Mongolia Bike Challenge

Finding a Way to the Finish

Cory Wallace (Kona/The North Face) / 13.08.2012

The final day of the MBC followed suit with the rest of the race as the superb adventure carried on.  

Having been dealt a huge curve ball by the flooding rivers all over the country the MBC organizers had been hard at work in figuring out a way of keeping the race alive and still getting us to the final stage finish line in Karakorum in time before we had to fly home.  We were stuck behind the eight ball on this one with no easy way out.  Willy and his crew continued to step up to the plate and came up with  the best solution available, although it certainly wasn't easy on any of us.

Arising at 5 am we were a pile of bushy-eyed bike racers as we hopped in the Russian vans to transfer 5 hours to a start position which would allow us to race 90 km and finish the MBC in Karakorum.  The rough dirt “highway” made us feel like we were driving in vans with triangle wheels.  Potholes, mud holes, ditches, herds of animals, rocks and animal turds kept the 1950 style vans deeking around like Wayne Gretzky back in his hay day.  We felt like a bunch of pinballs getting bounced around inside the vans.

 It was one of the most challenging parts of the whole race as we all tried to keep our breakfasts in our stomachs and not worry too much about the race yet to come.  Three hours into the voyage a Mongolian in our van made like a human volcano as he launched an acidic mix of stomach juices/food out the door.  My breakfast was coming back into my mouth when I heard this but I fought hard and managed to keep it back where it belonged as that was my much needed race fuel for the day.

 Arriving at the start line on time for the scheduled 12:30 pm start gave us all a lot to be proud of.  As we hopped on our bikes a sense of freedom overwhelmed us as we now each had control of our destiny again.  The day started off surprisingly fast as the Mongolians took charge.  It was a rude awakening to our Russian van seized legs as we fought off mental, physical and emotional tiredness. 

This would fade away as we hit the first climbs of the day and soon found ourselves at 8000 feet on top of an alpine plateau.  It was a wicked ride, matching any highly praised alpine ride back in Canada.  None of us know how the MBC staff managed to find the great courses for the last two stages but they were some of the best riding days any of us had all year. 

 Hitting the top of the plateau we had a nice lead group of 6, Pau (Team Buff), a Mongol, Carter Hovey (Orbea) and us 3 Kona riders.  We were all faking it as exhaustion was setting in to everyone but that didn't stop the pace from being high as Wick's and myself drove the pace up the climbs and Sneddon and Carter ripped the descents.  This deadly combo made for another fast and hard day on the bikes.