Polar roll: My first Marathon

 I had no interest in driving my Kia forte 9.5 hours north to the U.P. in February, ever in my life. That seemed like “the juice wasn’t worth the squeeze” just for a 30 mile race on a fat bike I do not own. So polar roll was off my radar. 

Then Ms. Todd tells us that the secret event for the Hall of pain members is this October. The hall of pain for me this year would mean I’ll have to do Polar roll MS30, Crusher 225EX, and Marji 100. Marji 100 has been 2 years in the making and this was the year. Crusher 225 EX has high reward, low risk in my mind. I would have 40 hours to complete it, but if stuff goes sideways, I’ll be prepared enough to bikepack it for multiple days and get back. Reward being, if I can make the 40 hour cutoff, I’ll have 2/3 adventures complete for the triple crown. But the year starts with Polar roll, so if I’m going to take a stab at making the hall of pain this year and getting invited to the secret event; then I had to do the polar roll MS30. 

You have to have a fat bike for this event, which I did not, but I had 3 months to acquire one. That’ll be easy, and it WAS! My friend shmaren

Characterization 1. Shmaren

Hair-thick and smooth 

Claim to fame: coached IIona Maher through her entire childhood 

House style: town 

Plans for tomorrow: Polar role Ultra 100!!!🫢

Future last name: Ives 

Shmaren had contacted me with a fat bike for sale! How perfect. It was actually titled “historical memorabilia “ because it was once owned by the 2018 Ms. Xterra, polar roll MS15 3rd place female, THE Kristen Leland Wade; therefore it’s meant to be preserved in a glass case, but it was functional enough for one last easy 26 mile scenic ride in the U.P. 

I was in! I got a new fat bike, I just needed to go get it. Shmaren lives 6 hours away, so she had offered to meet half way; which was laughable. Not a chance Shmaren! I’m driving the 6 hours and we’re gunna ride bikes! Face on you! So I ordered her a puzzle Christmas gift of a picture of me feeding her pizza and went to get my fat bike the week before Christmas. 

Now we had no snow to ride in, then when it did snow, my programming was long zone 2 rides on a loaded adventure bike for my upcoming bikepacking adventure. So I had a 40 minute ride through the yards of my development in 6 inches of snow with rock hard 14 psi tires. Around that time I considered that Polar roll might be a smidge harder then I had anticipated. 

Biting off more then you can chew 

Somehow at a very young age I developed this bullet proof equation. It goes: 

Biting off more than you can chew= definite epic story to be told. 

And I have basically lived by that equation and it has not let me down! I’m never prepared and I got many stories 😉

So what is Polar Roll. 26 miles, 2500 feet elevation. 10 hours cut off. Push your bike up a hill, ride it down. Pretty simple stuff. Not rocket science. Push, ride, push, finish. That’s how I finished two Marji 50’s; so this was going to be zone 2 heart rate cake walk. The hardest part of Polar Roll was going to be driving up and gambling the Mackinaw bridge closures. The mackinaw bridge shuts down when temps get above freezing because of falling ice from the top, and the bridge had been shutting down for hours daily. 

Ok, now you understand how easy polar roll is going to be. Let’s move on. 

I started packing for the trip on Thursday, then I would drive through the night to hit the bridge at a good temperature and make it across. So I had a solid plan for my set up. 

Fully carbon, including rims, mega lightweight, super famous, Tomac fat bike. 4” studded tires that I was going to run at whatever PSI coach Mukluk recommended. 

I had the 45 north outer shell, smart wool base layer. And Bigfoot socks. I had my Hawaiian hero shirt on with all my favorite ladies. 

The only footwear I had were the 45 north Wolfgar boots, that are the warmest ones. Likely too warm but it was all I had. These boots took a regular size 9.5 foot and expanded it to a size 29.5. Not ideal for hiking a marathon… I would find out. 

