For the first time ever, three of the World Famous Singletracks.com Bloggers will be teaming up for a mountain bike race! This coming Saturday, October 22, mtbgreg1, trek7k, and myself will be entering the Baker’s Dozenmountain bike race at theLick Fork Recreation Area near Edgefield, SC.
This area will be jam packed with racers and pit set ups on race day.
The Event
The Baker’s Dozen is a 13 hour race with the emphasis on fun instead of competition. It’s a race targeted at the average mountain biker, not the guy who has a coach and power meter and gets excited at the idea of doing hill repeats. It’s laid back, relaxed, and a good excuse to spend an entire day outside surrounded by bikes,old friends, new friends, food, and fun times. The entry fee is nice and low – only $55 for IMBA/SORBA members and $65 for non-members. All proceeds are used for mountain bike advocacy and trail repair and construction in the Augusta, GA area. Dirty Spokes Racing will be handing timing duties, and SORBA-CSRA has a bunch of stuff to give away plus there will be a drawing every hour to give away some prizes. At the end of the daycustom engraved pint glasseswill be awarded to the top 3 riders/teams in each class.
Mile markers make it easy to meter your effort and keep an eye on your pace.
The Course
The Horn Creek trail is a bit of a hidden gem. We have a lot of great trails here, mostof which are closerand offer a lot more miles, soHorn Creek doesn’t get a ton of traffic which is a shame because it is a lot of fun! Some sections are out in the open through areas that have been logged in recent years. Other sections flow through thick forest on picture-perfect bench-cut singletrack. There’s a lot of roots, some bridges, a few rocks here and there, and some hills. The race course starts with a mile of paved and gravel roads through the campground which gets you to the six mile singletrack loop, and another mile of roads brings you back to the finish. The singletrack goes right past the start/finish area, giving teams a heads up that their rider will be finishing a lap in a few more minutes.
The Horn Creek trail is a pretty fast trail, even though some sections are a little rough.
Formal Invitation…and some smack talk
Come hang! Race solo to see what you’re made of or get a team together and spend the day hanging with your buddies. If you get a 3-person team together you can even go head to head with Team Singletacks! You won’t beat us, but you can try. 😉 Pre-registration is still available, but closes at midnight on Wednesday October 19th. Day-of registration is also available, if the race doesn’t sell out, andprices go up$10. Camping is available for only $7on a first-come-first-served basis. But, if all the tent pads get filledup you can still set your tent anywhere inside the park. Mtbgreg1 and I will be camping Friday night, so drop by and say hello if you do camp.
The open sections of the trail have great sight lines and really let you rip.
Internal Competition
Team Singletracks is going racing just to have fun…but we’re also racing against ourselves. We’re going to see who can have the fastest average lap time over the course of the day and here’s your chance to get in on it. In the comments section tell us who you think is going to throw down the fastest average lap times. If you get it right, we’ll send you some sweet Singletracks stickers.
Hope to meet some of y’all at the race! Be sure and stop by our pit and say hello – just look for the tent with the Singletracks banner.
Get all the important details on the race HERE.
This is going to be a LOT of fun! The current forecast is calling for sunny skies and a high of only 67 degrees – a perfect day to ride!
I wish I was there ….Sounds like it’s gonna be a tonne of fun..
Good luck.
This is going to be an awesome time! Guys, we’ve got to get ourselves some pint glasses!
trek7k is probably going to destroy us on the average lap time… that guy is fast!
Oh, and I second dgaddis’s invitation: if you’re around, be sure to come by, say hi, and hang out!
@mtbgreg1 – trek7k already doomed himself by volunteering to go first – the first lap of races like this kinda sucks, you inevitably end up stuck behind a long line of riders. mwhahahaha!
You only get stuck at the back of the pack if you get a slow start. If it’s a LeMans style start I’m money: long legs = fast running. 🙂
I won’t mention his name (cough, dgaddis cough) has been doing some practice laps the last few weekends.
I’m signed up in the solo class. This will be my first endurance race and I’m anxious to see if I’m cutout for it. See you guys there.
Sorry I wont get to see this one in person, someone take some photos please-
You guys have a great time!
Flamingotter – good luck man! As long as you have fun, then you’re cut out for it. I tried to convince mtbgreg and trek7k for all of us to sign up solo, but they wouldn’t hear it 😀 Also, are you in the army, and you use to live in the area, then left for a little while? used to ride a black and green Cannondale 29er?
dgaddis, gotta suport the locals. :thumbsup:
good luck to you guys. Hoping to convince the g/f to come watch with me this weekend.
Good luck guys, and have fun! I gotta root for Greg though, as he sent me some swag last summer for commenting on his site.
I like the LeMans reference. I going with Trek7k. Good luck guys. Sounds like a great race.
For those who don’t know the three of us, let me handicap the field for you:
Greg (aka mtbgreg1) – Lives in north Georgia and rides in the mountains all the time. The IMBA Epic Bull Mountain trail system, with 1000+ foot climbs, is his go-to ride.
Dustin (aka dgaddis) – Lick Fork, the location for the race, is his home turf and he even did a 5-lap pre-ride of the course just a couple weeks ago. If anyone has insider knowledge for this race, it’s Dustin. Dustin also has more races under his belt than anyone else (by far).
Jeff (aka trek7k, me) – The most experienced rider (read: oldest).
So you be the judge – who will turn in the fastest average lap time?
Hmm that’s a good break down… all told, I think we’ve got an impressive team put together!
Also, you might want to mention that this is my first MTB race EVER! I’m just hoping I don’t accidentally go out too fast and blow all my energy in the first couple of laps.
I’m going to go with mtbgreg1. He has the fastest looking avatar out of the three.
Internet logic don’t fail me now!
Good luck and have fun to all three…wait, FOUR including flamingotter!
that was a great race! it was nice meeting all of the riders from singletracks.com. hopefully lowcountry biking can race against you guys again soon!