I worked up to this event since November and this was the longest event I’ve done. I did a more local 150 mile race in March but it was on the east coast with essentially no climbing. I’m still a relative new comer to cycling with only starting to ride in 2024; I have done a handful of road and gravel races now for context.
This event was about a 10/10 for me on difficulty. I dropped my chain (1x SRAM aero running the Red XPLR group) after the first muddy section around mile 15. I am not exaggerating when I say this happened, at least, 20 more times through the rest of the race. I’ve never dropped a chain prior to this event. The constant stopping to fix and then restarting was both physical and mentally draining to me. I was close to pulling the plug at the first aid station because the chain would not stay on the chain ring and, when it did, it was constantly jumping between cogs on the cassette no matter what I tried. It started to get better at the second aid station because I jokingly asked one of the guys if they had a power washer to hose me off and they said “yea, right over there”. I ran over and had the guy blast my chain and derailleur and then applied a free sample bottle of drip on wax I got in the goodie bag from a previous race.
The W Road section I believe it was really hurt my mental state as well. I couldn’t believe how bad that was and told my wife later that it was like trying to ride through a swamp. I saw the photos above of the person that said they found lots of old barbed wire and nails which I’m thankful I didn’t find or it probably would have finished me off (I did not flat once all day running 2.2 race kings thankfully at 24/25psi).
The other section oddly enough that “helped” was when I was carrying my bike through the tunnel while wading through the rising water. I stepped in a hole under the water and almost went under. I caught my balance and staring at a guy I met in the airport on the flight out to Kansas and we had a good laugh; funny how finding humor in suffering will lift your spirits.
My biggest advice to anyone attempting this in the future: BRING MORE NUTRITION THAN YOU THINK - ALOT MORE. I planned on 90-110g/hour and packed exactly that thinking I would cruise along and knock this out in 10 hours best and 12 hours worst. I was solely mistaken and the neutral aid (maybe it was the pro stop) 10 miles before the last aid station at mile 166 single handedly saved my race. I was OUT of gels and water at that point and they just happened to be in the right place for me at exactly the right time. Don’t rely on luck; bring more than you think you’ll ever need. It will be worth a few extra oz/g of weight.
My one gripe: the rent a crew option did not have great info out there. The rent a crew guys were absolutely wonderful to me at every stop even cleaning my glasses and head unit. However, I had to fly in and fly out on a tight schedule due to real world stuff. The gripe that I have is that I didn’t know where to meet them or where to pick up my stuff. I stayed in Lawrence (about 75 miles away) and, thankfully, I brought all of my stuff down along with a case of water bottles I picked up at the gas station when I checked in on Friday. After riding my TR scheduled opener, they told me that I needed to drop ALL of my gear right then. Thankfully I had it all in the rental car so I just filled bottles in the parking lot and dropped it off; no problem. The gripe is that the schedule online says to pick up your stuff at 7PM on Saturday. The guy I was talking with in the “bike wash” line after finishing just laughed and said “not a chance” and that they would be back on Sunday. My flight was Sunday morning so I wound up unexpectedly"donating" about 500 bucks worth USWE packs, bottles, etc. If it went to a good cause then fine, but I would’ve like to have known this was going to happen ahead of time.
It was a great experience otherwise and I’ll never forget the scenery (when it wasn’t pissing rain) at the tops of those hills.
Definitely check that chain carefully for tight links before using it again, or just toss it. I had early/constant issues with a skipping chain as well, but no drops. Super annoying, I should have swapped the chain at the first aid station but still had hopes of staying with the group at that point. I did swap on a new chain at the 160 mile stop and it was life changing (at least mentally). This is the second race I’ve done where I’ve damaged a chain and had bad skipping. I’ve heard that transmission holds up in the mud a bit better than xplr, but have no idea if that’s true. I also had a stretch where my RD was totally mucked up and stopped shifting completely and my head unit said my RD battery was “critical”. I think it was just gummed up with mud and it started working again after a while and I never had another issue.
Congrats on a great race, those are some crazy numbers you are pushing.
That is interesting, maybe the bigger front chain rings drop chains more? I run a 40 front and around mile 26 is where I stopped to wash out my derailleur and chain with my water bottle I brought expressly for that purpose. I was also spraying it down liberally on that section while riding.
Also, for the 100 around mile 12 is when we got hit by the thunder storm and the MMR ruts were full of water and not mud, that helped clean out the derailleur for me.
Yes the 100 2023 was much worse. The 5 mile hike a bike in the heat really wore me out and the 2nd hike a bike was just as bad. The ride-able mud was not “peanut butter sticky and full of gravel”.
This year, we had a lot of rain/wet roads that washed off your drive train after the first mud section. Experience from 2023 led me to make better choices to not ride in the peanut butter mud and stay to the standard line in ride-able mud even if I had to spin like 90w due to the slow people in front of me.
Of course my equipment is much better now; I rode 2023 on 38s (max spec for that bike) with 2x standard 1-1 and my shifting was trashed.
I read this ^^ but when I was asking about crew for hire I got this (it’s in reverse chronological order). I think she is saying the Jeep club will pick anybody up, not just people who have crew for hire as she says the only thing crew for hire is providing is drop bag service. But I did end up going with crew for hire just in case…and after seeing how tough some of the “regular” gravel roads were out there.
Joe
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Treva Anno** (Life Time)
May 11, 2026, 1:08 PM CDT
Hello,
We will have the jeep club out there and they can pick up riders who need to abandon the event.
Treva Anno
Athlete Services Manager | Athletic Events
Life Time
lifetime.life
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Joseph Frost
May 11, 2026, 1:03 PM CDT
Ah only bag drop ok. So where are you at for pickups in case a rider can’t continue?
Hello
Thank you for reaching out! We recently sent out an email announcing that we will provide food and support at each checkpoint, so the only thing the crew for hire service would be providing is drop bag service. If you still wish to hire the crew for hire, you can go back into your profile to purchase. Here is your booking. Thanks
Yes it was confusing. I just payed the $50 even though I ended up not dropping a bag.
The support station was well stocked with everything you could want.
Interesting. They definitely make it sound like a crew for hire only thing as they list the KC Jeep Club under the crew for hire. And crew for hire gives you the number to call for pickup. Not sure how you’d get the pickup without the number.
But that email definitely implies they will pick up anybody.
Obviously there is a range of support at different events but I think they could do a lot more “you are responsible for you” messaging. The best supported race I’ve ever been to is the Breck Epic. Multiple layers of medical response teams including helicopters and full back country evac plans as well as clear course marking and fully stocked aid stations. If they can do it there, they can do it here. But I’m not saying they should, it’s just that it’s a high profile event and you kinda expect world class support. I’m not opposed to “you are on your own, don’t even bother calling us” events, it is a communication problem. Participants have an expectation and the event is not doing that so you’re gonna get some people that are like “wtf guys, this isn’t what I signed up for!”
For me personally I underestimated the remoteness of the course, the difficulty of getting help in an emergency, and the weather. I got lucky with a relatively clean run but (if there is a) next time I’ll be a little more careful.
It really feels like they’re trying to thread the needle of being a self supported event with the glitz and glamor of the Lifetime brand.
I have different expectations signing up for Unbound than I would for Ozark Doom and the price reflects the difference in support. Lifetime wants to be Ironman with the brand and cache without actually providing the age groupers with the same support they’re laying out for the GP athletes. It’s a turn off for me for sure.
I keep reading online about how much everyone is spending on new parts after the race. Beyond a little surface rust on my chain, I think I did ok. Did anyone else have issues that require expensive parts?
My bike handled the 2023 edition pretty well. I replaced the chain - not surprisingly. Also - the plastic jockey wheels in my derailleur were totally worn out - easily the worst worn part of my bike.
The thing that caused my front-ring shifting issues in the race (which I identified only after the race at home cleaning the bIke) was dirt that had worked its way into the pivots of the front mech. So it was super stiff, and required a lot of lever force to shift. I cleaned those pivots with WD40, and it’s been fine ever since.
But no major repairs. If this years edition had more “liquid mud” instead of “peanut butter mud” - maybe that cause more problems as it penetrated bearings, etc, more easily?
Unbound has been on my radar since the DK days and people riding 33mm cross tires.
I took a deep dive into what it would take to go by myself without support and actually make a race of it. I have since found, anything over 5 hours just isn’t a fun day for me, I would rather bury myself in an XCO or CX race. I have also just stopped going to events that are going to ruin equipment. They can have my reg money…
Props to you folks that gutted out a long and challenging day.
The old days of Almanzo were fun, “here are your cue cards, there isn’t any official support out there, see you when you get back.” That eventually got too big for what could be supported. Much of your unbound entry fee is just to cover the logistics of shutting down an entire town for a weekend+.
I can understand and appreciate the folks upset with how brutal the mud can be, but at this point there is no way it is an unknown. And if you didn’t know it was possible, you have to own your own lack of understanding what that day has in store for you. The weather in that part of the country is a total wild card, it could have been 100F with a steady wind at 30mph gusting to 50. That weather won’t inherently wreck a bike, it will absolutely destroy you in a way that is hard to believe.
If you want to experience a lifetime event that is part of the GP, I highly recommend Chequamegon. They have nailed the balance between an amazing amateur event and the pro event.
