Michigan Mountain Mayhem Gravel Grinder

The Michigan Mountain Mayhem Gravel Grinder in Boyne City, Michigan was scheduled for October 3, 2015.  Boyne City is at the very tip of the fingers of the Michigan mitten, and fall comes much earlier to Northern Michigan than it does to Indiana.  Weeks before the race, I anxiously checked weather reports and discovered that Michigan, like Indiana, was having a very nice extended summer.  The entire week before the race was predicted to be high 50s, sunny skies, and dry.  The day of the race was predicted to be cloudy, with no chance of rain, and temperatures ranging from 44 to 55 degrees.

I had planned on riding my new Niner RLT gravel specific bike, but I really wanted to try it out on Michigan Gravel prior to the race.  I was a bit anxious about the way the thinner 35 mm tires would handle on gravel compared to the MTB, and I also wanted to know how it would do on a descent on gravel and dirt hills, as the MMM Gravel Grinder was said to have lots of climbing.  Marc and I did two 50 mile gravel ride courses just over the state line in Michigan a few weeks prior to the race, and I discovered that the RLT was lightning fast compared to my MTB, and it had absolutely no problem with traction.  It felt very stable.  I was looking forward to seeing what kind of average speed I could accomplish with the RLT.  I had checked the previous year results, and the average winning speed in my age group was only 13.6 mph.  This spooked me just a bit, because that meant that the course must be pretty rough if the average winning speed was so low.

The night before the race, Marc, James, Jeff and I all headed to Michigan with our bikes in the back of Jeff’s truck and James’ camper in tow.  It was a 5 1/2 hour drive to Boyne City, and we had to eat dinner along the way.  By the time we pulled into the Young State Park campground, it was after 10:30 pm.  We set up the camper and immediately went to sleep.

When I woke up the morning of the 3rd, I stepped out of the camper to find it was in the low 40’s.  It had been so warm in Indiana the previous week that the chill really got to me.  I was glad that I had packed a backpack filled with different bike clothes, as I opted for my fall jacket and a thin base layer instead of the jersey and long sleeved shirt I was going to wear. I looked around at the campground and was taken aback by the incredible beauty of the lodgepole pines. I also noticed we were just steps away from the lake! I walked to the shore and took some pictures before getting ready for the race.

After getting ready, we drove into Boyne City to pick up our packets and racing numbers at a local bike shop in town. There was a farmer’s market going on downtown, and we had to drive around to find parking. We then drove to the park where the race was to start. James, Jeff, and Mark were all doing the 60 mile race and their start time was 10:00. I was doing the 45 mile race, and my start time was 10:15. We all rode around the area streets to warm up, and then the guys got in line for their wave. I had a hard time snapping a picture because of all the other riders. It was funny that the one picture that I managed to take with all three of them was one with a guy in the foreground who looked like he could be Jeff’s twin.

After the guys’ wave was off, we were allowed to immediately line up. I got all the way up front, to the left, so I would be in a position to both pass riders and to try and catch the wheel of the leaders. It was cold waiting for the announcer to begin counting down, and Pharrell Williams’ song “Happy” played from the loudspeaker. Some riders were singing along, and I wished that I could take a video. The announcer started counting down from 10, and we were off. I immediately had issues clipping in my left shoe, and the start was on grass, so I was off to a slow start. By the time we got to the pavement, I was pretty far behind the leaders and I hammered it as hard as I could to catch the wheel of the three or four guys leading the pack. It was hard staying on the wheel in front of me, because everyone was going so fast. We were riding 24-25 miles per hour right from the beginning, and riders were aggressively trying to squeeze out other riders. After about 3 miles, the guy on the left of me motioned to the guy on the right of me, and I thought they were going to make me crash. My hesitation cost me the wheel in front of me, and I fell behind. I found out later from a post on Instagram that this team of guys pulled a girl to 2nd place. They apparently were not happy that I had been drafting behind one of their guys. By the time we turned onto the gravel at about mile 4, I lost the leaders. But I was happy because it looked like the entire wave had been split in two and that gave me enough time so that the back half of the wave would have a hard time catching up.

