Team MotionBased

At 9am a blue Ford wagon came careening into the lot and Fred’s grin belies the good news as he unloads my bike box. Hallelujah – time to race! I’m sure I’ve never worked so fast to assemble a bike, get dressed and fight our way 4/5 of the way back in the start list of nearly 1200 riders. We ended up next to a German Powerbar team sporting rooster manes and bar taped all over their bars. The levity finally gave me a chance to take a breath, look around and realize what we were about to embark upon. Were all those Powerbars taped to their bikes a sign of how long we were going to be out there on the course?!? Not more planning – time to ride the bike…a lot.

The energy was palpable as everyone in the gates listened to the announcer begin the countdown to the 8^th annual TransAlp Challenge Stage 1 from Fussen, German to Imst, Austria – fans cheering, riders doing that last minute brake or tire check and the lead moto gunning the two-stroke. Bang and we’re off…sort of. Took about 10 minutes for all 1200 of us to roll through the start line and string out thin enough to snake through the ancient cobbled streets of Fussen. Once past the small, streeside cafes and bakeries the race began as we all jammed into a steep uphill singletrack. Nothing like keeping that adrenaline pegged as 1200 people flooded like rats fleeing the flood waters up over the hillside, skipping the trail altogether. This certainly provided the shake-out of those racing and those out “for fun”. Somehow Evan and I seemed to pass a couple of hundred people because once exiting the forest we could actually see trail under our tires and a clear road in front of us.

A side thought that skitted across my brain while turning those pedals over and over; this place is beautiful - its hard to believe we’re actually racing our bikes up and over ski passes, through dense woods and down into the next town (and country) – dang, this is cool! 79K later and what felt like crossing over a thousand steep mountain passes we arrived in Imst; our rusty, airline-stiff legs feeling the wear and tear but minds and bodies relieved to finally have gotten under way. Now all the worries, stresses, distractions that plagued us during the months of planning were distant memories. All we had to do was ride, eat, sleep and thank our wonderful RV drivers and support staff and most importantly spousal support. Checking the result board at the first dinner, things were looking good. Somehow we’d moved through the field and were sitting in 17th place overall. Evan and I looked at each other in disbelief and silently prayed our legs to hold up for another week of this. Check out the Garmin / MotionBased file: http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/episode/view.mb?episodePk.pkValue=1053486