krewetland: Burnin' at the Bluff VI

Mesa Cycles held their first 'Burnin' at the Bluff' 12 hour mountain bike race at Council Bluffs Lake in 2004. I wasn't racing bikes at the time, but recall reading and hearing about all the fun. I couldn't race Burnin' II as Erin and I had a wedding to attend that night, but we did take the kayaks down to watch and cheer and had a blast.

By 2006, I was racing for DRJ and teamed up with teammates BLM and Little Buddy (aka Mark B.) in the single speed class. We won, but only by something like 6 minutes. I was ready to repeat in 2007 but BLM had a series of mechanicals early in the race and decided he would rather drink beer than race. Not wanting to give up, I ended up doing his last lap and mine back-to-back and I think we took 3rd.

So last year, when it was clear BLM was out, I signed on with John D. and Brad B. of Cape G. Then Brad got hurt. John and I ended up racing our single speeds in what is supposed to be a 3 man class without Brad. The 2 of us each did 5 laps and took 2nd. Since Brad can ride an SS almost as fast as John, I have no doubt we would have kicked some butt if he hadn't busted himself up preriding the course.

John and I had so much fun racing together we had planned to team up again this year, until John decided he'd rather try Co-Ed for a change. Enter BLM. Having missed out last year and (I think) feeling lazy (or maybe just wanting a new bike?), Brenden bought himself a new Superfly SS so all we needed was a fast guy. I knew the Seagals and GORC boys would have strong teams, so we recruited Dan to make up for our slowness.

Mesa has always lucked out with perfect weather for this race and this year was no different. Even with 2.5" of rain on Thursday and Friday, the course was in unbelievable shape and Saturday was beautiful with a high around 60. I headed down Friday night after borrowing one of Frank's F350s and loading its 8' bed with firewood. Good thing Paul gave me grief and "encouraged" me to bring more than I had initially loaded. We needed almost every piece, even if some found them "wet" or "too big."

This race really is a good time and Council Bluffs has got to be the perfect venue. The campsites are great and we had 2 double sites for our gang.

Our teams included:

Wes, Bob, and Chris in Wicked Fast
Tom, John, and Ryan in Wicked Fast
Me, BLM, and Dan in SS
Paul, Thrasher, and Christine in Co-Ed
Scott in 6 hour

The Wicked Fast race was exactly that and it looked like Wes, Bob, and Chris would suffer their first loss in a few years. Entering the last lap, one team appeared to have it wrapped up until their lead guy suffered a series of mechanicals. CP passed him and the second place team to take the win by ~45 seconds. A bummer way to lose for sure, but it is mtb racing and that's all part of the game.

Meanwhile, Dan was only a few second behind first place SS after lap 1, but a flat on his second lap pushed us back and we never got much closer. And, of course, we had BLM, who proudly noted his "fastest lap this year was 6 minutes slower than his slowest lap" in years past. BLM, you better get in shape for 2010!

I wasn't as fast as I'd have liked, but stayed consistent as my first 2 laps were almost identical in time and my third good enough for the (unofficial) fastest SS night lap and one of the quicker night laps overall. Speaking of overall, congrats to the Seagal fellas for their first place SS win! With 45+/- teams overall, 3 SS teams in the top 10 (we were #9) is not bad!

Can't wait for next year!

Pre-race good times, clearly: