The Trans-Sylvania Mountain Bike Epic

There are a bunch of folks who did this thing who think they are important enough that you really want to read about their week at TSE.  Whether or not you think they are important, I think you’ll find most of these pretty good reads.  If you don’t like reading most of them have pretty pictures.

And, these are the blogs we’re going to be using for the bloggers’ competition too.  I’ll post them all individually on Facebook and then you just “Like” the one you like the most and we’ll come up with something for the person with the most liked blog.

My kid just opened a box of cereal with a squirting Shrek inside.  That’s probably the top prize.

In no particular order except for the order of the tabs on my firefox browser…

Doug Jenne – High Gear Cyclery.  Don’t know if you’ll like it best, but may be the most organized.

Selene Yeager – Team CF & Bicycling Magazine’s Fit Chick – Overall Women’s Champ

Karen Potter – MTBRaceNews.com – one of two on the MTBRaceNews.com site, but much more detailed post here

Evan Plews – Speaking MTBRaceNews.com, EP blogged for ‘em (note, can’t link back to older posts, hopefully that will be up soon)

Junkshow!! – This is Mountain Bike/Bicycling’s Mike Cushionberry who suffered early then came roaring back late

Team DICKY/Rich Dillon – he’s so damn influential you’ve all probably already read it.  Go again as there’s more and he needs votes.

Tim Darwick posts some words amongst all the vids over at CyclingDirt and is suffering from withdrawal

Peter from Misfit yaps a lot so you may have to scroll back or use the index on the left

Mike Wissel from B2C2 documented the crap out of his week.  Check the index on the right for other days.

Rebecca Rusch from Specialized and ID brought all those rainbow stripes out for the week, a couple posts here so look around

Greg Martin who took the SS GC and his Club Ride Apparel made the trip from ID too

Joe Castle chimed in from the Twin Six blog, but must still be out there on course since the blog ends on stage 6!

Mike Festa, the “roadie P.O.S.” from Philly Cyclismo

Tanya and her Canadian Veganese.  Mentions something about metric stuff and I got lost after that.

Rachel Mirvish who went home with the Smiles award, her blog is aptly named.

More Misfits from Canada by way of MTBR, Marc and Kim did the duo deed all week.

No, not done yet!  Team CF – with Christian, Selene, Nikki and Kristin in the race put their stories up too!

And that’s all that we’re either sent to me or I just wasted hours hunting down on the interweb.  Wilderness Trail Bikes did it a little differently -

http://www.facebook.com/wildernesstrailbikes

Enjoy.  And, don’t waste your valuable weekend riding time reading these…wait til you’re at work on Monday!

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We made it.  It was yummy.  Not as yummy perhaps as mom’s chocolate chocolate chip walnut zucchini bread but real freakin’ close.   Actually, maybe it was better, but don’t tell mom.

It wasn’t a big field, but man it was really good racing and it sure was fun.  I’ve never had as much fun promoting an event and I don’t think racers have ever had as much fun doing one of mine.  From the bunk house lodging to the camp meals to the varied courses to the tight racing to the beverage carrying singlespeed champ to the Dicky Battle Royale to reading all the blogs since and especially the party after stage 7 and all the other stuff it was one sweet week.

We didn’t talk about it much at the race, but this thing has been a long time in the making.  I started thinking about it a long time ago (7+ years?) when I was still racing a lot and heard about stuff like Trans-Alps.  I knew PA should have a race like this.  I thought a lot about how to make it work and what I’d want in it and somewhere along the line tricked Ray into thinking this was a good idea.  Two years ago we had a commitment for a decent chunk of cash from a tourism agency and then the economy fell apart and away it all went.  We were probably within weeks if not days of announcing the event.

So we regrouped and we thought long and hard about it again.  Was it something we wanted to do?  Did we want to move forward without a sponsor?  Could we make this work?  Then we found the 7 Mountains Scout Camp and things began to fall into place.  We revamped the vision and came up with the centralized location and “hub and spoke” plan for stages.  We talked with the scouts and had some early discussions with DCNR and visitPA.com.  We announced the event at my Festival weekend at the end of last June.

Ray went out and rode really well at Trans-Rockies to get an idea of how they did things.  I went out to Breck to watch Mike at work and rode really shitty in the sweet Breck Epic and learned some more about what we wanted to do and how we were going to do it.  (It is very nice when going to do a stage race somewhere becomes a work related research.)

Somewhere along the way last summer Ray and I both took part time jobs due to the amount of work it was taking to make this thing into what we wanted.  Neither of our wives really thought this was the best idea they’d ever heard, but we all moved forward.

We hooked up with guys like Frank Maguire (IMBA) and  Mike Hermann (Purple Lizard maps) who helped figure out courses.  We got support from local mtbers like Matt Ferrari, Rich Staub, Vikki Barclay, Rich Oneil (Stan’s NoTubes) and Bill Alcorn (BikeFlights) – all Penn State riders who loaned time and floor space – and from the local tourism folks who put up media types for some camps.  Selene and Cush came out from PA publications Bicycling, Mountain Bike and Shannon from DirtRag.  We met Jason at XXCmag.com which is based in PA.  Sue from CyclingNews.com came up from VA.  Jay de Jesus wrote some stuff too.  We got great help from all these people who helped tell everyone else what we were up to.

