The Shadow of the Wall

“I am always doing that which I cannot do in order that may learn how to do it.”  – Pablo Picasso

I only had a handful of miles to go to see my van.  But now that I was stopped at this Baja Pit under this pop up canopy, I realized I was seriously overheated and dehydrated.  The workers at the pit were awesome to me.  They gave me water and a banana and a wet washcloth.  I wiped my face and neck down and it felt like first aid.  I took five minutes – maybe ten.  I thanked my new friends, and headed out on course.  A blistering hot, rocky, white-with-sun course.

If I didn’t know I’d see my crew soon, I’d have stayed there longer.  Another fifteen minutes and I see a flagman and cones ahead – the physical checkpoint.  Thank God.  I rolled in slow between the cones and came to a complete stop.  They wrote down my race number. “Get it right boys – 714x is here, at mile 784!”.

Just as I started again I saw a half dozen faces I knew.  My crew!  They pointed to where I should pull over.  I dismounted, happy to see them.  They hadn’t seen me in 13 hours, and didn’t really know if I was dead or alive.  They looked relieved. 

They were baking in the heat too.  I got my pack off, then my wind proof jacket.  Then my pullover.  Evaporative cooling – sweet relief.  My face was red, and I was down a few quarts.  Since I saw them last I nearly got hypothermia, and now I was wiped out from the heat.

It’s hard to describe how great it was to see them.  Tanner looked very concerned about me.  John rubbed my traps and arms.  I got some cold Chia drink and food in me.  Chad and Omar changed the rear wheel and checked the oil.  There wasn’t much for the mechanics to do, as I had not crashed the bike since I saw them last.

I told them about what happened as I rehabilitated.  I started to feel better as my body cooled some.  We put a Tanner’s water bladder in my pack and filled it – lots of ice too.  I changed helmets, goggles, jersey and gloves, put my pack on, and mounted my trusty motorcycle.  Trevor changed my helmet camera batteries and memory card. I felt good….compared to how I felt 20 minutes ago that is.  I had a job to do and so long as I was able, I was going to do it.  Only 339 miles to go.  It was a little past noon, and I had been in the race for 35 hours.

I know what’s coming. During pre-running it was the hardest most technical section of the course.  I told Tanner about it 10 times since pre-running when he sat in the truck with a swollen ankle and foot.

I asked Tanner what the math was for me finishing in time. He said “Don’t worry about it. You only have to go 43 miles” (to the next van stop). I knew this meant they damn well figured the math and it was becoming nearly impossible to finish in time.

I told Tanner this section was 43 miles of hell. “Don’t be surprised if it takes me three hours to get there.” He said “Just give me ten miles, four reps”.  Ok, I thought. That’s what I’ll do. Ten miles. I can go ten miles.

He was right.  When we have a huge task ahead of us that seems insurmountable, just break it down into small doable steps, and do first things first.  That’s all you can do.

I took off out of there with authority. The bike sounded great. I had been up for 39-1/2 hours and only had caffeine once. The caffeine put me on a roller coaster I did not like.  It was long gone out of me and I didn’t want anymore.  Amazingly I didn’t feel sleepy. What I was beginning to feel was exhaustion.

I was controlling the bike well, but the pain was in my face now. Arms, shoulders, traps, back, knees and my butt.  They all performed spectacularly so far. But they were all sending me a message – “Hello. Umm, when is this going to end?”

I was beaten down by a long war, and the 43 mile dragon was in front of me – in 100 degree heat no less.

Now was the time.  When the needle is on empty, transcend the definition.  Perhaps it is hard to understand, but I had worked so hard and so long to come within the shadow of the wall, and now I would be able to see what I could do…

The Flight of Icarus

“Live like life depends on it. Because it does.”

Sand whoops gave way to a wide gravel road that rolled up and down in long intervals. I crossed three rivers that were filled in for the race. A race truck passed me going 20 miles an hour faster than I was – and I was doing 65. He must have had trouble earlier to be this far back.

Finally, I pulled into the Baja Pit for gas just outside Scorpion Bay. The whole town must have been there watching the race. The pit staff offered me an 8-ounce bottle of water and a half a peanut butter sandwich. I would normally decline. Not this time. I needed it.

It was near 100 degrees. A guy held an umbrella over me as I choked down the little sandwich. I was cooking in my race jacket, pullover, and jersey. To get it all off would take some time and effort, and my pack was not big enough to get my jacket in. There was no place else to carry it and I didn’t want to ditch it as I had another night to face later. My time limit would be up at 1:00a.m.

