Cycling Oklahoma
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Cycling Oklahoma
A New Era for Oklahoma's Cycling Scene - GCXC MTB Race Series
The GCXC Mountain Bike Race Series is launching a new chapter in Oklahoma's cycling scene, offering an inclusive and exciting format for riders of all skill levels. With six events scheduled throughout the year, the series promotes community engagement and innovation while supporting local trail maintenance and philanthropy.
• Overview of GCXC series and its goals
• Details on the inaugural race and schedule
• Discussion on innovations in race formats
• Focus on community involvement and social aspects of racing
• Collaboration with Oklahoma Mountain Bike Association
• Philanthropic efforts and support for local charities
• Encouragement for riders of all levels to participate
With each race, we’re committed to building a vibrant, united cycling community in Oklahoma. Join us!
Facebook @GCXC MTB Race Series https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61567737677158
12 Hours of Twisted Oak https://www.facebook.com/events/865070055552333/
What is up? Cycling Oklahoma? Thank you so much for tuning in for another episode. This one is different and it's wonderful. I really enjoy being able to bring the stories of our awesome athletes and let them share their life stories and their events that they've done and all that kind of stuff. This one is a race promoter episode and I'm super excited about it because it is showcasing a new series in Oklahoma called GCXC Mountain Bike Race Series. It's going to be awesome.
Speaker 1:All the details are in this episode and it's going to be featured in the eastern part of Oklahoma, northeastern part of Oklahoma. It's a full race series. They are going to have six events. They have some really cool new ideas and fresh ideas that they're going to try as far as age groups and your categories and how they're doing their championship. They're going to have a co-champion with another series and I just want to don't want to spoil it, so I want you to listen to it. But g? Uh, gcxc starts March 9th. Registration is open. Um, and it's going to be the first race is going to be kind of in that Turkey mountain area, if you are familiar with that area of Tulsa. Uh, so I really am excited about this episode. Um, it was really fun recording this one and I'm excited to see what happens. So, um, it'll be fun. Uh, all the links and everything are in the show notes, so please go there check it out, but I do think that you're going to find some info on this one, even if you're not planning on racing. I really hope that you listen to it to hear some new, fresh and exciting ideas and things that are going to be changing around Oklahoma when it comes to mountain biking and the mountain bike scene. I think it's going to do nothing but great things as far as helping tour to dirt and, you know, getting more people into the sport and staying in the sport. I think it's really going to help everybody. I'm excited for tour to dirt this year. They're changing some things and are going to have some new race venues that we haven't really had recently, so it's an exciting time for mountain biking in Oklahoma and I am so honored to be able to bring uh this episode to you and kind of share that with you. So, uh, make sure you check it out.
Speaker 1:Gcxc mountain bike race series. Uh, we are going to be having some, uh like some race update episodes that come throughout the year. That's going to talk to some of our racing. I figured out a cool way to do that, so please listen to that. Make sure you're going to cycling Oklahomaomacom checking out the site. We got some blogs on there. We got routes on there. You know there's been a lot of time and money that's put into this website and so we really need to continue to share our routes that we like for our gravel routes and things like that.
Speaker 1:But all of this is made possible by our incredible sponsors, and I could not do it without our incredible sponsors. Um, we have an amazing one that stepped up and sponsored the podcast for the entire year, called it's Oklahoma mountain bike association, and that sponsor is perfect for this episode. Ride ombaorg is the website. Uh, without this group, mountain biking in Oklahoma is not non-existent, but without them it looks significantly different, and so I'm so honored to have them as a sponsor, I'm so appreciative to them to have them as a sponsor. We did a podcast, so if you haven't listened to that, go listen to it so you can see what they do in our state. It's not just Oklahoma City, they do it all over Oklahoma. They have some on their website, rideombaorg. They have all kinds of really cool tabs that show you like the forum, you know, the blog, all those kinds of things.
Speaker 1:But I really encourage you to sign up. It's 50 bucks for the year. Sign up. That $50 goes to maintaining the trails in Oklahoma and $50 is nothing compared to how much time we spend on these trails. So I highly encourage you to join, become a member. They have some upcoming events. They have a couple work days coming up Sunday, february 23rd, at Trosper, they're going to be working on that, which is a new trail coming to Oklahoma City, and then they're going to be on March 2nd working on the Draper trails, which is also in the Oklahoma city metro area. But go, if you can't do the $50, I get it. Go, donate your time and help out, help maintain these amazing trails.
Speaker 1:But I'm so appreciative to Oklahoma mountain bike association for stepping up and sponsors, so let's get back to them. Help them out, donate some time, donate some money, but I won't hold you back anymore. I hope you enjoy GCXC Mountain Bike Series episode and I hope you learn a little something, and thank you again so much for tuning in. If you want to be a sponsor of an episode, you want to be on an episode. We want to do a couple more videos, so we're going to need some sponsors for that.
Speaker 1:But thank you, guys so much. Please reach out if you have ideas, ways that we can make this world better, way that we can make cycling in Oklahoma better. I am all about trying to share that with the people and connect people that we need to make our community stronger, more fun and more loving in all these crazy times. So get out, ride your bike, have fun and stay warm out there and enjoy and hope to see you guys on the trails real soon. Thank you All right, so we're good, we're recording. Gentlemen, this is exciting Kind of came together last minute, I mean on a short notice. I think it was Drummond that set this up.
Speaker 2:I had reached out to Drummond and just seeing if he could basically make it happen, cool. And he said why don't you talk to ryan?
Speaker 1:well, introduce yourselves and let's jump into the good stuff, because this is gonna be a good one uh ray hall um.
Speaker 2:Promoter for the the twisted mountain bike festival. Uh, before that, I promoted the Turkey Mountain Bike Festival, which was part of the Tour de.
Speaker 3:Dirt. And we've got Bobby Reese with Cold Turkey Mountain Bike Festival at Turkey Mountain. Also some background with co-promoting with you know, ray Hall, bill Clark, when did you start Cold Turkey? Last year was our second year. Okay, gotcha, the whole intention of that is to grow it into like a bin, build like this, like so that's cool, yeah, river parks, someone's turkey mountain and they want to grow it to this huge event.
Speaker 1:So that's awesome, I'm so. I haven't ridden turkey since they redid it. I mean, I haven't ridden turkey since we had the end of, or it was the last race of two or three or of two or three years ago.
Speaker 2:That would have been 2021.
Speaker 1:That was the last time I've ridden it and I know you guys have done a ton of work out there and every time I try to come up here it's snowed or rained or whatever, so I haven't been able to do it. I have done nothing out there.
Speaker 3:Really I ride out there like three or four days a week awesome how brutal are the downhills.
Speaker 3:Like the downhill runs yeah, there's something for everyone, okay, uh, black gold is mandatory gaps. So you, you need to know what you're doing. And it's got a nice, what they call squirrel catcher something on the front. Okay, a nice little drop. So if you, if you're not comfortable with that, you're not going to go further. The rest of them um, I hope that's the right term barrel guys, my downhill guys. The rest of them I hope that's the right term. They're all guys, my downhill guys.
Speaker 2:The rest of them are all rideable.
Speaker 3:There's no mandatory gaps, they're all tabletops. You can scrub it, you can be the XC or do it on XC bike. You don't have to have big bikes, it's just a level of fun. So they're all doing black gold, just that one that you have. Okay, you have to be ready for it, but they're fun.
Speaker 1:I knew there was some like legit downhill runs there or some legit downhill features. I didn't know where they were at and I was like man downhill. When I go to Bentonville and stuff I'm like they always scare me because I'm like is black really like real, real black, or is it like a dark blue?
Speaker 3:It's a big difference, right yeah?
Speaker 2:The black is to one.
Speaker 3:Okay, you could ride any of them, and they have optional lines too. Okay, so you know you can progress to some of the jumps, even on the same on-hills.
Speaker 1:Oh okay, cool, are they still building more out there?
Speaker 3:They're building more trails.
Speaker 1:Oh, they're just doing, more, they're doing.
Speaker 3:Purgatory, which is across 61st Street right now. It's going to be, I believe, about nine miles of trail and it's going to be they're calling it blue, black, xc trails. Okay, I've ridden over there a couple times. We haven't been on it in the last couple weeks to a month because of the weather. Yeah, um, it's so soft that we're leaving ruts, but it is. Uh, it's got that keystone feel. Keystone trails. It's. It's super techie, but the rocks are placed just right where you can pedal through most everything. But you're on rocks and you're just rolling.
