Hardcore 24 Naples NY

We arranged a 3 day weekend for ourselves, spent the previous week packing, finished it all up Thursday night/Friday morning and took off for Naples, NY at 6.5 hour ride says Mapquest.....they lie! Some goofy pictures on the ride and a couple of incredible Tractor sightings and a stop at the Coleman factory outlet store...

7.5 gruelling hours later we arrived atop a mountain in NY at a huge Boy Scout camp. I promptly starting setting up camp, begging for "just one more piece" to put in place before we pre-rode the course. We suited up and off we went to ride 8 miles of rolling double track and fire roads with SEVERAL hills/grass walls! Jason was on this brand new Vassago cruising away from me with each pedal stroke shifting through his gears to push on the flats and effortlessly climb in the interesting collection of hills. I decided I wasn't up for grinding my bumm butt muscle through a chase on singlespeed so i headed back to take a little nap. Jason was back shortly after and we cleaned up and made some dinner.

Up bright and early Saturday morning, ticking away at the 6 hours before the race I made baggies of stuff and dumped powder into water bottles, we ate breakfast then promptly at Noon all the riders took off in a Lemanz start.

35 minutes later Jason grabbed a bottle as he cruised by our pit about 3/4 of the way through the lap. 15 minutes later with the little guy from Earl's on his tail J finished his 1st lap at 50minutes.

The next 4 laps ticked by in a similar fashion in the heat of the day. I took pictures of my chilling out and of my bike gleaming in the sun begging to be ridden and of the mess J leaves behind after a pit stop! On Lap 5 I switched the nice clean dry polka dotted jersey in my hand for the wet limp horribly funky jersey and baselayer off of Jason.

He took a little break to let his tummy settle down in the heat of the day, choked down 2 more laps at just over 1 hour a piece and came in for a full clothing change and some "dinner".

Our little friend from Earl's had about 1/2 a lap on J over the past 2 laps and was starting to fade just a little. I watched David(Earl's guy) come in not 10 minutes after he took off for his 9th lap. Strange, I thought and promptly pushed Jason to take advantage of his break and take back that 1/2 of a lap lead and maybe hammer down another. Ok...push, push, push then he was off to my surprise. Ok I thought, it's cooler, dark now, he loves the night ride experience and with 14 years of riding under his belt I thought he had jumped on the lead for at least 3rd place. I was working on picking up the mess he made in the pit when we got a tummy turning notice from out on the course. A rider was down about 3 miles into the lap and they were temporally postponing the race. Yikes! My stomach rolled, the race directors sent out a crew for First Aide, and I watched the minutes tick away on my watch until J as supposed to show up. 5 minutes before he was due in he showed up. I told him of the past events he changed into dry clothes and we waited. He had 8 full laps under his belt and was sitting in 3 or 4th place at the moment.

The race was called at 8:58PM and we waited to hear what had happened. We went to bed with the knowledge that one of Park Ave Bikes' own had gone to the hospital after 20minutes of CPR in the woods. Sunday morning we had awards but under the cloud of knowing Ben from Park Ave had died on the way to the hospital.

We packed our stuff and headed home..grateful that we would be home much before we would had the race finished at Noon on Sunday, but riding the long 7 hours home with a funk in the car...not the smelly kind, the mental kind...for us the preparation and anticipation of the trials and tribulations of the 24 Hour race were left unexplored, but worse a fellow rider, a lover of bikes and the culture they cultivate, a young kind fun guy had lost his life doing what he loved.

I struggled with this fact until late Monday afternoon when we found a Blog and news article that further explained the course of events. The story that we heard and probably partially formulated in our minds about a skilled biker crashing down in the woods after a long time riding dissolved under Ben's health issues. Ben had a heart condition that was attended to with open heart surgery not long ago to replace a bad valve. Ben's heart failed under the increased stress of long, hot gruelling laps, he was found slumped on the side of the course by 1st a cardiologist and 2nd an EMT who promptly began CPR and a 3rd rider who rode back to notify the race officials. Ben got the best care and prompt attendance he could have. Once at the hospital 25 minutes away, the Doc's pronounced him dead on the scene...the opened him up and found that he had an aneurysm on his heart. Ben passed away doing exactly the one thing he loved, rest in peace!

A dear loss to the bike community, a reality check for all, and an unfortunate opportunity to learn about Jason's response to racing and about the love we have for the people in our lives that are dear to us and that are complete strangers that share a common view of life.

Not the race report I would have liked to write but it is what happened. We did enjoy our adventure ending with a dinner of champions, hot dogs and perogies!