I sped away. Amazingly, I felt pretty good. I was thirsty, and tired and hungry and fatigued – but there was no one factor or body part that was screaming much louder than any other. It was good.

I hit the paved road for six miles along the Pacific Ocean. I looked to my right and watched the blue waves turn to white foam. The hills were brown, with a black ribbon of asphalt undulating ahead of me. The sky was blue and clear, and the sun bore down on it all. 

Thoughts of a worn man. We are blessed. To have all this. To be here at all. We’re just temporary dots on a big spinning planet. We’ve been given all this ability – to shape our world. To create. To experience. To love. And yes, we have been given this. We are not responsible for us being created. Hell, we don’t even know how we work. So…then…something else made us and set the table.

I headed back into the desert. It was way siltier than when we pre-ran it. The course got rockier as I knew it would. Rocks and silt. Rocks and silt. I was riding fast. I felt good. I felt lucky.

I was headed to mile 784 to the physical checkpoint. That’s where I’d meet my van and see my friends. I hadn’t seen them for over 12 hours now. The course went up a mountain and switch-backed; straight up on the right, straight down on the left. It was very hot.

The next Baja pit was 12 miles before the checkpoint. I pulled in. I was feeling it…something. I had to get off my bike and sit down. 

I knew I was in trouble…

Possibilities

“People living deeply have no fear of death.” – Anais Nin

I had a lot of time to make up. I had 646 miles and 28 hours of race time behind me, and 477 miles and 20 hours ahead of me. Finishing was possible, I thought, if I didn’t take any breaks and had no more problems. That’s what I was going to do. No more calculating. Just ride – fast.

I hit 94 mph on an open dirt road section – but it didn’t last long enough to make up anything significant. I was near the Pacific Ocean now. I couldn’t see it, but I could smell it. I was getting near the pit 16 miles away from where I ran out of gas. There was no way I was going to miss it. I got nervous early and pulled over to ask a spectator. “Where’s the Baja Pit?” He motioned ahead. I found it.

The sand was deep and some gentle whoops began. I reached for my water tube hanging over my left shoulder to take a drink. It wasn’t there. That’s right – I used it to siphon gas. No water for me. I was riding good, and I felt good, and that’s all that mattered right now.

Later I’d learned that Jeff Benrud and others had lots of problems in the night. When the fog came in, it made it hard to see through their goggles. When a truck went by, all the dust stuck to their lenses. Wiping it off with your gloves just makes abrasions on the lenses that catch the light and make it hard to see at all. Jeff threw his goggles off and rode without eye protection for three hours. He had dirt packed around his eyes at the end of the race. I missed all the fog. 

The mile-to-effort ratio is low at night. It was daytime now, and I was flying like the wind. Maybe I was lucky. In fact, I was sure I was. Here I was, 53 years old, 31 hours into the longest non-stop race in the world. This far in, you start to think different. You are beyond normal function. You have dug deep, over and over again. You’re in a surreal state.

What human beings can do is not based on their date of manufacture. That’s how we teach kids. You’re ten years old now, and you, and all the other ten years old’s will learn this, and have to pass this test to get a good grade and have your parents proud of your progress based on the same yardstick all the other ten-year-olds are on. This continues through life – we act our age. We are supposed to.

I’m not going to act like a 53-year-old. I don’t want to. So if my behavior is not that of a 53-year-old, then what is age anyway? Is it a limitation? Too young for this or that? Too old for this or that? Your body has an age, yes. But what you can do with it is up to your mind. Are there limitations? Of course. But they are far beyond the fence we have accepted.

I recently heard of a man in his nineties who swam every day for decades. At age 95, he improved his lap times. He was still trying to get better – and he did.

I got to the salt flats and was happy about it. They were fast and required little energy. The course alternated to sand dunes and back to salt flats. I went off course and wound up in a tiny fishing village. I saw a young man and held my arm up, palm up. He motioned to the way. Just the other side of the berm – back on track. 

The air was getting a lot warmer now. I was sweating. I had three layers on since I left my van at 11:30 last night in 40-degree air. Now it was about 85 degrees and rising. I hadn’t eaten in 9 hours and I had no water. 

As I raced toward Scorpion Bay I thought, this was going to be a problem…

Liberation

“To reach the port of heaven, we must sail sometimes with the wind, and sometimes against it – but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes

Are mistakes failure? Only if you give up after making one. 

Mistakes can help us. They create humility. They are a primary source of wisdom. You learn from mistakes and are smarter after making them. Mistakes improve mental flexibility because when you realize you have made one, you have to change your mind.

