Leg One: 48.4 miles
We roll south on Main Street, and that’s when I realize how many people are out there. Shit, it’s 6:00 am, and the streets are covered. Both sides. Not with support crew personnel, but with locals. Emporia. The entire town. The town was there. Moms, dads, little kids, cell phones, all taking videos (although a lot of them vertical video, but I digress) That’s when it hits me. It really hits me. This shit is huge. I am once again part of something big. Just a small cog in this machine of DK, staring down 206 miles.
Just outside of town, literally still freewheeling from the slight downhill from Emporia, we make a right hand turn and then it’s gravel. My first tasted of the flint roads. Up ahead I see fields and tree lines, and a bright sinewy line of riders contrasted against the green of those trees. Somewhere in the distance is a left hand bend, and then another right hander, so as I look out across that first field, as far as I can see there are riders in a single file line until they disappear with the next turn. I’m nowhere near the back, but that’s when I realize that there are a helluva lot of people in front of me.
Just outside of town, literally still freewheeling from the slight downhill from Emporia, we make a right hand turn and then it’s gravel. My first tasted of the flint roads. Up ahead I see fields and tree lines, and a bright sinewy line of riders contrasted against the green of those trees. Somewhere in the distance is a left hand bend, and then another right hander, so as I look out across that first field, as far as I can see there are riders in a single file line until they disappear with the next turn. I’m nowhere near the back, but that’s when I realize that there are a helluva lot of people in front of me.
Just outside of town, literally still freewheeling from the slight downhill from Emporia, we make a right hand turn and then it’s gravel. My first tasted of the flint roads. Up ahead I see fields and tree lines, and a bright sinewy line of riders contrasted against the green of those trees. Somewhere in the distance is a left hand bend, and then another right hander, so as I look out across that first field, as far as I can see there are riders in a single file line until they disappear with the next turn. I’m nowhere near the back, but that’s when I realize that there are a helluva lot of people in front of me.
We soon veer off the straight roads and 90 degree turns for a minimum maintenance B road. There are people standing at the fork, a family, and a few college-age kids, with one holding a green poster board sign. Good Luck DK riders, hope you had your morning (poop emoji). Damn that was funny. DK spirit, out on the roads.
That’s the moment the fast flat roads ended, and we began the 160 or so mile roller coaster, as the final miles closer to Emporia would also be flat. Up and down, out of the saddle her and there, minding the exposed bedrock going up, picking lines going down. Luckily I had begun my cycling career on a hardtail MTB with a rigid fork. Picking lines and floating over terrain was my speciality, and I instantly felt at home working my bike on the downhills. I wasn’t as fast as some that flew past me at 30 mph, but I didn’t have to stop and change a flat on the downhills either.
We cross over a highway overpass and then do a couple of switchbacks and end up on what seems like the top of the world. A nice flat plateau and all of a sudden the horizon seems like it’s a GoPro fisheye, curving away in all directions with the seeming natural curve of the earth, and for the first time, I realize the scale of the absolute nothingness of the ride. To quote Spaceballs: “We ain’t found shit!”
I saw a bottle get ejected while we were still bunched up together. That would be the first of many. At this point, there is a never-ending stream of riders ahead and behind. There is no need for navigation, as I could simply look up the road for a half a mile, and see people. If there was a turn, I could look across the land and see the road, that of course would be running perpendicular, and see people scattered all along it.
Also during this leg, I come upon a guy wearing an owl costume. Wait, what? Why would one… I mean, complete with horns/ears on his helmet… multiple layers of fabric flapping in the wind.
Welcome to Dirty Kanza.
Ok, systems check. I’m 30 miles in, the sun is up, it still isn’t hot, I’m rolling great, finally remembering to take on some food, (I was a little negligent in that for the first hour and a 45 minutes, so I made up for that) and I’m averaging over 15 at this point. I thought it was a little slow, but if I kept my plan of short stops going, I figured I’d be ok. Besides, I had no idea what I was going to feel like, or how hard I was going to have to dig to ride 200 miles. I had completed a 142 mile ride, and two centuries back to back in a weekend, one on the road and then one on gravel, but this was entirely new territory.
Just before the first checkpoint I see another USMES rider, a woman, and she has a single water bottle on her bike, and she used to have two water bottle cages mounted behind her saddle. Dirty Kanza is hard on equipment, and extremely hard on her. There is a mount, and the remains of two of two water bottle cages, one of which is missing a bolt, so the base plate is dangling upside down, swaying with each bump. I ask her if she’s good on fluids, as I still have a complete bottle of Skratch I could offer, but she says she’s good to get to the checkpoint, and that she had some bad luck with her others. Bad luck indeed.
Upon entering the town of Madison, we pass the rest stop for DK100 riders, so I assumed that the 200 rest stop must be near. Well, near is a relative term, as we left downtown Madison with an abrupt right hand bend, and were faced with the 6% wall of red bricks. It was only 0.3 miles, and I didn’t even have 50 miles in my legs, but it felt pretty defeating to think you’re about coast in to the stop, and then suddenly you’re faced with this out of the saddle climb. Not bad though, but I was looking to conserve every bit of energy I could, because it was going to be a long, long day.
We roll up closer to the checkpoint and I have no idea what to expect, much less the cyclocross style maze of flags and tape that I have to navigate to get there. I know Allison texted that she’s on the left side past a yellow flag, but no clue what that would look like. I make a series of slow cyclocross style turns following a fence, and there I was, crossing the timing mat, looking for Allison and holy shit is that someone dressed in a Yeti costume? Oh, there she is, on the left, cool, I see the car.
After a quick refit of food, fresh water and ice, new bottles of Skratch, and Allison cleaned and lubed my chain, I have my kit changed and I’m ready to roll out. Surprisingly fresh for having ridden nearly 50 miles.
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