Speaker 2:Is that where Lollipop was?
Speaker 3:Yes, that's where Lollipop and Zoe was.
Speaker 1:So it's like the old Turkey, where it's bumpy, oh yeah, but they're doing a good job.
Speaker 3:Rock Solid's doing the work and they are really putting together some good trails Super excited. They have some skinnies, they have some wood features. That's super excited. They have some skinnies, they have some wood features. In fact, I think some of the wood that's over there and I hope this is accurate is some of the wood that came from the father's day storm. Repurposing some of those trees that are down and bring them here nice, it's pretty awesome.
Speaker 1:Well, anytime a good, a professional group comes in and cuts something that's big, like that, I mean it's going to be rideable even if it's hard, right? That's. The thing is like people always ask like my uncle lives in colorado and he asked about bentonville. He hasn't been there yet. He's like how is it like? What's it like? And I'm like, well, it's hard to explain because, like, everything is smooth and everything is pretty and it's wide and it's really nice.
Speaker 1:The hard stuff is hard because of they made it hard, but it's not like when you come to like well, think about the old crispin and you know it's like a I don't know what to relate it to up here but it's like you know, you have a tiny little spot that you can get through and there's one line and it's just bumpy and it just hold on to get through it kind of section. It's not where there's rocks placed that you can ride on top of and get through it, and things like that. It's yeah, when this professional groups do it, it it's significantly different. It's going to be pretty nice, it's exciting.
Speaker 3:Like I said, you're not going to go fast but you're going to have good times. Okay, if you're pedaling, it's not something, that's just a bunch of power, it's more, and you guys have so much trail out here now. Yeah, I think there's going to be close to 44 miles when they're done, with nine at the process. You're still Turkey, but they're calling it sanctuary, we call it, I call it purgatory.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Same thing, same but different.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a lot of fun, yeah, doing work. We're super excited. That's awesome.
Speaker 1:When's that going to be open?
Speaker 3:Do you know? In about a month and a half, two months, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:Well, I guess we can talk about why we're really here. And first off, ray, I've never been here. Yeah, this place is insanely beautiful, like incredibly beautiful. So, if it hasn't been a twist of note, well, you have to come in April, april 12th, we're doing a 12 hour and we'll get we'll, we'll wrap everything up with with talking about the 12 hour, but you have to come just to come see this place. It's gorgeous. It pictures, don't do it.
Speaker 2:Just when you're driving in, you catch a glimpse of the Valley. Yeah, and then when you drive, you know, come in on the gravel road, it opens up you. Yeah, it's beautiful. I was actually just thinking about I can remember the first race we promoted out here.
Speaker 1:I don't know what people thought they were coming to, but they were like, oh, there's a house down here, yeah, there was another race that you guys did up here that I came to, and it was out on somebody's private land.
Speaker 2:That was over. That was Tim and Tori's out in Kellyville. Okay, that's what I was kind of picturing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I can post it. Yeah, that's what it was. That's kind of his picture. He did a great job with what he had. That's a fun trail.
Speaker 2:He only had 45 acres. It was five miles of trail on 45 acres.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a fun trail. It was a lot of trail.
Speaker 2:A lot of trackers. I just remember that we sent was no joke. Yeah, we've got 112 acres here and we basically we have about seven and a half miles of trail. Um, emma recommends 10 miles or 10 acres per mile. So you know, we're not even. We're nowhere near that. Yeah, um, and you know people ask me where are you going to build more trail? It's, it's no, we're I, we, we went for quality over quantity and I mean I had to make, I've made numerous reroutes. There's a lot of times you just unless you were talking about professional trail builder, which I'm not, and um well, even even they, there's areas that stumbled right.
Speaker 1:There's always.
Speaker 3:Always go back and rework and re-up Right.
Speaker 1:Well, that's the luxury of having it on your land, and over time it's just going to get better and better and better.
Speaker 2:I think currently, as far as the actual trail, I'm done building trail, my goal and what I've been doing this winter is just improving. I'm working on sections, just making them better. I added some culverts to a few spots where there's some basically like erosion areas. But yeah, it's pretty cool. I appreciate it. Yeah, we're extremely grateful to call this home. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I'll break on this a little bit.
Speaker 3:They're great. We like to break it, or I think of it as four different sections on a float relief, so you have something a little bit different in each little section of this property. So you go from techy with elevation, some climbing stuff, to fun, flowy and then some chunk.
Speaker 1:That's the best.
Speaker 3:So it's got everything. It's a mountain biker's course.
Speaker 1:That's the fun part, when you go ride a trail and you're like man, I got to like hit it as hard as I want with fast, open, flowy section. There was some stuff that kind of sketched me out a little bit and then it had a good climb, like when you hit everything.
Speaker 2:That doesn't happen very often and the rock that's here, um, I was riding with nick blackwell and, uh, he, he was like dude, this is like rock flow and uh, and it was just. There's areas that appear visually like it should be rocky, because there's boulders scattered, you know, littered around, but we've done a really good job of making a path that you ride on, so it's very right. Right, it's just. I think you look and you see all the you know the big rocks.
Speaker 1:It's kind of deceiving yeah.
Speaker 2:Someone. Actually, just the other day I was going all over Tulsa. I went to pretty much every bike shop in Tulsa yesterday handing out flyers for the 12-hour and one guy said, man, I really want to go out there, but I heard it's just like old school Turkey. And I was like, not really man. I said it's old school single track, but it's not old school.
Speaker 1:Can anybody beat you out here? Can anybody beat you out here?
Speaker 2:I've been beat.
Speaker 1:Ryan Drummond has the KWM right now, that's what I was going to ask Molly?
Speaker 2:Molly beat me in the short track On her E-bike. It was so funny, she was so cute.
Speaker 3:I was like Molly, just go around me.
Speaker 2:She was so cute. I was like Wally, just go around me. That's amazing. She's like no.
Speaker 1:I was like Wally, go around me. You cannot have a Drummond, be the top step when you're At least it's Ryan. I also promoted the race that day too. Okay, you've got to get that back. Let's talk about the new and exciting things that you guys are cooking up and have rolling out. Goodness, in a month, we're a month out. We're recording on the 6th of February, so you guys are what less than a month now? Right In the third, it's the ninth, ninth, okay, so the weekend after that? Okay, so we're right there. So let's talk I don't know which one of you guys want to take off and leave, but kind of talk about why we're here, and then let's get into the details of it and explain a new chapter in Oklahoma mountain biking.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'll start off and I, you know, ran our good French for a long time, so I'm sure we'll just tag team it. But yeah, gcxc Organically between the race directors here in this region. There's a lot of need for Races over here. We have the infrastructure now, with the courses over the last five years, because of Turkey, because of Twisted Oak, claremore, you have a lot of trails up here.
Speaker 3:Right, so we've caught up. So, man, it just really started over text when we're all just texting each other and next thing we know we're like damn, did we just start a race? And the real concept is just to bring people back to racing, back to mountain biking, give them something to look forward to, something, a target to shoot for, motivation to train within our region.
Speaker 1:So this is definitely saying right now up in the northeast part of the state yes, Okay, yes. That's the least we're.
Speaker 2:We actually when we announced it we actually had. There were three other promoters that were part of the Tour de l'Ere series that reached out to us within 24 hours asking if they could be a part of GCXC and obviously we were flattered but we declined. We're trying to keep it centralized around Tulsa, but that tells you something. We're not the only promoters that were wanting some change. Yeah, I think a big driving force of it for me was USA Cycling. I wanted to branch away from USA Cycling because of the fees predominantly.
Speaker 2:And, that being said, if USA Cycling rep and we tossed around some ideas, basically the point system is ridiculous. Coming from Oklahoma, you're forced if you actually want to be competitive at nationals, you've got to travel all over the country to chase points. Let's face it, that's what less than 2% of the racing population. So why are we paying all these fees if none of us have a legitimate chance to actually compete?
Speaker 1:And or want to the ability to.
Speaker 2:So with that, that's when Bobby, like Bobby said it was, you know, it was some some texting going on and I think it was right before my it was like right before my race, um which made it. It was really. It made it really difficult, you know, because I really I really admire pom and debbie and um and it was my birthday and I felt really guilty not saying anything, but we wanted to wait until the series was over to make an announcement.
