in my last race, I was smacked hard in the face by a thorn branch, my eyes had no injuries and my glasses didn’t even have a scratch, I feel good knowing that these glasses can hold up under all conditions and protect my eyes. Oh, and I have to say that the white pro athlete version of the glasses, not only make me look cool, but I swear when I have them on I race faster, I’m not sure if I’m faster because I think I look cool or if it’s the crystal clear lens paired with no fear of injury, but whatever it is.. Fast is always good.

Quik Trip (QT) Soda

I am a diehard Diet Coke aholic and have even had to make new years resolutions to force me into cutting back on my diet coke consumption in past years. I have a new twist to my diet coke issues now, it’s called QT build your own soda fountain. Not only can I have my diet coke, but I get it with my own twist. I have profected the mix. You need the perfect amount of ice, followed by the perfect amount of cherry and then topped off with the diet coke. Very few people know the formula, but lucky for you I am going to show you how to make the perfect cherry diet coke. I should probably patent this mix and sell it, but for ROCK Racing readers, I will give it to you for free.

Doris, ROCK Racing’s favorite lunch lady

Have you ever eaten somewhere and became attached to one of the employees, well Robin and Chuck have. Her name is Doris and she makes lunch very entertaining. First she has a personality that some people may not get, but we do. She seems a little gruff when you first meet her and if you ask her how the food is, she will say “shitty” and if you ask her how she is, she will say “shitty”. Oh, but she makes the best home cooked meal around, meatloaf to die for, and chicken fried steak, smothered in gravy. She even puts out some really good peach cobbler once in a while and if by chance you get her to take a liking to you, she will make sure you get some. So if you ever get to St Louis, head down Lindbergh, about 2 miles from the St Louis International airport and stop in at Mattingly’s for lunch, I know you will enjoy it.

Andy Gibbs, ROCK Racings favorite bike Wrench at our favorite Bike Shop

If you are ever in the Edwardsville, IL area, you have to head over to the Cyclery and check in with the #1 bike mechanic of all time. Not only is he a top rated mechanic, but he is also a certified coach and bike fit technician and to top it off, he is an expert mountain biker. Andy has setup the fit of our bikes to perfection and also fixed them every time we crash them. He always explains everything he does and shows us how to do repairs on the trails. As a bonus, he gives up great training tips. Don’t miss out, if you’re in the area, stop in and see Andy! Be sure to check out the Cyclery too, it’s our favorite bike shop and I know they will have anything you need on hand.



And if you are in need of a new bike, you won’t find a guy that knows more about the components that come spec’d out on all the models they carry. There are a ton of decisions to make on a new bike and you want the best to help make them. Plus you might score big time and get the chance to buy Andy’s ‘last year’ race bike with all the perfect upgrades like Lori did!

Castlewood 8hr 2011

By Robin Rongey, Chuck Vohsen comments in red

At the beginning of 2011, Chuck and I decided that we would skip the Castlewood race and instead be volunteers. Our thought was, we always race, time to give back to those that volunteer so we get to race. Our plans changed though. You see Gerry the race director at the Thunder Rolls Adventure race gave this really nice speech about getting more people into the sport that we all love, and how it is really hard to do your first race. That speech got us thinking, why not get a bunch of people who are always asking about adventure racing, but are afraid to try it, and just make as many teams as we can and stick together the entire race. This way, they have veteran racers guiding them and helping solve problems along the way. It was going to be an adventure race clinic held during a race. So as my friend Patrick calls it, the Castlewood Experience came to life.

I sent out emails to everyone who had ever asked us about adventure racing, and soon we had 10 racers committed and ready to go, including Chuck’s son Jacob and his wife Lori, it was kind of a family affair for him.

Before the race I tried to give out as much advice as I could, on what to bring and what to wear and what to eat. Chuck said, “they are going to be really good at this because we are giving them everything we had to learn by mistake”. You know what, they all did really well, with only a few mishaps, read on to hear about it in detail. Oh and Chuck and I decided that we all needed ROCK Racing shirts, so we had my brother Joel, make us a bunch for them for the team. Everyone on the ROCK Racing teams are also Metro Tri Club (aka Team Godzilla) members, so Green fit well with the Team Godzilla theme.



