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Post Your T.I.V3 Stories/Pics Here!

16K views 74 replies 35 participants last post by  Fastskiguy 
#1 ·
Hey Everyone!

Just got back in from an epic Trans Iowa and decided we needed to start fresh with a new thread dedicated to our experiences. Post your epic tales here and please link to any and all pics!

FYI: You may remember seeing a fellow by the name of Zach there, (red head/green glasses). He was hanging out with me along the way, and is researching his book project on underground/DIY sporting events. This thread would help him out tremendously. :D

Okay, ya'll know enough about me, so I'll not sully this thread with my meanderings.

Have at 'er! :p
 
#3 ·
my story's probably pretty boring: rode a bike farther than I ever have before. averaged 12 mph or so while on it, called for a lift before I really needed, so that if I had to ride another 30-50 miles to get a ride I could. I made the check point(which was my initial goal) and then a bit more. No sense in risking injury or further recovery time. The 150 or so miles I did in about 14 hours total were a great time with kick ass scenery. thanks mark and jeff.
 
#6 ·
Broken Bones

ink1373 said:
Was Matt Chester present?

I don't intend to start another discussion about the guy, I'm just curious. I assume that he was the "MC" on the roster. Or maybe that was Curiak?
Matt e-mailed me about a week before the event to say he wasn't coming due to a freak accident where he apparently had his hand smashed in a door and broke a bone in his hand.
 
#10 · (Edited)
my pics will be here (some are Already) im just doing the updating right now. i am still decompressing a bit and i plan i doing a longish writeup which i will post a link too as well but most people just wanna see the pics so here you go.

BTW:this is cale, ken (the fixed rider) Matt (summer sausage and cheese guy), Tennesee yazoo guy and s-works guy with the surly fork it was really fun riding with you
 
#11 · (Edited)
Well...actually there were 24 finishers!

From the Trans Iowa site;

4/30/07: Final Official Results!

Overall Listing With Time And Class

1.Ira Ryan: 25:00hrs.............................................Mens Open
2. Marcin Nowak 25 hrs 10 min .........................Mens Open
3. Aaron Millberger 26.00 hrs.............................Mens Open
4. Joe Kucharski 26 hrs 4 min ...........................Single Speed/Fixed
5. Joeseph Meiser 27 hrs 7min..........................Mens Open
6. Chris Plesko 27hrs 12 min ............................Single Speed/Fixed
7. Brian Dukek 28 hrs 13 min ............................Single Speed/Fixed
8. Paul Black 29 hrs 38 min ...............................Mens Open
9. Tim Ek 29 hrs 59 min ...................................Mens Open
10. Corey Heintz 30.00 hrs.................................Single Speed/Fixed
11.Joe Frost Jr. 30 hrs 1 min..............................Mens Open
12. Ward Budweg 30 hrs 20 min .......................Mens Open
13. Ken Stuckart 30 hrs 25 min .........................Mens Open
14. Cale Wenthur 31 hrs 50 min .......................Single Speed/ Fixed
15. Ken Yokanovich 32 hrs 13 min ...................Single Speed Fixed*
16. Tie: Matt Braun
Skip Cronin 32 hrs 15 min ...................Single Speed/Fixed
Travis Braun
17. Tie: Michael Meister
Steve McGuire 32 hrs 48 min..............} Mens Open
Michael Beck ........................................ Single Speed/Fixed
18. Tie: Butch Johnson
Matt Wills 32 hrs 57 min ......................Single Speed/Fixed
19. Mike Denehy 33 hrs 45 min ....................... Mens Open

* Ken Yokanovich is the first Trans Iowa fixed gear finisher ever.

Thanks to everyone for a great event!

Again, I appologize for any misunderstandings for the results and for my shoddy post race presentation at T-Bocks. I can't even remember what I said! I guess my brain was shutting down after about 35 plus hours!
 
#12 ·
i had a great time. thanks so much to the friendly folks of Iowa...

i dropped my chain twice in the first mile (we Chicagoans never use that small ring- how was i to know?) and didn't see another rider the entire time. i flatted 4 times- and on the 5th i was out of tubes and out of time. that was it for me. yup, i'm the girl who couldn't fix her bike. boo.

either way, i had a really great time, and i was smiling and singing my way up and down some pretty awesome hills. (A Avenue outside Postville FTW!) Having to drop out when my body was still feeling great and good to go was a big disappointment, but I had a good time anyway. Hope too see y'all around real soon! (Gnome fest?!??)
 