Speaker 3:We didn't want to taint the rest of the season with this news, right?
Speaker 2:So we're like, okay, timing is everything, Well there's a timing place for everything, Right yeah for sure, we wanted to wait until the Tour de Dirt season came to a close, and then, as soon as it was over, all right, let's rip this Band-Aid off.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you got to announce it at some point, right, right, yeah.
Speaker 3:We always wanted to be transparent up front, but do it right. So that's when we called the meeting. It's like, okay, we need to talk, here's what we want to do. Let's hopefully come to an understanding.
Speaker 1:Well, come to an understanding. Well, I think I mean and we talked about it briefly before we got on here I'm sure it ruffles feathers, but ruffling feathers makes everything better when it's done in the right way and for the right reasons, and things like that. I mean I I understand people are probably a little upset, uh, or frazzled by the situation that there's a new race series and now it's competition, or now I can only race here, now they're not going to come here, whatever the case may be, but like I think it just gives from a racer standpoint, there's more opportunities to go race?
Speaker 2:Yes, well, more and more. And let's face it, um, our, our, our change definitely, definitely cause Tour de Dirt to step it up a notch. Yeah, they got their schedule out way faster than ever before. I've been here almost 20 years. They dropped USA Cycling.
Speaker 1:It's always possible, and then they're going to push you guys, right? No, I mean, and it's not that we're trying to.
Speaker 2:you know we weren't. It wasn't an attack on Tour de Dirt Right, and in fact we took a long time to actually get our schedule out there, because we were truly trying to make sure that we were accommodating to Tour de Dirt, to NICA. We want it to be where racers whether it's kids racing in NICA or racers from Tour de Dirt, want to come race in ours. There's no overlapping weekends at all.
Speaker 3:No hard decisions where you're like which race do I do this weekend? Right, so we have a whole spreadsheet. It took a long time we were looking at it, putting in that. I mean, that's a hard part to schedule, that's fun, and then not to overlap people there's. That was hard. So yeah, it was.
Speaker 1:Our main goal was not to compete so people could do all of them having more quality races I don't see as being a negative. Clearly, people may get race fatigue and people from oklahoma city may be like man, I've raced four weekends in a row. People from tulsa like I've raced four or five weekends in a row, I don't want to drive to this other place to go to. Like I get that, but that's part of it. People that also have been on vacation or had sick kids or they couldn't do the last two races. Now they have opportunity to jump in on this race this weekend, so it's possible.
Speaker 2:Well, and the reality is is you're the, the diehards that did the full tour de dirt season or, you know, did their two drops, but they did all, all the races. Nothing has really changed, right, there's, we have six races. There is probably one more race that would be on the on the schedule, you know, for the year between tour de dirt and um gcxc. I haven't announced it yet, but I'm actually I've been working on how the verbiage of it. But I want to do a twisted oak trails wants to. I want to promote a, or say promote sponsor, a dual series champion, um. So if you do our category, let's say you're the third place overall in our category and you happen to be, you competed, I'm sorry, you finished in the Tour de Dirt season. So basically, I'm going to go through all of our categories, I'm going to start tracking people that are doing both races. Then at the end of the year, at the Cold Turkey, I would basically crown a dual series champion.
Speaker 1:Super cool, just something to try to throw another carrot to do both of our series.
Speaker 2:We're all.
Speaker 3:Oklahoma mountain bikers.
Speaker 2:I'll tell you, one of my favorite races is not actually it's not in GCXC One of my favorite races is Medicine Park. I'm glad you said that.
Speaker 1:That's my favorite. I love it, I love it. I love everything about that place. I love that place, man, everything the gravel, the mountain, biking, the camping, the town, everything.
Speaker 2:I mean everything. The only reason I didn't go out there more in the last few years was while we were going through everything with Ashley's cancer. When we got everything under control, I was back out at Medicine Park. I love that place. It's the best.
Speaker 1:That's the only thing outside of here that has that kind of terrain.
Speaker 2:The thing is you were talking about Crispin's. I'm not trying to talk about my place some more, but that's the thing is there's, um, there's a few courses that just have like a really good variety of a little bit of everything, whereas you've got to be a well-rounded rider, yeah, and that's but anyway, I haven't written out here yet.
Speaker 1:Crispin was my absolute favorite trail in Oklahoma. Hands down had everything so fun. I like Crispin. I'm so bummed to see it. Maybe someday it'll come back, but yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, that's one thing with this place. I've actually had several people kind of compare it to a Crispin as far as the fact that it has such diversity. Yeah, that's nice Well let's get into.
Speaker 1:Let's just start with the schedule, now that we kind of know what it is, and kind of get into your dates. I mean, I know it kicks off in March. March is when it kicks off and that's going to be here in Tulsa, right by Turkey, correct? Yes, okay.
Speaker 3:So that is right across from Highway 75, from Turkey Mountain, it's Bellas Park. Okay, yeah, what is that?
Speaker 1:61st and yeah, okay, okay, and so that's, and that's the one that you guys have a race at last year, right?
Speaker 3:so that's hails bells, that is Chad's. Greg promotes that with his race team center and that starts.
Speaker 1:You said March 9th, march 9th, okay, and that'll be the kicking off the tour, kicking off the season, kicking off everything. It's a great race.
Speaker 3:It's challenging. It's got some technicals, got a nice little climb that'll kick you in the gut.
Speaker 1:And we can get into more of the details of what you guys have different in your series. That's, different than Tour de D'Or, different than traditional stuff that we're used to in Aero Coloma, different than traditional stuff that we that we're used to in aero coloma. But I'm assuming that things are going to be more of that.
Speaker 2:Um uci style lap situation we're trying to we're trying to create more spectator friendly. Yeah, okay, that's the main strategy yeah, that's so.
Speaker 3:The thought is you know, no one wants to drive two hours or whatever and do one lap right, they take off and they tell their level and take you can see you, you again, when I finish. Yeah, um, but we like that that just.
Speaker 1:But you know, proud participation, more laps, more opportunities for shenanigans on the course, right, yeah, that's great I mean that's what makes cross cycle cross great is because everybody gets to watch the whole time and heckle and you see everybody's. But you actually get to see and that's what I like about going to the crits and stuff, cause you get to see like dynamics and things happening, people passing you to actually watch the race?
Speaker 3:Yeah, and so if you understand the race and you can see some strategy, or you can see someone closing the gap or someone stretching it out a little bit and you're like, oh my gosh, that guy's on fire or whatever hearing like what happened?
Speaker 1:was it mechanical or whatever? Yeah, I think that'd be really fun. Like my girlfriend, whenever we talked about coming to race, I'm like don't come, okay, I won't see you. Like you know, I'm like I'll see you when I leave and I'll see you when I start like it's it so that's great, I love that. So that's march 9th. Uh, bales, is that the name of the trail? Bales? Yeah, okay, b-a-l-e-s, okay, um, what your next one?
Speaker 3:After that is, I believe it's Keystone no.
Speaker 2:Hell's Bells, and then we have oh.
Speaker 3:Hollow Hustle, hollow Hustle, okay, which is Mosier and LaBelle Park, which is super fun. I actually. What date is that?
Speaker 1:April 19th, april 19th, april 19th. Okay, and then where?
Speaker 3:is that at? So that is at the Bell Park, Mosher Park, which is actually really just another mile west from Bell you?
Speaker 1:can almost throw your bike. Oh, so it's all kind of right there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that Elgin is the only thing that separates it. Oh, okay. So, you can actually. Just if you cross Elgin at Bell's Park, you can jump right on one of the trailheads.
Speaker 2:Super cool it's actually going to be the the main office for the bike club.
Speaker 3:Right, bell's is yes, yes, okay. So bike club is building. So if you, when you come to Bell's, to Hell's Bells you'll notice construction that is bike club Oklahoma is going to be headquartered. Cool, I don't know what I can say, but they're going to do some really cool stuff with their headquarters incorporating it into races and stuff they have so many awesome goals and projects coming up. I can't wait for the next three years with them Cool.
Speaker 1:So March 9th and April 19th, and then what's your next one?
Speaker 2:That's Keystone next May the 4th. Be with you.