I was going to wear my ultraspire hydration vest under my jacket to keep my water from freezing. Then I would have chocolate milk and sprite/pink lemonade mocktail in 2 different bottle. Both uninsulated bottles. -the next error. 

Hand warmth was not going to be an issue, I had the monster 45 north pogies that keep your hands hot in any temperature, so all I needed were some waterproof gloves. 

I had no bake peanut butter cookies, slim Jim’s, twizzlers, and Swedish fish for fuel; not that I needed that much fuel. It’s only 26 miles and 2500 feet of climbing. 

I got all packed up and stared looking at the weather. Big storm rolling through, it was 38 degrees and rain until about 11 a.m. on my route, then turning to snow and the temperature dropping. So I decided to leave at 3 a.m. in an attempt to get across the Mackinaw bridge in the rain. 

As a confidence precaution, I did front and rear brakes, spark plugs, air filter, headlight bulbs, and an oil change before the journey. Make sure the Ol Kia forte was at her best. 

The drive was pretty rainy but 10 hours was nothing compared to the 16.5 to Florida, so I turned up the Will Smith-gettin jiggy with it, in my shox headphones…. Because the radio in my car doesn’t work 😂 and made the easy drive. 

82 miles to Ishpeming, the roads turned to snow. Between Marquette and Ishpeming, the roads were completely covered in inches of snow. Kia fortes wave the white flag in inches of snow. So I carried momentum up hills and downshifted down hills and puckered my glute muscles and made it to our air bnb in Ishpeming around 1:00. It appeared the town had no occupants 😂. It was a snow covered town with not a soul in sight. The road had 8 inches of snow on them and it was coming down fast, the air bnb I was supposed to park at had an easy 1 foot of snow in it, that wasn’t going to happen. So I stayed in the street and put on a podcast and took a 2 hour nap 😎. When I awoke, the drive had been plowed and I was able to sneak into a spot. I unloaded my stuff and took my bike in to thaw. 

Shortly thereafter Coach Mohawk, I mean Coach Nohawk and the fire chief show up to give me a lift to packet pickup. Boy was I relieved when they pulled up in a new adventure 4wd Chevy pickup! That was the perfect machine to cruise unplowed roads. We easily cruised to packet pick. 

Packet Pickup 

Packet pickup was at Blackrocks Brewery, the usual location for 906 things. And in true 906 fashion, nothing was going to be easy. We were heading to a heated brewery, an establishment that prides themselves on having such a warm atmosphere that you can remove your jacket and enjoy a beverage in a comfortable warm environment. So of course I only wore a hoodie, running shoes, and sweatpants. Then we stood outside in a line in the snow for 20 minutes and it took all of my being to not shiver and chatter my teeth loudly and look weak in front of my fellow adventurers. 

Once inside, I got my packet, and saw Shmaley

Shmaley characterization: 

First met: Marji camp 2024 group 11

Best kit- usually goes to Shmaley, she’s always got on an awesome cycleology jersey 

Story writing abilities: 10/10, her punctuations make me jealous 

Positive vibes: 24/7

Plans for 2026: Get into the hall of pain 

After a hug and some positive vibes shared, I got a hug from Ms. Todd and then we headed to get dinner. The Brewery doesn’t serve food and it was packed! We headed over to the world famous Lakers in Marquette for some burgers, fries, and milkshakes. At Lakers I got to meet fellow Dirtbags that I had only heard magnificent stories about. First I met shmoug

Shmoug Characterization

Truck: named after a dinosaur 🦖 (raptor)

Beard grooming- 11/10. Perfect beard maintenance 

Occupation-farm related horse riding apparel sales 

First fat bike event: Affirmative 

We all ordered bunches of food and stayed for at least an hour sharing stories and smiling so much my face was sore. I had a cheese steak with cheddar cheese and fries. It was amazing! 

We then gave goodbye hugs and parted ways to get some sleep for the big event. When we got back to the air bnb, it was all business with Coach Diet Coke and Coach Waterloo melon medley. 