In between race traffic that was getting spaced farther apart now, the desert was peaceful. I thought about what could have happened to Arturo, and why he turned back. I paced slowly around the low brush in the sand. There were thousands of footprints in the area from my pacing all night. I thought about how most stops where there was a Baja Pit near my van, it was Baja Pit first, then the van. The one I missed was the opposite. I usually just took off from the van and gas was already taken care of.

I was a racer, standing still, alone, isolated and ignored by passing vehicles. The eastern sky turned orangey. The light was welcomed and changed my attitude yet again, as it had yesterday, 446 miles back at San Felipe. I was 120 miles off my plan now, and more sleep deprived than I had hoped at this location. I had been awake for 32 hours now.

An ATV came by at 6a.m. Not the racing type of ATV, but a big Artic Cat, even though he was in the race. He slowed as he went past and turned around and came back. He approached me and the first thing he said was “Hey, you’re Larry Janesky!” “Yeah,” I said, shocked – partly that he knew me, and partly that after standing there for seven hours someone actually stopped.

“I saw your movie!  Your movie is the reason I’m here. My wife let me come because of it!” “Cool!” I said. “Can you help me? I’m out of gas.” “Yeah I think so.”

Mercy.

Just then, another similar ATV came by and stopped. It was his friend. They were Canadian, from Manitoba. Their machines had much more gas than was necessary to get from pit to pit – and they weren’t in it to win it, they were just in it to finish. 

I pulled the suction tube from my hydration pack off and we used an empty water bottle to siphon gas out of one of their gas tanks. I didn’t need much. He asked if he could take a picture with me to show his wife. I took a picture of them too. Thank God for the friendly Canadians! 

They headed out. I got on the satellite phone and called Andrew. “Andrew! I got gas! I’m heading out!”  “But Arturo is on his way again,” he said. I thought about it. If Arturo got to where I was and didn’t see me, he’d keep going, looking for me. He’d never find me since I would be moving faster than he was ahead of him – and it was another 150 miles to the van again. He didn’t have a satellite phone. 

“Are you kidding me?” I thought to myself. I waited six and a half hours for gas, now I got it, and I can’t go? Arturo was a great guy. He was caring, thoughtful, concerned, and a great rider. He was taking care of me. I couldn’t just leave. If I waited for him, he’d see me and turn back. It was 39 miles if he turned back, and 150 if he went straight.

The sun was up. The warmth was more than welcomed. I waited. Twenty minutes later a light approached. Here he was at last. “Mr. Janesky, I am so sorry. I tried my best…” I told Arturo to call me Larry a bunch of times, but that’s the kind of guy he was. He apologized profusely. I told him not to worry, it was my fault.

 

His first attempt he had a five-gallon can between his legs with a tie down around his neck and the gas can handle. This attempt, he had a two-gallon water jug 2/3 full of gas, carrying it in the same manner. He had work boots and jeans on. I poured more gas into my tank, thanked him sincerely, and packed up quickly. I switched goggles with him as my lenses were full of micro scratches from the dust and condensation. The 714x fired up.

A week after I’d return, I’d be listening to a podcast and it would say “A two-million-dollar Ferrari is useless if it runs out of gas.” “Yeah,” I thought, shaking my head.

I sped away from Arturo. I clicked through the gears. It was light out and most of the dust making dragons were past me. I felt good. My body was working. I pushed miles behind me.

I was free.

Isolation

“The real glory is being knocked to your knees and then coming back.”

The next Baja pit was 16 miles ahead. Could I walk? In riding boots in the sand…it would take forever, and then I’d have to walk back.   

Could I walk back? It was about 14 miles to the river crossing where I could find locals. Too far. More trucks. Another bike slows and stops. “Are you ok?” Nothing he can do. I stopped flagging vehicles. I called Andrew again. Another truncated conversation. He said Arturo was coming out on Tanner’s bike. Before we could discuss details, the call was dropped.

If I could talk for five minutes I would have told him that I was only 16 miles from the next Baja pit – so I didn’t need too much gas. They could fill four or five water bottles with gas and put them in Tanner’s pack. Arturo could ride freely this way.

I stood there in the dark, thinking about how much time I would lose. I thought it would take an hour for them to get back to San Ignacio and unload Tanner’s bike. Then figure 15 minutes to get Arturo prepped. Then an hour for him to get to me. I may even be able to get to mile 784 by daybreak, which would be right on my plan.

I rolled the numbers over in my head as trucks and racing buggies came by and dusted me, my bike, and my pack at irregular intervals.