Speaker 1:He's done Clash Okay, so it's May 4th. Okay, he's done. Okay, so it's.
Speaker 3:May 4th Okay, okay, it'll be fun and, uh, you know, keystone is Keystone. Yeah, Like it's. People are familiar with that. Yeah, it's fun. One thing we are trying to do um, I'm going to try and submit this in the next month or whatever is get it down to about a four mile lap. Okay, right now the old Keystone loop is six miles. We're going to try and find a way to make it about a four-mile loop. That way it gets us in that 25 to 30-minute lap times so we can do a couple more laps but then maybe not do some of the sketchy areas. So we're trying to find some reroutes and change it up to go back to that format.
Speaker 1:I was going to say, if you get rid of that section where Drummond passed me, well, he lapped me there and he floated through it like he was riding on the road and I was bouncing off of rocks and like cussing myself. And he's like you just ride faster, you get on top of him. I mean, I heard that as he disappeared. Yeah, sure, okay, keystones, may 4th and then is that your break?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we'll have the summer break and then we'll kick off on Labor Day weekend with Claremore. Oh, is that right?
Speaker 3:It's Labor Day weekend right September 6th and 7th. Okay, so the weekend Weekend after yeah, yeah, that's Shoreline Shred, that's another. That's a great trade. Our fall schedule is all festivals, so multi-days, really.
Speaker 1:So Claremont will be a multi-day, okay, and then, well, let's get into that in just a second and what those multi-day events are going to look like. So you got Claremont, september 6th, and then what's your next one? And then Twisted Oat.
Speaker 3:October 4th and 5th, okay, and then November 14th through the 16th. Three days is cold turkey. What was November? What 14th through the 16th, turkey?
Speaker 1:Okay, and that's at Turkey Mountain. Okay, so well. I mean, I know there has been multi-day events in the past. Yeah, randomly here and there, throughout stuff. What are you guys doing inside of yours to? I mean, are they going to be kind of the traditional thing that we've done in the past, or is?
Speaker 2:it going to be anything a little different. Well, we've tried as far as like to try to encourage people to actually attend them has always been a challenge. We tried I said we and Tour de Guerre we tried doing two bonus points if you came and did the Saturday races, and there were some people that were bellyaching over it and so that went by the wayside. What we are doing is, which we can provide, the point system. You get your cross-country points. It's a similar format to what Tambor uses. You get 60 points for first, and then I think it's 55 for second, 51 for third. It goes all the way down to the 30th place, right? So our Saturday events, you get a percentage of the same point system. So basically, it's an equivalent of if you win, you get a bonus 10 points. Okay, Second place, it's like nine, it works its way down, it works its way down.
Speaker 3:It works its way down, so it's a point one. Six, six scale, okay, so it's one 66 of a point. Okay, the system, so it's just bonus points.
Speaker 1:Are you guys going to do be doing short track for the time trials? What downhill stuff Different Okay.
Speaker 3:And different. Okay, and I haven't spoke with rory, but what rory typically does is saturday is some enduro okay stuff. There's a lot of enduro guys around here and it's a big wave so and they're awesome, they're, they ride with us, but they have their, their discipline. Saturday's enduro for shoreline shred um, if it was like last year. And then xc sunday okay, um ray, he does time trial, short track.
Speaker 1:XC, so you'll do all three here.
Speaker 2:Right, We'll have a time trial course, then we'll have a short track course and then the cross country on Sunday, which I spoke with Tanner Colberth. He's been real big in Northeast Oklahoma doing short track series. We are actually, since we're going to be the state championship cross country race on Sunday, Saturday's short track will be a state championship as well. So it's kind of like a state championship weekend. Love that.
Speaker 3:It's awesome.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's great, that's awesome. Which, while we're on that topic of the state championship, you know that was a. That's something that's been in a long time in the making. Yeah, there's been a lot of guys over the years inquiring. You know, when you think about it, every other discipline.
Speaker 1:Everything.
Speaker 2:Road racing, yeah. Track racing Uh-huh. Never understood this, but yeah, that's for a one-day state championship and all we've ever had is a series championship.
Speaker 1:Which is a series champion. A series champion, it's not a state champion, right. And I won the series one time and I was like, eh, that's just cause it did all the races.
Speaker 2:Right, I mean you know and the thing is is not everybody can commit to a full season, Right? So it's been something that's that it's been needed.
Speaker 1:Something's been needed and it's been talked about by a lot of people for a long time, for years.
Speaker 2:Well, long before GCXC came along, way before. Yes, actually, we talked, you know. You remember when we made the announcement? Yeah, we were, you know, like we. That was something we wanted to see happen. The vision on the state championship is that it's going to be something that travels back and forth between the Tour de Dirt Series and the GCXC Series.
Speaker 3:I love that it could be first race. You know, it's just all.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think you get it's. You know, I think you're going to get more diverse champions, because Oklahoma City people hate coming to the rocks because they don't ride the rocks.
Speaker 2:So they suck at rocks.
Speaker 1:But you get the Tulsa people and they come down to Draper and they're like this sucks, how do you write this? And you're like you. Just I don't understand what you're talking about. You just there's like nothing in your way. That doesn't work that way, for if you never ride super fast, twisty tight sink tracks, so it'll also just different riding styles.
Speaker 2:But also because it travels, the date will travel. So you may have a guy who you know, like me, my son, you know he's a robotics nerd and through the fall and the winter he's full on robotics. So I mean, I'm traveling to different competitions and it's hard to put it together a training schedule. And I'm just saying like in general, you have somebody that they're not able to train a whole lot in the offseason and they're typically like they may be faster coming to the fall races. Good point. So the point is, yeah, so like I actually recommended that Medicine Park actually host the first state championship Cause I already mentioned, I love medicine park, I thought that would have been awesome. But yeah, so that would have been like one of the very beginning races of the year, so you would be the state champion for the full season.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's. And plus, the state championship should be part of the state, and it should be. It should travel, you should have. State championship should be part of the state, and it should be. It should travel, you should have. You should see different parts of the state. It should be on different trails, it should be all of that. That's the whole point of a true champion.
Speaker 2:Well, we, you know, this is something we talked about last October when we announced GCXC and which I finally just went ahead and threw it on the schedule as I actually was asking the other promoters on GCX. I was like hey, tom declined, the Twitter doesn't want to host it. I didn't want to just throw it, I'm like I'm doing it. I asked them what do you all think? They were like dude, it was something you were pushing, so why don't you do it first? That's how I ended it.
Speaker 1:I think you're going to make a lot of friends with that one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm hoping.
Speaker 3:I think so. I think that brings everybody together, something really awesome, which it should.
Speaker 1:And then having a short track, state championship, which is super cool, because I don't think anybody's even talked and thought about that. Can you imagine if you doubled up? That's great, man, that'd be great. That's great.
Speaker 3:Um, and then ends with cold Turkey. Uh, so what's your multi-day? So cold Turkey? Um, usually Friday Is it really a race thing? It's really fun. We did, uh, zingo and chained. So Zingo is one of the earlier than one of the first downhills. It's like five switchbacks. It's super fun. Um, that was a fun thing. That was just for get people out there. Saturday's Enduro okay, so we'll have five to seven courses, okay, just Enduro all day, and then Sunday is the XC. The cool thing that we realized last year about cold turkey we only had eight riders transition from Saturday to to sunday, so saturday was its own race. Only eight people came back sunday. But both days had, you know, 250, 300, right, oh my gosh, it was two full days, but we started looking at it. We had our vendors, you know, who were doing merch and stuff yeah like um, you need to go get more merch.
Speaker 3:Wow, there's.
Speaker 1:The fact that you have 400 people plus on a mountain bike in Oklahoma. Yeah, and a weekend is phenomenal.
Speaker 2:It was awesome and it just goes to show you that there's a need.
Speaker 1:There's something.
Speaker 2:Yep, there's something going on For sure, when the other races we're not seeing those numbers. No, I've been averaging 110 racers out here. Yeah, and so.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's great. I mean our goal. We want to grow, you know 15, 20% each year.
Speaker 1:So are you guys. You'll have an overall series leader or winner.
