Into the Darkness: Town Run Night Race Report

First, mountain biking at night is a fantastic experience. If you ever have an opportunity to try it out, I whole heartedly encourage you to do so.

With that intro, I participated in what will hopefully be an inaugural night race at Town Run Trail Park on the north side if Indianapolis. To put it simply, it was a blast. Not only was the race held at night, but the course was run backwards, which turned the typically familiar confines of Town Run into a whole new course.

Planet Adventure put on the event and did a great job marking the course and organizing. The only problem was that whether the race was even going off was up in the air two weeks before the race. Not many people had signed up and there was a concerted effort on the HMBA forum to get people to register. Luckily, by the Monday before the race 21 people had signed up and by the Friday of the event the number had increased to 30. I think there were roughly 40 the night of.

The nice thing about the Planet Adventure races is that they include a single speed category for mountain bike races. A SS category was floated for the DINO series a few years ago but I don’t think there was enough interest. Presented with this option, I decided to see how the Monocog 29er would fair in a race situation.  

The single speed race began at 8:50 on August 31. My lighting was a Magicshine 900 on the handlebar and a Nite Rider 300 on my helmet.  I bought both these lights well over a year ago and had not used them on any trail except the Monon since then. Happily, they both worked perfectly.

 

Lining up with the other single speeders. I figured it would be rude
to turn my lightson and blind the race director before we began.

There were only a total of six single speed riders and we all got started five minutes after the Cat 3 men’s wave went off. Originally, single speed was to do one lap but at the line it was decided we’d do two. The race started in a short track area behind the Town Run main parking and first went on about 400 feet of gravel road followed by a sharp right and then a sharp left onto single track.

               Single speed start along with the lone Cat 1/2 woman.

Heading into the single track I was in second, with first place well off the front. Two other riders were right on my tail as we went through the usually last section of the trail which is tight and twisty. They stayed on me until Talking Tree when I let them get around and jumped on their tails. The technical section near the interstate was a bit interesting, although it actually seemed easier going than the normal clockwise. At this point we ran into a few of the Cat 3 riders, which slowed me down and allowed the now second place rider to get a gap. However, I managed to stay with 3^rd place, who I found out was the same rider I had ridden with at the DINO Southwestway race the week before.

Heading into the southern park of the course, or “The Field” was very cool, as you could see other riders in the distance working their way through the course. Kind of a surreal experience. About halfway through the field section the 3^rd place rider lost traction in a sandy turn and I got around him and opened a gap. The final section was uneventful, as I caught several more Cat 3 riders. I started my second lap alone and was riding that way up until Talking Tree when I was caught by a Cat 1/2  woman. She had started at the same time as the single speeders, but she was well ahead of me last I saw. Her reappearance was surprising, and I knew there was no way she was lapping me since she was only doing two laps as well. She stayed ahead of me throughout the last lap, and although I did get fairly close to her a few times in the field, on the return leg she got away. I ended up coming in 3^rd place with a time of one hour twelve minutes. Full results are here. I found out after finishing that the Cat 1/2 woman who passed me had crashed going off of one of several small hills just after the start line, which slowed her down enough for me to get past.

The top two singles speeders had three and two minutes gaps over me in the end. Not exactly, close, but I was still happy to place. The Monocog, while definitely not designed as a race bike, performed admirably and was great fun to ride. I could see using it in future races, although not during a DINO race unless faced the primary bike was down. However, I do plan on riding the single speed more during the winter. Seems like it makes me work harder and its lack of gearing makes the damn icing of the derailleurs a non issue.

One nice thing about the race was that Planet Adventure does podium presentations. It was cool to be on the podium, even with a six person field. Hopefully the DINO series will implement a podiumat some point.

Speaking of the field, here is the majority of single speed field, sans one rider.  The winner is on the far left, standing to my right.

Overall it was a great race and a very fun evening. Hopefully this will be a annual event. There was some post race chatter about a series of night race sat TR and other trails in the area. I think a limited series with perhaps 3 to 4 races would work perfectly, especially if they were timed in the slight lull between the end of the DINO series and cyclocross season. I need to try to do more night riding, although outside of state parks, I am not sure where else this could be done. It was a very unique experience and everyone whop participated seemed top have a good time and was very fired up. Definitely one of the more entertaining evenings I have spent on a bike in quite some time.