Understandable. I go through phases where I get motivated to do longer stuff but then get tired of that and just like doing stuff under 5 hours
It definitely happens and sure some people really wreck their gear especially if they try to ride when their frame and rear derailleur are clogged up with the peanut butter mud. That’s when they really damage their frames or rip off their derailler.
I never had major damage. Just some worn jockey wheels and needing things throughly. Obviously tires are a hole thing as well.
I think you’re underestimate a lot of people’s habit of just “winging it”. They’ve ridden whatever gravel they have in their area. They’ve heard of Unbound is known to be epic. And show up little understanding or preparation. I don’t think. you really understand that peanut butter mud until you experience it. The heat definitely is something that should be mentioned more. It’s not just that it’s hot, it’s the absolute lack of shade. You get no brake from the sun for hours. And given it’s in early June a lot of places haven’t hit a heat wave so people are not acclimated to the heat at all. I know in 2023 the heat was really taking a toll on me and then I could see the dark clouds coming in so I traded heat for a torrential downpour.
it’s a long day. it can be fun but also awful at the same time.
I think you hit an important point there that Lifetime wants to be the Ironman of off-road cycling, but with Lifetime being being Lifetime, they can’t pull it off for a couple of reasons:
(1) Ironman developed their experience from the ground up over time while Lifetime bought a race and just pumped money into it. Ironman set the expectation for triathlon experiences while Lifetime is attempting to scale things up to that level on the fly. Ironman is smart to put their events in population centres or tourist destinations. Gravel and MTB generally is the opposite of that so they’re already behind the eight ball trying to make a destination event.
(2) Triathletes have an expectation of on-course support that Ironman has given for a good chunk of its existence. You might be paying $700+ for a 140.6 race, but you take in a ton of on-course nutrition they supply, or even have your own bags waiting for you at specific stops with volunteers at the ready to give them to you, and the swag is really nice–even if private equity has made them dial all of that back a bit recently. Lifetime could do something similar for Unbound, but getting enough volunteers to Emporia would be a challenge unto itself and Unbound isn’t that kind of race.
(3) Lifetime picked the wrong race to turn into an Ironman-style event because the ethos of Dirty Kanza/Unbound was the “Welp, you’re on your own. Best of luck!” Trying to keep that ethos while attempting to cater to the experience crowd doesn’t easily mesh as you say. Ironman has a Executive program that runs $7-15k for a hand-catered experience–and those sell out at the biggest events. As much as Lifetime would want to dip into that crowd, none of their gravel events overlap with that crowd for better or worse.
Honestly Lifetime would be better off standing up its own Midwest adventure race and spinning it into the “Adventure of a Lifetime™” where it could give casuals the kind of experience they expect–and charge appropriately, but it’s easier to just buy a race and dump money into it to give it prestige to the average gravel enthusiast. The issue will be whether they keep the wild core of Unbound alive, or quietly toss it aside for the sake of people entering the lottery to do a bucket list item.
Mad respect to anyone that is willing to even consider taking on the challenge of unbound, double mad respect for anyone willing to go spend 20 hours fighting their way along the course.
I don’t want it to look like I am coming here to seagull on Unbound.
Lifetime is in a bind with this event. They want it as their flagship event, and people expect a lot from such an ordeal. But these big offroad adventure type races have always had a sense of, here is the start, there is the finish. good luck and have fun.
Reddit is full of people who clearly winged it more than they should have. It is a very different demographic than you see here.
At this point, I don’t think unbound offers any surprises to anyone with any knowledge of the event.
It can be really hot, it can storm like you have never seen, it will destroy tires, it can be crazy windy.
It will be a long day, and you may experience all of those surprises. Spend 30 minutes on youtube and you can be pretty well acquainted with what to plan for. Nobody here needs to hear that, at least I hope not.
RE peanut butter mud, that is, to be cliche, a character building experience. I’ve had the pleasure in MTB and cyclocross and each time it just kind of breaks you mentally. Even when you know it is going to happen.
To some extent that’s the appeal to if races like unbound. It’s the mental challenge. Whether it’s peanut butter mud or heat or mechanicals or fatigue or any number of things, being such a long day you’ll likely end up in a bad headspace at various times and other times it’ll be amazing.
For me, 200 miles on gravel in ideal conditions is a lot.
We have a series out here in Colorado that is kind of what some are describing. It’s very lowkey and very hard. Big, offroad adventure type events with minimal support (if any) and a great challenge. I personally haven’t done one, but have always been intrigued. No glamour of UnBound.
As for Unbound. I haven’t done one, but I see the appeal. I’m not a ‘bucket list’ type of person, just someone who wants to do fun/challenging races. As for the conditions/mud; I think they revel in it. It’s not suppose to be easy. Kristi Mohn loves it from what I gather listening to the latest Bonk Babes pod. They know it’ll sell out year after year regardless. I’m sure I’m stating the obvious here!
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