Speaker 2:Right, we're doing. We're doing a season, a series, a season. Champion, you will be allowed one drop out of the six races. Okay, champion, you will be allowed one drop out of the six races. Okay, we're also, um, we had, we. We've been slow to get some things out there because we're obviously we're trying to make sure we get everything done right. Right again, we this isn't something we've been planning for six months a year, um, but we are doing a team challenge as well, okay, but which chad sprague was the driving force behind this? We're not allowing a 30 person team where your top five racers out of 30 count. Yeah, you can have a maximum of six racers and your top four count, so a lot of it. What we're trying to do is, even so, you're, you know, they're a big shop, fat tire. They could, they could potentially put together three, four teams that are competing with them to sell, so it's just going to make it more interesting, Well it makes it a real competition and not a numbers game.
Speaker 1:Well, yes, and what it allows is you know you can have a group of buddies, go do it Right.
Speaker 3:Have a team Right and it's really close to like what Ray does with his endurance rides, like where you can do like the six hour. Have a four man team. I mean, we already talked about this last night at the ride. It's the same structure, just buddies who normally wouldn't race together. Now have a team.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's super fun. Yeah, I think that's, and that's going to create a whole nother dynamic of just like good times.
Speaker 2:Right. I remember in 2016, when I first started the burn camp, which I had a few guys that were racing on burn camp and we were gonna enter the team challenge and we did it one year and it was like, oh, that was a waste, we can't, you can't, right there were five of us and it was whatever shop had the most people.
Speaker 1:And then they sandbag it and like line people up in certain categories, don't let them cut up, or you race to this age group and you race.
Speaker 3:There's a lot of strategy where, like, you got to get third today even though you're faster than this guy, and that's not that's not having a real team champion, that's just like playing the system, which is good for you.
Speaker 2:So we challenge Six man teams you can obviously have up to six.
Speaker 3:You can start with a four man team. You only need four Top four score. You can have up to six. I love that. That's super fun.
Speaker 2:We're not doing any rules on, you can only have, you can't have, but like one open rider type of thing Put together.
Speaker 3:Whatever your teammate wants to be, okay. You can have a junior.
Speaker 1:You can have open sport okay well, let's uh, I think now they've got schedule let's talk. Let's jump into your categories. Now we're talking about open and sport and all that. That's. Maybe it's a kind of person verbiage that people are not familiar with, um, so let's talk about what you guys are doing in your categories, because I know it's a little different. So, beginner, is.
Speaker 3:It's just what it is. It's beginner. It's that level where maybe you've never raised but you want to, you know, dive into it. It's there for that. Um, maybe your fitness isn't there, whatever it's equivalent to a cat three it's equivalent to cat three exactly and it's equivalent to cat three distance.
Speaker 2:Okay, you know, we are going to try to make that, where your finishing time is basically like 50 minutes to an hour and, like Bobby said, it's, you know, it's the beginner category.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and having an hour race is great because I know when I was cat three there was a handful of races I would go to. It'd be like a 35 minute lap. I'm like I'm not driving to Paul's or to Kansas or whatever.
Speaker 2:That's the luxury of when we're doing multiple. Yeah, you know, to pulsar in kansas, that's the luxury of when we're doing multiple. Yeah, you know, the short, the short laps you're able, for one you're also. It makes it more exciting for you. Yeah, you're dialed in. You know, if you have somebody coming, you have more than one chance to learn the course, even if you have a one bad lap.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so then we have our sport category. Let me back up a second. You, you've, you have to kind of get out of the, the usac model, and even back in the old days, the norba model, where it was beginner, it used to be beginner sport and expert, um, and which you know, cat one, cat two, cat three, um, we, in a sense, we're only doing two, two categories. Okay, we have beginner, which is for beginners, and then we have or I'm sorry sport, which is going to be. It is your competitive, it is your experience category. So if somebody, let's say somebody, is dominating beginner, they win the season next year. We're going to force them up to sport. Sport is not a category that you're passing through on your way to another category. Sport is a place where someone could spend the rest of their adult life racing as a sport racer. That is the competitive field. It has age groups. So, beginner, let's back up a second. Beginner is 19 to 44. Okay, 45 to 59. Okay, 60 to 69. And if WC is listening, 70 plus because of WC.
Speaker 2:Okay, which is great, because there are some guys that are in that age group. Good for them. Now they can line up and have fun together, that's even better. Yeah, which is great, because there are some guys that are in that age group Good for them. Now they can line up and have fun together.
Speaker 1:That's even better so in the sport class we have 19 to 44, 45 to 59, and 60 plus man, I've never been so happy to age up I'm so excited about that.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Now there's the open category. I said we have two categories. Well, why is there the open? Well, the open is there for guys like myself who like the longer races. I mean, I'm 50 years old and I still want to line up against the best. I'm not going to win, but I want to line up against the best. And so the open class is there for anyone who wants to challenge themselves. They want to do some longer distance races. It's going to be equivalent in distance to Cat 1. A sport rider. Let's say you have a sport rider who's having a phenomenal year. What's Ryan Chessie? Chessie, yeah, ryan Chessie is a great example. He was a guy that came in like flying, and that particular year he could say you know what I'm going to race. The open guys. Well, life happens Not able to train quite as much as a kid. I don't know what the story, you know what it is, but you know, as adults, we all know life happens and to maintain a cat one fitness forever is not easy, especially for a younger family.
Speaker 1:Man Right, if I was in my early 30s.
Speaker 2:There's a lot going on, a lot of changes every day, so he could go back and race sport. Sport is going to be competitive, man it's going to be big, Especially with those big age groups.
Speaker 1:Some big fun age groups Can you imagine lining up with groups like that there could be.
Speaker 2:Let me tell you my favorite times were in the 90s and early 2000s, where I was racing against. I raced one race in Lajitas, Texas, and there were 63 of us in the 19 to 29. And that's racing.
Speaker 1:You could get kind of in that like 40 plus Right In a category.
Speaker 2:The funny thing about that is is you're out there racing, you're tired and you back off the gas a little bit. Two people pass you. Yeah, you're like dang it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're not riding with six people and then after like 10 minutes, you're by yourself for the next time.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Or you look at their pedaling. Well man, that whole shot yeah.
Speaker 2:No, it matters.
Speaker 1:People better start working on their starts. Yeah.
Speaker 2:In the 90s, I used to practice starts you better, Randy Hagans. We would get at a dead stop and we would just practice our starts.
Speaker 1:They become real important when you have big fields like that Very important. Yeah, that's awesome, I love that. And then you do a cash payout for the open division.
Speaker 2:Yes, we're going to do a cash payout for the open division, so that's kind of, you know, more or less like that's going to be the money class.
Speaker 1:It's just everybody against everybody. There is no way. In truth, I love that which they're like. Well, there's only four in ours and there's eight in the other ones. Let's just all go together and, for whatever reason, most times they won't let them start together or whatever. But yeah, it just makes it much more competitive, much more fun, for even when you have smaller fields, now at least everybody's against everybody.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so you know there's going to be some guys. So this is new. I mean we're and you're going to have it growing. We actually If you've seen our logo. It says Racing Refined. Uh-huh, we're trying some things differently, some will work, some won't.
Speaker 3:Yeah, 100%.
Speaker 2:It's our inaugural season. Yeah, it is what it is. We'll see how it goes, yeah.
Speaker 1:You're going to make tweaks and changes.
Speaker 2:It may end up being that next year. We, you know it's. It's one of those things where do whatever you want to work on, which is great.
Speaker 3:If it's good for the sport and it makes sense. You know, nothing's off the table. If it's good for the sport, it helps grow and it helps people come back or come for the first time, Then why, why would we not try it?
Speaker 1:So we got three categories. You're open, is truly open. Your age groups are different than your standard USA Cycling setup, which will promote bigger fields, which is great. What about? They don't have to be USA Cycling licensed? No, because they're not cycling in the USA Cycling.
Speaker 2:I'll just say this it's not an attack on USA Cycling. It's more or less as a promoter paying for a product that doesn't benefit me and it doesn't benefit the racers.
Speaker 1:Will that affect the cost of entry for the races? Do you know?
Speaker 2:Our entry fee is going to be. I'd have to pull up.
Speaker 1:It'll be on the website.
Speaker 3:It's like $35 or $40.
Speaker 2:It was beginner. Beginner was $25. Will it's like 35 or 40.
