Saddle sores and social media spats – just another day in the saddle with cycling aficionados Chris Drummond and Troy Cowan. Buckle up for a rollercoaster ride through the peloton as we swap tales from the Tour de Dirt, debate the aerodynamics of TT helmets, and swap pro tips for bike packing with minimal mishaps. Whether you're gearing up for the Mid-South Race, discover a new gravel route, or simply looking for a hearty laugh, this is a good episode for you.
Dive helmet-first into discussions on strategy, the tactical use of a bell in a race, and how a nickname like "Bunny Hop Wizard" can stick. Plus, we address the elephant in the peloton – etiquette. Both in group rides and gravel racing, we're pedaling out pearls of wisdom that'll help you navigate the pack with grace.
www.cyclingoklahoma.com
AERO HELMETS
https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/is-the-new-uno-x-time-trial-helmet-the-wildest-one-yet/
https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/when-you-see-how-fast-it-is-you-wont-laugh-anymore-jonas-vingegaard-defends-wild-new-time-trial-helmet/
https://www.alamy.com/swiss-stefan-bissegger-of-ef-education-easypost-pictured-in-action-during-the-first-stage-of-the-tour-de-france-cycling-race-a-13-km-individual-time-trial-in-and-around-copenhagen-denmark-friday-01-july-2022-this-years-tour-de-france-takes-place-from-01-to-24-july-2022-and-starts-with-three-stages-in-denmark-belga-photo-jasper-jacobs-image474153536.html
https://www.cyclingweekly.com/products/tech-triumphs-and-fashion-failures-at-the-first-weekend-of-the-tour-de-france
Saddle sores and social media spats – just another day in the saddle with cycling aficionados Chris Drummond and Troy Cowan. Buckle up for a rollercoaster ride through the peloton as we swap tales from the Tour de Dirt, debate the aerodynamics of TT helmets, and swap pro tips for bike packing with minimal mishaps. Whether you're gearing up for the Mid-South Race, discover a new gravel route, or simply looking for a hearty laugh, this is a good episode for you.
Dive helmet-first into discussions on strategy, the tactical use of a bell in a race, and how a nickname like "Bunny Hop Wizard" can stick. Plus, we address the elephant in the peloton – etiquette. Both in group rides and gravel racing, we're pedaling out pearls of wisdom that'll help you navigate the pack with grace.
www.cyclingoklahoma.com
AERO HELMETS
https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/is-the-new-uno-x-time-trial-helmet-the-wildest-one-yet/
https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/when-you-see-how-fast-it-is-you-wont-laugh-anymore-jonas-vingegaard-defends-wild-new-time-trial-helmet/
https://www.alamy.com/swiss-stefan-bissegger-of-ef-education-easypost-pictured-in-action-during-the-first-stage-of-the-tour-de-france-cycling-race-a-13-km-individual-time-trial-in-and-around-copenhagen-denmark-friday-01-july-2022-this-years-tour-de-france-takes-place-from-01-to-24-july-2022-and-starts-with-three-stages-in-denmark-belga-photo-jasper-jacobs-image474153536.html
https://www.cyclingweekly.com/products/tech-triumphs-and-fashion-failures-at-the-first-weekend-of-the-tour-de-france
What is up? Cycling Oklahoma? I appreciate you tuning in for another episode. This one is going to be fun. It's a little bit different.
Speaker 1:Normally when we do the conversations it's with the fine Dr Alan White and he's not a real doctor and we actually get into that story. This one is with Chris Drummond and Troy Cowan. So several of you have heard Chris on the podcast before and Ryan Drummond, his son. So we bring Troy in on this one as well and I don't know if Troy knows it, but we're going to do an episode with him someday about bikepacking and those kinds of things and some of his adventures with tour divide and he's done some really cool stuff. So I want to make sure we get to share his story at some point. So we have conversations, we talk about a whole bunch of random junk on this episode and there's a lot of laughs. We talk about the new Aero helmets in the world tour, which are incredible and I will put a link in the show notes if you want to see them and have no idea what we're talking about. Also, we get into the tour to dirt.
Speaker 1:Season has kicked off, the results that the fields are packed this year and with some super fast people out there, men and women. The first turnout was great. It looked like it was some good battles out there and it was really excited to see some people racing, racing hard, and the category one in Oklahoma this year is legit, so that's going to be fun to watch. But there was a ton of drama and it's Facebook drama, which is, of course, the best kind of drama for a bunch of middle age people to be keyboard warriors and it's hilarious. So if you want a bunch of funny reads, go to the tour to dirt Facebook page and just look at all the e-bike posts, because it's hilarious. We get into talking about that, some of our favorite gravel routes. So we get into a whole bunch of stuff and it's a lot of fun. It's a good episode, so I appreciate this. Also, when this comes out is going to be around Mid-South Run or Mid-South Race, and so everybody that's out there racing Mid-South good luck. I hope you had a great experience. If you're listening to this afterwards, it's the premier event in Oklahoma and yeah, we're just we're super pumped about that and we have a ton, ton of people go into that and I hope everybody has a good, safe, fun day playing bikes and taking it for what it is and just enjoying a really awesome day on the bike with a bunch of awesome people.
Speaker 1:So the other big thing that I've been leading up to in talking about I'm sure everybody's tired of hearing me say it, but we have a new website Now. This website is a lot of different things, so it's cyclingaclacom. Please go check it out. It is a work in progress. It is nowhere near the final piece here, but I wanted to get it up before this podcast came out. So what's so awesome about this website is it's not just about the podcast. It's a resource for people in our community and we're going to continue to grow it and I have a bunch of collaborators that are helping me with the blog piece of it. So we're going to have a ton of different themes on the blog, where you can find all kinds of things from women, cycling maintenance tips, hopefully some race reports let's see what else we got going bike packing tips, gravel tips, newbie tips. I think there's going to be someone who's going to possibly do some triathlon articles on there, some possibly some coaching tips and tricks on there. So the blog is going to be incredible and they have some really awesome people that are going to help out and write those blog posts, and so I am not doing that, so it's going to be a community effort.
Speaker 1:But the really awesome part of this website you're going to be able to find your routes there. So I have linked it to Ride With GPS. I am continually pulling in routes from around Oklahoma, so you'll have to go in. You'll join the club on Ride With GPS. It doesn't cost you anything, just click the link. Super cool, super simple, but you'll be able to find routes all over Oklahoma and download them right from this website. And if you're doing the free Ride With GPS account, you'll get some features that are not with your free account by joining the club. It doesn't cost you anything, you just click have to click a button and it gives you access to it. So if you have questions, let me know. But also we have a mountain bike tab. I'm pulling in all the mountain bike trails in Oklahoma and that will be through all trails. So again, you don't have to have a paid account. Just do the free one and you can locate all of the mountain bike single track trails in Oklahoma through this website.
Speaker 1:Hopefully, I will continue to pile on the gravel routes to this website and you won't have to go search them. You can just go here and be like I want to look for something in the Southwest, and it will be there, or the Northeast or wherever you want still water routes, whatever. It's going to be a really cool resource when we continue to flush it out. Please go visit it and give me some feedback that you like it, you don't like it, something's wrong, something that we need to tweak, make better. If you have tips, like I'm all in, because this is going to be a community resource and this is all been an ongoing effort and it's taken me a long time to put together because I'm not a tech person, so I hope you enjoy it. Please use this as a resource, tell people about it and hopefully this will make it easier for you to find your next adventure.
Speaker 1:The other piece of that is it's brought to you. This web, or this podcast, is brought to you by more overhead door. They have sponsored the podcast and that money is going back into the community. This is another perfect example. This website is costing money. The ride with GPS account that I had to set up is costing money, so all of that is paid for with the sponsorships of this podcast, and so I can't think more overhead door enough for helping out. They are supporting us in this community. Their dollars are going into making our community better, so please support them.
Speaker 1:Storm season is here. You're going to get dense in your in your garage door with hail storms coming through. Reach out to more overhead door whenever you have to get that insurance claim, get that taken care of, or spring cleaning and you need to maintenance. Reach out to more overhead door and and support them, because they are supporting us and this is another example of how their dollars are going back into our community and I'm using sponsorship dollars to better our community. So if you are a business owner or an individual who just wants to help support this and we're putting money back into the community, please reach out and let me know. This doesn't. This isn't free and it's not cheap to put all this together. So I'm sorry I'm ranting and going on long here, but I can't think more overhead door enough for stepping up and supporting the sponsor, the sponsor, the podcast, and we've been able to put their money back into the community to hopefully provide some resources and some good things To our community, so check them out.
Speaker 1:If you need anything, please go check out cycling Oklahomacom. Use it as a resource. Give me feedback. Check out the blogs. They are coming soon. They probably will not be posted by the time that you this episode is aired, but they will be going up soon, so please double check that. Hope you enjoy this fun episode of a bunch of knuckleheads talking about a whole bunch of random junk. So super long intro. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you enjoy it. Please give me feedback. And you know what? Go play bikes. All right, we're recording so I don't want to keep make sure we capture the gold here. We can always cut anything in the in the up if we need to. All right, you boys are ready to roll. No curse.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's all you want. We can hit the. If I have a coughing fit on me, I'm still coming off the covid's.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, how is your? It's not bad, I'm just coughing a lot, and is that your excuse for why Rai Rai whooped up on you?
Speaker 3:You let your little boy beat you.
Speaker 2:He's a child.
Speaker 3:He's 17.
Speaker 2:I wouldn't say I let him. I might have been able to beat him if I, if I didn't take the opportunity to teach him, but but in the end, yeah he got away from me.
Speaker 1:What? Okay? Well, let's just start with with that race. What, what did you? What were you able to teach him in the race?
Speaker 2:I was teaching him how to manage the lead when you have he and. I there's, there's a lot to teach us.
Speaker 1:What's going to say? What does?
Speaker 3:that mean there's nobody in front of you.
Speaker 2:The three of us kind of got away. One of the one and other kid crashed, so then it was the two of us and then Ryan was just going full gas. I was kind of watching him. I was watching him come apart a little bit in front of me. That course was a. We started in a field and then it went. It was kind of downhill, rocky, kind of technical, like you get coast for a long time, very little pedaling, and then it was. It was kind of a slow rocky climb out and then and then straight into like a 20 mile an hour headwind like through a field and for for a few minutes. So it was like that was the hardest physically the hardest part of the race. And he just, you know, he started smashing out there but he was being like really inefficient in the rocky downhill and I kept catching him.
Speaker 1:So then I just I just told him to get behind me.