As soon as we turned onto the first gravel road, I knew that this gravel was much different from Southern Michigan gravel. It was sandier, and there were spots where fresh rock had been poured to give drivers more traction. My bike was doing some slipping and sliding, and it was hard trying to keep a decent pace. This gravel road turned back onto pavement shortly before we were to climb Mt. Diablo, a category 4 climb that is a 520 feet elevation gain in about 1.8 miles. As we turned onto the pavement I saw an extremely fit, tall girl that I had noticed at the start of the race, along the side of the road. I asked her if she was OK and she said she had broken her chain. It looked like she had a repair kit and was fixing it. I then saw an older guy on a mountain bike in front of me and I rode as hard as I could to get behind his wheel for some protection because of a terrible east wind. I was happy to see he was maintaining a 16-17 mph pace in spite of the wind, which was more than I could do on my own. I decided to enjoy his wheel for a while and eat a gel because the climb was coming up in about 2 or 3 miles, according to my Garmin route. As I rode, I noticed he was slowing down considerably because he was having a hard time maintaining that pace against the wind. I rode around him and set my sight on two guys on mountain bikes ahead of me. I caught up to them and stayed behind them for a while, then I had to move on because they were too slow. It was shortly after I passed them that I noticed the elevation going up and I knew I was at the start of the Mt. Diablo climb. I switched to my smaller ring and put my head down. I heard two guys and a girl behind me talking and I thought they were going to pass me on the climb for sure. Indiana is very flat, and even though I try and train and do hill repeats, I don’t do well with climbing. As I passed a younger guy on a mountain bike, I noticed that the voices behind me had stopped. I didn’t know if they had fallen behind, or if it was too hard for them to talk. I just kept my head down and kept climbing, trying to keep an 8 mph pace. The road was winding and it was frustrating because I couldn’t see the top of the climb. I just kept watching my Garmin, being amazed that as much as I sucked on this climb, no one was passing me.

Shortly after we reached the top, the road turned back onto gravel. From this point on there would be very little pavement until the last few miles of the course. It was challenging maintaining a decent pace while slipping on sand, dodging rocks, and at times being blasted by wind. As the course turned onto seasonal roads, I was taken aback by the beauty. There were tons of lodgepole pines and evergreens that blanketed the roads and made me feel like I was riding through a magical tunnel. The seasonal roads had small sections that were hard packed dirt that made it easy to fly almost 20 mph. I quickly found that as soon as I would start flying there would be ruts, potholes, rocks, or mud to dodge. The most frustrating sections had deep sand pits that were ankle deep. The first sand pit I came across I managed to ride to the left onto the grass. Then I hit another and tried to shift to a lower gear to get some traction. My wheels just sunk in the sand and I had to jump off and run through it with my bike. I ended up doing this three times. It was frustrating because every time I’d get off the bike my legs did not want to pedal when I got back on. I was relieved when the seasonal roads ended and the course turned back onto a gravel road. Shortly thereafter, the second category 4 climb of the ride started. It was a sandy, dirt and gravel wall! This was the hardest part of the race, and I saw at the top of the climb there was a SAG stop with people handing out water and bananas, and there was a woman taking pictures. I hope I didn’t get my picture taken, because I’m sure I did not have a pretty look on my face! I passed two girls on this hill, and I never saw them again. At the top of the hill there was a woman in a cute “Cat in the Hat” jersey on a mountain bike and she looked about my age. She passed me as the road turned onto a flat gravel road with a tailwind. I tried to catch up to her, but I was having difficulty as she was on a mountain bike and my skinnier tires were slipping and sliding. It was discouraging that I couldn’t go faster on this road. There was a lot of sand and freshly poured gravel that made it extremely treacherous. I managed to catch up with her and she said that she was from Denver. We said goodbye shorty before another gravel hill that led me to pavement. I knew I was on the last stretch of the race, and I hammered it as hard as I could as soon as my wheels hit the asphalt. I flew down Mount Diablo, and marveled at how much shorter it seemed on the way down. I was very happy to be flying fast, but I knew my joy would be short lived because the course was going to turn back onto gravel before the final home stretch.

As I turned into the park towards the finish line, I was wondering how well I did. I knew if I had finished in the top 10 they would announce my name and position as I crossed the line. I was hoping that I would have good news for my Daddy, because it was his birthday. I felt bad about not being able to see him, so I wanted to give him some good news. The finish was extremely frustrating because they had made a little course with orange snow fences so that riders had to zig zag through the grass like a maze. As I crossed the line I heard the announcer say my name, my city, and that I had gotten 9th place overall in the Women’s 45 miler. I was extremely happy with the results.

James finished 28th in the Men’s 60 miler, but would have most likely made top 10 if his brakes hadn’t broken and he had to stop to repair them. Marc finished 43rd. We were all concerned about Jeff because 15 or 20 minutes had passed and he had still not come across the finish line. Marc said that Jeff had passed him, and that he had not seen him again. We were worried that if Jeff had technical problems he probably would have called, so we wondered if he had crashed. Marc called him, and Jeff said that he had gone off course. He ended up climbing Mt. Diablo twice and adding an extra 8 miles. I snapped a picture of Jeff making a face as he approached the finish line.

We ate lunch in the park and there was a raffle drawing while we waited for the awards ceremony.  I got a medal and $75 for my 9th place win, and Marc snapped a picture of the top 10 girls. I’m on the far left in a baseball cap. This is a race I can’t wait to do again.

My only regret is that I didn’t have time to take more pictures. Northern Michigan is beautiful. I snapped a picture of the lake again before we packed up to head home and was sad that we couldn’t stay longer.