Speaker 1:So it was beginner was 25. Okay, will it change per event or will it kind of be a standard across the board? It's going to be a standard? It'll be a standard? Oh sweet, and all that will be on your site once you guys get all that stuff the team challenge and all these things going throughout the year. I think are there going to be call-ups or anything like that, because you're going to have these big fields?
Speaker 1:I just thought of that and those could be the little things that you guys make decisions on and tweak as you go, but just trying to think about how to make it more prestigious to have those, or is there going to be? You know, I think about and these are things that just are coming to my head as we're talking about them. You know how you have a series leader, have a Jersey or a different plate or something like that. You know, like anything like that. I think you guys, being new startup, having the ability to make these changes and quick, and being open-minded to making some of these fun events and fun changes, I think is going to be exciting to watch for those things I don't think we've actually we haven't don't think those things.
Speaker 3:It will happen yeah, this thing is happening, yeah, yeah. So we're, you know, think our race is gonna be timed. We'll have points, we will have it on a spreadsheet like, okay, these three guys are here, they won last week, or you know, hell's bells, you're up front is there going to be I just thought of this as well like um, I know at tour de dirt we have to buy um a number plate situation.
Speaker 1:Will there be something like that with you guys, because every race is same concept here, we'll have a series race plate.
Speaker 3:Okay, gcxc race plate. It'll have the timing on there. It'll be a one time, you know. As long as you don't damage it right, don't fold it, don't lose it, you keep it for the season. That's one cost, that's your okay are they?
Speaker 1:uh, we're around 15 20 for the plate, okay, and then your rice is uh, okay, cool I love it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, when you register there's going to be a little box that says do you have a series plate? Oh okay, check. No, then you'll get one. Or if you lose it, then you'll just come to reg or two the info box and say I didn't get it Okay, gotcha, I think we have a QR code, right that?
Speaker 2:will be for. Yes, we're going to put a QR code out at the table for anybody who needs another. Yeah, okay, and basically what we're going to do also is on our registration. We're going to leave our online registration up until 30 minutes before your race. Oh, wow, so basically, what you're going to do?
Speaker 2:you're going to walk up, you're going to scan a QR code, you're going to register online and you will pay at midnight the day before the race, or the day of the race, I guess. Technically, you know the entry fee will go up because of the same day registration, but you're going to actually register online. Um, so there won't be any cash handed out, and then, if so, you'll actually be able to buy a number plate, either there or just do it on registration. Nice, sorry, I'm trying to look, look this up real quick. Just to what we're talking about it.
Speaker 1:My little co-host here what's this dog's name? Coco? Coco might be going home with me. Yeah, she's a sweetheart. Yeah, yeah, we're excited about the series. I'm excited for the series and like and now I'm even more excited because I didn't think I was going to get to come to the first race. I thought I was going to be out of town, but I'll be here for that week, so I'm excited to come up and see what you guys have going and how it's. I mean, it is going to be the same horses that people have raced, traditionally-ish for the most part, but a completely different vibe and a completely different setup, and I hope this just brings energy to, I wouldn't say, a sport that's kind of become stagnant. But racing in Oklahoma has become stagnant across every sport.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I'm excited. People are running, a lot of people are riding, not a lot of people are racing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've seen it go down significantly. And then even my friends, you know I'm like what are you doing this year? And everybody's like I know, yeah, Cause you kind of get tired of doing the same events all the time.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we ride every week. Yeah, and then like, you get these you mentioned the word race and like all the fun just leaves.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Like I can't have fun anymore. I got to train.
Speaker 1:I got you know you just get, and you get like just over, like you show up and it's like, okay, me and him might battle and I know this, I'm going to average this speed on this course and that's it. Like well, there's no like race drama. That really happens Once it becomes the sack stagnant. Same courses, same race, same everything, same people, same same 15 guys yeah.
Speaker 1:So I think this would be fun. I would love to see and I'm just throwing this out here and throwing you guys under the fence with this, but I would love to see some well, I equate it back to golf, because that's my pants, but a Ryder Cup situation between the two series at the end of the year, or something. That would be super fun because you're doing kind of an overall.
Speaker 2:Well, that's what I'm trying to do. I'm going to try to do with the overall. I just need to put it out there, obviously.
Speaker 1:I just did. Yeah, that would be super fun.
Speaker 3:I think it would be easy.
Speaker 2:The difference is. The challenge is we have two different categories. What I would do is I'm going to base it off of our series. If you're a Cat 2 47-year-old man and you are racing the 45 to 59 here, let's say that you end up finishing up the year third overall in our series. Well, and let's say that over in in a tour de dirt, that guy raced 40 to 49 cat too. Well, he might've been fifth place over there, but so he's the top person in cat to 45 to 59 of Basin.
Speaker 1:Bars that did both series, so he would be the dual series.
Speaker 2:I love that, nice, I think that's, and plus it promotes people to cross borders essentially, and what I'm wanting to do is I haven't put a number on it yet, but for the open rider, mel, which we've got, I was wanting to put a cash prize out there.
Speaker 1:So, basically um if you can make that happen right.
Speaker 2:Well, I love that.
Speaker 1:And I love having a dual series thing and I think it just promotes each other. No, absolutely I want. Hopefully tour is on board and wants to do things.
Speaker 2:I'm disappointed. Like I was looking at um, I was looking at Tour de Gert's schedule and I can't make. I would have to take vacation from the fire department to make a couple of the races that are coming up and I'm going to still try to make it happen. I want to do as many of the races as I can Right. I'm actually looking forward to next year. I'll be retired and I plan on winning both series.
Speaker 1:Oh, oh, drumming, I was going to say Drummond, better start training.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about. We talked about interviews and stuff.
Speaker 2:So basically what we're doing is kids. We are going to do a kids cup type of race as well. The kids race is totally free. Awesome, they don't buy, obviously, because it's they don't buy some stupid USAC license for an eight-year-old to race. So it's free, 30 free. Any junior. If you're junior categories, you know, 18 and under, we're going to be $20. Awesome, we're trying to make that a little bit economical. Your cat, I'm sorry your sport got to get out of that. The sport and your open. We're going to be $30. And then your beginner are going to be $25.
Speaker 1:That's pre-reg.
Speaker 2:We are going to have same-day registration, so obviously try to encourage everybody to pre-register for races. It just makes it easier.
Speaker 3:It helps those promoters gauge having the right stuff there Food trucks and water and support and volunteers when we have a general idea of what this?
Speaker 2:is going to be honestly as a promoter. I love same day registration. Come pay me more money. Yeah, Bonus money Honestly if you, I mean it's, it's bonus money, right, but it does you know it makes it. It's always nerve wracking, but it does you know, it's always nerve-wracking.
Speaker 3:Logistics. It's good to have too. One thing I've realized with Turkey, because Turkey is way more public than the rest of the courses here we have, man, probably 20 riders that weekend that just show up to ride and they're like what's going on? Pulled Turkey Mount, like this, oh really, like, yeah, go try the loop, come back If you want to do it, come rest and they'll go do a loop and then they'll sign up and I'm in.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I wanted to address one more thing on entry fees and this is just on USA Cycling. When we were meeting with that regional rep, he asked us because we were talking about the fees the amount of fees you have to pay for USA Cycling officials for car minutes. He said well, maybe your entry fees aren't high enough, raise your entry fees so we can get that.
Speaker 1:It's not allowed.
Speaker 2:That's what's wrong with them. That's what we'll do.
Speaker 3:Hey, my buddy who wants to race and he has three kids Right, I'm going to get more money from you.
Speaker 1:Right, let me just make it harder for you so I can send it to USA Cycle, right yeah.
Speaker 3:I mean, I get they have a point.
Speaker 2:I mean they have a place but that's the thing we are trying to make it where?
Speaker 1:you know. So we're passing on the savings, obviously Right.
Speaker 2:That's what brought this whole thing up on injury pricing.
Speaker 3:I'll touch on the USAC thing too, since we're on it. You know USAC's great Like they have a purpose For Oklahoma Racing. We didn't have the base rider. We don't have like the strength in the younger groups, the beginners in sports, the juniors. It was kind of the cart before the horse right. So with the points with USAC you're catering to that 1% to 2% who are chasing the points doing a lot of travel. You're losing everyone else. So when USAC becomes relevant again because we built our state to have a competitive mountain bike scene where even people from neighboring states are like man, those guys in Oklahoma can ride, then that's when it makes sense to us. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I agree it's probably a different topic, but when we were talking to the regional rep, the whole USAC points was something that we really hammered on. We're punished in Oklahoma because we are a smaller populated state. It was like, how can we change that? The USAC rep said what if we are a smaller populated state? And so it was like how can we change that? And the USAC rep said what if we did a regional championship? And I'll be honest with you, I've been mountain biking for a long time and I would love to be able to host a regional championship or participate in a regional championship to qualify to go to nationals and actually have a decent call-up without having to travel all over the country.
