SMC Lessons Learned

[dgaddis1]

1 - Be on time, with all necessary materials (still feel bad about that....)
2 - Turkey - better signage where the trail comes out on the gravel, you turn left, then go around the gate
3 - Modoc - better signage from the culdesac
4 - Modoc - tape off the trail back to the access road
5 - Modoc - fix the Bridge of Death
6 - Horn - tape off the hiking trail in the last section (didn't hear of anyone going that way, but it'd be easy to get confused there)

What else?

[Mark Y]

Riders don't eat as many bananas as you might think? (j/k Daniel- you and Angela did a superb job with provisioning)

Great job with the organization Dustin and all involved. My hat is off to all of the riders too; I still can't envision ever getting in the kind of shape it takes to ride that far, much less that fast.

[seenvic]

PBJ sandwiches cut into qts.

Food that can be easily put in your jersey pocket to be eaten while riding away from the station.

#2 above....I was thinking the non locals may get confused there.
#3. That is the best signage I have ever seen there. Carsonite signs with arrows on them were stellar, I thought. You could flagging tape the heck out it. Use two unique colors flying together and it's pretty obvious which flags are for the race. In a broader scheme of things, I'd like to just carsonite sign the entire loop. It's something that's been on my mind for years and yesterday recharged that battery.
#4. It will only take a minute to do, but I was in disbelief when I heard that someone turned up that hill to FS 632.
#5. Please. I fell off this bridge. It needs to be leveled and hardware cloth added to it.
#6. Good idea.

I thought it was a great event and run very well. I had a blast and did not encountered one person who wasn't having fun and loving it. Alot more went right than wrong, that's for sure.

[azdrawdy]

Point number 1: The volunteers were awesome and came through in so many different ways.

#2: Paint arrows on the road in addition to the signage. All it would take is one missing sign to screw things up for a passle of people.

#3: Any color other than WHITE for the signs. Something that can be seen from a distance.

#4: Announce exact sag stop mileage at the rider's meeting.

MD

P.S. Great ride! Great route!

[dgaddis1]

May 17, 2009 11:06:35 GMT -5 seenvic said:

#2 above....I was thinking the non locals may get confused there.
#3. That is the best signage I have ever seen there. Carsonite signs with arrows on them were stellar, I thought. You could flagging tape the heck out it. Use two unique colors flying together and it's pretty obvious which flags are for the race. In a broader scheme of things, I'd like to just carsonite sign the entire loop. It's something that's been on my mind for years and yesterday recharged that battery.

Here's the problem - everyone was used to seeing the white signs, and we forgot to mention the carsonite posts in the meeting just before the start. Most people figured it out, but not all.

I do believe tho, no matter what you do, someone will make a mistake. It's easy to miss a sign when you're suffering and riding with your head down.

[brianW]

#4- If I wasn't with yetichic I would of paused there, before we left a rider came up and asked "Is that the trail?"

#5- I didn't go over the bridge, walked through the creek. I would suggest someone to tape it off 'til it can be fixed.

My personal goals, finish the race (check) under 7 hrs (no check) have fun (multi-checks) Learned a lot on my first race.

I do know that when I hit the final single track I took off on Jesse (MD and yetichic's son) I didn't know if anyone was behind us. Didn't want to be DFL just in case.

Great job Dustin and many thanks to everyone that helped out.

[money]

Great event and great time riding. Dustin I think that you did a good job, and I really appreciated everyone that was at each sag.

Modoc was brutal while I was there. I run a dry condition tire, and I was all over that trail on the downhill sections. Heck I was all over the trail on every section. The mileage signs just didn't seem to come as quickly due to the soup.

#5 - The bridge was nuts. I am pretty sure that I left 10 fingerprints in the wood to keep from sliding off.

Thumbs up for this type of format.