I was sobered by my situation. I had worked so hard, done so much right, and come so far – only to make such a heavy mistake. If just one person from either crew said, “Don’t forget the gas pit ahead,” I would have been looking for it. But I couldn’t blame them. Everyone was focused on Tanner dropping out and not the details of me staying in. Fair enough. It was my fault.

Well, if I have to wait for Arturo, I’ll take a nap. He can’t miss my bike, reflectors, and blinkers. If I was any closer to the course I’d be on it. I laid down between the low brush and small cactus that lived in this flat sandy plain. I left my helmet on to hold my head up and keep it warm. 

This may be a luxury I thought. Maybe this is good. Maybe I’ll get an hour or two of sleep and be fresh as a daisy when Arturo wakes me up. It was cold. Real cold, and I wasn’t moving. My socks were damp from the river crossing and my jersey was damp with sweat. Cold night air doesn’t dry you like hot day air. The cold sand sucked the heat out of me. I started shivering. Intermittently at first, then continuously. Trucks roared by.

I had to get up. As tired as I was, I couldn’t sleep with my body so cold and quaking. I jumped up and down to get my blood going. I began getting warmer once I got off the ground and heat loss by conduction stopped.

I called Andrew. He answered. “Arturo is coming with a gas can.” I could hardly make out what he was saying. “A gas can?” I thought. How is he going to ride with a gas can? You have to stand up when it’s rough, and he had a river crossing to navigate. A dirt bike seat is about 4 inches wide, and you need to slide forward and backward to use body English to ride. Where is he going to put a gas can?

Time went by. It was 1:30a.m. and I had been there for two hours. It was 24 ½ hours since I saw the green flag. Then it was 2:30. Then 3:30. I kept recalculating the entire rest of the race. I laid down to try to sleep again. Same result – impending hypothermia. Get back up.

The sky was beautiful. I observed the desert at night as I never had before. I had hours to kill. I heard animals; a coyote or desert fox howling, and some kind of night owl. A shooting star. Hues of black.

It seemed to be getting colder. I observe a low cloud – no, a fog bank – rolling in. Soon, I was wet with condensation. My bike and pack and helmet and gear were all wet. When a truck went by, the dust stuck to me like I was a powdered donut.

More time passed. Slowly, I came to the realization that I was going to lose a lot of time. A LOT. This was going to threaten all my cushion time and even the race itself. All that cushion time I had earned with everything I had for the last 24 hours…gone. This I did not want to accept easily. I stayed positive. 

Another light is coming. Is it Arturo? I have a feeling it is. Closer…closer…the lights fly by – again.

By now I was pretty wet. The fog was moving on a slow wind. “So this is how plants and animals drink out here.”

Another light. Is it Arturo? No.

It was 4:30a.m. Then 5:30. A new day was turning the eastern horizon a dark blue, then lighter blue. The satellite phone rang. It was Andrew. I could not believe what the scratchy voice on the phone was saying. 

“Arturo did everything he could. He tried to get to you, but he had to turn back. He’s back here at the van now… We are no closer to getting you gas than we were six hours ago.”

My body was still. I blinked in slow motion…

Facing Reality

“The keenest sorrow is to recognize ourselves as the cause of all our adversities.” – Sophocles

 

It said plain as day on the tape on my front fender – Van stop 607. Baja Pit (gas) 607. I never saw the pit. It was in San Ignacio along the street with the people and the lights and the colors. It was camouflaged in plain sight. When I was fist pumping the crowd to the right, it was on the left.

I accepted what happened right away and began thinking about what to do about it. It was 11:32 pm and I was far away from any people or structure. It was 45 degrees and dropping. I pulled my bike over to the left side of the course and heaved it up the bank of sand to get it off the course. The sand was deep, and the bike would not roll. I had to pull it sideways one wheel a few inches at a time with great effort. 

I was ahead of my plan. It will be ok. I’ll get gas somehow, and if it takes an hour or two, I’ll be alright.

I didn’t pull it more than four feet out of the way of race traffic, because I wanted to be seen. Maybe someone would stop and help me. It was very dark, and the desert stars laced the sky above the clear air. I took my pack off and got my satellite phone out. I turned it on and waited to get a signal. I called Andrew and hoped he was monitoring his phone. 

There was a time when Iridium satellite phones were a hot technology. With 22 satellites orbiting the earth, supposedly you could call anywhere on earth from anywhere else. It never took off and I knew why. The damn things didn’t work half the time. I knew this from last year. The calls would not go through often, voices would come in garbled, and the calls would be dropped halfway through. Still, we rented them for the race because there was little choice in a situation just like this.