Speaker 2:So you know, I may end up promoting a race under USAC again in the future, just not right now. Just not right now, not until they make a change and they make it worth my while and your while as a racer.
Speaker 1:And the regional thing is a great idea, because now that you say that, I've been coming back to other disciplines in endurance sports and I think XTERRA is the only one that I know of that's like that and they have an XTERRA regional and if you do a certain thing there, then you go to nationals from there, but that's your qualifier instead of chasing the heights, and the thing is they could still allow anybody to go to nationals and use that code. It's just another way to get in.
Speaker 2:But if you have a regional and you actually podium in the regional race, then you get points that are going to make it worth your while to actually travel and you're not just donating money to the cause, right?
Speaker 3:So I'm traveling around, just to be six and seven row call-ups. Yeah, yeah, traveling around, just to be, you know, six and seven row call-ups.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so where can people like I'm going to put a lot of this information in the show notes for people to see, and that's why I've been taking notes here and I'll probably reach back out to a couple of clarifications that I didn't get but I know you have a Facebook page, so that's is it? Gcxc on Facebook.
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 1:GCXC series. Series Okay, gcxc series is.
Speaker 3:And then we have a website that should go up by the end of next week, okay, and it'll have all these links. We're just really trying to get it right, correct? Yeah? Yeah, let me confirm that. So the Facebook is GCXC Mountain Bike, mtb Race Series, race Series, mtb Race Series Okay, and we're on Insta as well. Same thing on Instagram, okay.
Speaker 2:And our website is going to be GCXCSeriescom.
Speaker 1:GCXCSeriescom. Okay, all right, and I'll give those links on there. Um, and this will come out on the 15th, so we'll put this one out. Um, so it's a couple of weeks before your event. Um, hopefully we can get some Oklahoma city people on Western Oklahoma people up here to do this. Um, I mean, I feel like we've covered it all. Is there anything we haven't covered?
Speaker 2:Um talk about my 12 hours.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's wrap it up with the 12 hour.
Speaker 2:So the 12 hour is coming up on April 12th. I normally do it at the end of March, but there's a little race in Arkansas called the Washtenaw Challenge that ended up being on the same date as mine, so I kicked my back a couple weeks. The race it's called the 12 hours of Twisted Oak, but there is more than just the 12 hour. There's a three hour option, there's a six hour option and then there's the 12 hour. Um, the three hour you can do solo or you can do a two person relay team you know one person on the course at a time and then in the six hour you can do solo, you can do a two personperson relay or you can do a up to four person relay. The 12 hour same thing solo, two person, four person.
Speaker 2:Um, what I'm going to do different this year? I'm going to do the same format as what I did at uh, our race in october, the cross country race. We have a flyover that you're going to have, so you're going to be able to come through the spectator zone twice per lap and what I'm going to do is I'm trying to make it as beginner-friendly as possible and allow people to do a half-lap option. So if you have a beginner rider that let's just say that they are nervous on the technical part of the race course. Well, they could just do the south loop. That's cool, do the south loop, that's cool. Um, and also what it does is, let's say, you're a part of a, or you could be solo or you can be a relay. But particularly if you're a relay and you have a mechanical out, on course, you don't have to do the full lap, right, you come in to the, the pit zone, that's your half lap and your teammate can take off.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because it's a awesome Because it's a 12-hour race and it would suck on.
Speaker 2:Hour three, yeah, hour three to break a chain. And now you're a lap down and you're done, yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, because you had to walk you know five miles.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was awesome so it will make it more competitive for the teams. The downside to it is so, if you know you have a team of four let's say it's team number nine every part, all four racers have number nine number plate. Okay, and um, they have number nine rfid tag, so the system only knows that number nine came across the line and so that's how we're going to be able to do the half lap option. But the downside is is when you look at your online results, you'll have to remember the order that you wrote in. If you're wanting to look, if you're wanting to, you know if you want to get in and see if you had the fastest lap of your team, right, you know?
Speaker 2:but there's a thing that everybody uses called Strava, so you can still say no, that was my lap, just claim it, I think that even if there's somebody who's disappointed because they won't be able to just see their name with the lap time, but if that person has a mechanical, they're going to be damn glad they can come into the pits and hand the baton off to their teammate.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a nice one.
Speaker 2:So that's something we're doing differently this year. The teams there is male teams, there are female teams, teams, there's co-ed teams as well. You have to have at least one female on your team, do you on the co-ed? And the biggest thing is is this race is a fundraiser for a cancer patient. The first year it was my wife we raised money for for while we were going through her chemo. And uh, last year we we found a lady named amber cartwright and uh, amber still going through her treatment. We donated 12 000 to her family to help with. You know, get them through, you know what they're going through. And uh, this year it turns out, unfortunately, our good friend, mark taruki is battling stage four, uh, colon cancer as well. Yeah, so every, every dollar that we can make from this race, we're turning over to mark. Um, mark's an incredible man. Um, if you're, if you're in cycling, whether you're track, road, you know mountain bike, and even if you're probably multi-school, mark has done it all. Mark is actually from New Zealand.
Speaker 1:But you had your podcast with him.
Speaker 2:In case someone didn't hear it listen to Mark's podcast. He's an incredible man so kind, so kind. He was Bike Club 30 years ago. Brian Duvall is a good example. Jake Lasley those are guys that raced on Team Pow is a good example. Jake Lasley, those are guys that raced on Team Powertrain under Mark. He trained them, took them to races and those guys are obviously still competitive racers going into the 50s now.
Speaker 2:And he's still turning out powerful riders and he's still turning out powerful riders. Drummond Mark was Drummond's coach for a year. He's just and that's we're talking. You know cycling and then, just as a human being, he's just. He's the best.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's a great guy. I've never heard anybody not say those exact words about him. I'm not I mean, I don't know him outside of our podcast and the time that we talked there, but I've never talked to anyone who has not said he is the best dude that you'll ever meet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he's got a heart of gold. So like we used to do this thing at Turkey Mountain on Thanksgiving, you know turkey.
Speaker 1:We're drinking wild turkey on Turkey Mountain.
Speaker 2:Wild turkey and Mark made it big because Mark started promoting it and then he actually started you had to come and bring. You had to bring a food item. He would go and donate to the food bank. Just always giving, always giving.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, and I was going to say I mean, I know we talked about it when we did your podcast Even if you can't make this event, donate or sign up, even if it's a question, sign up because the money goes to him.
Speaker 2:And you can go to our website, twistoattrailscom. You site twistotetrailscom, you click on the 12-hour. There is a link for a donate link it's called Spot Fund, which actually I was checking it yesterday and, ashley, she even reset it and everything, but it's still showing data from last year. But it's obviously the money that's in there is going to Mark. Yeah, but you would see some comments from a year ago, okay, and we're trying to get them to remove that. But there is a donation link on there when you register for the race. There's actually a question Would you like to make a donation to Mark more than just your entry fee?
Speaker 2:Okay, and I've noticed there's been. Right now I've got a handful of people who have registered and probably half of those people have made an extra donation to Mark. I try to make the entry fee, the entry fees. I've seen I did some looking around around the country in other formats and we're cheaper as far as the entry fee compared to, like the 24 hours in the canyon. But, and we're cheaper, you know, as far as the entropy compared to, you know, like the 24 hours in the Canyon. Right, but it's for a good cause.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's for a good cause, and if there's any corporate people out there, business owners that want to donate. They have a way to donate a little extra.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, you know, and that's not just for the 12-hour. If there's somebody who's interested out there that wants to help us out with GCXE, to be a sponsor of the series, we would welcome you with open arms. We've been so engrossed with building the series. Yeah, honestly, we haven't even seeked sponsorship. Yeah, like our website, me, bobby and the rest of the guys we all dove into our pockets and donated money to build our website Not cheap.
Speaker 1:No, not if you want it to be decent.