This is about the time I realized we forgot Hydration vest, pogies, thick gloves, and I was still unsure of if I should wear the massive Wolfgar boots or mountain bike shoes. 

Alright adapt and overcome, Coach Waterloo said Wolfgar boots for sure. No hydration vest and only 2 non insulated plastic water bottles. I guess we will do one with chocolate milk and one with water. Then refill with water at neutral aid. And No pogies, ouch, that might get cold. But it’s only going to be 21 degrees so not that cold, I scrounged up some hand up gloves from my car and put the water proof gloves over them. It’s only 26 miles. This should all be fine. 

I put a small bag on the frame under my seat with my little battery powered inflator, first aid kit and tools. I forgot the straps for the frame though, so I used blue zip ties, that I did not steal from packet pickup. 

Then I had a top tube bag with twizzlers and Swedish fish. Two mountain feed bags on my bars. One for no bake peanut butter cookies and the other for my water. Chocolate milk would go on the frame. Name plate was attached. I was ready. It’s only 26 miles. 

I had already successfully loaded my route on my Garmin and calculated it. I was so ahead of schedule and killing it on the tech. UNTIL…. Remember when I bought that fat bike off Shmaren, it had a gps mount on it. Which was perfect. One less thing to install. Did I test the gps mount? No way? It’s there, and it looks exactly like my other ones. No problem. Well, unbeknownst to be, Shmaren has a Wahoo GPS. I have a Garmin. Different mounting situation you ask? Barely, but yes. The Wahoo is 90 degrees different than the Garmin. So my gps was charged and mounted and ready, just have to turn my head 90 degrees to the side to see it. No problem, it’s only 26 miles. 

The only thing left was to sleep, that doesn’t happen the night before an event but I just lay in the dark meditating and listening to 2 cellos and that’s good enough. 

Polar Roll mass start. 

We awoke early around 5:30, had coffee. PRD’s completed. Bikes ready. And we were like an hour early. We chatted for a while and then rode to the start. That was a cool thing about the air bnb, it was a 7 minute walk from the start and finish. Ms. Todd has put out a tire pressure video and said to let air out of your tires until you could flatten the tire with your hand. I did as I was told. 

We set out on the snow covered roads and this bike barely moves and barely steers. When we got to the starting line/highschool, Coach bike chain wallet told me those tires were flat. So I upped them to 3psi and that was much better. I watched the MS15 leave the start and immediately put my bike about 40 feet back in the coral of the starting line. In no way did I want to be upfront but, I knew we had under a mile until a Congo line of bike pushing through single track. So I made the decision to put in a bit of an effort to get to the bike pushing in decent position. 

I pedaled hard and took an inside line just before the single track and gained a lot of positions. Again this was only to get in the Congo line early. Everyone’s moving relatively the same speed but if you were in the back you could accidentally loose up to an hour of just standing. 

I jumped off my bike and started pushing. As far as the eye could see were people pushing. The trail was deep mush. One side was the tire track to push your bike and the other side were a stairway of footprints from the hundreds of riders ahead. 

Secret time: I didn’t know what a trail groomer was nor had I ever ridden on a trail in the snow, that was groomed or anything. But I quickly figured some things out. It seems the grooming starts the first snow and is professionally taken care of so the base of the groom stays firm all winter. That’s a super amazing thing they do so people can continue recreational activities on the woods all year. 

What that also means, is the snow on either side of the groom (snowmobile track width), is light, fluffy, and at least 4 foot deep. Therefore, if you think “I’ll just put a foot down on the side of the trail”, you immediately plunge at least to your waist in snow. Then you have to wrestle your bike off yourself and then do a swimming motion to get out of the fluffy snow, back onto the harder packed groom. I believe I can speak for every single fat biker out there, I fell minimum 50 times. I think every attempt at riding usually ended in being waste deep sideways in the snow. 