Speaker 2:He was just trying to go too hard, like in the rocks, you know, and you're trying to pedal really hard and you're really just like you're just bouncing around and kind of you're killing your speed. So I just I could see that like if I had wanted to attack him at that moment I would have gotten away. I don't think I would have held it, but I would have definitely. He was kind of I could tell he was getting tired from riding that way. So I just told him to get behind me and follow what I was doing. I was just kind of like pointing out to him that we were known, was in sight. So I was like teaching him you know, if no one's in sight, no one's going to go so fast through these rocks that they're going to catch you. It's impossible, like no one at this race is going to catch you here. So just be smooth, like just cruise, flow, and then just smash the climb in the headwind and then then you just cruise and flow. We had seven laps.
Speaker 2:so like learning how to break that course down was you know if it was like two laps, you could just do whatever. But then he started to figure that out, like oh, I can recover for five I don't know five to six minutes, whatever that. That section was Like just rest, like no one's going to catch you. And if you, if you do that, then you smash the climb and in the headwind where they're trying to catch up, also, like you'll never get caught. Like I want, I want a lot of races like that. Like you, you've got to get away first, but then you've got to realize like where you're faster and where they're faster and kind of do the opposites.
Speaker 2:And then, once you figure that out, we just kind of rolled, like it's kind of like me and me and Brandon back in the day, we're just we're talking and we're going fast, but we were talking and riding, which was kind of cool, it was a fun race and we had we actually benefited from an e-biker. It's not all negative. He bought us right before the headwind and gave us a tow all the way to the field. I said I said I'll let you buy at the top of this climb. And he's like OK, because I knew I could jump on his wheel there. Yeah, pullers like 18, 18 miles an hour through the field and through the headwind.
Speaker 3:Awesome.
Speaker 2:But then he about clean somebody out. I know the fundraise like. I mean. It's always fun going to tour de dirt like seeing all the people that you haven't seen in a while, and that a really good turnout. It was a short loop, what's that?
Speaker 1:That a huge turnout.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it was good and it was like I was kind of worried about there being a lot of traffic because that course was so short. But it was no different than anything else and it was. It was fun. For for what it was I enjoyed it was kind of like Turkey Mountain, only not not as I mean old Turkey is kind of, but watered down, so it was rideable for everybody.
Speaker 1:Did you like the short course format? Like the short?
Speaker 2:laps, it was all right. I mean seven laps was. It seemed like a lot when I was on that, like lap three, my man is going to be long. But then I started to realize how short the course was. And seven laps wasn't, wasn't really that long.
Speaker 3:So yeah, I don't know, do they put up a lap counter for you, or how'd you keep track?
Speaker 2:Man I was, we were, we were getting confused. Ryan kept asking me like man I'm not. I think I thought I knew and I was right. But when we came through with like three to go, tom Euglain was telling us he told us three to go. And so, yeah, because seven. I mean, when you do like four laps in an XC, it's hard to sometimes it's hard to remember what lap you're on. But no official lap counter, but he was yelling it out on the way by.
Speaker 1:Well, I had a tiny nightmare for them to keep track of people stopping early or like logistic wise for them. That's freaking brutal.
Speaker 3:Yeah you tend or not do the chips or the?
Speaker 2:time chips. It wasn't chip timed.
Speaker 1:Well, because they're, they have a good know. Well, they're part of it. I think they're part of the tour series. I think them and Corey run it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, some of them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think they're not necessarily technically owners, but I think it's them and Corey that do everything. So it was fun.
Speaker 2:I thought everything ran smooth and we had a great day.
Speaker 1:Are you guys going to do Get CR side kick back there? Are you guys going to do all the races this year, just the Tulsa area ones?
Speaker 2:I don't know yet Ryan's. Ryan's got a lot of races he wants to travel to, so like he wanted to do that one to get a race in before he goes to do UCI stuff. So I will do what's not conflicting, probably just because it's fun to go over there and race. Only thing missing was Troy.
Speaker 3:Sorry, man, I wasn't invited.
Speaker 2:I kept looking, I was.
Speaker 3:I mean you could have texted me and said, hey, I'll meet you up there. But actually Hussleberg sent me a text and he was like man, this course isn't the best. I would save your money.
Speaker 2:I thought it was fun, but I like that kind of writing, so I told Rob and had any issues, so anyways.
Speaker 3:so, but I'll probably go to Thunderbird. I'll go to Thunderbird.
Speaker 1:Oh you coming down for that one.
Speaker 2:Probably not in me. They're gonna be in Tennessee or if I don't go to that with Ryan, I'm gonna go to Washington, haven't decided yet I want to go to Washington. I also want to go to Tennessee to help him, but there's not a whole lot I can do to help him. That amount by grace. So.
Speaker 1:Vanessa's taken in. I Think there's a perfect part to jump into wash all because you're doing that to get ready for you to his dumb adventure. That's Andy's deal they might will jump into that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, roll three or wash it off.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, well, let's just start with rule of three, because that's the stupid one. So is that kind of your big one for the spring?
Speaker 2:I Guess. So I mean it. I don't. I know a lot of people are kind of Wanting to train for it to do well, like I want to be able to finish it, but that's really I mean. I just thought it would be interesting to go see if I could do a 200 mile ride. What's the longest ride you've ever done.
Speaker 1:Probably like 160 on road.
Speaker 2:No mountain bike 24-hour race that one.
Speaker 1:You know 160 miles out there by yourself. I.
Speaker 2:Think it's like 157.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's close to 160 Troy. What's up far this. You've ever ridden one once like stretch.
Speaker 3:Three, 300, that was like a third. That was like a 36 hour stretch, though it was. It was like it was a second to last day of the divide in 16, because I was in Pytown and I had to get home because I'd go back to work and it was like 10 am On Saturday morning and we rode all the way until 10 pm. Sunday night is when I'm finished and I think I think from Pytown to the border was like 300 miles. We took maybe an hour and a half nap at like 4 am. Like I didn't even get out my sleeping bag. I like pulled out my tent and just laid on top of it for like an hour. I don't think I slept. I think it is laid down, but miserable.
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 3:Like I crushed it because I was like it's the only time on the divide it was flat and it was like road riding on the like these. Yeah, there's roads.
Speaker 1:How's your back and stuff hold up to be on the bike that long?
Speaker 3:I mean, I was younger and Well, you just get used to it like I'd been doing it for 20 days prior, so it's like oh he, just my ass was.
Speaker 1:I. How many saddle sores did you have?
Speaker 3:Oh, I didn't have any saddle sores. I had one big saddle sore that was like the size of a half doll, like we got a gas, because I've heard this story and I don't want to hear it again.
Speaker 3:So we get you get done, and like you smell like shit, like you haven't had a real shower. Lexi picks me up. We have to. You have to drive two hours to like a real hotel like off, you know, like I ten or something. And so we get the hotel, I take a shower, I get out, I'm like hey, and God bless, lexi. I was like can you like look at my butt, like I think I got a inch, and so I just like bend over. She's like oh my god, you have like a hole in your ass. It's not your asshole. This is pretty bad. I mean it, that's.
Speaker 1:It wasn't like a big like sore sticking out like you have, more like a hole in your body.
Speaker 3:It was bad, it was yeah, I'm lucky to get affected. Well, I think it probably was. I mean it hurts for like a week, straight to the point like I get dressed in the morning and like I'd sit on my saddle and I just like Just the pain was like so bad for the first hour, uh-huh, and then it'd like go away, yeah, and then at the end of the day, like the last hour of riding, I would literally like I would scoot around on my seat like every single pedal stroke and it just Sounds like so much fine.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's saddle got thrown in the trash.
Speaker 2:I don't want it. I don't want it that bad. I don't want anything that bad.
Speaker 3:Well, but I mean, it's you know, it's my fault. You live and learn right like I think I'd be fine. Now what?
Speaker 1:would you do different?
Speaker 3:I would have like desitin and I would like clean it better every night. I would wear something with. I would have worn like I, just because I just wore like your, your chamois, right like I would wear like an, like a mountain biking short over the top of a chamois, just to have a little bit more cushion. Probably a different saddle. I have a Brooks saddle now. I'd probably use that.
Speaker 1:Man, hopefully you guys have really fun adventures like this, up at 200.
Speaker 3:It's, but that's a one-time thing, so that's. This was like.
Speaker 1:Did it just show up one day, or did it? Was it like a slow progress?
Speaker 3:Oh, it's a slow progress. Yeah, because you're doing like we have, like we did in 23 days, and change whatever like that averages out to like a buck 20 a day. Like a buck 20 a day for on the mountain bike, 23. Yeah, with a loaded, a loaded mountain bike, and I was not loaded the way it should have been. It was.
Speaker 2:This is why we're getting a hotel. You take a shower, wash our chamois, we get up. We get some waffles in the morning.
Speaker 3:Oh, continental breakfast whatever you want, boss, whatever you want, I'm just following you.
Speaker 1:You need to just empty with ho ho's and what ding-dongs and Mountain Dew, that's all you're gonna smash for a hundred miles Get a hotel.
Speaker 2:I don't smash again and we'll probably still win because we got waffles in us in the shower.
Speaker 3:I don't know. There's this guy named Rob Bell and he came flying by me at the six hour race.
Speaker 1:I mean, well, he didn't fly by you because you kind of blocked the trail. Yeah, you totally Basically trying to divide you and oh no, oh no, I saw him coming.
Speaker 3:I'm like you go.
Speaker 2:Yeah you go. He's probably gonna win your right.
Speaker 1:Let me tell you how this story really went from. In the six hour race I catch up with Troy and he's still, you know, maybe like 20 or 30 yards in front of me, coming off full fire at section. We go in and we're talking a little bit and he gets a little bit farther in front of me and in about that time we have probably yeah, probably, 30 yards between us about that time Rob catches us, catches me, he goes past and we talked for a second.
Speaker 1:Then he gets up on Troy's wheel and he says something to Troy. Troy doesn't even like Acknowledge he's there, so he says something again. Totally it's just nothing. So then I start yelling at Troy nothing.
Speaker 1:And then so now me and Rob are both yelling at Troy, like maybe he has earphones in, I did, I did this one for I mean a couple of minutes, and finally we got to a point where I'm like Rob, yeah, I think you're either gonna just like have to tap his wheel or like scream at him. And I was like he thinks it's me that's behind him. Yeah, because we're just roll up, because when we met each other, rob was nowhere in sight until like three seconds later. He was honest, yeah, but Troy totally one of those guys.
Speaker 2:He's one of those guys two phones in a bike race.
Speaker 3:Hey, I had to get through it somehow.
Speaker 2:Troy cow and no one's gonna catch me. I'm putting both.
Speaker 3:He was the only one that did catch me. I mean no, you.
Speaker 2:I. I was right on my wheel, though it still makes me laugh that the whole first lap of that race I thought Rob bell was Chad Hodges and I was really blown away at how fast Chad Hodges was on a mountain bike. I'm like man he's a lot better than I thought he was gonna be.