So let’s start at the beginning. Once we had commitments from everyone, we entered the teams and started planning our strategy. We had a 2 person male, Chuck and Jacob, 4 person co-ed, Robin, Keith, Gary and Patrick, and a 4 person female, Jenny, Lori, Judy, and Vanessa. Questions came and answers went out and before we knew it, it was the night before the race and we all met at the Alpine Shop to sign in. Sign in came off without a hitch and we saw a couple of our favorite teams there, Alpine Shop and Orange Lederhosen. We chatted about the race and everyone was excited for all the new racers. Have I ever told you what a great group of people adventure racers are, they sincerely want new racers in the sport and will do anything to help any team out.


All the maps we received at check-in were plotted, except for 3 points, so we all drove down to the McDonalds and plotted points, Chuck and I teaching the new racers how to plot. We finished quickly and headed home, those of us who were driving from home in the morning had a long drive so we needed to get to bed, although the best plans never work out, I don’t think I got to bed until almost 11 pm.

At 4:30 am I walked out of my garage thinking I had a few minutes, but found out that Jenny and Patrick were already waiting for me. So I quickly threw my pack in the van and we all hopped in and took off for the race. You see this is where things started to go wrong, but you have to think fast with adventure racing, so when we were about 5 miles from my house and I realized that the bag with my clothes was still at my house, I didn’t worry, I just stopped at Wal-Mart and bought some clothes. Really it wasn’t so awful, it was mostly just dry clothes to wear home, I had all the required gear on or in my pack. Plus the Wal-Mart stop gave us time to use the bathroom and Patrick bought some bananas.

Our next stop was the bike drop, it was packed with racers dropping off bikes, it only took us about 10 minutes to drop the bikes and another 15 to make it to the start. At the start we saw Laura and Jason, the original owners of Bonk Hard Racing, they were parking the cars, weird seeing them as volunteers and not running the show, but they were great volunteers and we were just happy to see them. We got a pretty good parking spot, it was still dark out, so all you really saw were head lamps bobbing all over. I walked right past Chuck and didn’t even see him. We all headed to race headquarters, picked up our passport and hit the bathroom for about the 10th time. And get this, there was such a mad rush to draw first blood, that the race had not even started and Judy was bleeding, don’t ask me how it happened, I just know there was blood.

Chuck: Jacob has a great name for this situation. You find yourself bleeding but not exactly sure how it happened: Anonymous Blood. Haha, would make a great adventure race team name.


It wasn’t long before we were singing the national anthem, and who knew, but Keith can sing, I mean I knew Gary could sing, but had no idea Keith could too. I tried to keep my voice low as to not draw any attention to how bad I sing. After that it was time to play ball. We all scooted to the starting line and the gun when off and there we were all three ROCK Racing teams, the Rebels, Renegades and Trail Rats, all racing for the 1st CP.


We made it through some tough hills and the first 4 trekking points without a problem, before we knew it we were at the bikes and ready to ride. There was a ton of riding in this race, more riding then we have ever had in a Castlewood adventure race. We were hoping this would work to our benefit with all the new racers. I was happy knowing that I had brought my Trek Top Fuel, it was perfectly suited for this type of ride where I could ride the single track and just hit the switch on my handlebar to lock out the shock when I hit any pavement.

The bike leg started on the Green Rock Trail in Greensfelder Park. These trails have some really long steep climbs and super rocky sections, but they are so fun to ride. Some of them are even marked with black diamonds. Well that is my opinion, I think Gary felt that way too, he was a little worried about the bike coming into the race, but my gosh he was flying through the trails like he knew what he was doing and feeling good, trying to think of how he could talk his son into doing a few of these adventure races with him.


Jenny was right there with Gary, I could tell she really liked the trails, I think I might be able to talk her into going back out and riding them with me sometime.


Keith was chomping at the bit to ride faster staying right on Chuck and Jacobs wheel and of course Patrick was doing all kinds of stunts, I was just waiting for him to crash, he crashes more than anyone I know because he is just crazy when he gets on a bike.