Riders started to sign up.  We didn’t get as many as we thought we would being so close to so many lovers of mountain biking, but we made it work.  And, it worked really well.  Friends and family lined up to help out and we ended up with at least as many volunteers during the week as we had racers.  Parents made food and deserts for the week in addition to standing along the course somewhere most days.  The guys from Freeze Thaw Cycles were especially helpful hooking us up with lots of volunteers and being on site all week to take care of bikes into the wee hours of the morning.  Bill Leech and Chris Jones ran logistical operations perfectly.  Local boys Matt and Will fired up their motos and supported the race all week long for nothing more than loving the idea of the event.  Todd came up from Philly to run the medical crew and on some days had as many as nine (!) medical staff out on the race course with him.  The Zachs ran scoring flawlessly all week.  Abe and Jen took photos that told incredible stories at a glance and made the evening awards ceremonies something no one wanted to miss. The support from the community and our friends was incredible.  We learned a lot too and it’ll be even better next year.  All these people and many more deserve more thanks that I can possibly give them.

Finally, thank you to the 54 racers who chose to participate in this thing – most of whom, if they weren’t before, I now consider friends – and who trusted us to put on a good race.  I wish I had a picture of all you guys to put up here and to hang on my wall.

Here’s what Ray and I had to say on the final day of this thing:

Ray and Mike wrapping up TSE

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE MAY 12, 2010

STATE COLLEGE – The Trans-Sylvania Epic, the longest mountain bike stage race experience in the USA offering seven days in the mountain bike paradise that is the Alleghenies region of Pennsylvania, is attracting the most competitive field of endurance racers to yet assemble for an MTB stage race in North America.

Mountain bike luminaries such as Cannondale Factory Racing’s Jeremiah Bishop and WTB’s Mark Weir alongside PAValleys.com’s National 24 Hour Solo Series Champions Bradon Draugulis (’09) and Rob Lichtenwalner (’07/’08); perennial NUE series contenders Christian Tanguay and Harlan Price from Team CF as well as endurance race stalwart Evan Plews and top US Ruta finisher Alex Grant (Cannondale) are some of the stars who will be battling it out daily with a slate of regional stars and local legends for the right to wear the Pactimo TSE Leader’s Jersey.  The women’s entrants are just as powerful with multiple time World 24 Champ, Rebecca Rusch (Specialized), women’s 2009 Iron Cross Champion Selene Yeager and her Team CF mates Nikki Thiemann and Kristin Gavin, PAValleys.com’s Carolyn Popovich and Karen Potter (MTBRaceNews.com) amongst those ripping each other apart daily in pursuit of their own Pactimo leader’s jersey at the TSE.

TSE director Mike Kuhn noted, “The quality of the racers taking part in our first year is fantastic; there hasn’t been a field like this assembled for a mountain bike race in the region in a long time.”  He added, “It’s not just elite racers. We have people coming because they see Trans-Sylvania as a perfect mountain bike vacation or as an incredible challenge.  We can’t wait to show mountain bike enthusiasts and racers from across North America just how good the riding is in Pennsylvania as this event unfolds.”

“This is a great opportunity to meet and interact with some of the nation’s best racers,” added director Ray Adams. “If you love mountain biking you’ll have a whole week to ride incredible trails and compare notes with some of the finest riders around the bonfire each evening.  You’re not going to find this anywhere else.  It’s especially true this first year as we set the stage for what will become at least eastern North America’s don’t miss mountain bike experience.  Yes, seven days of great trail riding in a row is not easy, but it is absolutely possible for a lot of riders.  What’s more, the sense of accomplishment from riding seven back to back days is beyond words.  Everyone should – and can – experience that.”

When asked why he is choosing TSE over the multitude of of stage races out there; CFRs Bishop replied, “It’s about riding killer technical single track. Some places have good scenery and some good trails but nothing is like the raw rocks roots and deep forest of the east coast single track in PA. Riding in the state college area is world class and with solid promotion back round the race is sure to be well run and a lot of fun.” He continued, “TSE is going to be demanding, in fact its probably the longest stage race in North America; but that is going to make for an incredible experience. If the other trails are like what I have ridden, its going to rock!”

Specialized’s three time Women’s World 24 Hour Solo Champ Rebecca Rusch commented on TSE, “I love mountain bike stage races because the offer the opportunity to really see the riding an area has to offer.  For me 7 days in a row of hard racing is a perfect training block and sort of my own PA boot camp.  I have not ridden out East much and from what I hear, this place offers some of the best single track in the world.  The TSE jumped out at me because of the reputation of the race directors, the chance to ride out East and the time of year of the event.”  Her companion Greg Martin (Club Ride Apparel), owner of two 24 Hr Solo Singlespeed World Titles added, ” I’m really looking forward to spending a full week riding some of the beautiful trails that PA has to offer.  Having grown up in Virginia and now living out west, I really miss the technical trails that the east coast is famous for.  This is going to be a super fun race!”

WTB’s legendary Mark Weir offered up a slightly different motivation for attending, “Last time I was in PA I got schooled by a bunch of round face tough guys.  This race looks like a great way to find some redemption.”  Weir seems to have his eye on one competitor in particular adding, “Harlan you and your 29”s of wheel better look out. Had about enough of you buddy.”

Based out of the expansive Seven Mountain Scout Camp near State College, PA, the Trans-Sylvania Epic offers 7 days of spectacular trails in some of the most remote riding in Pennsylvania through the spectacular Allegheny mountains.  Through the course of the 7 days the participants will explore over 250 miles of mountain bike heaven and just scratch the surface of the trails and paths in this part of PA.  The event will challenge riders physically and mentally but reward them with an experience they’ll never forget.  Running May 30-June 5, 2010, more information about Trans-Sylvania at www.TransSylvaniaEpic.com.

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