24hrs of Moab - anyone??

[alta825]

We'll be rolling down Weds morning for the 24hrs of Moab race. Looking forward to finally roughing it in style after the last 10yrs of various camp set-ups. Anyone from here also going to be down there racing this yr??

We'll be there w/ the Red 4x4 RB and Rocky Mtn tent down on the south side of the 'city' on course.

Cheers,

Derek

[alta825]

Well, we survived yet another 24 hours of Moab and this year marked the 9th or 10th yr that I have done the 24 hour relay mtn bike race in the desert.

Man, how did we ever deal w/o the SMB? it was so nice having it for mid-day shade, heat at night and the list goes on and on...Saw only one or two other SMB's in addition to ours out at the venue.

to sum up the event - picture 450 teams of anywhere from 1-5 riders and all of their support staff setup in a makeshift tent city out in the Behind the Rocks area south of moab. there usually is 2500-3500 people camped out there. Pretty wild site to say the least.

The race starts at noon Sat to a mass Lemans style of start where 450 riders run a 1/4 mile through the desert to their waiting bikes and then they hop on for a pretty technical 15 mile lap. You then tag your teammate and then they hit the course, this all goes on and on for 24 hrs and ends noon Sun. Night laps are the most entertaining as you are using HID headlamps to guide yourself through the desert. My final night lap was around 4:30am

Our team raced the 5 person coed division and had a darn good showing. Out of 25-30 teams in our class we ended up 2nd! Our best finish to date...

On our drive home Monday, we had SMB sitings galore! 2 or 3 right in moab parked and then saw 2 others as we were heading north on rt 6.

sorry about no pics - mine are too large to upload!!

cheers,

Derek

[jage]

I hate to think of pictures going unuploaded. How big are they? (Dimensions and file size)

I know I shoot 6 megapixels and keep everything high quality.

There is a great image management software available free from google called Picasa, you can bulk resize all your photos and export them (choose say 800x and it will crank them out to a new folder) got red-eye reduction, cropping, easy rotation etc. It's pretty great (I use a lot of image editing software but Picasa is my daily camera->web tool)

Otherwise it seems like there are more complex options (ftp, other online albums, new sportsmobileforum gallery software) so let me know...

[alta825]

FYI - my pics are 1600x1200 and approx 800 KB

[pjpvi]

Congrats on the good finish!

I did the 24hour at Moab as my first 24hour event probably 9ish years ago. I remember it snowing on me on one of my pre-dawn laps. A great time though!

Phil

[alta825]

yeah, I have bad memories of the yr it snowed too, that might have been the first yr we did it and we were way underprepared. still fun and I still keep going back....

D

[pjpvi]

I keep getting pressured from my riding friends to get back into 24 hour races. Maybe I'll have to look into going back to Moab next year. I did the 24 hour at Laguna Seca for about 6 years in a row and could ride that course with my eyes shut. Moab was a much more remote and interesting (and difficult) course though.

Phil

[pjpvi]

You got me thinking so I went to their old results page. I raced in 1997 and we came in second to last in the Men's Sport category (Team #145 Red Hot). I remember "checking" the baton for an hour or so in the middle of the night when I just couldn't see hopping on my bike. My wife then kicked me out of the rental motorhome pre-dawn in the snow. I remember it being my favorite lap of the race though!

Back to work now ....

Phil

[EMrider]

Thanks for the race recap. Never been to Moab, but would like to visit for an event like that. Maybe an all SMB owner team? FWIW, I'm slow but have decent endurance.

Would like to see the pics if you can get them posted somewhere.

Rob