Speaker 3:Hey Chad did.
Speaker 2:Well, I was talking to someone saying man Hodges is riding good, and they seemed confused. And then I stopped to get a bottle and and then Vanessa told me Rob was up there. We're like oh Rob, that makes no sense. More sense because there's no way Chad Hodges could be me In that joke there with me and Chad but I just got a text message from Chad Hodges Because, like he hurt us, yeah, that's hilarious.
Speaker 1:How did you, did you guys have fun at the six hour?
Speaker 2:Uh, I mean I rode by myself for most of it because there's kind of a group that went out fast and I was like all right, well, I'm not gonna go out that fast. And then I didn't really. I mean, I kind of caught Chad cook. Ryan was in front of me but he was doing a team with Aubrey, so I rode by myself, I'd say, the majority of that race. So it was kind of fun, but it was kind of boring. Like I rode with with cook a little bit, but it's kind of like he was going fast. When I caught him he slowed down so and then I stopped to get some food and took a, took a 10 minute break or something and he went back in front of me and I didn't. I almost caught him on the last lap until I started almost thrown up. So I decided that was it, I would shut it down. Good idea. So I mean, it was a. It was a pretty fun day. I always like riding it at t-bird, but yeah, that was a great six hour course.
Speaker 3:Yeah, how'd you like it Was your first big day I was, I was happy I finished, I was super happy I finished because I haven't. I just don't have that kind of endurance anymore, so it felt good. But I mean, I I tried to pace myself. I think I did pretty well until the last like hour. And then I was just like because I got to that four hour mark and I'm like, okay, but I was, yeah, I was ahead of like Chad and Ryan Hussleberg. They were chasing me, I could see him and I'm like, okay, I'm just gonna maintain and see how I do. And then I could see Saxby for first four hours. I was within 30 seconds, yeah. And then Chad was on my wheel and Hussleberg had been dropped or whatever. And and then Chad rode with me. For God.
Speaker 3:I think two or three laps at least nice. And then I told him I'm like dude, you got to go, like I'm, I'm not gonna. And in sax we was kind of starting to creep away and I was slowing down. So, yeah, I kind of stretched out my last lap. I didn't want to, I didn't want to get done and have to do another one. So I'm like, oh, came in at 602, I can't, can't, can't do another one now.
Speaker 2:Too bad, but I'm just, I'm just proud of my, proud of myself for finishing. Yeah, that's not. Yeah, that's a third attempt at that race that that they've put on that. The first two, I did not get to the end and then I got to about four hours.
Speaker 2:No, I last year I paced myself Really well, I was really being good, and then and it almost happening in this year, that's why I stopped to sit down and eat two burritos and then I went back out and then I was like I felt really, I felt really good to the end after that.
Speaker 3:So See, you just need to follow my wheel, because I know how to chill now and you don't that's why I've recruited you for the 200 miles. Because we're like, we're literally like you're just going to be following me and you're going to go berserk in the back Like what the fuck? Hurry up, ride that line. What are you doing? But it's so, I'm going to go that way. You're just going to ride my wheel and that's fine.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to wrap my head around that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, it's gonna be tough.
Speaker 1:Well, maybe drama, maybe you leave in the single track, since you know the trail so well. Yeah, maybe that'll work, but you can't leave him. You can't. Yeah, you gotta go slow slow for the old guy?
Speaker 3:Yeah, we'll see it's fine. I got a gps on how to use it.
Speaker 1:Well, just telling what hotel you're at, go, get there eventually. Yeah, I'll drop up in.
Speaker 3:If he drops me, I'm gonna stop him. I'm going.
Speaker 1:I think I saw Malachi when I was out there the last time, when I was riding on the back 40, I mean in that day I saw One, one other person I think, when I was riding and I'm riding along and I scoot over because this guy's coming at me and I just had to head down, I wasn't paying attention, like I mean, I don't know anybody out there to see anybody, and he's right, what are you doing? I was like I stopped and turned around and he comes riding back up and it was Malachi, you just. But he told me he's going after the 200, like For real going after it. So there's me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so maybe a good battle up there with with rob.
Speaker 3:Just callable.
Speaker 1:He loves that long stuff, Kitto.
Speaker 3:I don't know. I think rob's probably rob's gonna be.
Speaker 2:Well, I'm like riding decent for that, like washita, if I go do it. And then I listened to rob's podcast yesterday and I'm like, oh shit, he's going. It's like, well, I'm definitely not winning.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's that, we'll go go with him, go chase with him.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, no, no, I know better than that.
Speaker 1:Going back to the six hour trip, my brother got drone footage of the star. I'll have to show it to you, troy. It's hilarious. So it's from the start, you know, and it goes down the Uh, the highline wire situation and you can see everybody. You know, just like starting to, you guys start creeping out, there's like a group of like five sticks or so off the front and you guys keep creeping off and then there becomes like Ones and twos, kind of just shooting off, like almost trying to get across the gap, but not really, and there's like a legit, just Like a clog in the whole couple of times. Guess who that is? Me and Troy boy. Yeah.
Speaker 3:I straight up said I'm not going hard and I wasn't.
Speaker 1:I get next to Troy and he's like, yeah, I'm not going Hard. I was like that's perfect, because I was like we just talk and we're just like, yeah, the whole entire race is stuck behind.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but nobody. Nobody got past this.
Speaker 1:No, there's a couple of randos that kind of come around. Yeah, because I think.
Speaker 3:I think I passed in the first lap or two, like at least five people that were ahead of us and then, like nobody from behind got to have round us, it's like, yeah, crowd control, that's right, I was bouncing man. This is the bouncer, we're good teammates. It's blocking for you. Chris, we didn't get into the appreciate it.
Speaker 1:We're doing teamwork, but whatever.
Speaker 3:Oh shit, we got belt buckles. Oh, I did get a belt buckle, yeah.
Speaker 1:Saxman gave me his belt buckle because he's like a minimalist about everything when it comes to stuff like that. I'm like so do with your belt buckle.
Speaker 3:He drives a Porsche, doesn't?
Speaker 1:he does driver Porsche. Minimalist but he doesn't have a lot of stuff. Let's say he doesn't have all things. So the good thing is this podcast is going to come out when he can't listen to it. But that belt buckles, going to Africa and coming back with him somehow.
Speaker 3:So I tell him he's like, he's like.
Speaker 1:Just the way you know, I was like, oh no, I got it. He's like what are you going to do with it? I was like you'll see it again at some point. You will see it again, so I gotta figure out a way to sneak it into his. I think I'm gonna zip it. I was bike for the way back.
Speaker 3:I say put in a saddle bike bag.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so that thing's gonna.
Speaker 2:I've snuck stuff in aobri's bike bags when she's traveling. Before she was when she's going to europe. I had I don't know how I got it, but I had like a mosquito net that you put over your head when you're and I was like you should take this. The mosquitoes are really bad over there. And she's like shut up, dad. I was like no, I really heard they're bad. And she's like I'm not taking that. And she packed her bag and I stuffed it in there. Then she got to europe. She's like unpacking her bag with the team. There's like this mosquito net.
Speaker 1:She didn't think it was funny. My dad's the worst, yeah, well, I mean, I guess we'll get into her at some other point because I want to sit down and do a podcast. However, she's on a new team, so that's going to be exciting to to see. Is she racing just us stuff this year? She'd go on anything overseas.
Speaker 2:It'll just be the domestic crit scene. Yeah, a few different like the uh, most of what she did last year, but she also did the ncl races and so I think she's got like 30 33 races this year on all crits. Yeah, it's a lot of raising.
Speaker 1:I think she's since the, the lifetime and the gravel scene, all that. At this point it's like basically like the retirees or people towards the end of their career, with people like her and rye rye on the upswing, like their career is not even starting yet. Do they look at that as something that's like a potential or is that like not even on the radar, like you think there's any like young people coming into that kind of racing soon?
Speaker 1:Like the lifetime, like the lifetime in the big gravel races because there's really no younger. That's like in that world, guys or girls.
Speaker 2:I mean cold patents kind of and I think it's like, I think I don't know, I don't. I don't think that would be the best idea to be taking on that kind of training load at like 17 or 18. But that's just based on my opinion and lack of knowledge. Maybe I'm wrong. But I mean ryan's definitely interested in and he's been talking about it lately. But he said I mean he right now he wants to chase the like the uci by mountain bike and cycle crosses, what he's really interested in and kind of seeing what he can do. But um, he's watched the lifetime, like the youtube series, and so he's like maybe he said like 23 when he's 23.
Speaker 1:Maybe he's interested.
Speaker 2:Yeah, when he's an old man. But no, I mean he's got some interest in it for sure, and, and I think abry has some interest in it, but she really, she really likes crit racing. So I think she's just kind of seeing where that goes right now. Yeah, but I mean it's Like the bad part of it is like, even if you don't like that kind of racing, that's the only place you're really gonna make Potentially make a living racing a bike. It's gonna be Like the things they're interested in. There's just not a lot of money in it. You got to hustle quite a bit, I think, to make money, so I don't know if they'll get into it or not, but if, if you want to, I could see a lot of the younger generation going that way because it's it's what's you know mainstream as far as cycling media and what everyone's doing and sponsors want and and there's like, if you can get in the top 10 of that overall, like you can make a decent year's salary what?
Speaker 2:do they?
Speaker 1:make per race. They make cash money each race.
Speaker 2:I don't know the payouts, so I just kind of know, like I saw the year-end payouts and when I was watching that series, you know.
Speaker 3:It's like five grand if you're in the top 10, no, like the overall. Like I listen to something where they got Is one of the women I think got 10th overall in the grand pre series and got like five thousand dollars and it's like that doesn't even cover like half your shit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, you gotta be, you gotta be in the top top Four or five probably to make. I mean, I don't know what what the winning check was.
Speaker 3:I know they're like, well, and then now they're doing the top, like if you score in the top 15, they'll roll you over to the next year automatically. But like those bottom 15 people, that's just like a. Even those people, I think, are pretty legit like racers, to the point where it's like, yeah, and you're just gonna get more and more, and you're just well.
Speaker 1:That's what's gonna make it even worse. Yeah, like I'm gonna have to expand that field because you're gonna have more and more like people like the 30 year old that's just tired of being like doing the world travel and they come over and gives them something else to do.
Speaker 2:I don't know it should expand into a mountain bike series and a gravel series and put like legit mountain bike races in it, like like Washington Challenge, like hard old school, like single track, because the mountain bike races they have in there I mean not that I've done them, but they're mostly like gravel or or fire road type thing with some single track Like it's. It's too rough to ride a gravel bike, so they ride a mountain bike but not sea otter.
