Wilderness 101 Pre-ride

Today, me and a few other members of our MBR team pre-rode the first 15, then last 25 miles of the Wilderness 101. It was an early start - getting up at 5:00 and driving to first highway intersection of the course to meet at 6:30. My dad and I drove to our team-mate Bill Gardner's house to pick him up along the way. At the pull-off beside the highway we met the other team-mate planning on racing the W101, Stu Hess. After a short climb up and over the ridge, we rode the Sand Mountain road to where the course meets it at the end of Stillhouse Hollow road. From there it was a short climb up to the Sand Mountain parking lot, where we started along the Sand Mountain trail, a loose ATV trail that was very steep in sections, reaching 18-20% in most climbs. After that trail, we rode on a road for a while, then finding the trails got difficult. We were riding in an area that sees very little bicycle use until the time of the 101, and following the obscure trails presented a challenge. We finally made our way to another road, and it was a long, chilly downhill to an old railroad bed, where we crossed a narrow bridge over a river and then rode through a long, dark tunnel. It was still a gradual downhill when we got to the other side. After the railroad bed, we continued on one of the bigger climbs of the W101 - Old Mingle. After riding down the other side of the mountain, the infamous "Fisherman's Path" lied ahead of us. This trail is extremely technical, with rocky and rooty drop-offs then hairpin turns on the edge of a cliff. When Chris Eatough raced the W101 a few years ago, his only goal was to ride this section of trail without putting a foot down or walking. He rode it successfully, and although the trail is at about mile 90, it is a trail that few people can ride even fresh into a ride. With the help of a few trees, I was barely able to make it; I almost fell into the river once or twice. From there it was a long railroad bed back to Coburn, where the finish is. Then we went on to ride the first climb. The climb was definetly fooling us. It was 5 miles where it kept looking like we were at the top, then went around a turn and kept climbing. The descent was rewarding, reaching speeds of close to 40mph at times. After that, it was a long, half paved and half not road back to the highway. Overall it was a pretty good day; we had a ride time of about 3 and a half hours, and got back to the car around 10:15, which was just before it started to get hot.