Speaker 2:There's been other expenses that we've had All out of pocket.
Speaker 3:We believe in this so much.
Speaker 1:I think it's going to be a home run I never really do think it's going to be a home run.
Speaker 3:I do want to touch on one thing. All these races are foot racers for usually a nonprofit or a trail system.
Speaker 1:Interesting.
Speaker 3:So none of it really goes back to our pockets. We're volunteers, right. So there's all Special Olympics, right. Hell's Bells goes to the Special Olympic athletes, ray Burn Camp. Then we have Fairmore and Turkey. Those funds actually go back to trail remediation and repair, so it goes back and it funds the trails, because those are nothing set up there, right, there's not an entity that just works on the trails all day, right. So that's pretty unique because it's all really a non-profit system. Yeah, it's all really a nonprofit system.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's all for the right reason. Just get people healthy, get people having fun and get people outside and try to make somebody else's life better. What else could you ask for?
Speaker 2:We need more people to ride with.
Speaker 3:Hopefully we can get you some flatlanders to come up here and ride with you. The trails are, I would say our trails are getting a lot better, we're getting a lot better with building our, our trails.
Speaker 1:They are a lot more rideable than they used to.
Speaker 3:They are come don't be scared feel free to hit us up on on social, say, hey, I'm gonna be in town this weekend with someone. Show me around. I guarantee like I'll do everything I can to meet you. As long as I don't have life getting away, I can get you tied in with someone. Ray will ride with you out here. Um, they really are some really enjoyable.
Speaker 1:Yeah, don't be scared of them, like I think that's a big thing. A lot of Oklahoma city people are very scared of the trails and Tulsa because you hear the horror stories of the old Turkey Right, and everybody likes to brag about the old Turkey. They're like oh, it's like. Yeah, I mean when I came passage, but it's not like that anymore. Even from when I wrote it the first time to when I rode it a couple years ago. It's not even close to the same. Is it rocky in Vice Keystone?
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's some sections that suck you can make these as gnarly as you want, right?
Speaker 1:Or you can you just stay on the new stuff or flow it can get better though and that's the thing with mountain biking that I think is so great is it can be rocky, it can be skip, like in Ult city. That's just like how hard can you pedal, you know, and ride on on road bike, essentially like that's. That's the beauty of it. So I don't. I want people to not be scared of coming up here. That's the big thing. Yeah, because it's not scary. Please do, and we have enough now that there's really enough trail systems.
Speaker 3:You can ride a those in one day and that's a 20-mile loop. That's awesome. And that's not even breaking off and doing variations of lines, right. Claremore is 35 minutes away, mm-hmm, right I love. Claremore. Twisted Oak is still just 25, 30 minutes away, mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:So if you want to do like a weekend weekend, you could really ride. You know six or seven different trail systems. One question I have about twisted goat do they need to contact you before they come out here? Uh, yeah, I, I, um, I've had one person show up unannounced and they had driven from oklahoma city and I'll let it ride. You know it is our home.
Speaker 1:yeah, it's your, it's literally your backyard, it's our backyard.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I do you know. I've put my phone number out there on all of my you can reach you on any of the socials.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes.
Speaker 2:Reach out to me on Facebook, you know slide into my DMs.
Speaker 1:You know creepers that are listening to this have done that before, so I do.
Speaker 2:I would love for people to come out and ride uh just let me know or contact me, and you know, is today, tomorrow, whatever right time, and I'm gonna say yeah but you need to have a clue. Somebody's showing up here for sure which just don't want someone also wrecking out there by themselves, right? Uh, I don't find them for two days.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, exactly For sure, cool. Is there anything else you guys want to wrap up with, or we?
Speaker 3:we cover it all Just you know, come give us a chance, like we have a great, we have a good series, so come ride, do tour de dirt, do both series, I think both some variation of both series.
Speaker 1:But yeah, gcx is just on this side of state. I will tell you, I love that the attitude on y'all side is like we're here for both, like it's not pick us over them, and I greatly appreciate that I greatly appreciate that and it's nice to see that I mean we've all, we all.
Speaker 3:I have teammates that are in okc from from my road days and my mountain bike days, so there's still people I love to see when the winter comes through. And there I was, like man, you know, good to see you. And, like I said, it's just going to grow.
Speaker 2:The sport, yeah, here's the deal, whether you live in Tulsa, whether you live in Oklahoma.
Speaker 2:City whether you live in Medicine Park, if you're promoting a race also, you're not doing it to get rid, we're all doing it because we love the sport, right, we're all doing it because we love the sport, right. Um, you know, tom and debbie being the you know promoters of of tour de dirt, they're not. They're doing it because they love the sport. You know cory white for so many years he put his heart and soul into tour de, tour de dirt. You know it's and no, I mean everybody you know, everybody here.
Speaker 2:We all have the same goal.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:We're just trying to do a little differently and I think that after it all, the dust settled, you know there's guys that are like, well, this is pretty cool, I'm going to be able to do a series without having to commit to doing 10 all over the state, and not even just in the state, right To Wichita Falls Falls, to Independence, kansas, so you can just focus on your small series or you can do both.
Speaker 2:Still, there's probably going to be fall off on people doing both. People did both because they were forced to. So we're hoping that we pick up some more people that didn't want to do the whole thing and I and I would imagine there's going to be a lot of people that toward it or sees that. You know, if you look at, if you look at the number plates, for example, of toward it, there's we were averaging 110 racers at our race, but I bet you they probably sold 300 number plates through last year and that goes to say there's a lot of people that just did ones and twos. Yeah, they didn't do them all, and now they might be a little bit more apt to do them all. So let's tour dirt.
Speaker 3:That's a commitment in your region, right, so you can commit to a green country that's one day. Travel Just like Tour de Dirt most of it's on that side of the state. It's achievable to hit all those and not be expensed with traveling.
Speaker 1:I think it's definitely helped rearrange the racing schedule and racing scene for the better for both sides of the state, but for the state as a whole.
Speaker 2:And again, though, the diehards can still do both Exactly, and they will, and they will.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, I think there's people that would race seven days a week.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it would be badass to be the first person to win both series. Yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:And do every race of the year.
Speaker 2:Right, whatever category it is, it'd be like I was the champion in both series, I mean.
Speaker 1:And then if you could throw on a little double dip in the state championship, yeah, that'd be awesome man.
Speaker 3:It's got me motivated Like I haven't had a motivated race to race in a long time, and I've been training and eating right just so, like man, I can race in my area and now the juice is worth the squeeze.
Speaker 2:I love that Cool. Well, you mentioned the state championship. I really want to hit that on that again. I really hope that that I had actually talked to somebody that lives in the in the Oklahoma city area and there were some disgruntlement over and that's why I brought it up earlier over me promoting the first you know one day state championship. I truthfully threw my name in the hat because it was like if I don't do it, it's not going to happen.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And I had reached out to Tour de D'Or. I actually recommended that they you know Tour de D'Or has been around for so many years. Hey guys, I think it should be on y'all's series this first year. I even recommended you know Medicine Park, but it became apparent to me that nothing was going to happen. So I even recommended you know medicine park, but it became apparent to me that nothing was going to happen. So it was like you know what? This needs to happen. So we're doing it year one next year, for 2026. I hope that a a tour de dirt promoter steps up and maybe it's T-Bird, maybe it's the first race of the season next year, you know, but it's going to travel. I hope that I'm starting something that's going to continue on and travel around the state and got and you know guys and gals are going to be excited to do that one day state championship and then you get to rock your Jersey.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I love it.
Speaker 3:That's so cool. And it will mean so much. Yeah, for sure Jersey and you go to any.
Speaker 2:We don't have the funding right now to buy a jersey, but what I am doing is I may try to see if I can't make a jersey happen, but what I planned on doing was doing a state championship belt buckle not like a custom one, and that is going to be part of the Twisted Oak race in October. That's going to be part of the Twisted Oak race. Like two in one. So it's going to be two in one, okay race in October.
Speaker 2:That's going to be part of the Twitch Go race, so it's going to be two and one. Okay, technically it's almost like there's three and one at that race, because you've got the Omnium, you've got the state championship and it's part of the GCXC. I love it, bring it. I love it All worth points too.
Speaker 1:That's even better. Gentlemen, I appreciate your time and I'm excited to see what happens.