MOAT Mountain 24-Hours of Great Glen – Race Day in Detail

By Patria Vandermark Last updated Aug 7, 2024 0

Many 24-hour races start by having the first person from each team run to their bike. It’s called a Le Mans start. This keeps the start safer since everyone runs at a different pace and bikes are placed at various positions. We are cyclists NOT necessarily runners. I don’t know how to run in my bike shoes! The solo racers plodded their way to their bikes and though it’s been basically forever since I’ve gone on a real run, I felt like it got my whole body moving nicely, blood flowing, nerves shook out on this little run that was probably all of 5 minutes or less to lap the pond and grab the bike.

*I’m not a runner. But here we gooooo!!*

The lap blow by blow

I’m not going to bore you with details of every lap. Mostly because it’s a blur now. Here are the highlights of what I can remember:

Lap 1 – 12:00 PM – 1:15 PM

Trying to suss out who’s who in the field as we were standing around waiting for the starting cannon to go off. There are too many racers to see all of the women in my field and figure out who looks serious.
Once we started on the bike, I saw some go ahead of me, and I saw plenty of 24-hour solo men going around my pace. I was very careful to stay steady, smooth, resist any temptation to go hard. I watched my heart rate trying to stay in zone 2 (endurance, talking pace) as much as is possible without falling over on a climb.
The first trail section started, and people got jammed up. Lots of people hadn’t pre-ridden the course so it was a surprise to them. Most people were patient with the traffic jam.
The course was warm, dry in most places, and sketchy descents were a little better since there had been some rain overnight.

Lap 2 – 1:23 PM – 2:38 PM

The fastest laps of the day for me. Dry trails, confidence, freshness.
At one point, I was trying to get off my bike and instead slipped and fell. Immediately I got two very serious cramps, one in each leg and I couldn’t move. Two guys (solo riders I think) were there and wanted to help. I explained that all was well, I just needed to get the cramps to go away. I’ve never cramped on the bike before so that was a little unnerving, but after pulling my feet back, the cramps went away, and I got back on the bike. All of that drama must not have taken much time given the speed of this lap compared with my others! 1 hour 14 minutes for those of you wondering. And no, this is not fast compared with the fastest lap of the day which was sub 40 minutes. The fastest solo man had a 45 minute fastest lap and 1 hour 7-minute slowest lap. He did 25 total laps. Fastest lap for any woman solo 24-hr was 1 hour 5 minutes.

Lap 3 – 2:47 PM – 4:08 PM

I think this is when I got up the nerve to ride the floating bridge. The entrance to the bridge is a bit intimidating and I was certain I’d ride right into the pond which, with the high temps and humidity, would not have been unwelcome. As I started onto the bridge, I heard someone encouraging me to just roll onto it. Turns out it was NEER friend Dave who was also doing a 24-hour solo race riding right behind me!

Lap 4-5 – 4:09 PM – 5:24 PM & 5:42 PM – 6:57 PM

Feast of tortilla and Nutella. Great combo except my stomach started refusing food not all that long after this was taken.

No memory of these laps except that at the end of lap 5, I felt like I really needed to eat something, and few things sounded digestible. Skratch Labs in my bottles and Honey Stingers gummy chews were all I could eat. I tried some fake chicken salad, and it went down easily. I think there were some pickles in it. I was craving pickles but hadn’t thought to pack any. DOH!
The sun went down somewhere in this time, all racers are required to have 2 headlights starting at 7pm. It’s racer’s choice as to when they are turned on. It’s dark early in the woods!

Lap 6 – 7:11 PM – 8:31 PM

Got into the transition area with no problem, got bottles, drank, the usual.
Made it about 200 yards into lap 6 when I felt like I was going to vomit. Got off the bike and quickly dispensed of all stomach contents next to the pond. No more fake chicken salad in stomach. But I needed those calories in there. A nice guy who was camping on the course near where I was getting sick came over to offer water and anything I needed. He must be a dad, he asked me if I felt better or worse. The answer was “I think better.” Except I knew I would miss the calories and wondered if my race was over.
Found I could continue to drink the Skratch bottle and plain water tasted much better. So I fueled the lap and made it to lap 7.

Laps 7-10 – 8:42 PM – 3:18 AM

All night laps, all good. I loved the quiet of night, that there were fewer racers on course because the 12-hour racers were done by 1:15am, and so many people were sleeping. The race tent that had been buzzing with activity was quiet and subdued in the middle of the night with many fewer racers coming in and out.
This was my chance to make up for time lost, I was in 2nd place with 3rd and 4th places not far behind. And it looked like they might be sleeping. It was hard to know. Just keep moving.
At some point, it started to rain, I think that might be lap 8 around midnight? (Memory is so foggy). The temps cooled when the sun went down, and the rain felt great. Everything got slipperier and the mucky, previously slimy sections got slimier.
I just kept thinking about how much I love night riding and was remembering some of the many pleasant times I’ve had on Full Moon rides and other night rides with friends. I find trails easier to ride at night and no, I don’t ride faster (everyone goes slower), but lights focus your attention on the trail, there are no distractions, it’s quiet and peaceful.
From 7pm-11pm the promoters had a fire on the far side of the course and were serving up bacon and s’mores. Rob met me here for a s’more. I ate half and couldn’t get down the rest. At least I tried!

Lap 11-12 – 3:30 AM – 5:06 AM & 5:55 AM – 7:19 AM

At this point, I was getting ahead of the others in my race probably because they were sleeping. They probably figured I would, too. Technically, if everyone else is cracked, then I could stop here and get a finish time that ends up with a podium spot. Sounds good to me. I got tired and with the rain, it was chilly after stopping for too long. I was shivering (even with a jacket), and I closed my eyes. Not sure if there was sleep there, but those few minutes of closed eyes was good. I was stopped for 49 minutes and that was almost too much. Rob told me it was time to either go back to the tent to sleep or go back to the race. I knew if I laid down on the (very comfy) air mattress in the tent, I would never wake up. Time to race!
Dawn started at the beginning of lap 12 and I never felt even a wink of tiredness after that point.

