echow

Hello All

Just wanted to share my photo blog and video fom this year's FC 508:

https://yurides.wordpress.com/furnace-creek-508-2012/

I was part of a 4x tandem realy team-it was a lot of FUN!

Nancy

JetWave

Cool, great report!

big john

One of my friends was on a 4x mixed team and she said it was a blast. Several BF members have done it solo including some this year.

echow

Thanks!

echow

being a part of a relay team is the way to go, you get to do all aspects of the race; ride and crew. FANTASTIC! Solo riders are awesome!

bitingduck

BF member Shprung did it solo fixed gear this year and made it look almost pleasant. We saw him around stage 6 (I was crewing for the 2x women fixed gear team) and he seemed to be having a pretty good time. He certainly didn't look like he'd just ridden about 400 miles on a fixed gear, and he came in strong at the finish when we saw him roll in.

big john

He came to the club ride Saturday wearing a 508 "Fixed Gear" kit. He does everything on the fixed gear now, including Paris-Brest-Paris.

bitingduck

Yeah, he's nuts (but in a good way). He looked really great out on the road.

leaping_gnome

Hi Gray Goose! Great Eagle here, well half of Great Eagle anyway. I remember visiting with you at the Cal City stop. Your blog is fantastic, a really great account! It was a good weekend for us also and I know I will be back next year as a solo.

Great to meet you.

Jim "Great Eagle" Harris

echow

Hey Great Eagle, Thanks! Congrats to you guys for finishing! It does get addictive, you get it in your head that you would want to do it again! Maybe solo tandem....

Garfield Cat

echow, maybe you could explain what kind of conditioning it takes to attempt a solo tandem, or solo anything for such a ride. Also, the support team, what is it that you bring in that van(s). For instance, my headlight at its highest output brightness would only last 2.5 hours at best.

echow

You get a partner and make him/her ride, ride, ride and ride some more, plus climb, climb and climb! For solo, you make yourself do all the riding and climbing. The van should have whatever support gear you need and lots of drinks and foods that your stomach can handle. Always have extra batterys/packs and a back up lights. The next thing to decide is if you want to race for time or race to finish. Big difference right there! Be prepared for anything & everything. And somewhere along the line, remember to have some fun.

JustMe

Good answer.

bitingduck

As far as lights, you only need them on max on the descents. If you're climbing in the dark the van will be close enough behind that medium or low is enough. That said, we had a lot of spare batteries all charged up in our van, plus chargers for two different light systems going all the time.
Crewing is harder than doing a 2x team ride, but any kind of solo ride is *way* worse than crewing. I had a 6 or 7 page (not all pages totally full) checklist of stuff to bring in the van. It was separated by category of item and how it was stowed. One thing you probably wouldn't expect is that we had pee pads. Crew (or non-riding rider) has to go at night? If the van stops, the rider has to stop, so we had pee pads to take care of that...

JustMe

That's pretty elaborate. We just suggested people not drink the warm Gatorade when disposing of the Gatorade containers at TSs.

bitingduck

The pee pads don't require the ability to aim, which was useful since we were supporting a 2x women team.