Speaker 3:I think sea otter, like last year, was the exact same course as the gravel race and the mountain bike race.
Speaker 1:It was the same course from what I understand and it was like my on that video they're talking about how much worse it was just because it had been running from rain. That was it, yeah.
Speaker 3:And then the only other mountain bike races are what Schwarm again and that's like a two hour race in Leadville, which is everybody Knows what that is. Yeah, so yeah, I would agree with you. I I think the like the BWR series is growing and I'll get like I've heard a couple of the you know top gravel guys are just moving towards. Hey, I'm just going to go try to take that whole series rather than All series money for that I think.
Speaker 1:I don't know if there's money in it. They have like a crown or something, and they have good money per race, I think.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean BWR is a big series. Now it seems like there's a race in every state now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, have you ever done a BWR? No, yeah, I think that would be. They're just like just a shade too long to be enjoyable to me.
Speaker 2:Like 130 of that is that's a long day of I mean I don't want to race like the 200 is different because I don't plan to race it, but I don't want to race over like that's six hours pushing my limit, because I don't, I don't know, like I don't really have the time to train like you would need to train to race for five or six hours full gas, but I can race for like three and a half four.
Speaker 2:Like that's kind of the limit of what I like to do, because I can train enough to like race my hardest, but yeah. I don't know how they race for 10 or 12 hours.
Speaker 3:That's like a. That's like the old school mountain bike endurance series that they used to have, like the what do they call it? The NUH or something NUH Natural ultra endurance race series, you remember?
Speaker 2:that at all. It's still going on.
Speaker 3:Does it Okay? Like cause it's right around those six hour races like the whiskey 50 and like those 50 miles, 50 miles and stuff like that. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and they're still doing that series. It's pretty spread out across the U? S and it seems like it's still really popular, but I mean, it's just probably not a lot of money in it. That's what lifetime has going for them. Is they're able to pay that huge purse that is attracting the sponsors and the big writers? Yeah.
Speaker 3:But I mean back in the day. Do you remember what we used to do in Arkansas? There was like three big endurance races. There was like watch that challenge. There was Silamos revenge. And then there was like a six hour race at like it was a hot.
Speaker 1:Love it.
Speaker 3:Did you ever do that one Maybe?
Speaker 1:I did, and there's one at Arkadelphia or something like that Iron mountain, iron mountain.
Speaker 2:Do you remember that Spaw City? There was one in hot springs at Spaw City, spaw.
Speaker 3:City.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was a great race. They still do a marathon at that venue but it's in, it's in like November in conjunction with an Enduro. It's like one day's marathon, one day's Enduro. Yeah, a lot of that stuff like the Silamos is gone. I never did that Love it. I mean it's a marathon but it's gone, wash of tiles, kind of the only ones still going.
Speaker 3:Oh, and I heard they're charging way too much money and people just said no, no, thanks. I think they've lowered it now Because what's cost?
Speaker 1:It's told in random big names.
Speaker 3:Really Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:Shockingly. I mean Paladero, that marathon out there.
Speaker 3:Well, that's, that's part of that. Timber does a series, the sixth marathon series.
Speaker 2:That's a pretty. That pays a lot of money, though. Yeah, I mean for a local type of race like I did. That two years ago.
Speaker 3:It does because they have a pro profile.
Speaker 2:It's like $800 to win it and I think I got fourth or fifth or something and I don't know. I made a few hundred bucks, but it's a pretty decent price this pasture?
Speaker 1:I think it was 12 or 1500 bucks for the winter this year. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:It's a fun race.
Speaker 1:That is a fun race. You doing anything else big this year?
Speaker 2:I'm kind of thinking about doing marathon nationals, because the timing just it's in Alabama.
Speaker 3:Alabama.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but.
Speaker 1:I looked at the horses.
Speaker 2:Is that in June?
Speaker 3:Oh God, have fun, that'll be miserable.
Speaker 2:It's hot everywhere in June.
Speaker 1:You're going to be swimming.
Speaker 3:But the humidity is going to kill you.
Speaker 1:Well, you're going to have to get used to it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I don't know, maybe I'll do that. I've got a lot of maybes on my schedule, but a lot of it kind of is revolving around where and when I need to be places to help Ryan. So I don't want to make any definite plans. I'm just trying to stay fit enough to jump in if it works out.
Speaker 1:What are you doing Besides the rule of three? Nothing High country.
Speaker 2:Oh what the high country.
Speaker 3:I don't know, we'll see.
Speaker 1:When is that?
Speaker 3:I don't know. I think it's in October.
Speaker 2:This weekend.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'll be ready. I'm ready to go. No, I might actually go to Texas on Saturday for that. Turkey, texas, the Valley of Tears. It's like a brand new race and they've paid a bunch of I think Keegan's going to go there A bunch of the pros are going. It's a brand new race and they like hyped it up. It was like a $20 entry fee or something stupid. But I'm going with the guy from work, so I'll just kind of chill. Hopefully is my idea.
Speaker 1:And me and Troy might do a trans-Oklahoma route in April if you want to have a training weekend.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know, we'll see.
Speaker 3:So he's in a good hotel.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:If I do it by myself, I can tell you that there's hotels involved I could be in. I'm not right on my body. There's no hotels on that route. I've scouted it.
Speaker 2:I'm not looking on the ground.
Speaker 1:I'll probably have to carry all my crap and sleep in the dirt like a peasant. But if I do it by myself or with anyone else. I'm staying in a hotel, so come play it's the whole point. Well, you can camp outside the hotel.
Speaker 3:I'll take my shower.
Speaker 2:That's why you had two holes in your ass. That's why.
Speaker 3:That healed up a long time ago, mostly that easy month. Easy month Didn't even touch a bite. Oh, and then I kept eating like I was riding 100 plus miles a day.
Speaker 1:That's the worst bar.
Speaker 3:Oh, I was emaciated. It was crazy, like see, like gave me a hug and she could like hug me, she's like I've never, been able to hug you like that. You're like I could feel my freaking like kidneys. It's gross. You do all those pull-ups. No, it's because it's bad.
Speaker 1:It's still. You didn't do pull-ups or anything, I don't know Divide.
Speaker 3:No, I gave Chad Hodges my pull-up bar yeah.
Speaker 1:I haven't been to the gym like a month. It's disgusting.
Speaker 3:That's right. You're looking fat. How many, how many.
Speaker 2:How many pull-ups do you think Hodges can do?
Speaker 3:More than you.
Speaker 2:Oh, I can beat him at that.
Speaker 3:Oh, I'll put money on that one. I'll put money on that one, and Chad, better not let me down.
Speaker 1:But either one of you.
Speaker 2:I can do like.
Speaker 1:I am.
Speaker 2:I can do 10.
Speaker 1:10 probably.
Speaker 3:You can't do 10 pull-ups Bullshit, 10 real pull-ups Bullshit. We'll have to see. We'll have to see. Let's set it up.
Speaker 2:No, I'm far enough away that I can do it.
Speaker 3:No.
Speaker 2:I'm far enough away that I can delay this until I can do 10s for sure.
Speaker 1:See if that's a training game. Yeah, oh Lord, did you want to? Did you put the on the list? The bunny hop wizard name.
Speaker 2:I did. I did because we I was listening to this podcast and and then I was like man, nobody really.
Speaker 2:He wouldn't tell me. Well, yeah, I mean, what's funny is, I think I think I think people think he like he made it up or we made it up because he bunny hop stuff, but it's it's. It's funny because the person that made it up was kind of making fun of him. At the time we were out of race in Texas and this was when he was probably eight or nine and all the. So, like all the kids in his race, one kid paid attention.
Speaker 2:All the other kids did the start, went up this paved road but the course every lap turned off the paved road and kind of went into the woods. So all the kids turned off of the paved course, except there's one kid, and so he was like half a lap ahead of everyone. And this course had it was resolution, cross and garland and it's it's kind of on a hillside and on the hillside they put a telephone poles like stairs, like Belgian stairs, but they'd filled the backside of them so they were rideable because they, you know, they kind of had a flat edge on the top and I think I mean I think I was doing the elite race that day and maybe like five people in the elite race were riding them and everyone else was running them and Ryan was riding them that day. You know his tiny little kid was hopping up them. But anyways, because he was doing that, he's catching the kid that's in the lead and and he's the only one like he's he's about to catch this kid and Richard freeze, who's announcing, is just kind of a legendary cycle cross announcer from the New England area and they would pay him and bring him down to announce, cause he's just really, really good at that.
Speaker 2:And he kept. He kept saying something like this kid, cause Ryan was wearing glasses he's not wearing glasses anymore, but he was saying he looked like Harry Potter because he was, because he was wearing glasses Like this kid looks like a wizard, it looks like Harry Potter on a bike. And then he comes around and then the announcer sees him hopping the logs and he's like, oh my God, he's a bunny hopping wizard.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's a great name. That's a great way to give a name, so it's actually pretty.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Since you're telling stories on nicknames, you want to tell us how GravelDoc since GravelDoc is not here to defend himself and or to stand up for any stories we may make up you want to tell how we got his GravelDoc name?
Speaker 2:Well, I know he got his doc name. That's just evolved through the years and whatever he's doing at the time.
Speaker 1:But it was. We went for him and he gave himself the doctor title.
Speaker 2:Yeah, pretty much. We went to the Mellow Johnny's race in Austin when we had the Bike One team, which was a fun group, but most of us traveled down there. And he's like, he's just like I'll get the hotels, I'll book them Cause I'm gonna, if you like, book them under a doctor's name. You get this huge discount. And so you know, he, like he booked them under Dr Alan White. And you know, like no, no, no way to like prove he's a doctor. When he gets there, he just he just walks in, like he's like you know, kind of step aside, boys, I'll get this. And he any one of the counters, like Dr Alan White, and they're just looking and looking. It starts to get awkward and they're looking, they can't find it and they, they didn't book it under a doctor and he didn't get a discount.
Speaker 1:So we called him.
Speaker 2:we called him Doc from then on.
Speaker 1:I like it I like it, I like it. None of that is surprising actually.
Speaker 2:He was pretty confident that that was gonna work.
Speaker 3:Yeah, most of the trip, yeah.
Speaker 1:And looking back, that group that was a good group of writers, Best.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:That was the best team I've been a part of. I think, like it was Not everyone was the fastest, but man, we had a really good time.
Speaker 1:I wish there was really that team aspect in Oklahoma, well, at least in the Oklahoma city area. I was like God. I remember like I was at Schlegel's. There was like there were so many different teams. There was like the, was it like Fossil or whatever it was with the old guys, yeah, yeah, Like there was just so many you had that undiscovered and then there was all the DNA guys, dna guys had a team and then who else was? I mean, there was tons of them.