Lap 13 – 7:25:29 AM – 8:48:55 AM

I think I told the judges I hoped this would be the last lap. I’d know when I returned if the other women had woken up and started racing again or if they were done.
Not long into this lap (I think it was this lap!), I spied a woman with a yellow number passing me when I was dealing with stuffing my rain jacket into my pocket for too much time. I didn’t know what lap she was on or anything, I just knew that it was close between me and at least 2 others so I couldn’t mess around any longer.
Game ON!

This is Jessica Nankman from PA on her first lap. Turns out (thanks to Google that I am just now employing to learn who everyone was out there), she is an experienced 24-hour and endurance MTB racer. I’m sure she gambled that I would sleep and that would have made the difference. The odds were in her favor.

Lap 14 – 8:55:28 AM – 10:13:48 AM

Up to this point, I was mostly riding to see how long I could stay on the bike and try to make it to noon Sunday. Suddenly, the feeling of racing started, the feeling of chasing and being chased. What a great feeling! What’s going to happen, how will this play out? Time to shift mindset from finishing to how to finish, how to win this thing, if that’s possible.
Everyone is awake and racing, maybe they’re fresh, maybe they’re dealing with what I saw in some of the men: 2-hour sleeps are brutal. Wake up to feel worse than before the sleep.
I’m trying to do the math on how to make this work. The rule is this: if you come through the finish line before 12pm, you can do another lap. The race ends at 12pm so if you arrive just after this time, that’s your lap count. If competitors have the same lap count, the fastest time wins the race. If you leave for your last lap prior to 12pm, you have to finish before 1:15pm or that lap doesn’t count.
With my lap times right around 1 hr 15 minutes, I’d need to get through the next lap with enough time before 12pm to give me time for yet another lap. Not that I wanted to do two more laps, but there was a race happening now and I am here to race!

Lap 15 – 8:55 AM – 10:13 AM

Gotta keep moving! Rain stopped somewhere before this I think. Hopefully the sun stays away. The sun was absolutely brutal Saturday and I didn’t want to try to reapply sunscreen.
I saw another woman with a yellow number on her bike across the course on the first half of this lap. My heart jumped, I was certain this was the woman who was in 2nd who would be hunting me down. I couldn’t see her number, I just knew the chances were good I was going to have to stay ahead of her in this section since she would get me on the technical portions of the technical part of the lap a little later on. Also, if I saw her at this point, we couldn’t have been that far away from each other on the course. YIKES! RACE!
Now I’m trying to move faster and I’m passing by people who are on their last lap and happy to be done. The fast guys were really fast (just like at night) and the slower guys were getting chatty. It was sweet, but I was now trying to race and I was running out of energy to talk in general. Funny change in things from a bit earlier when I was more in that chatty mode.
Doing the math figuring out if I’d need to do another lap or not. I didn’t drink my full Skratch bottle since I figured it’d need to last 2 laps. Rob wouldn’t necessarily have more clarity than me on the situation and I’d need to make the next transition very fast.
This lap was within seconds of my fastest lap of the day. By playing it safe all of this time, I had more to give to this race…

Lap 16 – 11:32 AM – 12:49 PM

I thought I’d be passing through the tent later than 11:30am, but this timing allowed me a much longer last lap to still get credit for completing this last lap before 1:15pm, the race time cut off.
The problem with not doing a last lap is that if the woman who I am sure is right on my heels chasing me crosses the line before 12pm, she gets 1 more lap. That would put us on the same lap and in an actual race during the entire lap for the win. Again, I am pretty sure she’s faster than me, so I can’t let this happen.
I have a 46 second transition, I don’t try to find Rob, hope he’s not too confused as to why I didn’t come find him in the race tent like on every other lap, and I take off on this last lap with zest. I’m still sure I’m being chased and am not sticking around to find out the details. I debate whether I’ll pick up my phone if he calls me. He could be calling to say she didn’t make the 12pm time cut so I could stop racing and come back.
This last lap is 1hr 16 minutes, so not far off from my fastest lap. I inquired (without being too annoying or hoped this to be the case) with people I saw on course. as to whether they’d just passed a woman with yellow number. No one had seen anyone. Still, not leaving things to chance, I completed the lap and finished feeling great. And yes, this is how a 24-hour race stretched to almost 25 hours.

The Finish

The end of the story is that the woman, Jessica, who was the actual person who was chasing was just far enough back that she wasn’t able to take the last lap. Thus, I didn’t have to ride that last lap after all. I don’t remember seeing her out there once the whole race, same with the woman who came in third. So all of the people who were freaking me out who I thought were chasing weren’t the ones to worry about! But having them there and feeling that “being chased” feeling added to the fun.

Jessica was super friendly and said a few things on the podium about the time she slept, and I really wanted to spend a whole lot more time digging into the details with her and Lauri who took 3rd to hear their stories of what they’d been through, how long they’d slept, what their races had involved. Pretty sure I wasn’t capable of conversation then being hours since eating anything and a total of 31 hours since sleeping. It was time to rest.

Everyone scattered post-podium, and I headed straight for that air mattress for a good, long 2–3-hour nap before breaking down camp and heading home.

Moments after the race, I took a few deep breaths then joined my friend Ben in the river just a few yards away to clean up and feel like a new person for the awards ceremony at 2pm. There wasn’t much time to decompress, and I didn’t eat anything though I knew food was necessary; it just wasn’t going to happen yet. Cold seltzer water did go down and hit the spot!