Judy was right there with them too, I’m sure she thought she might see the Patrick crash, come on we were all thinking it. I was just glad to know that when the crash happened I would be able to see it in high definition since I was wearing my super clear XX2i glasses and if by some reason I was taken down in the crash, at least I had my Hadnutz helmet on, so I would probably live to write about it. I’m not sure Vanessa felt the same way about the single track being so much fun.


Vanessa went down a couple times, but she got right back up and got back on the horse.


It reminded of me of my first mountain bike race, it was a six hour solo race and I crashed 38 times in 6 hours and finished covered in blood, but my gosh I paid for 6 hours I was racing six hours, so I know exactly how Vanessa was feeling and I knew the team would do everything possible to help her through.

Lori on the hand was not having too much trouble at all. We started to figure it out, Lori was riding Andy Gibb’s old bike, she had just bought it from him a few weeks earlier. Now, for those of you that don’t know Andy, he is somewhat of a local mountain bike hero. He is a super fast expert racer, who wins all the races. He had a great Giant Anthem mountain bike, but needed to sell it because he was going to be racing on a team that rode Treks. Lori, who just happened to ride the same size frame as Andy was in the market for a new mountain bike and was lucky enough to score Andy’s. Someone asked Lori if she got a new bike and she said, yes, this is Andy’s old bike, well the crowd went wild, the knowledge that Lori was riding Andy’s bike filtered back through the team and everyone was commenting on how Lori could just hang on and a bike like that would do all the work, and to that point it was. Lori said “like in the movie Toy Story, where Woody has Andy written on the bottom on his shoe, I’m going to write Andy on the bottom of my bike”.

Even with all the Luck of Andy’s bike, it’s kind of like the luck of the Irish, Lori managed a crash, and you know it’s not a good ride unless there is blood and mud, so she was really just keeping with tradition. I was behind her when she went down and I heard her knee hit a big rock, I was really worried about it and said stay down, but when she turned her head and looked at me, there was blood everywhere, her knee wasn’t even a thought.


The handlebars had reached out and struck her right on the chin and she had a gaping hole in her chin, it looked really bad and blood was everywhere. She had her Icebreaker base layer on and the blood was running down her shirt. Funny, the things that go through your head in a situation like this, but I thought, I guess we will see how well you can get blood out of Merino Wool. I need to ask her how it came out of the wash. So Vanessa being a good nurse pulled out the first aid kit and got it cleaned up with some iodine and put some butterfly bandages on it, she did a really good job, even the doctor that fixed Lori up after the race said that the field dressing on it was really great. So yep, Lori got up like a true ROCK Racer and finished the race, then went to urgent care, where her family members seem to be regulars and got her chin super glued back together.


As all this was happening, like all great teammates we were cracking jokes about her crash and how no one better tell Andy that she crashed his bike. And of course I let her know how she stole my thunder, I can’t even write about my broken tailbone now, it just seems trivial.


We all got back on our bikes and made it through the single track section and out to the road.


We picked up a few more CP’s after stopping at a gas station for some food. Well you see I may have forgotten my clothes, but Judy forgot her food, so we had to load up at the Quick stop. See I’m not the only goof on the team.

Soon we hit the CP right next to the train tracks and Keith with the help of Patrick, found 10 railroad spikes, then piled them up next to the CP and went back after the race to get them, so that we could all have a souvenir of the race. I still can’t figure this guy thing out, last race Chuck was picking up used mortar shells and this race Keith and Patrick were picking up old railroad spikes, I guess it really is a guy thing. Chuck and I are now trying to figure out how to paint or engrave the race name and date on them.




We made it to CP 15 where we were surprised by a Bike-O course, we plotted the points quickly and headed out for the points, they were actually pretty easy points, all on road, except for the last one, it was down a narrow trail. It didn’t take long and we were back to the TA and headed for the river. At this point Chuck stopped to check his map, Chuck is like a human Garmin, and we just follow him around blindly waiting for him to say “in 200 meters turn left”. Well as he was arranging the maps, I heard, not in a St Paul Chuck voice, but an Adventure Patrick voice, “Recalculating”, we just all busted out laughing, because it doesn’t get truer than that.


It took a while to get the canoes in the water, we had to first take the front wheels off our bikes and then load two bikes in each of the canoes and that was after carrying the canoes all the way down to the river.