2 miles in we were moving about 1.6-1.8 mph. I was wearing my gigantic boots and trying to step in the steps of the person in front of me, but I think due to the difference in everyone’s stride and boot size, I was stepping uphill in mash potato snow at a different stride, cadence, and foot position then I ever have before. Add that to that Harley wreck I had when so was 21 that required emergency surgery on my foot/leg and the Tijuana stomach removal surgery that accidently resulted in 32 days of not eating and loosing most my muscle,  I become susceptible to Hikers knee. 

Disclaimer: I’m not making excuses or saying my challenges are greater than anyone else’s. We all have equal challenges and pain in our lives. I just tell excessive stories about mine for entertainment value. Disclaimer end. 

Hikers knee is caused from over use of the knee joint in ways you don’t usually use it. It creates swelling, stiffness and joint pain behind the knee. But it’s not actually anything bad, no damage done. It’s just a reminder that I have not been taking my crosstraining programming seriously 😑. Don’t tell Coach cool new truck. I promise I’ll take them more seriously from here on out! 

It was painful at times but, I have been here before, did a super hard hike I wasn’t prepared for, made it 13 miles then my knee locked up and I walked backwards 3 miles to my bike and ride to the car. A few stretches and rest and I was fine 2 days later. So I knew this knee pain was just basically a sore muscle, likely no permanent damage was being done. 

The knee was making me limp and my feet were moving around a lot in these boots. I kept trying to tighten them but they were at their tightest. I felt blisters forming but… any minute now we would start riding. There’s no way it’s going to be 26 miles of bike pushing in deep soft snow…. Rite?!?

I pressed on, using my good leg to step in the deep snow to try and reposition my foot. Then when available I would switch and push from the passenger side to switch up the knee angles. First chance I got I ate 5 ibuprofen. It was too early in the day to be in pain. It helped a bit. The hours slowly passed and no bike riding, the Congo line slowly started to spread out. I was pulling off often to let people pass, as my bike pushing was very slow. 

Thoughts going through my head: 

It’s only 26 miles. But at this pace, we will never finish. 

Well not true, eventually they will cut us off and pick us up. Perfect! Move slow and eventually a human will show up and tell me to load my bike in a truck or sled and come with them, if I took too long. 

And at that time I will require this person to drive me directly to the front door of the air bnb and within 4 minutes I’ll be in a Hot bath writing this story. So just move forward. 

There were negative thoughts but, this time, I immediately told those negative thoughts to go pound salt! I’m not feeding into your dumb negativity, I know it’s only pain! Silly brain. 

Positive thoughts. Lets be positive. Let’s talk about my wife. Man I love her. I love that she made me pre race banana bread late at night and I love her Large brazier size that keeps me head comfy on the couch while we watch below deck! 

Smile acquired ✅

The pushing continued and never stopped. I never looked at my gps or the time. There was no need. One path of footprints and bike tires. People ahead pushing and people behind. I didn’t need to know the time or mileage, when the sun goes down I’ll be pulled from the course. That’s enough. 

A few thousand steps later I smelled smoke. Must be getting close to an aide station. That was good because my water was mostly ice. I kept sipping it but the tip was froze. 

As we approached the side station there was a big quitter vibe. There was a sign that pointed up a single track hill that said “course” and a flat kinda rideable path straight that said quitter. 

I thought about this situation quickly. And I was able to determine this was similar to the free candy van scenario. Suppose you come up to a windowless van that says free candy and there’s a dude with a killer mustache inviting you in, will the candy be delicious? Of course! Will the obligatory mustache ride be worth it? Likely not in the long run. 

Translation: quitting will make my knee stop hurting today but make my brain start hurting tomorrow. And brain hurt trumps knee hurt anyday. So I ghosted all those volunteers and pushed up the hill. I got to the top and turned around to let people pass and no one was there? Were they taking a long rest or did the group behind me bail? Hmm. 

