Tour of Tucker County

20110603

Tour of Tucker County

Kirk Morrison and Dan Schar headed for the hills...

...the hills of West Ver-ginny-ya, that is, to do sum climin' there!

ALSO see a related post from Dan Schar's "On the Schardar" under Biker Blogz.

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Kirk Writes:

I enjoyed the chance to compete in this race for the 2nd year in a row. The weather was perfect with temperatures in the low 70’s and partly cloudy skies. Attendance was up with a total of 233 racers. As usual JR, Gina and their crew ran a smooth event with excellent organization.

This race is billed as being one of the 10 toughest one day races in the USA. This is due in part to the final climb which covers about 2,000 ft of vertical in the last 4-5 miles of the race. There is one other major climb (about 7 miles long) as well as lots of potholes and gravel sections (the total vertical climb is almost 4,500 ft over the 33 mile course).

Of course, at the top of every hill, every where, is either a cemetary or a windmill!

There were a number of crashes with some serious road rash and even stitches being administered at the finish area. As a new twist, there were also reports of horses on a section of the course.

Dan Schar and I were in the same starting group where he was competing in the Masters 40+ field while I was in the Masters 50+ field. This race starts with a 4 mile neutral roll as we descend to the bottom of the finishing hill climb for the official staging and starts. As with last year, I saw over 6 riders flatting due to hot-rim issues on this neutral descent (!?).

After seeing the numerous crashes during the race I decided to take it easy on the descents since I had taken a spill earlier this week and was still carrying 7 stitches in my lip and a bit of road rash.