Andrew answered. He was on his way to our next rendezvous point at mile 784 and had driven over an hour away from San Ignacio. “I missed the pit, I’m out of gas at 646,” I reported. “Oh shit!” he said. After a pause for not knowing what to say, he said he’d head back toward San Ignacio and figure something out and call me back. I wanted to discuss some options, but the call was dropped. All I could do was wait.

Lights appeared on the horizon, coming my way. I stood near the course near my bike. Was it a bike? A truck? A buggy? As it got closer I could tell. I had never been stranded in a race before. When I saw a bike stranded, I always stopped to ask if he was ok. I guess I was assuming they’d do that for me. 

I had two red blinker lights on the back of my pack when riding at night. I also put reflector tape on every rear facing surface I could – the shoulders of my jacket, my pack, the back of my boots, under my rear fender and the back of my helmet. I didn’t want to get run over by an 800-horsepower truck going twice my speed. I positioned my bike and the blinkers so other race vehicles could see me.

Soon enough I had my answer. They didn’t even slow down. Race trucks went by at 80 miles an hour and showered me with dust. At first, I was disappointed. But when I thought about it, I guess I can’t blame them. They are in a race in their respective classes and have planned all year and spent a ton of money on this race. Bikes are cheap. The trucks are one million dollars apiece, not including pre-run trucks, the crew, chase vehicles, and the shop they built them in. If I was stranded, that’s not their problem.

A light approached and this time it was a motorcycle. I waved to him – as he went by. “Oh, ok. It’s like that then.” The thick of the pack of trucks and buggies were coming through – one every few minutes now. I knew there were about 300 vehicles besides motorcycles in this race – 400 entries in all.

Another bike…he slows and stops. “I’m out of gas,” I shouted over his engine and through his helmet. He thought about it for five seconds and then shook his helmet and shrugged. “I’ll tell them at the next pit,” he said. I paused. “Okay. Thanks.” He took off. There was nothing the guys at the pit could do for me other than report it to my team if we called them. What did I expect? That’s what I said to a rider who was out of gas last year. There’s nothing a bike can do. They don’t have any extra gas.

I called Andrew again. No answer.

The Second Crossing

“Let me embrace thee, sour adversity. For wise men say it is the wisest course.“ – William Shakespeare

I rode away from San Ignacio at 10:30 pm on a leg that I knew would take me most of the night. I felt good. Surprisingly good for being this deep into the world’s longest non-stop race. My physical preparation was paying dividends now.

I turned off the paved road into the desert yet again. There were fires along the course – people camping out and watching the race. The course rolled and turned in the hills, but it was far easier than the last 50 miles. I hear a truck and see lights coming up behind me. I pick a place to pull over and watch the dragon pass, populating the air with particles of airborne earth so effectively, you’d think that was why the machine was built.

I’d have to deal with passing trucks and buggies the rest of the race. This would slow me down significantly from the first half. I’d have to pull over to get out of their way, and then wait for the dust to clear so I could see and proceed. If there was no wind, a typical nighttime situation, it would take a number of minutes, and sometimes ten. Just when you get going, you see the lights of another one coming up behind you. This process gets repeated when the bulk of the pack is coming through, as your average speed suffers considerably.

I came to a river crossing – the same river crossing that had claimed Santana. It was about 60 feet across. This time it was night. There were crowds of people on both banks. This could only mean that there was drama here worth watching. The last thing I wanted to do was fall down in the water at night, submerged, with 40-degree air and being 157 miles from my truck. Now that I think of it, that could be life-threatening.

I stopped and asked a spectator, “Which line is good?” and I motioned with my hand. I couldn’t understand him. I asked again. He tried to help me, but I wasn’t confident he had been paying attention. A truck could take any line they want. But a bike had to miss the big boulders to stay upright.

When you have something tough to do, staring at it and telling yourself how bad it will be it won’t make it any easier. I didn’t hesitate any longer. I put the bike in first gear and put my calves up on the radiator shrouds, as is my water crossing technique to keep my feet dry.

The river received me without much protest at first. The water got deeper and deeper. The splashing from my front wheel licked the back of my boots on my outstretched legs. About 2/3 the way through, I hit something under the black water that knocked me off balance. Instinctively I hit the throttle to stay up. I altered my course to regain my balance and sprinted for the bank. I was about ten feet to the left of my original target when I got there, but I got there. Besides a little water in my boot, I was dry. 

I happily left the crowd behind and sprinted into the darkness.