We all quickly grabbed food while loading the canoes, I had a Honey Stinger Rocket Chocolate, but I saw sandwiches, nuts, HS gels and fruit cups out. Keith, who is not used to eating during a race, said, “I have never been so full during a race before”, it’s crazy how much food it takes to get through an Adventure Race.


Once we sucked down some food, we were loaded and ready to go, but no one was as ready as Jacob. You see Jacob has youth on his side, this may have been his first race, but when your 14 years old, it’s easy to be like the energizer bunny. At every CP, Jacob would be watching and as soon as the last team punched the CP, he would say “Ok, let’s go” and he was off. My gosh! he was up front next to Chuck almost the entire race. Plus he looked so cool in his XX2i glasses, I really think they made him faster.


On the water, things were going pretty well, except that at one point Judy and Vanessa were floating backwards down the river, then there was a little issue of T-boning Lori and Jenny at one of the CP’s, but hey, no one ended up in the water so all was well.


We were soon floating under a train trestle and there was a train on the tracks, I tried to get it to honk, but it just gave me a little beep, but get this when the 4 girls came under the train it blew the horn super loud. I’m kind of thinking that having Keith in my canoe was really cramping my style, how do you get the train engineer to give you a good toot with a guy in your canoe, it just doesn’t happen. In Keith’s defense, he was sort of doing all the work, paddling hard while I was busy taking pictures, so I guess having a guy in the canoe isn’t all bad.


We soon made it to the beach where we pulled our canoes out, put our wheels back on our bikes and also had a gear check. While in gear check everyone had to show their headlamp and Keith couldn’t find his, he poured his entire pack out and finally found it. You could just see him getting frustrated because he knew he had it. What is really funny is that Keith is the most organized guy you could possibly know, he is the guy that keeps it together for everyone else and to see him not find something was so crazy. I guess we all have those days, I just never thought Keith did.


So with gear check complete, we all passed, we started carrying the canoes up the hill. If I were going to whine about my tailbone this is where I would do it at, but since Lori trumped me with the whole chin incident, I guess I can’t whine. So we carried the canoes up the hill and lucky for me the boys felt sorry for my all but forgotten tailbone and grabbed my canoe and took it to the top of the hill. Thank you so much boys, that was really nice of you. The beach was really muddy, so there you go, you now know what a great day it was, because now we had mud and blood. But really, the mud was in all of our bike cleats and we had to stomp around and try to get it out so that we could clip in for the next bike section. It was kind of like a really bad rendition of River Dance.

So after all the dancing was done we were on the bike riding down the trail, we even passed the little train on the tracks with the conductor working on it.

Chuck: Stop right there! None of the men-folk were dancing, we stomped the mud out.

Patrick said he might want to throw his bike on the train and have that conductor take him to the finish. Oh, but we are not quitters so that never happened. I think Patrick was onto something though, he knew that the Alt Road hill lie ahead. I have ridden the Alt Road hill before and I knew it was bad, but I had kind of forgotten about it. You know like after having a baby, you say, I will never do that again, then, before you know it, the joy of the baby makes you forget the pain and you do it all over again. Well, it’s like that, the joy of finishing the Castlewood race of a few years back, took away the memory of how bad that hill was, but guess what, I along with my teammates got to live the glory of the Alt road hill again. I’m pretty sure I’m not going to forget how hard it was this time, well at least until the next time I do it. The good news is we all made it to the top without the use of an oxygen tank, Jacob staying right up front. Then we were afforded the glory of the ride down the other side of the hill, it was so great, I was rolling at over 30 mph. This was also the point where we found out the limits of youth, Jacob was finally wearing down, I think he said he was tired and he was riding further back in the pack. So it took 8 hours and 3 minutes, plus the Alt Road hill to put the hurt on Jacob. Next race, I think we should make Jacob ride Alt Road Hill right off the bat, maybe then we will have a little leverage.

It seemed like it took forever to ride to CP 22, but we finally made it and when we got there Jason, Laura and Carrie Sona were working the CP. We picked up a new trekking map, checked on time and joked around with Jason about not having enough reentrants on the course. If you had competed in the Berryman race, you would understand why this was a big joke, every single clue for the Berryman race was reentrant and reentrants are not always easy to find. We told Jason we knew he didn’t setup the course there wasn’t enough reentrants on it.


