Marji Gesick 2024

Marji Gesick 2024

 

 

    Last year I was able to sign up for the 50 mile Marji Gesick with a special code from Todd because he just likes me I guess.  I signed up in October and was excited but then Todd moved me into the 100 mile version and I was nervous.  This distance plagued my mind throughout the year.  Wondering if I should downgrade to the 50 miler or give it a go.  Marji took over my mind and I would find myself randomly typing Marji in search bars.  I got a better mountain bike with more travel.

To train I tried to fit in as many mountain bike races as I could.  Life is better now with Annmarie, but you can’t just go ride for hours on end when you have a toddler at home.  It takes more coordination, but thankfully I have a beautiful and understanding wife who tries to help.  My family is also supportive.  I completed the Mohican 100k mountain bike race in May without much issue and had a blast.  I went ahead and downgraded to the 50 mile Marji before the transfer deadline, because I just wasn’t sure.  The Mohican Trippple, another bike event that included the Mohican MTB trail, put on by my friend Chris Holmes, was also completed as a stage race.  Mohican Trippple information is here, everyone should do it at least once. The Trippple

The best training I had was coming with my friends to Marquette in August.  We rode most of the 100-mile route throughout the week.  I learned a lot of skills and how to send it correctly.  What risks to take and what to just hike.  I am lucky to have so many good mountain bikers as friends. After this mountain bike camp, I asked Todd if I could go back in the 100 because I felt better about it.  My motto was If I can complete most of the 100 miler, that’s better than the 50-mile version.  Life gets busy and you never know if you will have a chance to complete these in future.  Todd said we can make it happen, and at packet pickup he moved me into the extra painful 100-mile race.  My goal was to make it into the hall of pain which meant finishing by 25 hours.

 

 

Now onto the race.  We made a vacation out of it which I like to do when possible.  Everything was great with the bike, and I did a test ride the day before.  I made some last-minute adjustments to my main pivot bolt and chain catcher the week before because I thought it was too far away from my chain.  Roseann was my support and I love her very much.  My Mom watched Annmarie at the Airbnb.  Race morning started great at 430am.  I loaded my bike up and then all the gear we needed.  At 520am I was walking down the stairs from the apartment and missed a step.  My right ankle rolled bad, and I was now limping.   Here is the aftermath of the stairs post race.

 

A couple tears started, and I knew I just really screwed up my day.  I thought of Chris Marquardt and how he injured his knee and kept going and finished. Anyways we got to Forestville and made the best of the start.

My 100 miler Bro's at the start!

    I stayed with Josh Smith and Chris Holmes at the beginning.  Marji starts with a run which is great for a rolled ankle.  My run was more of a jog or hobble.  I completed it without issues, and I thought it funny of people that brought their Garmin, and one guy lost his on the run and had to find It!  I got on my bike and the next part was super easy.  We rolled on double-track for a while and then hit top of the world at mile 6~.  I did not send top of the world and walked it.  

 This hurt my poor ankle and I felt bad being the slowest and most cautious walker.  We were on the north trails of the Marquette trail system.  Most of the trails were not too bad until we got to Wild Cat and Pine Knob.  Pine Knob is a double black diamond which meant a lot of hiking for me.  Every step with my right foot hurt bad balancing on these rocks.  I did start crying because of the pain.  It was a bad situation and only mile 22.  I remember the race name plate saying if you start crying uncontrollably to text #quitter.  I wasn’t done yet.

     I kept pushing through the trails and made it to Roseann at America Mall area around 5 hours and averaged ~6mph.  I planned for around 4 hours but this ankle!  Roseann gave me a small coke and a bag of Doritos.  I put both down and we swapped my infinit bottles.  So far, I had 2 bottles of Infinit, some honey stingers and a cliff bar.  Roseann gave me 2 ibuprofen which was so smart. I was feeling good other than the ankle and told Roseann I wanted a jimmy johns sandwich at the next stop.  I was stopped for around 15 minutes.