[OopsFellDown]

I am thinking back to the first ever Baker's Dozen, and all of the things that were learned and adjusted for the next year's event, scoring in particular. That first one went pretty well, and it got better every year. For a first time event, I think the SMC went very well. You are absolutely on target by doing a "lessons learned" and applying this to the next one. Suggestion (tongue-in-cheek): How about next year we run it backwards, and get Modoc out of the way early in the race. I hated every millisecond of that trail yesterday... I had no fight left in me by the time I reached it, and that trail wanted to fight me from beginning to end. I crashed no less than 6 times, probably more. The worst one had to be the last one, only 20 feet from the parking lot at the end. I stalled in the rock pile and tipped over (couldnt get unclipped). I just laid there contemplating life and cold beer for a while, until M. Drawdy came along and helped me up. Michael had just taken a wicked spill on the bridge at the bottom of that climb (the sound of that crash was awesome, kind of a "Whump - Clank", with whump being Michael's body landing on the bridge, clank being the bike tumbling). Thanks to MD for picking me up and then pushing me to the finish...

[ted]

My lesson learned was to speak up when I see someone doing wrong.
Here's my situation:
Rode past Modoc Speedway, turned left onto FS632. As I approached the "Marked" turn onto FS632A to head to the end of Modoc trail, I saw a fellow rider that was riding toward me as if he had missed FS632A and continued on FS632 then had turned around to come back to the turn. It appeared a few people had gone this way as there were other "fresh" tire tracks heading in that direction.
I made the left "marked" turn onto 632A, just ahead (100 feet) of the rider and assumed he would catch me seeing as he was ahead of me the whole race up to this point. Instead I was passed by absolutely no one during my entire time on Modoc.

Who do I see when I get back to Lick Fork? The rider I had seen earlier, sitting under the shelter and later accepting an award.

Surely they should have noticed that 4 miles of Modoc had been cut off? I could understand the mistake had the turn not been marked, or if the rider wasn't a "local that has ridden this trail before". But in this case the rider had passed, turned around, and then continued on the wrong course after the marker.

It's not a big deal to me personally as this rider was in a different age group than I. It's just disappointing to know who this person is and what was done.

Other than that I had a thoroughly enjoyable time on all of the trails and absolutely love the home court advantage and the slippery, technical aspects of the trails.
BV had a good point of being on these trails in an "Official" race.
It only took 20 years, but it finally happened.
My vote would be for more of this type of event as opposed to multiple laps on the same trail. However I do think that the number of participants would be less in this type of event as opposed to an event with "Team" possibilities.
Maybe a shorter route could be available to encourage less capable riders.

I also like the idea of doing this event in reverse. The final pavement portion from Modoc back to Lick Fork was sooooo loooooong to say the least.

Glad I didn't do this on a CX bike!!
Not counting the rider that did ride his CX and finish first (he could ride that big a** high wheeler and probably still produce the same result), the others didn't seem to have enjoyed the physical beating and mechanical issues all that much.

[seenvic]

May 18, 2009 8:31:03 GMT -5 ted said:

I also like the idea of doing this event in reverse. The final pavement portion from Modoc back to Lick Fork was demoralizing to say the least.

The climbing on Delaughter Road at the end is brutal going that way.

I've done it. Believe me, you don't want to go that direction. It's not hard climbing, but coming at mile 55 it is tough.

[ted]

May 18, 2009 8:36:12 GMT -5 seenvic said:

May 18, 2009 8:31:03 GMT -5 ted said:

I also like the idea of doing this event in reverse. The final pavement portion from Modoc back to Lick Fork was demoralizing to say the least.

The climbing on Delaughter Road at the end is brutal going that way.

I've done it. Believe me, you don't want to go that direction. It's not hard climbing, but coming at mile 55 it is tough.

I've done it as well. It's really like comparing apples to apples. Anything that's not downhill or level is difficult after 55 miles.

[seenvic]

May 18, 2009 8:31:03 GMT -5 ted said:

My lesson learned was to speak up when I see someone doing wrong.
Here's my situation:
Rode past Modoc Speedway, turned left onto FS632. As I approached the "Marked" turn onto FS632A to head to the end of Modoc trail, I saw a fellow rider that was riding toward me as if he had missed FS632A and continued on FS632 then had turned around to come back to the turn. It appeared a few people had gone this way as there were other "fresh" tire tracks heading in that direction.
I made the left "marked" turn onto 632A, just ahead (100 feet) of the rider and assumed he would catch me seeing as he was ahead of me the whole race up to this point. Instead I was passed by absolutely no one during my entire time on Modoc.