I never was a quitter. When things got tough, I hung in there. When nobody expected me to win or finish or stick it out, I always did. If anyone can do it, I can do it. Maybe not at first, if I didn’t have the training or experience or knowledge, but if I wanted something, I’d pay the price.

I think too many people quit on themselves. In an age of instant gratification, where we find out if we win in minutes and go on to the next thing, persistence over long periods of time is a valuable quality. Sometimes you just keep going until everyone else goes home.

Finishing a project, even after you discover it is taking far longer than you expected or hoped, is what we need to do. Doing anything worthwhile means going deep into it. It means sticking with it through complexity and problems and when weeks turn to months or years. So long as it was a worthwhile endeavor in the first place, if you start, you finish. Finishing builds self-esteem and confidence. And life is a confidence game.

I pressed on. The excitement of it being on me, and the fans in San Ignacio, and now even the river crossing had faded. It was work again. It was cold. When I look behind me I could always see at least one set of racing truck lights back there coming my way. I had to keep looking to time when I’d pull over.

The course flattened out. The sand got deep. I shifted my weight back to lighten up the front wheel and gave it a healthy dose of throttle to push through the sand. 

Suddenly, “broughhhhhhhhh.” My engine quit. It took two seconds to understand what happened. 

I was out of gas.

Man down

“The imagination is far better at inventing tortures than life because the imagination is a demon within us and it knows where to strike – where it hurts” – Anais Nin

I headed out away from my van with one concern. Why was Tanner “taking a rest” a mile ahead? Something was wrong. He had been there all the while I was at my pit – and they did not tell me. If they didn’t tell me, then something must be wrong, and they didn’t want me to know.

I saw the white van on the left – a twin to the one my crew was in. I circled around. There was Tanner, and he had his gear off. At least he was standing. I pulled up.

“Are you ok?” “Yeah.” “What happened?” “My body is just not working anymore.” I paused and surveyed his body language. “Can you go on?” I asked. “No,” he said, “I felt like I was going to pass out at 70 miles an hour.”

Awww man. I couldn’t believe it. If he tapped out of this race, there had to be a damn good reason. Here’s a kid who ran 46 miles a month earlier. He doesn’t quit. Being in anaphylactic shock 30 hours before the green flag had something to do with it, I was sure. Add lack of sleep and going all out like he was, and this is the result.

“Are you sure?” “Yeah,” he said solemnly.

“Are you okay with it?” He knew what I meant; was he ok with not finishing? “Yeah,” he said. I reached up to put my hand on his face. This was my son. It was just yesterday that he was a little boy. It was hard to see him have to drop out. But at least he was taking it alright.

Of course, when he rolled into this spot to meet his van earlier, he was far from alright. He got off the bike and dropped to the ground. Some members of the crew wanted to take him to the hospital. By the time I got there, he had some time to re-gather himself and accept it.

Ok. Now what?  I looked around. They were all looking at us. At me. Two crews. Andrew, Arturo, Ralph, Franz, Trevor, John, Jesse, Ted, Chad, Omar, Bobby, and Todd.

Tanner looked at me with encouragement.

It was on me now. It was up to me to finish this race. All of a sudden it was more important than ever. Nobody else could do it. I had to make it happen. I was Dad again.

There was nothing more for me to do here. Tanner was ok. I had to go.

I had two chase trucks now – one of them with Tanner in it. I felt great. Really good. A surge of resolve and energy filled me. I was reborn. I felt strong. I would finish this race!

My next goal was to go 177 miles to the physical checkpoint at mile 784 by dawn; the second dawn. It was 10:30 pm. I had all night to get there and still be on my race plan.

I rode away from the team with conviction. About a half-mile towards the center of this tiny town a flagger waved me right. There were crowds of people along the road, three deep in places. They were waving and cheering. I fist pumped them to the right. There were lights and colors and movement. Cheering. I fist pumped them to the left.

The people of Baja let us ride on their land. They don’t know me, but I was giving them something back. I fist pumped them to the left. Colors. Crowds. Lights. The 230-year-old mission church presided over the plaza. Left. More crowds along the narrow streets with one story masonry buildings three feet off the curbs. I fist pump the crowd again. I will finish this race. I had done so much right, and I felt good. I was over halfway there.

More people. More cheering. Narrow street. All of a sudden this little town kicked me out into the oblivion of the nighttime desert. Black. No more people or cheering. No more lights. Just me and the blood in my veins and oil in my engine.