Speaker 3:Only the bike lab had a team for a while, and yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but now I started that bike one team and it was just like man, I just want all the people that I want to hang out with on this team. It was awesome.
Speaker 1:There's nothing like that anymore. No.
Speaker 3:It's everybody's sponsor. Now you got to get paid to get on that team. Factory.
Speaker 1:Factory. That's right. It's right there.
Speaker 3:I'm an influencer. Is that what they're called? People that act like they really know what they're doing, but they really don't? Maybe it's called you an influencer? No, I'm not on the social, so I have no idea what that is.
Speaker 1:That's why I was going to make sure that you knew our topics. Whenever I tell Troy how to do this and he's like I'm going to do technology, I'm like you just need to open an email link in your phone.
Speaker 2:What's an email link?
Speaker 3:Yeah, hey, I have it pulled up on my phone, Okay.
Speaker 1:He did actually pull up a. Thing.
Speaker 3:I got it on my phone. Yeah, see, got it right here. See, buddy, right there.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:Good job, good job. So, what's see, what else did we want to make? Oh well, we kind of touched on the tour today, and I want to make sure we have plenty of time to talk about this before we get in. Well actually, let's get into that first and then we can talk about some of the other stuff. But the that we can finish with the tour to Dirt Drama. It's keeping the socials.
Speaker 2:The latest tour to Dirt Drama. The latest, there's only some.
Speaker 1:Well, I'll start with this. I am very happy to report that the two dudes that crushed cat two last year also won cat one this year. So my sandbag and comments Thank you for what you want, because they went one, two and the 40 plus, and it was from the time results that I saw it was close. Jake and Ryan yeah, fast dudes, so it looks like a battle they were just really finally ready to go.
Speaker 3:Jake, he'd be mean across. Race you what?
Speaker 2:Robin, they were just finally ready to move up. They had to be ready.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they just needed one good summer or one good winter of training to get ready for it and it really showed.
Speaker 3:So all this old cat ones can now cat down to cat two.
Speaker 1:Yeah, come on, come play.
Speaker 3:So that's probably where I belong about this point, yeah.
Speaker 1:Come on, you always talked about how you wanted a bigger cat one. Feel deep, be careful what you wish for.
Speaker 3:Well, that's, I mean I do. I think that's great. I mean I'm at that point now where, like the problem that I have with tour to Dirt last year is like I would show up and it's like me and three dudes every fucking time and you're just like dude, like I'm sick of getting beat by Chad Sprig and Jason Engelke, like I'm just this is not fun, racing these two dudes every week and get my face kicked in.
Speaker 3:Like I would rather race for eighth place and race somebody than just take second in a three person field, like that doesn't even. But I mean like there's tons of people that have been in cat one that just they get there, they get their teeth kicked in and then they're like oh, I guess I'm gonna go do cat two or a different type of race.
Speaker 1:The field was huge in the cat one. Yeah, it's good. 50 plus group was massive too.
Speaker 3:Good yeah, good for them.
Speaker 1:Herrera, who's crushed the 50 plus forever. Finished like how many like fifth or something like that that I saw.
Speaker 3:Like Dave's fast too.
Speaker 1:Dave's? Yeah, dave's legit. So let's see if something happened, but yeah, it looks like the cat. One field this year is.
Speaker 3:Well, it might just be cause it's I mean, good job to chat, spray up there just promoting it. And it's it's also the first race of the year. Everybody's getting busters Right. I mean, that's how it goes, right.
Speaker 2:Well, someone said that like, oh, it was a great turnout, and I was like, well, let's see how round two goes Cause yeah, you know, right Round one everyone's excited and then it's like, yeah, but I I mean the next one will be good.
Speaker 3:Like they always do a good job down in there and then they do a good job down at, like Thunderbird, but it's then after that it's like the you know, they do one in Texas that nobody ever shows up. Apparently there's one in Kansas too, and you're like nobody's going to show up to that. Like it's like why do you put that in the series? There's a massive amount of travel this year.
Speaker 1:And it was like 10 races and like eight counts. So you better be committed if you're wanting to do the series. Cause, yeah you go, I think you go to Claremont. Elk City and Wichita Falls are the like outside edges. Claremont's fun, Claremont's great Claremont's great. I mean there's a lot of travel involved.
Speaker 3:But like I've, I've done that Wichita Falls one. It's like. It's like it's fun, but it's like riding Bluff Creek yeah.
Speaker 1:Only on, you know longer.
Speaker 3:Although God have you, you haven't heard about this, Chris. Bluff Creek is like 10 plus miles now. Yeah, it's insane.
Speaker 2:I have, I think Ryan told me that actually I've heard it's longer.
Speaker 3:It's, it's decent, it's it is pretty decent. It's kind of fun. Like I wrote over there the last week, did like two laps and wrote home. I'm like shit, I got like 26 miles today. Yeah, it's insane.
Speaker 2:I always liked riding there. I thought it was super fun, but only for maybe like 45 minutes or an hour, just cause the laps were short back then. But it was. It was a ton of fun to ride.
Speaker 1:And they cleaned up and calmed down some of the roots on the old section. So it's not quite as bumpy and techy, as it was back then. But one of the areas that they added has, like, some ups and downs, like if you go into them with too much speed and don't know where you're going, like you could have some bad.
Speaker 3:You remember, you know where the like the BMX jumps are way back there.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:If you go to the right and go north. They did like another whole, like two and a half miles up in there. That's like kind of falls along the creek bed. It's really enjoyable.
Speaker 1:It's fun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then they did oh yeah, there used to be, yeah, there used to be some trail like some pretty, pretty primitive trails back there a long time ago.
Speaker 3:Like I don't know. I don't know.
Speaker 1:Got them, but you can pretty nice.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's good. It's really good. It is really fun flow stuff that they go from the other side of the path, between the path and the neighborhood out in that field area. So I think I saw last week or something somebody clocked it at like 11, 11 and a half miles.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I keep that into it, so it's great. How fast could you do that on an e-bike? I mean, we're getting sidetracked on our topic, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, back to the important. So what's the question, what's the question.
Speaker 2:I pulled this back in there.
Speaker 3:Good job Way to redirect yeah.
Speaker 1:E-bikes. How do you feel?
Speaker 3:But OK, so reading everything that I, Because, chris, you were there.
Speaker 1:We just got to be keyboard warriors.
Speaker 2:I actually I witnessed some of it, so Well, here's the thing.
Speaker 3:I don't think it's an e-bike issue. No, I think it's just a faster. Now, granted, they happen to be on an e-bike, but they're just a faster rider, Because it could be a cat one racer cat, like you know passing a cat, three person.
Speaker 2:It could be the same thing, the issue the issue is and it got way out of control on Facebook because everyone wanted to call names and go crazy but like the only issue is just a lack of education on etiquette, because I don't know all the e-bike racers but I'm pretty sure most of them are probably moto guys. A lot of them are and I. They just don't know that like I mean sometimes.
Speaker 3:That is why for them.
Speaker 2:That you just well, the guy, the guy that pulled us through the field. We went through the feed zone behind him and he buzzed a girl on her right side kind of spooked her. They almost locked bars and almost crashed and he never said, he never announced he was there in any way. So I was just, you know, I didn't yell at him, I was. I was like here's my chance to like explain this. I just said, hey, just tell her you're there, like tell her you're going by on the right and she's not going to move. Like you just have to announce it.
Speaker 2:And I think I think that's part of it is they pass and just don't think that they need to do that, and that's just kind of what people expect. And also, I mean, you know, you come up, you come up on someone and you're racing and there's nowhere for them to go. And it can be frustrating, but like I don't, like that's happened to me hundreds of times. That's happened on the last lap of a race after I attacked somebody and I'm like all right, here's my time to win the race, and then you catch somebody and there's nowhere for them to go and you have no choice but to stop. Like I mean you can't yell at them or crash them out, you just you have to wait. Like it's not a world championship, it's a tour de dert race. So just like I'll say, hey, I need to get by whenever it's safe, like that's the easiest way to do it when it's safe for them.
Speaker 2:And what's safe for you may not be safe for them. That's what another issue on education is. You're catching, you know, you're catching a rider that maybe one really tired or not have the skill set you have and not comfortable pulling over where you think they should. So you can't just blast them off the trail because you don't agree. You don't agree, and I mean, if people can't get on board with that, then they're assholes and maybe they shouldn't be racing. But I don't, I don't think there's like bad intentions. Honestly, I think they just don't know any different that like you have to announce it and you should probably just wait till they're comfortable moving. Now you know, I've also encountered people that just won't move.
Speaker 1:And like like Troy against Rob.
Speaker 2:That's yeah. People like put their headphones in Right, just won't get out of the way.
Speaker 3:During race yeah, yeah, good for me, but that's a whole different story.
Speaker 2:Like I think everyone that had issues were probably like trying to get out of the way or wanting to get out of the way, and I mean I think whoever's running toward the dirt, maybe it's on them to at the next race or at every race, like explain that at the start line, like here's how you pass. And if people choose to still not pass that way, then there's a problem with the individual, not what kind of bike they're riding.
Speaker 3:Is there a use to the or like a use act? Rule on this?
Speaker 1:There has to be, they have a use.
Speaker 2:There is a there's a rule that they're supposed to have a standalone race, like some. Of course, someone highlighted no no, no, no.
Speaker 3:I just I just meant like, no, like the rule book on passing, like because there's a, there's rules about like feed zones and like all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2:And I think the main rule is is Dr Ellen White's don't be a dick.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a good rule. It's pretty simple, I do believe, because back in the day, when I was faster, I felt like I passed a lot of people, and I will just say this now it is Long time ago, right, very, very long time ago. I find that you put a bell on your bike and just do that a couple of times, cause I do it at the lake and it is. It is so weird how people respond to a bell rather than rider back on your left.
Speaker 3:Like, all I do is just like you just ring the bell twice and like you know when you're creeping up on them not on them, but like you let them you ring it twice, let them know you're coming, and then when you get a little bit closer, you ring it again and they just like get at the. You don't even have to say a word, almost, and it's so nice.
Speaker 2:But that's another thing like you want to. You want to notify them before you're on their wheel. Oh yeah, like, if you say it early enough, they're usually out of the way, but and you don't even slow down, like well, that's, that's that's knowledge too, that I mean you've raced, I've raced enough.
Speaker 3:where you call it out like you know 10 seconds in advance and then, like, like you say, they get out of the way typically because they know you're coming.
