I’m looking for an event next year, I’m a participant as opposed to a competitor (potential DFL). I’m in the Midwest, but may travel and make it a road trip. Tell me about ones you did
What Event?
What’s the course like (technical, singletrack vs double track, punchy)?
What’s the event vibe: Is it super hard core, will anyone be there when DFL comes in?
Cool stuff in the area?
I’m a Midwesterner and a few events come to mind: Epic Bike Fest (Cable/Hayward, WI which was formerly the Borah Epic), BT Epic (Berryman Trail in Missouri), Brown County Epic, Dakota 5-0 in SD, and Little Sugar in Bentonville. My boss has done Epic/Borah a number of times and loves it–good vibes, medium amount of climbing and chunk, but tuff. I know a few friends that have done Berryman/BT Epic and camped out, less of a finish line and DFL vibe but a good event. Brown County is more of a festival and less of a race but a good time but better if done with friends/group. My boyfriend did Dakota 5-0 with a group of single speeders he met at 24HOP and had a great time, can do this race fun or serious and still have a good time but is it’s challenging even to the trained rider due to the amount of sustained climbing. I have done Little Sugar myself and the vibes are awesome (it’s Bentonville, so what’s not to be stoked about?) However it is a tough course, the cutoff is 6mph so if you are averaging slower than that at the checkpoints, they will pull you. There isn’t really a DFL as it’s a guy riding sweep behind the slowest rider (when I did it the rider before him was still in the 7-8 mph range) I made it in within a TON of time and sat around to wait for friends and watch the finish and it was an anticlimactic ghost town with many moved on to award and Leadville chip/food/tired so either it is completely crowded early on or dead. Kinda the thing about long MTB events are most folks are smoked after the event so all we might have in us are a beer and a slice of pizza after the A-race and then it’s time to lay down LBVS.
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That’s awesome, I will check those out.
Depending on where in the Midwest, if you’re closer to the Northeast I like the Wilmington Whiteface 100K in Lake Placid, NY.
Gorgeous area to visit in the summer, great place to bring the family. The event is smaller but a fun course - almost a mini Leadville of the east with big climbs and descents mixed in with a couple real singletrack sections.
It is smaller though, so not sure I’d do it unless it was a manageable drive in a day for you or you really liked the idea of going to Lake Placid and the Adirondacks with the family.
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+1 on little sugar. Hard to beat bentonville for the cycling vibe, especially if you plan to be there for more than race day. Cycling options for the whole family.
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