Death Riders

July 19, 2007

Mammoth has bike riders. Mammoth also has cyclists, which is one step further up the chain. Mammoth also has Death Riders, and those people are my favorites.

Last weekend, a strong group of Mammoth locals made the trip to Markleeville, Alpine County, for the famous Markleeville Death Ride. It's a 130-mile "adventure," in the words of Eastside Velo Club poobah John Armstrong, in which the strongest of the strong make a one-day jaunt over five mountain passes, climbing 15,000 vertical feet.

Death Riders are crazy, in their way. But they're so goldanged Mammoth about it, that is to say larger than life, it makes a guy like me really proud.

To guys like me, a "mountain pass" is waiting around for a women's bike club to pedal past in a pace line, drop in on the back of the train and make conversation (heh) until it's my turn at the front, then I drop off the line altogether and wait for the next one. Call me a scamp and I'll admit to it cheerfully.

San Diego women's pace lines are the best, in my opinion. Berkeley's women's pace lines will up the ante and drop you like a stone. Scheez already, huh?

Anyhoo, the Mammoth "A" team took just seven hours to do the thing. Jerry Oser, the climber-unicyclist nut from Rovana, clocked in just under seven hours. Whew! He was followed by Scott Busby, Dennis Phillips and Tim Standifer, who, by the way, celebrated his 51st birthday this past week.

The Eastside Velo "B" team followed in around eight and a half hours. It was led in by Jeff Byberg, Doug Howell, Dave DeVries and Tom Wallace. The team was almost derailed early in the day by a three-legged legged bear (ain't that a kick?) that crossed the highway directly in front of our boys while they were doing 35 miles an hour down the hill into Markleeville at 5:30 in the morning. Yipes.

Armstrong, meanwhile, Kiwi'd his way over five passes, too, while Barb Phillips and Shawna Pettigrew completed four. Jim Pettigrew completed three passes.

They're all nuts. Hats off to them.

The goofiest thing about the Mammoth riders is the way they innovate.

Glenn Miyata from Footloose was along the way to wrench the bikes into shape, but the kicker was Lynette Armstrong.

"She used her dental skills to clear Speedplay pedals of debris," marveled her husband John.

It was a tough ride.

Temps were at 95 degrees. And of the 3,000 riders registered, only one third of them finished five passes.

They get up at 4 a.m. in the Turtle Rock Campground accompanied by loud music. This year the song was "Morning Has Broken."

"It's hardly the way to get up for 10 hours on the bike," said John Armstrong later.

But that's why I love these people. They'll plow through anything. Even songs.

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