I had just completed my first bikepacking race with the Stagecoach 400 and I was hooked: I would be in Banff in 2016. However, I needed another stepping stone until then and after looking at the calendar for another race, I settled on the Caldera 500: not too far and not too long. Or so I thought…
Fast forward 6 months and many many hours of training. I finally made it to Mammoth Lakes and was checking in into the Alpenhof Lodge. After finishing during the night at 2am ans sleeping in the trunk of my car after the Stagecoach because all hotels were closed, I had decided to plan things a little better this time: the lodge is close to the finish line, open 24/7 and had low occupancy on both Monday and Tuesday when I would be back. Oh, delusion! I do a quick appearance at the pre-race meetup, meet with my executioner Alan and go for a last gear check ride on what I thought were the first two miles of the race… I took my last supper at the lodge and went to bed early.
After a good meal and packing up tons of food and water for the long stretch to Bridgeport, I got back on the bike and ran into Blake who told me about his decision to stop here. The climb into the Tablelands started as the sun slowly set. I made it to the other side and at 10pm I set camp on the side of the trail where I slept for a solid 4 hours.
The descent to Walker was long and offered a very different scenery than the climb. Much greener. I made it to Walker at 3:30pm, are a lot and refilled. I got back on the road right away hoping to make it to the next summit by sunset which did not happen. After a surreal encounter with a regiment of US Marines doing a night training in the forest I made it to the Leavitt Meadows Campground at 12am and decided to sleep for a few hours. I didn’t even change clothes and fell asleep right away.
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