Speaker 1:But I think that comes from starting at a cat three level and work in your way up. You learn those things in your racing. But if you come into the sport as a newbie, come into the sport as a cat three, but now you're passing everyone instead of getting past you. Just you don't know what you don't know and you can blame them, but not really blame them for that, because they don't know the etiquette, because they haven't made maybe their first time to ever race or they're you know. I think that's a lot of it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, it's their first time doing a race and they, if they are from the motor world, they have some skill to ride the bike fast, but they just and I mean there's a lot of debate on when they should start and where they should be in the lineup Like that doesn't matter, because at that speed they're going to lack people, they're still going to pass people and the people they're passing then, like, like when I got caught, I was able to deal with it because it's like I know what that's, like I just got out of the way.
Speaker 2:Like I saw you was there and I got out of the way. But there's people that just don't have that awareness and also just don't aren't comfortable just getting out of the way. Like they need to find a spot where they can, like put a foot down. So it doesn't matter where they start them or how they like, none of that's going to make a difference. Like, the only thing that's going to make a difference is education, and it's pretty simple to do. Like, go to the start line of the race and make sure everyone hears you and hey, here's how you pass. It's pretty easy.
Speaker 1:Or you could just blast everyone on Facebook, because that usually gets good responses and results.
Speaker 3:Is that what social media is good for? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:If they would have thrown something in there about the presidential election, that would have been a really nice topper.
Speaker 2:You know I quit reading it, but there probably is something.
Speaker 1:Probably dude. There was so many comments. The first time I got on there there was like 68 comments. I'm like holy crap. I got to read this and I was like this is like amazing, and I had a whiskey. I was on the back porch with the dog. I'm reading this. This is like this is amazing. The next time I got on there it was like 184 comments and there was like eight posts like that and I was like what has happened here? It was so much fun to get caught up.
Speaker 2:People's comments got buried so they had to make their own post.
Speaker 1:I don't know who this guy is. He's from. He I've got on his Facebook page to look and see if I can see who he is. He's from somewhere, I think Eastern Oklahoma, cause he had a Arkansas state championship jersey on his picture on his page. But he was like just ripping people, like calling them all kinds of stuff and like talking about how he's never coming back to this state cause everybody's so soft and a bunch of wooses, and then everybody'd rip him and he would just come right back down. I'm like Jesus, this guy, he was letting it rip.
Speaker 3:So we live in Oklahoma and we're riding bikes on the weekends for fun in spandex.
Speaker 1:As a bunch of middle-aged people.
Speaker 3:And people are taking it that serious, and and and who at best Chris, you and Rai Rai won right.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, ryan won. What was your? What was your payout?
Speaker 3:What was your payout? I?
Speaker 2:got $80.
Speaker 3:$80 for the best place. People, they didn't even get $100. Right, wow.
Speaker 3:But, but what do all those e-bikers win? What are the cat twos when nothing right, nobody wins anything except for cat one and they get 40%. Maybe I mean that's worth dying for, that's worth killing somebody for, apparently. I mean the thing is, it's the same shit at like At Wheeler with the cat what a sea rays where it's like dude, guys, it's Tuesday night, we got to go to work tomorrow and you're gonna chop me in this corner like seriously, guys, yeah, it's yeah the only time I had an issue.
Speaker 1:I will say, the only time that I remember having an issue at a race was the six hour at arcade and it was an E-bike. I there's the same guy got me twice, yeah, and it was the same thing, and I don't know. I think it was a lack of Knowledge because he came up and we were in an open area and I heard him coming because, like, he was humming and so, yeah, we was gonna get to us. So he gets there in an open area. That's okay, go here on your on my left, so I move right into the grass and the dude goes right and allows Wheel and runs up into my leg. Oh, I heard so bad.
Speaker 2:I was like dude, he probably had headphones in, he didn't know, what you said. I was like that's what you.
Speaker 3:That's what you call a callback. I was like Lexi, be so proud of me, yeah.
Speaker 1:So we just all laughed and it wasn't a big deal. I think he just maybe misunderstood or what like totally was chill, he wrote off, we wrote off whatever. Handful laps later he catches this again and he catches this in the section that's well, I don't.
Speaker 1:you probably aren't familiar with it, but it's his back corner and it's by the river and it's like a 30 foot drop down to the water, yeah it seems like legit up and down whoops that are like six feet deep probably at least, and they're really short, so it's like to do like on the south, the south end kind of, yeah, like the water tower, east corner.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, northeast end. Yeah, yeah yeah, far east side. So he, I didn't, we didn't hear him coming because he came out of nowhere in that little section and In sax he'd gotten past Saxby. Now he's in between us. But I didn't know he was between us because he came up on us that fast and I was in the middle of one of those islands, like I've gone down, and I was up getting ready to go down the next one. I turned to look over my left shoulder to see and it was. It was him. And when I did that I kind of veered to the right side of the trail because I was Looking back and then that he just like smacks me again.
Speaker 1:And almost dumps it off. I'm into the river and I let it fly. I was like you saw my mother, like I let it rip and he doesn't say where I was. Like you, sorry asshole. He just rides off, sorry, and just kept on. And Saxby was in tears. He was laughing so hard Like he almost killed me, like what the heck?
Speaker 3:but he got that trophy maybe I don't even know.
Speaker 1:He didn't get anything. He almost got a case. Okay, he almost needed you to come to work with them, man. But yeah, anybody needs some good light reading. You should get on the Facebook tour to dirt page. That's amazing.
Speaker 2:I don't know people have the time to do those like five paragraph comments.
Speaker 1:You're gonna need to commit a weekend. Yeah it's, it's a lot I gave because the original posts are now like 14 paragraphs, followed by a hundred and eighty seven comments. God. I just it's beautiful, that's too much middle-aged old people that have nothing better to do. Yeah, speaking of nothing better to do before we wrap this up, have you been watching any of the professional racing going on? Yes, like the one days.
Speaker 3:I'm gonna catch in highlights when boy takes a nap, I'm sad about you, max you can see most of it, watching it to. Max and then flow. Sports still has a couple of them and then the Perry.
Speaker 1:Nice, you can get the highlights on yeah and peacock. Yeah, it's on peacock but on the youth on YouTube they show that like a minute highlight overnight. So that's been good. What? Are you a drama. What do you think about the new TT helmets? Since you're Sure short-sought kind of guy figure, we get your input first.
Speaker 3:I.
Speaker 2:Every time I look at it I'm like I can't. I can't believe that's a real thing. How happy you so bad.
Speaker 1:Make fun of triathletes. It's now. It is the roadies.
Speaker 2:It makes me like I'm like I hate that in some way I'm lumped into this group of people that wear these helmets.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're a roadie. It's what you could use, your family.
Speaker 2:I just because I ride a bike. It's too, it's too close. Just gonna ride a bike, you're associated with those. But like the space balls, means are the best the space balls. Darth Vader helmet.
Speaker 1:It does look like a Darth Vader helmet, I mean In there is that the EF one?
Speaker 3:is that the mushroom?
Speaker 1:one, the EF one, is like not even that's tame, it's the Vismo last time the Vismo one.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that has like yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean it makes total sense when you look at it Like when they're in the TT position.
Speaker 2:It looks Not as stupid, but like when they're standing up and like after heads hanging out of that big thing. I don't know man.
Speaker 1:Dude, can you and I would love to see a video of when they debuted that to the team to see their reactions? Like what?
Speaker 3:Well, apparently they debuted it and they got it like passed off by the UCI yeah, now the UCI, and then they were. I think they were supposed to race it in the Jiro and then they did it a little early, yeah, so yeah, the UCI is finally doing good work because, first Good one they made everyone.
Speaker 2:they made everyone turn their hoods out on their roadbars, because that is the second stupidest thing going in bike racing Is it turning your hoods all the way in to be arrow? So they've, they've taken that away. That's some good work, and if they get rid of these helmets I would applaud them.
Speaker 1:Tell me how tell me you're an old man without telling me you're an old man?
Speaker 2:I'll be even call me an old man for that I.
Speaker 3:I agree with Chris.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the hoods thing is terrible.
Speaker 1:I think I like. I like that they Limits it. The hoods, I think you should be able to turn them in, but I mean laying on straight sideways, I agree, but that's a little I had a.
Speaker 3:The other one is I was on our group ride. It was down in Norman somewhere, maybe like a year or two ago, and like one of those some dude I don't even know who was he got on the top tube Did he have a hydrogen that's room thing.
Speaker 3:I'm a group. He was on the front of the group and it was a group ride and I was like second wheel and I like pulled out from behind him and I like rolled up to him like get the, what are you doing? And I was like don't do that shit here. And that's all I said to him, right? And then we rolled into like one of the stops and he's like hey, man, you just had to say something to me and I'm like yeah, I did.
Speaker 3:You got a whole line of people behind you. I don't want to die Uh-huh like, don't do that shit. You want to do that on your own, go do that. You want to do off the back of the pack Cool, Don't do it on the group.
Speaker 1:Ever, I agree.
Speaker 3:It's like, dude, you're in Oklahoma and you're on a group ride, like you're not a pro, sorry, you're not even close to it. Yeah, cool, he looked, maybe. But I mean I will say this like those bikes nowadays like cuz I had one of those Um Cannondale, like super fast ones it's they are ridiculous, like how much faster those bikes are. I mean you've had like one of those, what is it? A vange or whatever? Yeah, I mean they're insane. Yeah, like compared to what they you see, and like those new ones at Chad's selling. They are gorgeous and I want one, but they just they make it to where guys like they show up to these creates like they're going way too fast. They cannot handle those bikes. It's scary scary hey.
Speaker 3:I'm all about like I'll go to Wheeler and I'll race the a race and my goal is to not be last, but I want to be the oldest guy there, so if I beat what I'll back in my day.
Speaker 2:Our hoods were straight.
Speaker 1:That would be a good question, like what are some of the things that you wish Were in cycling that have progressed? So I riding on the top two, but for sure.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that was a bad one.
Speaker 1:That's a bad one. So you like. You got the hoods and the new arrow helmets.
Speaker 2:Yeah, draw the line on the arrow helmets. Just arrow road helmet, that's it.
Speaker 1:Oh, like not, you don't like the old-school alien specialized helmet. They went like halfway down your back. No, that's okay.
Speaker 3:No well, but the thing with those helmets is so the new V's for ones that looks like, whatever it looks like, if they crash, is that actually going to protect their head? Like, is it going to do the job of what the helmet's supposed to do? Because the helmet like, I feel like it potentially Caused neck injuries.
Speaker 2:I mean, yeah, there's a lot of leverage, there's a lot of things that that Used to happen with moto helmets that were causing neck injuries. Like They've got magnetic visors now because the visor would stick in the ground and like tweak your neck, I don't know. So like when you see those guys crash now and their visor pops off instantly, it's by design so that the helmet will slide. Like yeah, you would think those as big as they are, what could really tweak your neck? We'll find out.
