I know many are going to think this is a stupid question (or a fair question being asked by a stupid person) but I’m curious if anyone has done a 70.3 on a mountain bike. I know I can do it, and I know the Ironman 70.3 Austin rules don’t rule out mountain bikes like some races. I’m just curious how stupid I can go… I’m aiming for full retard. I’ve got a 55lb downhill bike, 9.5" rear suspension, 10" triple clamp fork, 3.5" tires… it’s just stupid. If I can get that approved and into T1, I have another challenge. I need to wear a P4 frame on my back. I’ve seen certain racers in full distance IM events wearing what I would consider “costumes”, didn’t know if I could pass a broken P4 frame as a fun costume. If they’d let me get that far with it, I’d love to knock out the run with the frame as well.
Ugh, that’d suck just a little but I suppose I might as well carry it through the whole race. I can’t see them approving it in the swim for safety reasons, though. The IM 70.3 Austin T1 allows participants to setup their transition area so I don’t think it’d be an issue if it didn’t fit in the bag. They only require everything fit in the bag when you leave transition.
I should note, this is 100% serious. If I can’t make this happen at the Austin 70.3, I need to make it work at another 70.3, preferably a more difficult one. The P4 may have had 500 miles on it before it failed during the Austin 70.3 and it doesn’t seem like Cervelo is willing to warranty it. I let them know I’d put another 1000 miles on it to get my money’s worth, wearing it on my back. I don’t want to bash their brand, though, so I’ll have it professionally repainted. Same font and lettering but their name will be removed and replaced with “DNF”. Should look pretty sharp.
That bike got me my only DNF, less than 2 weeks ago at the Austin 70.3. I was just cruising, 52 miles into the race when my derailleur hangar snapped. No impact, I wasn’t changing gears, I wasn’t at the top of the cassette where it could get sucked into the spokes, and I wasn’t out of the saddle hammering. It just snapped off with a loud pop. Total lack of bent spokes, which is generally what you see after someone’s derailleur is broken off by the spokes, as opposed to breaking off on its own. This bike has less than 500 miles on it. Cervelo and the terrible shop I bought it from continue to point the finger at me, basically saying that a bike I put less than 500 miles on over the course of 2 years must have been abused in some way. If they told me they’d give me a decked out P5 if I admitted to crashing or beating up the bike, this tightwad would turn it down without any hesitation.
So! I’m going to forego the crash replacement offer and put some more miles on it… in public settings. Their response has been ridiculous to say the least, so I figured the only appropriate response would be something just a tad more ridiculous. My main goal is to finish that stupid race with the bike I invested a lot of money in, even if I have to carry it across the finish line. I might even carry it for the last 4 miles of every race I do going forward, starting with the Rocky Raccoon 100. Trying to make lemonade over here…
You were 52 miles in when it snapped, why did you DNF, you could have walked it in. If you feel you can pull off the beast mountain bike under time, you would have been in a good position to just finish. I had issues with my bike at mile 25 and I was seriously contemplating ways to still finish the race.
I passed a lady on a mountain bike going out when I was on my way back in at 70.3 Racine. It was around mile 45 or so for me so around 11 for her. I probably wouldn’t normally have noticed but I remember thinking to myself…“I hope she gets in before the cutoff.”
I thought about it, but at the time I didn’t think to cut off the derailleur and chain. The chain was so tangled up in the rear wheel, it wouldn’t spin. I kept thinking I’d have to carry it. Looking back, I definitely wasn’t thinking clearly as my main focus was the failure, wondering how the heck it could happen on such a low mileage frame. If I could go back to that moment in the race, I would’ve cut off the derailleur, cut the chain down to a shorter length so it was maybe on the small ring up front and around the middle of the cassette in the rear and limped it back. With what seems to be a random failure that close to the dropout, I’d be a little iffy about that. Walking back in carbon fiber shoes would’ve sucked and probably would’ve destroyed the shoes. My feet were already full of broken off burrs (and a piece of glass) from T1 so I figured my feet would’ve been trashed as well. Took a week to get everything out. I don’t have time for injury at this point since injury has kept me from training for the RR100 at the end of January. Need to keep the feet in good shape, which was another consideration at the time.
If you can get a volunteer to hand it to you outside of transition, it’s not outside assistance. You’d need a pretty good reason for the race director to allow this.
Honestly, I see some safety issues with wearing a carbon fiber frame on you back while riding a MTB. Being goofy and wearing costumes is one thing, but if you crash, it could injure you and someone else worse than no frame on you back. If I was a race director, unless this was for a specific charity and the stunt related to the charity (raising awareness for sharing the roads, donating bicycles to Africa…something). No way I would allow it.