#13 ·
No pictures to post or a real story, but lots of thanks to:

Mark and Jeff: For putting on the event again this year. Due to your time and effort, the event was extremely well organized and I had a great time, well as great of a time as one can have while inflicting harm upon their body.

Ira Ryan. Seeing you at the pit stops gave me something to keep moving towards, besides Decorah. Your tire tracks in the gravel were always a good sign.

Aaron Milberger. I feel very fortunate to have met up with you on the ride. Your pace, attitude, and energy were just what I needed.

Team Polska. Thanks for the Polish lessons, humor, and pulls. Congratulations to Marcin on your 2nd place finish.

Chris Plesko and Paul Jacobson. Your blogs helped with my preparation and allowed me to know my thoughts were not alone.

Todd Scott and Joe Partridge. Your pre-race advice and suggestions were greatly appreciated, especially since I had never done a race this long before.

To everyone involved, thanks for the memories.

Joe Kucharski
 
#14 ·
Guitar Ted said:
From the Trans Iowa site;

4/30/07: Final Official Results!
Overall Listing With Time And Class

1.Ira Ryan: 25:00hrs.............................................Mens Open
2. Marcin Nowak 25 hrs 10 min .........................Mens Open
3. Aaron Millberger 26.00 hrs.............................Mens Open
5. Joe Kucharski 26 hrs 4 min ...........................Single Speed/Fixed
6. Joeseph Meiser 27 hrs 7min..........................Mens Open
7. Chris Plesko 27hrs 12 min ............................Single Speed/Fixed
8. Brian Dukek 28 hrs 13 min ............................Single Speed/Fixed
9. Paul Black 29 hrs 38 min ...............................Mens Open
10. Tim Ek 29 hrs 59 min ...................................Mens Open
11. Corey Heintz 30.00 hrs.................................Single Speed/Fixed
12.Joe Frost Jr. 30 hrs 1 min..............................Mens Open
13. Ward Budweg 30 hrs 20 min .......................Mens Open
14. Ken Stuckart 30 hrs 25 min .........................Mens Open
15. Cale Wenthur 31 hrs 50 min .......................Single Speed/ Fixed
16. Ken Yokanovich 32 hrs 13 min ...................Single Speed Fixed*
17. Tie: Matt Braun
Skip Cronin 32 hrs 15 min ...................Single Speed/Fixed
Travis Braun
18. Tie: Michael Meister
Steve McGuire 32 hrs 48 min..............} Mens Open
Michael Beck ........................................ Single Speed/Fixed
19. Tie: Butch Johnson
Matt Wills 32 hrs 57 min ......................Single Speed/Fixed
20. Mike Denehy 33 hrs 45 min ....................... Mens Open
Hey all - shout out to everyone from the organizers to the participants, great job!!

Special congrats from me to Chris P., Dave N. for awesome rides, safe trip back to Denver guys!!

FYI Ted, looks like a slight numbering problem - missing #4 placement?

Ed E
 
#15 ·
The course was awesome. For someone who has ever really tried to put together a route there is a lot of work that goes into this. The route was very well put together and clearly it took advantage of some great scenery as well as some torturous landscape. I might have cursed once or twice about mileage being off here and there, but over the whole thing... there's some understanding about a margin for error. I say that now that I'm done :)

Including some of our un-planned detours, missed turns, and what-not... I had almost exactly 350 miles from start to finish.

I was pleased to have met many great people.
Cale - We met on I think the first climb out of Decorah and rode together for most of the ride.
Tim - Duluth man. Another MN guy. Way to go!
Matt - I cannot remember exactly where along the way that you joined our little group.
Dan - (Tennessee Yazoo man) it was a treat to have you along for so many miles. You did the right thing by pulling out when you did. I know you were suffering and to put another almost 200 miles on top of that would have been silly.
Ken S - Sat across from you at the mixer at Mabes. It was cool to run into you out there covering the miles.
Travis - You joined up with Matt and slowed down enough for me to hang on toward the very end. Thanks, from the results portion, I finally learned your name.
Skip - You too... from the results I learned your name. Assuming you are the one on the IF Planet X? Seemed like you did some soul searching there in the 4-5am on Sunday. Glad that you came on strong again once the sun came up. Third time is the charm... you finished.