So we had 50 minutes to be through the finish line, so we headed out hoping to get 3 CP’s, but quickly found out that the team was dragging. As we headed into the woods, we saw Team SLU, who we happen to know as Andrew and Aimee coming out of the woods with all the CP’s, they wished us luck and headed to the finish line.


We trekked through the woods to the top of a very long steep hill and found the CP, Jacob, Jenny and I were the keepers of the passports all day, so we not so quickly punched the CP and decided to call it a day, better to get back with only one CP out of the bonus O-section then to miss the cutoff.

We all ran across the finish line with Jacob and Patrick sprinting it out to the end. What a motley crew we were.


So after some pizza and beer, it was cold diet coke courtesy of Mr Keith Timmins for me and Lori, the two Diet Coke Alcoholics on the team, we hung out and waited for awards, that is after I put on my brand new Wal-Mart clothes, yeah I was styling! Guess what, our girl’s team, ROCK Racing Rebels, won first place and picked up some great gear, including some cool Yurbuds.




I want to thank God for the great weather he gave us, the volunteers for spending their day working so we could race, Mr Timmins for the Diet Coke and Bonk Hard Racing for putting on such a great event.

One last thing, I think most of the team is hooked and will adventure race again, although one member said he would prefer to do it in the summer, because if we hadn’t been so lucky with the weather and had the cold and rain that came the next day, we may have lost him on the course.

Psycho 43 in 4 Minutes

If you want to see the race first hand, take a look, it's almost like you're there.

Psycho 43

Report by Robin Rongey, with Chuck comments in orange:

Dirty Kanza? HELL NO! Hahaha every race she swears off, ends up becoming her favorite.  Anyone got a cross-bike for sale?  Oh and I guess you want to know why I say this. Just fifteen days after a bad break to my tailbone, I along with my ROCK Racing Teammate, Chuck competed in the Psycho 43 in Milford Kansas. It’s a long story that starts like this.


Chuck and I registered for the Psycho Expedition Adventure race months ago, it was to be our last race of the 2011 Checkpoint Tracker series. The problem was when race day came, it was 15 days after I broke my tailbone and I was just barely starting to do very short workouts again and had not even attempted to sit on a bike. I had not been to the doctor since breaking it, but I did not want to miss the race and Chuck had no backup for me, so it was me or we both had to bow out. If you know me, you know I can’t walk away from any challenge. When I asked my manager at work for a vacation day, so I could go to the race, he said “I’m sure you are doing this AMA (against medical advice)”, I just smiled. It was better not to answer that. So I had a plan, I just had to get it past my doctor.

I saw the doctor on Thursday morning, where he told me I could start doing regular tasks as long as I could stand the pain, I took that to mean, I could do anything I wanted as long as I could deal with the pain. He was not real happy with me, but he said he knew I was going to race, so he told me what meds to take and when, and then he said “You are the toughest person I know”, but we all know, there is a very fine line between tough and stupid.
I bet the doctor was afraid to tell her no.  Can't you just imagine her on the edge of the exam table ready to pounce on the poor guy and start choking him?

I went home that night and finished packing for the race, that was because I was so sure I was going, I had already packed my bike and camping gear in Chuck’s van. On Friday morning I met Chuck and we headed for Kansas, flat Kansas, as we believed it to be. Ha Ha, it is so funny to say now. I just want to know, who started the rumor that Kansas is flat, because they should be slapped. We drove through the Flint Hills and the barren prairie, talking of how this race was going to be so easy and we were going to finish in no more than 16 hours, although we had 20 hours to complete it. What is really laughable is, the entire time as we were making plans to smoke this race, I was wiggling around in my seat to try and get my tailbone to stop hurting, like it would magically be fine when I started racing. We drove past the Ft Riley Military Base and into Milford, still completely clueless to what lay ahead.

We went to the campground, setup our tents and headed for race check-in, where we received our maps, all six of them and some notes on changes to the race course due to impending weather conditions. It was expected to be incredibly windy on race day, so two canoe points on the big lake were cancelled, which put the race course mileage to 85 miles.