I passed a lady on a mountain bike going out when I was on my way back in at 70.3 Racine. It was around mile 45 or so for me so around 11 for her. I probably wouldn’t normally have noticed but I remember thinking to myself…“I hope she gets in before the cutoff.”
Ouch! Must have been a rough day. I’m generally a pretty strong cyclist… when I’m in shape. I was supposed to do the 70.3 Austin with my 19 year old sister. Since I’d only done full distance IM races in the past, I had no idea the swim would start in waves. She started 10 minutes ahead of me. We had a plan - my wife would hang out at the swim exit and tell the second person out of the water how far behind they were. Since I was a much faster swimmer, I figured I’d be out first or, if I spotted her in the water, at the same time. One little catch, I was sick. Didn’t really hit me until about two minutes into the swim. By 10 minutes, I was dry heaving, ready to throw in the towel. Couldn’t accept that, though, so I finished the worst swim I’ve ever done, 16 minutes behind my sister (as told by my wife). I hurried through transition, carrying my bike through the burr filled T1 area, and hurried to catch up with my sister. At the start of my bike, I was about 7 minutes behind. She’s a slow cyclist (she’s about 5’1" and this is her first race of any kind) so I figured if I cranked for 20-30 minutes, I’d find her. At some point I missed her, probably stopped at the first aid station while I sped through, trying to catch her. We did agree before the race that we’d push it a bit on the bike so I just assumed she was flying. As it turns out, I was about 45 minutes ahead of her when my bike crapped out. Total bummer.
Still not a great performance by any means. Going into it sick and far from being in good shape wasn’t ideal but I still would’ve finished it under 7:00. As rough as the roads were, full suspension may not be so bad. I’m thinking 4ish hours is doable.
Motoguy128, I agree 100%. I know it could be a safety concern and if I was the race director, not knowing the riding ability of the clown wearing a broken P4 on his back, I wouldn’t consider it for a second. I’m going to get in touch with the race director, hopefully soon, to see if he/she can get me in touch with the course mechanic that was driving along side me when the hanger failed. His windows were open and the cab was maybe a bike length ahead of me when it happened. He quickly hit the brakes as I skid to a stop next to him and asked me if my derailleur hanger broke. He said he heard the pop and was familiar with the sound. At the very least, I can get a statement from him saying that I was definitely upright when it happened.
I understand Cervelo’s argument. Carbon has higher tensile strength than steel, it would’ve required an impact to break as no amount of torque I could apply through the pedals would break the hanger. That being the case, how would it have survived 52 miles with some long stretches of VERY rough road if an impact broke it. That impact would’ve happened before the race. Carbon is brittle, once it’s cracked, it’s toast. I could feel the pop in the handle bars, so it didn’t just fall off and it certainly didn’t get pulled into the spokes.
I digress. I’m not here to argue the claim anymore, I just want to find a way to get that thing across the finish line. I don’t expect the race director will allow it, and I’m not going to do it against their decision as I don’t want to get banned from M-Dot events. Just hoping someone could say if it’s plausible. Sounds like I’ll just have to train with it and maybe knock out some smaller events here and there.
That’s impressive! I don’t expect to finish in the low 3’s… he set the bar pretty high. Oh, and just realized in the last post that I’d be using the word “hangar” instead of “hanger”… I grew up in aviation, it automatically comes out that way. My apologies.
djastroman - only the last 4 miles. I’ll start bugging the folks I know to see if I can get it signed off as a hydration device. I mean, it does have that handy water bottle.
I’ve only just started training and I’m definitely not a runner. Before this past Saturday, I had about 3.75 miles logged since the start of August. Between the 2013 and 2014 IMTX, I may have logged about 30 miles. I’d say I’ve got about 30-40 pounds to lose before Rocky. Will I finish it? Without a doubt! Doing the full 100 mile race with a P4 on my back? Money would need to be involved for that to happen… a lot. I’ve done a little research on Bandera. No chance I’d attempt that one.
You wanna go full retard? Check out this dude who did Ironman Nice, a race with some serious climbs, on a vélo-bleu (an 18kg, 3 speed, bike share bike)
djastroman - Nothing to do with the elevation profile…
SpaceKitty - that’s pretty amazing, and I love he did it for a cause. I’m sure I can figure something out. My bike should attract some attention, I’d hate it if all the focus was on me being a d*ck and not something a little more productive. Speaking of being productive, there’s absolutely nothing productive about the amount of pedal bob all that travel allows.
Did RR100 in '13. No way in hell I’d want to be carrying at bike at mile 96. I didn’t even want to be carrying my water bottle anymore. This year at AT100 my neck and back hurt so bad at miles 90+ from carrying water bottles that I wanted to throw them into the woods.