 

As I would find out soon enough, I had just made a huge mistake…

Restoration

“And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.” 
― Haruki Murakami

Mile 607. A few miles outside San Ignacio. 

“I got two problems,” I shouted before I got my helmet off. “The GPS is not showing a course line, AND I fell into a cactus!” Arturo took the bike from me, and I pointed to my shoulder. Now that I had some better light and my helmet off, I could see needles bristling out of my jersey.

We got my pack off. It was cold now and a jersey wasn’t enough. The crew were all bundled up in jackets and hats. I sat down, and Andrew grabbed one of the toothpicks sticking up and yanked on it. “Owwww!” It hurt! I don’t know how, but these needles hang on. When you pull them out they pull your skin up an inch before letting go.

He pulled on another one, and another. When we got all the tall ones out, they helped me slowly pull my jersey off. Now we could see the ones that were only sticking out a little. There were two distinctly different types of needles in me. Dozens of the big toothpick-like ones, and hundreds of smaller fine hairy type ones. 

I had tweezers in my side pouch for this purpose, and Franz started working on me. Soon he realized that this job was for younger eyes, so he gave the tweezers to his son, Trevor. I don’t know how long they were trying to extract the little demons, maybe 15 minutes. I multi-tasked and ate and drank while I sat there. The little needles were so fine and so numerous, we decided to do what I did during pre-running to my forearm – shave them off. At least then they wouldn’t be rubbing up against the inside of my jersey. They’d work their way our over the next weeks.

“Where’s Tanner?” “He’s in second place,” they told me. “Wow,” I thought. 

A vehicle was coming that made its presence known. It was the first trophy truck passing me – 20 hours in as I had predicted. That means others would be coming soon.

Now that I was sitting down, I started to feel how tired I was. I had been awake for 23 hours after having four hours of sleep the night before. I had been racing for over 20 hours. In my race planning, I had rationed my cushion time over the second half of the race. 

I had planned on getting to mile 524 by dark and, so long as trucks were coming through, I’d take a rest there. But I was over two hours ahead, and no trucks had come yet. Now at 607, after that brutal section of terrain, it was dark, and trucks were coming through. Now was the time. Don’t keep going until you can’t go another mile. Invest a little time. Get refreshed. For all the distance I had come, I was only a little over halfway there.

I told the team I was going to take a nap. I put a jersey and a pullover on. Andrew set up the cot behind the van. Ralph, who did not anticipate the cold last year and suffered unprepared, had a huge coat this year that weighed 20 pounds. He wrapped it around me. I’ve got to say, it was a heavenly coat at that time. 

Last year I told the team to wake me up in 20 minutes when I took a nap at mile 430. They didn’t. I woke up on my own in 45 minutes. They said they thought I was done – out of the race. I admit I was in bad shape as I had been riding for 9 hours with a neck injury. But still, if I say to wake me up, then they should wake me up.

I gave them explicit instructions. Don’t mess around. Wake me up in 15 minutes. I lie down. It took me 5 minutes to fall asleep. But that’s all I needed to do. Hit the reset button. Allow all my muscles to relax. I don’t think it would make much difference if I was sleeping 30 minutes or 60 minutes. I was in a race. It was more of a therapeutic trick to my body than it was meaningful rest.

In 15 minutes, Andrew woke me up. “Do you want to sleep for 15 minutes more?” he asked. I thought about it. “Yes,” I said. He walked away. I thought about it more. No. I put one boot on the ground. Then the other. It was cold out. Maybe 40 degrees. I stood up and walked to the bike.

I put my riding jacket on. That was three layers. Backpack on. I hadn’t had any caffeine yet. Now was the time. I drank a five-hour energy. I am sure these are not good for you, but I was hoping for some good results right now. 

I was feeling pretty good about the whole race. Another trophy truck went by. I should still be ahead of my schedule by some. I was into the second night, and one of the two worst parts of the course were behind me. I wasn’t hurt. The cactus needles were flesh wounds that I could ignore. I felt like I was in good shape here. Then I asked the question again.

“Where’s Tanner?”

Did I notice an awkward hesitation? 

“He’s a mile up the road at his van.”

“What!?” Something is very wrong here. I thought he was in second place? He should be two hours ahead of me. 

“He’s where?”

“Just a mile up the road on the right.”

I shifted the 714x into gear. I couldn’t wait to see him…

Escape

There are ships sailing to many ports, but not a single one goes to where life is not painful. – Fernando Pessoa

I tried to pull up again, but there was no way. There were hundreds of needles in me that were still very much attached to the cactus. I’d have to rip them all out at once to stand up. These needles have a hook-like action. They don’t want to come out easily.