Who do I see when I get back to Lick Fork? The rider I had seen earlier, sitting under the shelter and later accepting an award.

Surely they should have noticed that 4 miles of Modoc had been cut off? I could understand the mistake had the turn not been marked, or if the rider wasn't a "local that has ridden this trail before". But in this case the rider had passed, turned around, and then continued on the wrong course after the marker.

It's not a big deal to me personally as this rider was in a different age group than I. It's just disappointing to know who this person is and what was done.

I think I may know the story on this one, if the same local rider. The rider didn't skip 632A and the back end of Modoc. He made the turn, and rode Modoc. When he got to this point on the trail, he turned off Modoc Trail and went up the steep hill to FS 632. You saw him riding towards you. He figured it out, and went back to the end of 632 and got back on Modoc where he left it. This was my point of being in disbelief that someone could do this....but at this point in a race riders aren't thinking clearly.

I am sure there were others that did this too. I know of one rider who did this, but he finished mid pack so it was no big deal.

This was Dustin' point in #4 of the OP. Block the trail going back off of Modoc up to FS 632. I think there is a sign there with a "A" on it.

[seenvic]

We need to get the course back onto Miller Road and only use .8 miles of Hewy 230 instead of the 2.4 miles we had to use this year.

[ted]

Good point on the turn uphill back to 632. You'd have to not be thinking clearly to make that obvious of a wrong turn.

[brianW]

If the SMC becomes a yearly thing, which I hope so, Changing directions every yar makes sense.

[seenvic]

I wouldn't change directions. Having the long paved section at the end is better than at the start.

That is a lonnggg paved section for a MTB race. It "fits in" better at the end than the start.

[azdrawdy]

May 18, 2009 8:47:05 GMT -5 seenvic said:

We need to get the course back onto Miller Road and only use .8 miles of Hewy 230 instead of the 2.4 miles we had to use this year.

A HUGE +1 on this.

MD

[thosaus]

My hat is off to all who put it on. I talked to Bill earlier today, and we agree that this can easily be an event that can grow to double or triple its size in no time flat. I have done many different long distance events, and I thought the feed stations on this one were great and the right distance apart. Only thing I would do next year is make sure you have hardware cloth on ALL bridges. I saw three crashes on Wine Creek bridges, and one on the Modoc Bridge of Death. Not one had cloth on it. Again, hats off to Paul and Justin (I think thats his name (I saw him on the road at one point and thanked him as I was spinning my a$$ off on my singlespeed) Angela, Daniel, Cody and the rest. I'll be back again next year. We'd love to put on a little event up on the Long Cane if anyone is interested. Heck, as well as you guys did with the SMC, we might just need to resurrect the Long Cane Massacre Ride.

[Mark Y]

1. I don't know about lessons learned, but I do have an observation; particularly if this event grows. At the SAG stops we just had everyone's personal stashes in a bin, and as the riders took what they wanted we put them aside so the remaining riders wouldn't have to dig through as many to find theirs. I knew Nate was hauling it, so I had his ready and on the table, but the next riders were on their own to dig through the bin.

For any riders out there; was this a pain or just SOP for this kind of event? I've been mulling over ways to make it easier but haven't come up with any firm ideas. With the radio operations there may be a way to predict with a little accuracy who the next few riders will be at a stop and have those bags out, but then again, it may be insignificant in the big scheme of things.

2. One thing I would suggest about the radio operations, is to impress on them that recording the numbers
is the first priority, and reporting them to the other stations is second. When a group of 4 or 5 are riding up it gets pretty busy and easy to miss a number. After the dust clears the times can be reported to the network. They did a super job, but we did get one number transposed at our stop and I think the process may have been the culprit.

[dgaddis1]

As far as the drop bags, I have seen where the bags get laid out, in order of the number on the bag, that way the racers can find them easier.