I kept pushing and nothing rideable in sight. The theory was to push uphill and ride downhill. But the ruts and the trail were so bad, you couldn’t ride down without crashing into the snow. So it turned into sitting on my top tube with both my feet out as balance skis and squeezing the brakes just enough to try and slow the tires but not lock them up. Virtually every downhill ended in a crash into a pile of snow. 

When I was passing through that aide station I had heard a fella mention we had been pushing for 5 hours and had made it 8-10 miles. That’s rough, but I wasn’t concerned. Everyone was pushing. It’s un rideable, but I know Ms. Todd, and he’s about the mission. Doing hard things and developing mentally. I’m confident if I press forward and give it my all, he will reward me with some sort of finishing status or another option. He doesn’t put rules out there to stop people from pushing themselves. If I limit my stopping time and don’t stop the forward progress…. Good things will happen. I knew it. It will not be a waste. 

I had also heard that once we crossed some road, it got rideable. So I pressed on, pushing and thinking positive thoughts, like how my daughter puts in the most effort on her cheer squad and she’s the shortest by a foot 🙂. So now we have a routine where if her last one legged high cheer kick is with the same effort as the first one legged cheer kick, we go out to eat after the games. Love that effort! ❤️ 

Many steps later I arrived back at the aide station, I topped off my water, shared some finishing vibes with shmoug and scurried out of there. Then the trail actually got kinda rideable. By this time my driver side knee had been taking the strain of the passenger side knee and both were hurting. I was going to have to take more breaks. But then we could ride! It was mega painful to get my leg over and start pedaling but after like 1 minute of pedaling the pain left. Something about the bending motion of the pedaling and not on slippery snow, it immediately made the pain go away. YES! YES! YES! Cowabonga! We’re gunna finish now. 

And then about 3 minutes of pedaling and we were back to pushing 😂. 5 more Ibuprofen past the lips over the gums lookout stomachs here they come! I was consistently eating the twizzlers and Swedish fish, so my stomach wasn’t empty and I was hopeful I wouldn’t get any pain, if so I’d just do the ol finger down the throat trick, remove them from my belly and press on. It was all good though, no belly issues from excessive over the counter drug use. 

The ride ability came and went. We would be on possibly “heritage trail” for a few pedal strokes then back into the woods. Not much rideable but any minute on the bike would result in a few pain free steps off that bike that would follow. 

I was leapfrogging with about 5 other riders. All of us fighting our own silent battles. 2 guys had leg locking up cramps and had to keep stopping. Another Rider would loose all air pressure about every hour, and another had terrible luck with falling when trying to ride, but that gal had to be pushing at 4mph. She would immediately drop me at every uphill then I’d catch her on a small rideable section. 

I had been lugging around my heavy giant brick sized battery powered tire inflator because fat tires take forever to pump up, therefore I was able to stop and pump up that ladies tire for her. It was a nice break for my knees and the positive vibes and light conversation was a giant boost. I ended up filling her up 2-3 times. But she would be far ahead so it took me a minute to catch up to find her using c02 with not much luck. 

Sometime in there we crossed the road finally and I saw Shmaitlin. 

Shmaitlin characterization: 

Occupation: Liaison between the Hells Angels and Harley Davidson world headquarters

Rings of choice: thiccc wedding ring on one hand a likely class ring on the other hand. 

Spooky badass status: confirmed. 

Plans for tomorrow: Polar Roll Ultra 100 with Shmaren 😎

Seeing Shmaitlin was awesome! Her vibes were stellar and our best friendship was blossoming. We only had met the night before but I reminded her everytime I saw her, that our best friendship was getting stronger 😂

And with that distraction I did not see the trail next to the road and I pedaled down the road for too long before I realized I was off course and turned around to get on the correct course. It was slightly rideable and my knee was pain free for a second. 

Then I arrived at the sugar shack. Shout out to Cori-Ann who gave me a non alcoholic blue moon at Marji camp 2 years ago and now was cooking hot dogs at the sugar shack in the snow. Just fantastic humans up there keeping the participants fueled. I guzzled some Coke and moved on. 