Speaker 3:I wonder if they have like the the MIPS stuff inside them that you know, because that's what the new helmets have, that they're supposed to move you know.
Speaker 1:I mean, as these races start getting more and more important, they're gonna start crashing in the TT. So Happens every year, I mean. But it's now. It's almost like which team's gonna show up with a dumbest-looking situation.
Speaker 3:Do no. X. It's that Ronald McDonald? Look, I don't know I've seen that, I've just not seen it looks like maybe the helmet of the juggernaut maybe One of the guys and one in the Peloton was saying something about how I guess guys are riding like TT helmets Just in the regular Peloton now too.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, it's the new arrow road helmet, but they have like a fin on the back Like yeah they're the ones with the, the ears go in.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Filippo Ganas right.
Speaker 1:It's ridiculous. And then they have the, the, they're like this, the point off the back of them. Oh god, yeah, looks good. Those are awful, those are. Those are worse. I told you.
Speaker 3:What does that look like?
Speaker 2:I gotta look at it now. Yeah, the.
Speaker 3:UNO X TT are the worst.
Speaker 1:They are the worst. Not even close. Yeah, because they look like they almost want to be like the Yumbo helmets, but they like Didn't finish them, like they were halfway through.
Speaker 2:That is terrible.
Speaker 1:Oh man, yeah, that's good, all right, well, damn rotis.
Speaker 2:Whatever rodents fun I'm getting one for the rule of three.
Speaker 3:Oh, I'm Efficiency you won't need it. You're gonna be you're gonna be drafting behind me, you will be riding my wheel. You will not need any type of arrow advantage.
Speaker 1:I think we're gonna have to have a post rule of three episode with the two of you to use.
Speaker 3:It's gonna be good we should just take a log of our Chloric intake. That oh that yeah, so yeah drumming right down all this.
Speaker 1:How much, how many grams of sugar this one eats?
Speaker 2:Well, I'm bringing him, so he tells me what to eat.
Speaker 3:I'm better now. You're a pro. There's some protein and shit now, not just all carbs, not all sugar he's gonna tell me when.
Speaker 1:Wait a sec, hold on, he's listen to. I'm doing much better now. I'm eating protein. I'll sit. Let's talk about the two items that he brought into this house when he I it's a snack, one one. I give him credit. It was a big bar big bar. Yeah, good little snack the second one you want to show him.
Speaker 3:Oh, he knows what it is. It's mine, it's my vice. This is an improvement. That see, this is an improvement. He knows what I used to do Bed wetter every fucking day. Oh, dude, I used to. 44 ounce are on the way to work. Die Mountain do 44 ounce from the afternoon.
Speaker 2:It's diet, it's diet.
Speaker 1:It's fine Good state employee right here.
Speaker 3:No, I could only have like I try to do like two cans a day. That's a huge improvement. Then the Red Bulls, the monsters. Oh, that's been tamed down. That's weekend only. Hey, I have a whole fridge of those. That's what I drink instead of beer now. So that's it. Well it's. You gotta be careful now that you're getting old and you gotta do. I got two year old.
Speaker 2:It took him like 46 years, but he's maturing now, starting to yeah, he's getting there, he's starting to we'll get there one day.
Speaker 1:All right, let's get into these. I had a few questions that came in a couple weeks ago whenever I asked, so I want you guys to To answer these, okay, man, from several different people. And these are perfect for both of you guys because, well, drumming, you're probably getting ready to do your first one. And choice approach, prepping for your first bite packing trip slash race what would be, have you done by packing drumming? No, even better. You guys can't get a hotel. You have to. That's gonna make it even funnier.
Speaker 2:It's just gotta fit in my pockets if I'm going to ride.
Speaker 1:Are you doing anything besides bringing a credit card for the rule of three two hundred?
Speaker 2:I haven't put a lot of thought into it. I need to talk that over with Troy.
Speaker 3:You need, you need to do the mapping and figure out where all these cases general stores are gonna be at.
Speaker 2:I don't want to put any stupid bags on my bike, but I'll probably put at least one on there, yeah you're gonna need one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what's what's your biggest concern with? Going into your first like ultra big, like kind of a, by packing a shit?
Speaker 2:In all seriousness, not being able to find a hotel when I want to, because if I don't know the route and if it doesn't work out I'm gonna have to keep riding. So then I'm gonna. I need to know if that's the case, because I'm gonna have to plan much different through the night.
Speaker 3:I Pull over and pop up my tent, my sleeping pad and just go to sleep.
Speaker 2:Is it a two person.
Speaker 1:Nope, it will be. No, I've slept with.
Speaker 2:Roy, I slept with Troy one time in a hotel Coming back from 24 hours in a Pueblo and he he put a pillow wall between us in the bed.
Speaker 1:I.
Speaker 2:Don't know what he was thinking, but there was. He built a pillow wall between us.
Speaker 3:I like my space.
Speaker 1:You have a lot of community right.
Speaker 3:There's a big body pillow.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I can fit that in what would be your for someone doing their first by packing trip. What would be your first couple of tips?
Speaker 3:I mean, the rule is you pack your fears right, so you want to be as minimal as you can. But if your level of confidence is not to the point where you think you can put a new chain link in and fix your chain, you might take a whole new chain. That's a mistake right.
Speaker 1:I have two chains over there in bags going with this on my trip.
Speaker 3:I mean you can take them just, but like, yeah, take probably a lot less stuff than you have packed and realize that everything can do something else. You're down jacket or whatever. That's a pillow, right, make sure everything has that. You don't need a layer of leg protection and rain pants, like, just wear your rain pants if it gets that cold. But I mean it's three things right. It's like it's protection from the elements.
Speaker 3:So you got to have everything watertight, whether that's your gear to ride in or your gear to sleep in. And then you're warmth. You got to make sure you're warmth, right. I mean it's back to basics. And then it's your food, and food and water weigh so much more than you think and take up so much more space than you think, because people pack their bikes and they're like, oh yeah, I'm down to like 15 pounds dry weight on top of my bike, which is great. But then you put on like I mean, a Biden with 20 ounces of water is like almost two pounds. And then how far am I going? How far is one bottle really going to get me? So I mean you got to know what you should be drinking.
Speaker 1:And then you got to. What's a high calorie food that you would say everyone if you're going to go on a trip that you like to pack, I mean I don't really.
Speaker 3:You don't really pack. That's the thing. I'm not. I've never cooked. You're a convenience store kind of guy.
Speaker 3:I'm a convenience store guy, because I just don't. I'm not going to take a fucking stove. I don't drink coffee too. So I understand that one Like if you're a coffee drinker and you want that, take your stove, and if that'll make you happy, it's more like. To me it's what you can eat, because it doesn't matter what you eat at that point, because you're just you're putting out so much more effort on a bike that's weighed down and you're usually just cruising that zone too, burning it anyway.
Speaker 2:So Are you eating like super heavy early in the ride just to get ahead? Or do you ride the first few hours normally and then, when you make a stop, start piling?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I would just treat it normal, because if you're bike packing like here's the thing You're not Lachlan Mortland, whoever you are, so you're not racing, right, you're riding, and guys make the mistake of pushing way too hard on a bike packing bike and then they just burn up their legs the first day and then the next day they're toast. So it's just. It's kind of like that six hour race like Ryan was talking about, like just go your speed on the. I knew I was going to ride for six hours a day, so I'm just going to cruise. You don't need to go fast. And on bike packing it's even worse. It's almost like you wanted to do, like you would, a recovery ride and try to ride that all the time. We're just going to ride it all day Because you're riding all day and you'll get your workout. You'll get a workout because it's always a loaded bike and the more you do that, the more comfortable you're on that, the better, because the handling is super sketchy and you need to learn.
Speaker 1:I would say make sure you pack your center of gravity correctly, right Like.
Speaker 3:I see. A bunch of weight on your bars and stuff People have in front of their bars. They got like a you want to put light shit out there. You don't put heavy shit on the front. Put your heavy shit behind your seat post or low in your frame bag because you just don't want to.
Speaker 2:Well, and I would think on the side of that you probably need to do some riding fully loaded just to kind of figure out tire pressure. You're not going to run with tire pressure when you load your bike down. So if it's Well never and like that, change in all that stuff. So the bike actually handles like it should with all the weight on it.
Speaker 3:Well, and I wouldn't ever do a bike packing trip without testing or at least using everything. Once. Even if you like, go to Lake Hefner, do two laps, ride home and go in your backyard and set up your tent Maybe not even sleeping in it, but set up your tent, set up your sleeping pad, all that stuff, just to be comfortable with it, because you're going to be doing it when you're tired, in the dark for the first time and it's going to be frustrating as hell and it'll take forever and you don't want to do that. So Drummond.
Speaker 1:what did you learn from there?
Speaker 2:Scouting- I need to go slower.
Speaker 1:Yes, you need to go slower and you need to scout your hotels before you. Yeah, all right, they asked for three gravel routes between us. So let's just say, pick one or two of your favorite gravel routes that you've ridden, either in Oklahoma or Arkansas. I'll go first on this one. My favorite gravel route that I've done in Oklahoma was down around Wichita Mountains.
Speaker 1:We started at Mears and Road North for a little bit, so the first couple miles were pavement and then you got into gravel and I don't think we had a stop sign. It was only like 40 miles, 45 mile ride. But you kind of go back into a bunch of private land. You go back behind the refuge, on the west side of the refuge, and it's like no part of Oklahoma I've ever seen you riding kind of through like valleys, those mountains we call them mountains or hills all around you in some areas and there is legitimately nothing out there. You go across some cattle, guards in your own private land and cows running with you and it's phenomenal. So that's my favorite gravel route I've ever done in Oklahoma by far not even close.
Speaker 3:Is this Oklahoma all night.
Speaker 1:Oh, you can pick whatever you want. If you have one in the region, then yes, but if you have another one that you've done, that you're like, oh, this one was just epic, and say that one.
Speaker 3:Like I don't know, epic.
Speaker 1:Drummond, you have one.
Speaker 3:He doesn't ride gravel.
Speaker 2:I ride gravel but I don't really have a specific route. I mean, there's just so much gravel you kind of over here. You end up on a lot of the same stuff getting out of town all the time.
Speaker 2:So probably one of the most fun gravel rides I've done. New Year's Day two years ago there was a big group right over here in Bentonville. I don't know the route. I think we did like 60 miles. It's just kind of the same gravel we always ride, but it was a fun. It was like a big group of like I don't know. We probably started like 40 people, 30 or 40 people and it was a chill day. Nobody was riding like idiots. It was just, I don't know, it was one of those days. It was just a really good ride. I don't do a ton of group rides over here, but that one was fun. It was a fun route, but I don't think it was a specific route. Yeah, it was kind of put together.