A few months ago, I was looking at a photo of Tanner from last year’s race. “What’s that on your side?” We’re always trying to figure out the best way to carry things. We test fanny packs and holsters and all kinds of things when we pre-run. You can’t really attach anything to the bike because the vibration and violent up and down movement will loosen it and you’ll lose it. Your body and head are the things that move the least.

A backpack is good, but you have to take it off to get anything out quick, and it can be an ordeal. (I can tell you there was no way to get my backpack off in this prickly situation.) I tested an awesome adventurer fanny pack, but in the heat it’s a bit claustrophobic. So I copied Tanner and got a little belt pouch from Home Depot. If you wear O’Neal riding pants, which I did this year, there is a belt that you can slide the pouch on.

I put the pouch on my right hip so I can grab things quick with my right hand. As luck would have it, my left hip was buried in the dirt, but my right hip was up. I unzipped the pouch and right where I had left it was a small pair of wire cutters. I carried them to cut wire ties, or to cut barbed wire out of my wheels or brake calipers.

I reached down under my left arm and began snipping away at the fleshy part of the plant. I separated it from the rooted part. I managed to get up and lift the bike up. I look on the back side of my arm and see green plates of the cactus still stuck to my arm via large toothpick sized thorns. I began cutting the thorns with the wire cutters one by one. I was able to release one of the plates and went to work cutting the thorns from the next. Then the third. Then the forth.

There was a lot in me. I had landed in a big angry plant. I reached behind my shoulder blade and could feel another one on me back there. I could barely reach and couldn’t see, but managed to feel around and cut the needles with my small wire cutters. Finally, the last plate fell off of me.

I could feel a myriad of needles sticking out of my skin through my jersey. I could not see them well as many of them were around the back side of my arm. When I touched them they poked my hand. I reckoned I was 20 miles or so from the van. Could I ride like this? If my muscles expanded and contracted and moved around with needles in them, would it be insufferable pain and discomfort? Let’s see…

It was a doable plan. Now I just needed to get to the van to get help. But I knew what was coming up and it was not good.

Some terrain is just really, really hard on a motorcycle. The deep silt whoops changed to a narrow river wash with tree branches hanging over it from both sides. Embedded boulders poked up 12” from the night time sand. Turns every 30 feet. Add all this together…

I passed a guy who was struggling in it. I looked at his number – an Ironman. He followed me. I knew it was for moral support. We came up on another bike struggling who had then stopped in front of us. We both pulled up to him and stopped. It was another Ironman. “Are you ok?” His voice was discouraged and frustrated. “Yeah,” he said while he was shaking his helmet “no.” “This sucks!” the other one said. Then he yelled some expletive over the sound of three engines in the night. I nodded in agreement and got going again. They both attempted to follow and stay with me, but I pulled ahead and lost them.

A rider from Norway, who had raced and won his class in the Dakar rally three times, another incredibly tough race, came to Baja this year. When he saw the Baja 1000 course on race day he said it was the most miserable terrain he had ever seen and said he would NOT be back! “I’m out!”

“When you’re going through hell, don’t stop!” – Les Brown

Suddenly the course turned up a rocky hill. Don’t let off the throttle. Holy smokes this is steep! But I knew the next hill was the worst. Down the rocks now. Dark. Two-foot vertical drops. Rocks. Down. Another ½ mile. Here it comes…

If I was a race fan and there was any place along the 1134-mile course I could camp out and watch, it would be this place. The uphill is so steep and full of rocks – I mean full of rocks – I mean no dirt, JUST rocks, that it must be an incredible spectacle and entertainment to see any type of vehicle try to ascend this angry slope. This was stupid dangerous.

My wheels danced off the rocks altering my direction every few seconds, but I kept my balance and held the throttle open, with my finger on the clutch ready for anything. I saw faces on the ledges to my left temporarily illuminated by my headlights. I avoided the biggest boulders that would surely cause a crash. Up, up, up, I felt like I was in a pinball machine bouncing around. How high can this hill be? My jersey pulled against the needles sticking out of me.

Mercifully, I got to the top. A few more miles to the military checkpoint and I start looking for my van.

I am so relieved that section is over. I had ridden every mile of this course in pre-run. It was one of the two worst parts of this entire course. I scanned the vehicles alongside the road, looking for a white van or the yellow 714x sign.

I knew I was still ahead of schedule, even though I had lost some time. I was excited, stressed, encouraged, and exhausted.

There they are! I pulled in. “Guys. I got two problems…”