I felt like it was getting late and we were running out of daylight. It was hard to tell though because on the high up clearing of possible power line area? In Ramba maybe? The snow was blowing so much you could only see white snow, no sky. 

I get a little foggy around this time. Lots of snow and trees and pushing. Then, more smoke! Another aide station with the free candy, I mean quitter sign. I believe this was hugs n bacon aid station. I should have stopped for a hug and bacon but I had tunnel vision. Move forward until we get at the air bnb. However that happened. 

5 more ibuprofen. 

My phone was on airplane mode and I refused to look at the Garmin. My brain thrives on lies I tell myself like… maybe we accidentally went fast and the finish was around the next corner! Move forward. 

Rumors were swirling through the leapfrogging of a cutoff time. I was confident I knew the answer. It was suppose to be dark, but I believe these conditions have everyone behind schedule so likely the cut off with now match the EX cutoff of 12 hours. This meant we had until 8:30. 2 hours of riding in the dark. And it wasn’t dark yet. So I’m in good shape. 

Then we passed a skier who said nice job guys! 9 miles left. 👀

👀

👀

Excuse me mam?!?! She looked like an honest good hearted person but I was praying to any and all religions that she was an evil manipulative toxic person who was teasing us by about 5 miles🤞 

And then I arrive at an aide station that confirms just over 8 miles left. It’s been a while since math class but 1.6 mph divided by 8 miles meant I would get a ride to the air bnb by a sled hopefully! Hopefully it’s that badass, well aged, gentlemen from the toddcast named Paul. I’d love to meet that dude! 

I kept the forward progress. Slowly. Fighting off the bad thoughts. Positive thoughts- my son rowdy boy, he is in 1st grade and had been slower at learning to read. We had a conference and made a plan. And I don’t mess around with a plan. I’m all in baby. Homework and extra reading every night and now he is above where he should be. The little dude puts in massive amounts of effort naturally, brings a happy tear to my eye. 

Back at it. Pushing, falling, pushing, riding, falling. Knee pain, blister issues, ice cold fingers. I was starting to tap Into my awful hard programmed rides from Coach “carry your bike uphill instead of ride it”. I believe the workouts are labeled “get comfortable with being uncomfortable”. I was. This was the reality for 3 more hours. Easy. 

Nothing exciting happening now. Repetitive walking uphill. Seeing the same fellow riders. All suffering and staying positive. Sometimes sharing with me how much further. 6.3 miles, Let’s do it! 

Now it was starting to get dark, but with all the snow, it was pretty easy to see. Until we went back into the woods. Then it got a lot darker. I stopped to get out my light and… no light. Uh oh. I had possibly under estimated this event and opted to not switch my outbound mount from my adventure bike to my fat bike, therefore my plan was to just use a cheapy headlamp. I mean it’s only 26 miles in bright snow and won’t be in the dark long if at all. 

No headlamp. I was in the stages of bonk. Possibly around a level 4 out of 10. I was at the point where you convince yourself, that your close enough to being done, you can stop forcing food and liquids. —- ALWAYS a mistake but it makes total sense to a level 4 bonkateer. 

No big deal. Pivot. I have my phone with a huge battery backup, zip ties, and duct tape. I’ll follow someone with a light then I’ll duct tape my phone to my bars. Easy. 

And rite as that thought entered my mind, a fella ahead of me, was coming back by on a different trail and shouted out “need a light”?? YES! He had two and gave me one. He said it’s fully charged, done worry about it. I’ll see you at the finish. 

And that is a 906 event in a nutshell. 

What an incredible human. So now I got a light and I’m going through the motions. Pushing and falling and sometimes a little wince of Pain. 

5 more ibuprofen. 