We started plotting maps, which usually takes us 1 to 2 hours, but there were so many points and only two of the six maps were of good quality, so it took 3 hours to plot the points. I hate blurry photocopy cardstock maps!  Some of the points were hard to understand, so we conversed with Team Orange Lederhosen, who was also competing, they had similar questions, but we got it figured out.


We headed back to camp for a few hours sleep before the bike drop at 4:30 am.


I could not sleep, due to both nerves and one sore butt. I think I slept 15 minutes the entire night, plus it was freezing and I had not brought a warm enough sleeping bag. Apparently Chuck had the same issue, he was freezing all night and didn’t sleep well either. I’m now asking for a zero degree Big Agnes sleeping bag for Christmas this year. We made one last check of our packs and loaded the Supefly and Top Fuel  in the truck at the bike drop, then headed to the starting line where we got last minute instructions and we then scrambled into a bus for a 45 minute bus ride due North.  I couldn't stay awake at all for the bus ride, it just went on and on.  This is when we realized that this race might be a little harder than we originally thought.

The first trekking section wasn’t too bad, but the issue we were having was that all the clues for the race, were just random items, like tall tree or boundary marker, not terrain descriptions, like you find in most adventure races, so it was a bit of a different animal for us. One of the clues was boundary marker.  It ended up being this sign post.  That kind of clue doesn't do much to help a team navigate.  Give me a reentrant, creek bottom, or saddle any day.


One of the CP’s was on a cliff side overlooking the water and we could see the long bridge that we were going to have to cross in the coming hours, it looked very ominous with the wind howling, it almost made me shiver.


We finished the section and headed across the long bridge into 30 to 40 mph winds, it was wicked and we were running into it, we knew then that the wind was out of the southeast and we would have to head directly south and east to make it to the finish line.  We were about a 1/3 of the way across the bridge when two trucks came from opposite directions and crossed right by us.  Scary!

The next leg was the bike, I was not looking forward to it for two reasons, first I didn’t know how my tailbone was going to handle it and second we were told that this was the toughest single track section in the area with grueling rock gardens, that safety was first, so it might be a good idea to push the bike through some of the rocky sections. Once on the bikes we headed into the single track and quickly found that it was tough going, but we were doing alright and although my tailbone was hurting, it wasn’t awful. We picked up all the checkpoints and headed out to the road, my butt was thanking me for smooth pavement. Too bad we turned directly into the wind. It’s hard to explain just how hard the wind was blowing except to say, if we didn’t pedal on the downhill, we would have stood still, the wind was that strong, it may have even pushed us backwards up the hill.  I seen tumbleweeds blowing by, and dust clouds were getting all stirred up.  Good thing we remembered sunglasses.

The pavement didn’t last for long, soon we were riding on gravel and packed dirt roads for miles heading towards Ft Riley, picking up CP’s along the way. We rode mile after mile of heavy graveled road, not crushed limestone, but big rock that feels horrible on a broken tailbone. There were hills, one right after the next, the kind that are just far enough apart that you don’t get any momentum on the downhill to help with the next uphill. Chuck helped as much as possible by riding out front and letting me stay in his draft, but even with that, it was such an effort to get through the wind, that my tailbone was screaming and I was struggling to keep moving forward. I had no idea that this race would be more like an Epic Gravel Grinder rather than an adventure race, if I had, I may have used the old broken tailbone excuse and stayed home. By now it was after noon and we needed to eat, but we couldn’t stand out in the wind, so we found a nice storm drain to sit in and have lunch.  Adventure racing takes us to the most scenic places.


Although, the day started out with temperatures in the 30’s, it had warmed up nicely, but due to the strong winds, we needed to keep warm without getting overheated. Lucky for us we were both wearing our Icebreaker base layer which kept us warm in the wind and dry even though we were sweating from working so hard to ride into the wind gusts. I can’t say enough about how great Icebreaker stuff is, if you haven’t tried it, you really need to.

Finally we reached Ft Riley, we signed in and headed to the next CP, but we had to keep stopping because Chuck was picking up used artillery and putting it in his pocket.