Speaker 3:I didn't want to go out on gravel.
Speaker 2:I just go out and try to gravel and see where I end up.
Speaker 3:Tanner put together a ride. Jesus, probably like a decade ago. It was up by Tulsa, but he went up by the Osage and did like the Buffalo Wildlife Refuge and all that. That'd be cool Up in, what's it. It's a Bartlesville up in that area. It is like a two day thing. And then we ended up back in Stillwater and yeah, it was a really cool route though, but Tanner knows that one. It's probably part of the Osage passage. I would guess some of that stuff, yeah. And then, like I wrote the other, I told you I went out to Roman Nose back in the day like Brandon and I wrote out there one God awful summer night. But that one came almost died.
Speaker 1:Oh, I almost died, oh, you almost died. I think somebody was.
Speaker 3:Hey, taylor almost died. I almost died. Brandon thought I was going to die. Dez, like was, there is good stuff. Yeah, it's good stuff. But there's a good route. If you don't do it in the summer, out to Roman Nose, it's pretty. It's mostly gravel once you get to like Piedmont.
Speaker 1:So I did a route to Red Rock, did a backpacking trip to there From the house here in Oklahoma City. It was like 75 miles, really 60, 40 pavement to gravel and it's beautiful. Once you get out past El Reno it's mostly gravel. It's really pretty from El Reno to him.
Speaker 3:You can go out on like or Hefner Road and once you get past like a certain point, it's just gravel from there on out, like Sheridan used to put on a gravel ride way back in the day that went out there. It's like a 50 mile route. It's a really cool route. I've done that multiple times.
Speaker 1:I did a gravel route. We'll move on after this one. I did a gravel route this past weekend and started in kind of got three like Liberty actually started like Liberty went up to Langston and came back and it was one of my favorite gravel routes I've ever done because it was good roads and you're out there it could good. I mean, I think we were like 55 miles. I think we got maybe like 3,500 feet of climbing so it was good rollers like really nice. But dude, the amount of animals I saw. It was amazing. I saw many horse like mini horses, mini donkeys regular horses llamas everything was having babies.
Speaker 1:So many big, white, fluffy dogs, goats, sheep, like it was it was incredible. I was so happy, buffalo she's in Buffalo.
Speaker 3:I didn't see any.
Speaker 1:Buffalo man long horns. Yeah, I led someone on my Strava as Oklahoma Safari. I highly recommend that route. It was amazing and we'll finish up with on that one in a second with where they can find these routes, because we'll announce that and I'll put it in the intro. But I'm afraid to ask this question because I think we've talked about it with the EVO what's the biggest issue facing local Oklahoma cycling scene? And we can even group in the Bentonville cycling scene, let's say the regional cycling scene what?
Speaker 2:would you say a big? Issue is there might be a whole another show. We start over here, yeah.
Speaker 1:I would say in Oklahoma man, that's a tough one. I think.
Speaker 2:I feel like it could potentially just all be the same thing. We talked about the e-bikes, new rider education, trail etiquette right, I get annoyed a lot over here because most of the trails are two-way trails, they're not directional and the standard for trail etiquettes if you're climbing or if you're descending and you yield to the riders that are climbing that's universal everywhere and over here, man, every ride I'm on there's just people blastin' downhill and I usually move just because I'm like, well, what does it matter, I'll just move out of the way. Yeah, that's frustrating and I think a lot of us just new riders that don't know that's a rule and they're having fun ripping down a hill and you're climbing up a pretty steep hill and they're just waiting on you to get out of the way.
Speaker 2:So let's see that. I think over here we have a lot of new riders, people getting into it or people that have gotten into it and travel here, and then I think you know they're in COVID. You got a lot of new riders and majority might have stuck with it, but, like Dektory said, on the group ride someone's sitting on their top tube on the front or, like Kevin, they're doing puppy paws Just shit that gets people worked up and causes drama is in most cases, a lack of education, people not knowing. Oh, I shouldn't do that.
Speaker 3:Well, I think and people don't want to hear it anymore Like I mean this is going to sound really old, but like back in my day, I mean you get yelled at if you did something stupid on a group ride. Like, hey, rotate to the left, dumbass, or whatever. Like don't pull through so damn hard, or whatever. Nobody calls people out anymore because they're like afraid of the. I don't want people, I don't think, respond well to that anymore these days, which is fine, but there's also not anybody educating them or telling them like, hey, dude, you don't need to do that. Like I was on a ride the other night and it was like guys, like the winds out of the north, you need to stay to this side, and it was like a foreign concept. I'm like guys, just go, you want to stay into the wind. Give everybody a draft. Like we're not guttering people here, we're not racing, and they just couldn't seem to understand that. So I'm like, move left, move left, and they just yeah.
Speaker 2:I wonder what that is, because it seems like I mean, you're right, like when I started riding, when our group rides, if you did something dumb, someone told you and you just didn't do it anymore, like that's how you learned. And we have, we have a Tuesday night road ride over here. That's huge, a lot of people on it, super, it's like a drop ride and there's just pretty much zero etiquette on it, like potholes, don't get pointed out, just everything. That's kind of the standard that you would do on a group ride and it's it's a lot of experienced riders and then a lot in there that maybe aren't so experienced.
Speaker 2:But yeah, it's like I feel like I want to like say something to these people, but it's just like you're right, they don't respond, they get pissed at you If you like, you're like you're trying to call them out, but you're really just trying to say, hey, don't do that or do it this way, because that's there is a proper way to do a lot of that stuff. But and then you I mean you have, you have a lot of people too that I think you know have gotten really, really fit on trainers and just you know there's that's all there's to, but they go out on a ride and they're strong enough to never get dropped. And they're. They have no idea what they're doing, they're just a hazard but they don't want to be called out on it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would. I would my, my, my old man. Gripe is that people take it way too serious.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:It's like it's just fun, man, like just go play box. That's why I keep it. It's like just go play. There's times to have a goal race and you want to gear up for something and you want to go smash it. But like this is the thing and you know, sometimes like a tour of dirt race is that for some people like I. I can appreciate that and understand that. I mean whatever, but it's at the end of the day we're all just like a bunch of middle age people that are not really that good and in a not really competitive market and we're wearing the bandaid helmets Like you know what I mean. I know you understand. You think you're really good, but you're like pretty good here. So let's just keep all of that in context. And I say that like jokingly but very serious, because it's just like it doesn't matter. Man, like it really does.
Speaker 1:Like it's just, it's not that serious of a thing. So yeah, that's that's my old man gripe for sure. Okay, and the last question that we have it is or will gravel be the national racing, or kind of think it kind of already is heading that way, the road way that road was years ago? Will gravel continue to take over and or get to the level that the road seat wants, you know, back in the 80s and 90s?
Speaker 3:I think it's different. I mean it won't be like sanction, like USA cycling was, because there's too many of the. You know the promoters are like trying to keep it. Like nope, this is our thing, we don't need you, and keep a lot more money and I think it's good for them. Like, do what you want to do, you don't need some you know governing body. Like those are garbage. So I mean, but anybody will tell you like you know the pros, nowadays they're all in the gravel series. That's what it has to be. So, but I don't know.
Speaker 2:You also hear all that there's always a debate about. You know people complaining about what, whether it's you know women in men's fields have an unfair advantage or feed zone attacks. You know all the all the drama that comes with it.
Speaker 1:So it's like that's.
Speaker 2:that's where you're going to end up with a governing body because it's like, all right, well, there's no rules, or there's rules, like you know, in the beginning gravel, there's no rules, let's just do whatever. And that they're slowly like headed that direction because it's gotten so serious that you know people are so serious about it that they want rules so that to protect their race results or whatever. So I don't know It'll. It'll either go that way and they'll start enforcing a ton of rules or it'll kind of just stay where it is. I mean, it's definitely the most popular, but I don't know if it'll be like the thing. I mean roads died off. But I feel like it's coming back a little bit.
Speaker 1:I love the wild west side of it. And then like traditionalists, like stepping and coming in and just getting pissed and crying at the time because somebody did something they weren't supposed to do. Like yeah, but it's unwritten rules and I'm like screw off the amount coming in the cycling at a later point in life. Like not growing up in this world, like all those learning all the unwritten rules and I'd watch the tour or watch all these various.
Speaker 1:I'm like this is so stupid Like he dropped his chain, that's that's part of racing, but you don't wait for him or he's your opponent. You're trying to beat him. He had an issue. Why would you not capitalize it?
Speaker 3:Like all of that crap.
Speaker 1:I don't. I don't understand. And in traditionalists and cycling would say that's like poor sport and crappy today, but I'm like dude, this, this is racing, it's competing. If you're playing football and you're running to tackle a guy and he pulls his hamstring here, you're just going to like not tackle him because he slowed down and let him keep going, and like we're going to walk in together because he already beat you. No, you're going to smoke his ass and like I don't understand why I love whenever there is the no rules and they skip, somebody comes up with a new strategy to skip a zone or you know the arrow bars or whatever they do. I think it brings all another level of strategy into racing. I think it's great Because you have to think about everything then.
Speaker 1:But I don't know, I think that's an outsider point of view when it comes to, just because I'm not in the traditional side of things.
Speaker 2:Well, without, without rules, it's just whatever. Your opinion is so and I have whatever yeah.
Speaker 1:And I'll tell you, believe me, that's part.
Speaker 3:So, if you like, sit on a group the whole time and you don't do a poll and then you sprint at the end and win. That's cool, right. They should get rid of it I mean they do that and rode literally every race, and then like somebody does it in a gravel race and it's like fuck that guy, he's not a good sportsman. It's like dude, like then get rid of them, right. Yeah, like go harder and drop them or make him do something Right.
Speaker 2:Like I mean, the goal of a race is to win the race is to win. It's not just a high power.
Speaker 3:It's your boy, vanderpool, right Like I get paid to win races. That's what I'm here to do, so, oh yeah, I agree, well is there anything else that you guys can touch on?
Speaker 2:You have enough of a look at your voice, pretty face, never. No, this is good for part one. Yeah, yeah, I think Alan may have gotten the boot. It's too bad for him. So sorry, you've been replaced.
Speaker 1:He can squeeze him in. Oh man, we do need to get him to the top, okay, okay. So next one may do a four way. Is he a doctor? It's on, it's on social media. Doctor of what? Of what? Hey, he could have inspected that issue you had after the divide.
Speaker 3:He would have loved to.
Speaker 2:You want to look at my ass?
Speaker 1:Yeah, he would have no problem.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think he's going to be a good guy, yeah.
Speaker 1:He would have no problem. Yeah, so all right and thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thanks for having me. All right, man, I'll talk to you later.
Speaker 3:Okay.