Now it had been dark a while and I came upon flat tire Ms. again. We pumped up her tire and she had one of those sweet Garmin watches and she told me, we have  under 2 miles and an hour until cut off. We’re going to finish. HELL yes we are mam! Let’s go! 

She took off walking at lightening speed and dropped me. But now I had the finish line in sight… but nowhere in sight. You get what I mean. 

So I was first gear pedaling just bashing through ruts and making it happen. I had my tire pressure under 1 and it was working. Faster than walking. 

The pain of the legs trying to pedal through that stuff was nothing compared to knee pain of walking. Sometime there after, we popped out onto a road. I had been thinking the entire time, the course profile had said 2.5 miles of pavement. Now I was trying not too, but I kept calculating in my head, there’s no way he have done even a mile of pavement. We must have a paved road to the finish anytime! 

So I got on that road and upshifted out of first, for the first time on the day and sent it! There were people in there homes with light on that did not care an event was happening on their street. But I’m on course, I see bike tire track. Head down keep pushing. Almost there. But why are there so many plow trucks plowing driveways on this road?!? I’m sure Todd has signs about the event. I check the tracks again and we’re down to 1 tire and 1 snowshoe. But it was snowing! So I’m probably on course. Then out of the corner of my eye on the other side of a 5 foot pile of snow I think I see shmougs helmet pedal by. … oh know. Please say that was a hallucination and I’m not off course. I then look up and see a bike and a snowshoer coming toward me. I shout “please tell me your going back to your air bnb and we’re not off course” 

The reply- we missed a turn and were off course! Well shucks. No time to dwell. Cut off could be any second. I turned around and went back to the woods. I knew the road wasn’t correct. Sure enough I had missed a sign and my Garmin had an inch of snow and ice on it. I found the missed turn and it made so much more sense. It was a flat trail you could ride inbetween a road and a snowmobile trail. Totally safe and correct. 

Once on the trail I found the flat tire Ms. again, I gave her my pump, showed her how to turn it on and left it with her. I was so cold and cutoff was close. I said I would see her at the finish. 

I could see lights through the snow. Had to be Ishpeming. But it was so far away. I kept pedaling but I was cooked. I had put in a as big of an effort as I could muster up to make that cutoff. And we were level 7 bonk. 

Then I see the Rider in front of me turn and I got hope! Maybe the finish was on that road! I picked up the pace and made the turn and I saw in the distance a big black arch through the falling snow. Holy moly, there it is. My goodness it’s real. The relief! 

As I pedaled closer there was a group of people standing at the finish. 

But I had a plan, I didn’t have my phone or a tracking device I thought, and I was wayyy late. All my friends were definitely finished and chilling at a warm restaurant. Which would be well deserved. I would just cross the finish, get out my phone, locate the air bnb. Get in it. Get in a hot bath, and reevaluate. 

Just before I crossed the finish line I was greeted by an excited volunteer cheering me on….  Now I’m a creeper and obsessed with 906 and mudslingers and Facebook and I know everyone. For real. I know you, your name, and your finish time. Not stalker esc, just a huge ran of people doing hard things and a kinda autistic memory. 

So rite away I was like Hey! Your shmenton! We’re about to be best friends. 

Shmenton characterization: 

Spouse: Hells Angels liaison

Beard thickness/coverage-8.7/10

Occupation: warden of America’s future 

Toddcast appearance: affirmative 

Birth year: likely 1983

After assuring shmenton that we would be best friends soon, I crossed the finish line to… everyone. Freakin everyone! 

Shmaren, shmenton, shmaitlin, coach biker gang, coach 3rd place MS15, Shmaley, shmoug, Ms.Todd. Wow. Overwhelming. 

Coach biker gang immediately gives me a squeezer hug and that was needed. 

I asked Ms. Todd if I was a finisher and he said yes! WOOOO I made cutoff. 11 hours 29 minutes. 26.7 miles and roughly 4000 feet of elevation. 