Travis, Matt, and Skip... You guys should have finished before I did. Thanks for holding back to let my sorry rear end catch up after some of the descents. By late into the ride on Sunday, I had slowed down to only about 21 or so on my comfort level for descents.

In the past, I've been morbidly curious as to what it is like to do something like this. Now I know. I questioned, speculated, and agonized over what to bring, what to ride, gearing, etc. In the end, I stuffed a change of clothes in one of my bags and headed for the starting line with my bike. I went from commuting to work on Thursday to "racing" the TransIowa on Saturday without a change. (People laughed at just how dirty my chain is on my bike... Yes... It really is that dirty almost all the time.)

I showed up with no contingency plan for not finishing other than a map of Iowa stuck down in one of my bags. Should something catastrophic have happened, I suppose I could have called, but when I left home to participate... it was clear that my wife gave me one of those looks like: "good luck buddy, you're on your own." Everything came together and I finished.

As for riding it fixed... well... that's just what I am comfortable riding. It also offered a small degree of motivation to the idea of finishing too. I rode 42x19. My maximum speed was 29 early in the morning on Saturday. That works out to be a cadence of 160. I unclipped my feet on one descent sometime mid-morning on Saturday. When I got to the bottom, I felt guilty like I had cheated and that thought bugged me the rest of the event... So, I never did it again. Based on my calculations, I moved my legs around more than 368,000 times.

Thanks again everyone who participated and added to the level of excitement. Thanks most of all to Mark and Jeff for all of the hard work that went into organizing this! 'twas fun.
 
#16 ·
Thanks Ed, I'll fix that!

edemtbs said:
Hey all - shout out to everyone from the organizers to the participants, great job!!

Special congrats from me to Chris P., Dave N. for awesome rides, safe trip back to Denver guys!!

FYI Ted, looks like a slight numbering problem - missing #4 placement?

Ed E
I didn't miss anyone, just miss numbered this morning. I was wondering why my numbers added up to 25 when I only had 24 names! :p
 
#17 · (Edited)
Before coming to TIv3 I have had some problems with motivating myself to finish races like this. I tried and failed at TIv2 (but then again so did everyone else), have tried and failed at 600K brevets three times (and never have finished one), have bailed on a 200K brevet when the wind was rough, etc. In other words, I had something to prove to myself.

In the name of finishing I came with a low geared single speed (39X20 with 30 mm tires). For the climbs it was perfect, for the flats it was lower than I would have liked. But at the end it saved my bacon.

The first half of the ride was pretty fun, joining up with various groups of riders, some more than once. I managed to drop and get dropped by Matt the Lonely Luddite at least five times. Because he was geared and I was single speed, we took different terrains at different speeds. He was much more consistent in his speed and turned his legs over like a metronome, while I would alternately speed up and slow down as my metabolism or the terrain dictated. In my 5+ meetings with Matt I found out quite a bit about a pretty cool guy, and it helped to while the daylight hours away.

Everything was going great for me up until about 12:00 am. About that time I started to get wheezy like I had asthma. I have had what my nurse/wife has diagnosed as exercise induced asthma when commuting to work at 0 degrees F, but never when it was warm. I complained about my breathing to Chris Plesko and Joe Meiser, but there was no cure so we continued on. Within an hour my stomach started to go and I couldn't drink water or eat my perpetuem. Everything felt acidic in my stomach. By 2:00 am, just after the second river crossing (what was up with that? In Minnesota we usually put bridges over rivers... ;) ), I was cooked. The assumption at the time was that I was off with electrolytes. I had run out of electrolyte tabs a few hours earlier, and it just sort of fit with the stomach issues.

Chris and Joe were ANGELS. Chris gave me the pep talk of my life and explained how we had been making awesome time up until my shutdown, how all I needed to do was maintain a reasonable speed to get to the finish, how I could survive a few rest breaks, etc. He also gave me a bunch of endurolyte like pills. Joe Meiser was everything but a miser, and he handed me beef jerky, a little packet of liquid electrolytes, and two cliff bars. The two of them then continued on in the race and wished me luck.

I sat at the side of the second river crossing for maybe 5 minutes before I realized I was getting pretty cold and it might be best to just keep moving at whatever pace I could hold. I started up again and found that I was feeling a little better after chowing on the food the guys gave me and having 5 minutes to catch my breath.