I have no idea why he wanted the stuff, but I was secretly glad that every time he stopped to pick something up, I got to get off my bike seat for a few seconds. Cmon!  thats 50cal brass with machine gun clips, it don't get cooler than that! geez girls.  We even made a couple turns to the west, they were just short stretches of gravel road, but it gave us a little bit of a tailwind, unfortunately, it also gave us a strong cross wind, so there were a couple times for both of us where we were thrown sideways across the road by the wind. My only thought was, if I go down I hope I land on my shoulder and not my tailbone, better to have a broken collar bone then to land on my tailbone and make it any worse, plus I knew if I landed on my head, I would be fine, my Hardnutz helmet had already saved my noggin a couple times this year, so I was sure if I hit my head it would be fine. Some might say that it would be fine because there was nothing in it, but don’t believe that.


When we hit the checkpoint we were told that we missed the cutoff, so we would have to skip the next 3 points and head to CP46. That meant more miles of gravel, hills and wind. I was now on the verge of tears, but was trying to hold them in. My tailbone hurt so bad that I just wanted to scream, not that anyone would have heard me with the wind howling like it was. Heck, we couldn’t even hear cars coming up on us and one pulled up next to Chuck and scared him so bad, that I was a little worried he might crash, but he kept his wheels on the road. Besides seeing all the artillery on the road we also saw a giant snake, I’m just glad Chuck didn’t want to bring it back with him.

At CP46, we sat down and ate a Honey stinger waffle and hashed out our go-forward plan. Although my Trek Top Fuel was really grabbing the gravel, and the shocks were taking the brunt of the beating, my tailbone pain level was about past my limit and we both knew that I wasn’t going to make it anywhere fast, and if I didn’t get off that bike soon, Chuck may have been taking me to the emergency room for some really good pain meds. The plan:  We would ride the 7 or so miles back to race HQ and from there do the trek to the Xterra Challenge and the mystery event, then pick up all the trekking points that were left, excluding those that we would have to bike too.

The Xterra challenge was really cool, we had to use a rope to pull a Nissan Xterra SUV across a parking lot. It’s funny how much work your tailbone does, who knew almost everything you do uses your butt, I felt every step of that challenge. Oh of course since I was doing all the work pulling the SUV while chuck was playing movie producer, it was probably much harder than it should have been. And to top it off, the movie he made while pulling the car, didn’t even come out good enough to use in this blog.

Next we were off to the mystery challenge, and guess what it was, whatever you just guessed I’m sure it is wrong. It was Karaoke, this is not a challenge that Chuck or I wanted to take part in. We both bucked up, and sang “Sweet Home Alabama”, it was probably the worst rendition ever. There was certainly no applause for us.  Team Torti was up next and they knocked it out of the park with this awesome performance:

So after that crazy challenge we headed out on a trek for the last of the CP’s. Finally finishing at the Anchor Inn, where we had hot pizza and cookies.


We chatted with Team Torti for a while, hit the showers that were nice and hot and headed back to camp for some well-deserved rest, lucky for us, the night was a little warmer and we both dressed in every clean item of clothing we had with us, including our recovery socks, so sleep would be much warmer this time. The night continued to be windy, so windy that I thought I was in OZ, but come to find out, it was just the shock waves from a 5.7 Earthquake in Oklahoma.

I’m very glad I attempted the race, It wasn’t our best performance, but we did everything we could to make it work and we finished. Going into this race we both agreed that we would do whatever it took to finish and not worry about how fast. With that said, I guess we did exactly what we set out to do, like always, it was team work, I couldn’t have done it without Chuck.

Ok, I gotta add something else here.  The girl spent this whole race in the Pain Cave.  All of us endurance racers have been in there before at some time or other.  So we all know how tough it can be to keep focused and pushing forward.  I have to say I was absolutely impressed with her ability to keep going when I know that butt pain was BAD.  I heard her moan and gasp a few times, and seen some glassed over eyes but I never saw a tear.  I don't know if you call it perseverance, indomitable spirit, toughness, or just stubborn beyond belief.  Whatever it is, the girl has it, and I was taken to school.  

Now how do I get some more pain meds from the doctor without having to admit that he was right, my butt was not ready to race yet.