Like The Play, Only No Singing

I tend to not sign up for a bunch of early season races, not a fan of mud racing and I kind of like my derailleur right where it is; making that chain sing over those cogs. So, in true me fashion, I did not sign up for the Oklahoma Gravel Growler that was held this past weekend but Doug did.


The weather around these parts has been less than stellar so I was kind of following along with the forecast "down south" and it just kept getting better and better; 50°, 60° and 70° Fri-Sun. So, selflessly, without any benefit to me what so ever, I offered to ride down with Doug and be his SAG hag. And that is how I found myself out of bed and on the road at the unholy hour of 4:30 am on Friday heading to Martell and then Shawnee Oklahoma.






But before we got all the way to Shawnee, we stopped at Prost in Wichita. Prost is Doug's friend's authentic German restaurant in a mall made entirely from old shipping containers. Food was amazing and the concept of the mall was pretty cool, we also stopped at the German grocery store next door to the restaurant that they also operate. Lots of foods I'd never heard of but I picked up some dried meat and chocolate... chocolate is a universal language that needs no translation.




Almost 8 hours of moving time later, for those Strava faithful, and we were checked into the hotel and pedaling our way to spOklahoma (maybe the coolest name ever for a bike shop) and the Expo.




Not much bigger than a postage stamp, you would want to make sure not to bring a long a bunch of friends if you were heading down but they did have a tub full of ice and hipster nectar out front; so there was that.





We had a little time between check in and the rider meeting so we met up with Rick and Debbie and took the shaggin wagon to try some Oklahoma BBQ. We picked a place based upon recommendations of one of the guys at spOklahoma, we Nebraskans were less than impressed with what they had to offer.




Rides meeting was cold, we spent most of the time huddling in the tent until the deal started. Lots of prizes were given away, since I didn't sign up I didn't win anything... I did try to sign up but they were full up and not budging on that. Rider meeting over we headed back to the hotel for some rest and relaxation before going to bed.




Up and the butt crack of dawn, we choked down some continental meh at the hotel and then headed downtown for some much needed coffee, good coffee. Just happened to run into Ashton, probably reading this blog, and chatted him up for a bit.


Coffee shop was super fast despite being one of the only places open at that hour. One line you can always count on to be excruciatingly long and slow however is the line for the bathroom right before a race. The Growler was no exception, thankfully the coffee hadn't quite done it's job yet.


Doug got his bike and gear ready and we headed for the start.



Before the bicycle race, the lined up and sent off the runners with a bag pipe send off. Fun fact, when it's cold out your bag pipes can freeze making for a somewhat awkward moment while everyone waits for you to thaw them out enough to play them. Good information to have right there, keep your bags warm kids.




Runners off doing their thing, it was time to line up the cyclists and send them off with a police escort for the neutral roll out.



After watching the riders leave I hot footed it out to the halfway point where the plan was to ride the course backwards and meet up with Doug somewhere on course. Not everyday your halfway point has it's own rooster.




There was also a super friendly doggo too but you had to let him come to you at his pace otherwise he was a bit shy, but once you made friends he didn't want to leave your side.





Gravel was in great shape, they had a little bit of rain a day or two prior to the race but with temps in the 50-70 degree range after that they roads dried up quite well. It wasn't too long before the leaders and chase groups started to pass me, given where I was and the time of day they were plugging along at around 20 mph I guesstimated.



A little bit after that I did find Doug, I turned around and we rode back to the halfway point.




By the time we rolled back into the halfway point it was really hopping with both people and bees, not sure where they all came from but there had to be hundreds of honey bees looking for anything sweet. I'm not sure why people get so freaked out about honey bees but they do, I was there for probably 45 minutes and didn't get a single sting or close call. Honey bees pretty much want nothing to do with you unless you look or smell like a flower.


Put the new 46cm Woodchippers on the Fargo, this was the first ride and I think I'm digging them over the 44cm bars that were on there. This was also the first navigational ride since switching over the the Wahoo Roam, still might need to do some tweaking with it to get it where I want it but the battery life as leaps and bounds better than the 820 I was using. After waiting for Rick to come in and helping him get back on his way I threw the bike on the car and headed back to the start/finish in Shawnee.




Plan was the same as the halfway point, I parked the car and started riding backwards on the course where I ran into more riders and also started seeing some of the runners coming in. I was amazed at how easily the Wahoo handled going backwards on the course. I don't have any experience with any Wahoo other than the Roam but it has a button to reverse the course as soon as you do to load it and it does it flawlessly... my old Garmin would freak out if I tried that, heck it didn't like it if I wandered 5 feet off course.




I knew Doug must have been slowing down when I passed the mileage I met him at riding into the halfway point. Then as I ticked over 12 miles in reverse I started to wonder if I had somehow missed him, just as I was getting really worried I crested my side of a fairly decent hill and there he was just on the other side of the top. He definitely looked a little pooped and seemed a bit down thinking he was going to miss his goal of getting in under 7 hours. With fresh legs I decided to try to coax him into a faster, yet manageable pace so I took off and hoped he would follow.


It worked like a charm, there was a little resistance at first but then he got a second wind and we were cruising. Even had time to stop at "The Lab", a sort of homage to the chaise lounge, and get a quick picture.




Once we hit the paved section and the town was in site things kicked up a little faster yet and I had high hopes of getting there before the 7 hour mark.


Doug beat that 7 hour mark, with the quicker pace for the last 13 miles he crossed the line at 6 hours and 44 minutes; room to spare even. Super proud of him for sticking with it, he was almost spent when I found him and those damn voices were creeping into his head, I could see it on his face. Would have been the easiest thing in the world to just accept that it wasn't going to happen and roll in at a casual pace but he managed to find that second wind and a little higher gear to get it done.


Nothing washed down goal crushing like a nice cold barley pop so that was our first stop after the finish. We grabbed a cold one and headed back to the finish to wait on Rick and see how he would fare.



We didn't end up needing to wait too long, Rick came rolling across at 7 hours and 25 minutes to finish his race.




After everyone was finished we moseyed over to Coney Island so Rick and Doug could get their free meal. We also ran into the Minster of Gravel himself and is bad ass Goodr hat, which they apparently don't sell on their website because you know I looked. I guess people will just have to trust me when I tell them I'm Goodr at bikes.



After showering we did manage to find decent BBQ at Bricktown Brewery and then ended the night with a malt from Braum's. While I didn't ride the 84 mile course I did manage to get just over 40 miles out on course and I neglected to eat all day so both the sandwich and the malt really hit the spot. If you're looking for an early season gravel event to help kick off your gravel race season, the Oklahoma Gravel Growler might just be where you need to look. I'm not sure if it was just a fluke or not but the weather was fantastic and the event was really well organized and put on. Maybe next year I won't drag my heels until the last minute and actually get signed up.