The next section was my favorite because it was the south trails.  I was flying and had personal records on this section.  The ibuprofen kicked in.  There was some hiking on Flow (#doesnt flow) and Scary/Gurly but there wasn’t as much pain.  I was able to ride up the road to Mt. Marquette overlook.  I was proud because a lot of people were walking this section.  I felt strong and made it through this section in around 5 mph which is slow on paper!  I made it to Roseann in 3 hours 46 minutes at Mt. Marquette resort.

     She had my sandwich ready and more coke.  I drank some coke and ate half the jimmy johns sub.  I was 9 hours into the race now.  We switched out the Infinit bottles and refilled my bladder.  Roseann gave me more ibuprofen and I pushed on.  I was at this stop around 20 minutes.  At this point my last-minute bike adjustment to the chain guard was causing issues.  I had loud noises in my two easiest gears and didn’t exactly know what it was at that point.  I just dealt with it and avoided using my two easiest gears.  The next section was the last of the south trails, double-track, and then the iron ore heritage trail.  I don’t remember anything interesting happening on this section, just kept moving and stuck with a couple that I was riding with most of the day.  It was 16 miles to Jackson Park, and I averaged 7.6mph.

     I called Roseann when I got there and retrieved my drop bag.  I got a report on how friends were doing in the race and ate the rest of the jimmy john’s sandwich.  I spent about 25 minutes here at the stop and prepared for night.  I was still feeling pretty good and drank more coke.  The coke tasted great but overall was probably a mistake.  The next section was super technical and slow.  It was a lot of hiking and some biking. I adjusted my chain guide that was touching the chain and was able to fix my two easiest gear noises.  My pivot bolt seemed to be a little loose even though it was at 15nm like specifications said.  The darkness came quickly, and my lights worked well.  I was trying to eat food, but my body started rejecting it.  All I could do was eat honey stinger chews but actually started dry heaving a couple times, but nothing came up.

     

It took me about 6.25 hours to make it to Jackson Park section 2 at 1:55am, this was 18.5 hours into the race.  I averaged about 3.5mph.  The cutoff was at 2am to make it to this stop.  Roseann was like a Nascar pit driver and got me out of there in 3 minutes.  I figured I may as well keep going since I made the cutoff.  At this point I wasn’t feeling the best, but my legs were okay.  I felt out of it but kept walking and riding some of the technical descents.  I was dry heaving more and now starting to feel dizzy. 

I intersected Suicide Bowl Road at mile 94 and I was 4.5 miles and 1 hour 37 minutes from the last stop.  I called Roseann at 3:52am to come because I was not sure what to do, I had about 14 miles to go, and I believe I was the last rider out there from the 100 at that point other than Kiko.  A nice couple came by in their truck while I was waiting for Roseann and they started feeding me some noodles.  I already ate half a sandwich Roseann gave me on this road.  I sat in the chair and just took some time to try and feel better.  I felt like I was improving but was still not sure I wanted to be out there by myself if I got injured.  I didn’t know at the time, but I was here on this road for about 40 minutes.  Anyways I had a little bit of a banana and that set my body into a tailspin.  I started full on puking all the noodles and water out.  It was two good pukes.  I believe I ate too much at that point, plus all the Coca-Cola throughout the day.  I made the call to quit.  It was about 4:29am and I had 4 hours minutes to make it to the finish.  When I rode this section in the daylight and self-navigated with friends it took around 4 hours to the finish from where I was at.  I figured I would have been slower in the night with my condition and my risk of crashing was high with no one behind me.

Overall I am happy with how far I made it and yes I would have liked to finish.  It's easy to look back and say I should have kept going, but in the moment I made the call.  Who knows #unfinished business? I don't know LOL.  I am thankful for all the supporters out there.  I made sure to take as many free snacks as I could.  I am super grateful that the love of my life was there to support me.  She kept me going and gave me a boost every time I saw her.  Thanks 906 Adventure team for giving us these challenges that push us to our limits.

 My Tokens and Plate.  I had 2 out of 4 tokens.  The Mannequins in the woods scared the crap out of me.  There was a sound machine with a bear and cougar noises too I heard from others.

Strava Ride