The problem I now faced was that if I rode too hard my wheezing got the better of me and I couldn't catch my breath. This was ok on the flats where I could just pace myself below where I lost my breath, but hills sometimes got the better of me and I had to get off and walk. This was especially bad in one of the river valleys where it was humid enough that I had some condensation on my glasses. A modest hill I normally would have ridden up strong had me standing on the side of the road, trying to catch my breath through the wheezing. My vision started getting dark before I caught my breath. This freaked me out a little, so from there on I took it more conservatively and walked before I let my breath get that far away from me.

Eventually I made it in. From 2 am until I got in at 8:12 was the most difficult spot of riding I have ever done. I don't exactly know what was up with me, because it has never happened before. My wife, a nurse, thinks it might have been exercise induced asthma. But it certainly could have been some electrolyte imbalance. Last night (immediately following the race) I couldn't lay down to sleep without wheezing and needed vicks vapor rub to help keep my airways open. that sounds asthma-ish. Normally I weigh 155-158 lbs, but right now I am sitting at 165 lbs and my hands are swollen and partially numb, my feet are swollen, my face is swollen and I look in the mirror and wonder who the heck is looking back at me. That sounds electrolyte-ish. Any MDs want to make a stab at this and tell me how to avoid it next time? :???:

Whatever the case, I really have to thank Chris and Joe for the help they gave me. I am not sure I would have finished without their food and encouragement.
 
#18 ·
you guys rock

Every one of you who toed the line rocks as far as I'm concerned.
I hope you got what you wanted out of the event and would like to thank you all for entertaining me in between my run Saturday morning and bike ride Sunday morning.
I followed it like I would any pro race and was just crazy ass excited by the possibility of a fast course.
you all didn't disappoint.

Dallas " inspired by you suffering." Sigurdur
 
#20 ·
Paging Ken Stuckart

Paging Ken Stuckart of WI. Good to have met you at the dinner at Mabes. Who knew that we'd cross paths again out on the dust. About the only good photo that turned out (read, I ride bikes, not a photographer) is of you coming up a hill with a smile on your face. You could use this photo of evidence to show your significant other that at some point during the event you really did have a good time. email me at: reflector dot collector at gmail dot com if you would like me to send the photo. Oh, and by the way... AWESOME finish!
 
#23 ·
AAAaaaaaaahhhhh!

Sorry, I just had a flashback to last year.... that's how the whole freank'n day was!!!

.... tempted..... Dave...

...... and working on the first tandem entrant for 08....... it'll be a hard sell, but I talked her into Leadville in 06.... and we're goin' back in 07, so it couldn't have been that bad...
 
#24 ·
On the flooded section

I knew that the section of Neon Road towards the end had what I guess you can call a creek crossing. When I first reconned that road, it had been dry as a bone; however a week before T.I., I drove it and it had water running across it. Maybe enough to get over your rims as you rode across it. That was before the rains of last week!

The other section, the one pictured here, I had no idea about until I was talking to Ira Ryan in Janesville Saturday night. He said, "Oh yeah, that section on Willow. It's flooded." Ira said something about wet shoes and how that sucked in cold weather, but he didn't give me any indication that it was not rideable.

I figured it was a bonus and would add to the epic nature of the event. Well.......that's what I'm going with, anyway. :D

The Neon Road water I knew about and I was good with that.
 
#25 ·
Some Photos

#1. Brian Hannon leading Ira Ryan into Wadena, IA
#2. The winners bike resting at the checkpoint
#3. "Team Polska" saying goodbye to the last "B" road
#4. Ira Ryan preparing to continue on through the night from Janesville, IA
 

Attachments

#26 ·
First off, I had a blast at Trans Iowa, and would do it again. I loved hanging out and riding with all of the awesome bikers. I pulled out at Independence, with 123 miles on my computer. This was my first century ride, and I was very happy with it.

I went out for a ride today to reflect on what I'd learned over the weekend. The first thing I learned is respect, not only for the guys who finished, but anybody who lined up at 4am to start the race. The second thing I learned was perspective. On my ride this morning, the hills that were my "big" hills, just didn't seem so big any more. Lastly, I leaned about nutrition. I have to learn how to eat right for long rides.

A BIG thanks goes out to Mark for all the time he put into this and for taking us through some really amazing countryside. Another BIG thanks goes out to all the helpers behind the scenes. Marty, I wish I would have gotten a chance to say hi.

Joe
 
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