Thoughts and words would not form though. People were congratulating me and telling me things, go here, we’re going out to eat, where’s this person, who’s light do I have. I couldn’t make sense of anything. 

Ms Todd asked me a question and whatever response I said, it did made him say “somebody get this guy home” . Coach 3rd place then guided me to the air bnb. I pedaled slowly because walking was agony. They got me to the air bnb and said “ go get changed into dry clothes. Consume some sugar and meet us at the pizza place. It’s a block away. 

Uhh yeah sure. One thing at a time. I gotta get this bike in a door. 😂 and that’s literally what I did. I rolled it in the door and left it. It was like frozen and full of random food and ick. And the two flights of stairs in front of me were too intimidating. I crawled up the steps, clinging to the hand railing and groaning. Noone was around now. I was aloud to audibly release some pain. I made it in the doorway and started peeling off soaking wet layers. I took my phone out if my pocket and set it on a shelf. 

Then I took my coat off and checked the pockets. No phone. Just immediate dread and sadness. How did I loose my phone?!? I never even got it out! It was on airplane mode?!? Man did I screw up again. The phone is out there somewhere gone forever, I won’t even be able to navigate home. So I stood there staring at the ground just sad as can be. Half de robed, just so sad. For about a minute. Then I raised my head and saw my phone on the shelf. O yeah, that’s where it is 😬. Whew. The old brain fog level 8 bonk won that one😉

I finished stripping out of my wet clothes. Waddled to the fridge for some sugar.All coach Mr and Mrs motorcycle brought was 0 calorie Diet Coke and 0 calorie Waterloo. That’s not helpful, but I wanted carbonation with vengeance, so I opened a Diet Coke and chugged some. Not much because of the tiny stomach. 

Then I sat down and was so cold and shivering, I put on my sweatpants, shirt, hoodie, yesterdays socks because I had not packed those either, my beautiful puffy jacket down pants and my micro puff. 

Now I was warm, in less pain, and had drank quality beverage. No calories though, but a definite mental boost. I thought to myself “ hmm, I haven’t checked in with my family since the race start, I should probably take my phone off airplane mode and send them a text. Airplane mode off and 9 new messages. Whoops. I send out a mass text. “Done. Whew. Real tough. More words tomorrow”

I then gingerly descended the two flight of steps and oh so carefully waddle limped down the middle of the snow covered road to the pizza place where all my best friends were waiting. 

I chugged some water and stared at the table. Many comments were made about how out of it I was. Some of these friends are new and I had to tell them this was me after an event. Always a bonk, different levels but always. Coach Colorado Soccer then confirmed “ Matt sent me the saddest crying video at the Huracan in a bonk”. That is a fact and will be in chapter 4 of the Huracan blog😉

I drank two glasses of water and almost 1 piece of Hawaiian pizza. I enjoyed listening to my friends stories from the day but didn’t have much to offer. Still needed calories to form thoughts and transition them to words. 

We made it back to the air bnb and I ate a little more and drank some. I chatted with the coaches a little and then took a shower. It felt amazing. Crawled into bed and started writing this story in my head. 

The drive home the next day was worse than the drive up. Lots of snow. But I was in a car with heat, McDonald’s, and the toddcast on, so life was great. 

When I got home and reviewed the damage, I’ve got 5 blisters on my passenger foot. And 2 maybe gone toenails. Driver side is 2 definitely going to fall off toenails. 

I’m confident I didn’t ride more than 5 miles and pushed over 20. I’m going to call that my first ever marathon. I ordered a 26.2 sticker and polar roll sticker to remind myself of the hardest thing I’d ever done. 

Highlights: 

Knowing people on a first name basis, since this is my 3rd 906 event. 

Mean face picture with Dawn 

Hugs and love shared with Nick and Mama Nick 

Sharing positive energy with Dennis and Graham at the start. 

And definitely cornering Jordan Wakely in the high school and vomiting my fandom to him with a mean face selfie after. 

Another amazing adventure!