So you think you want to be an IBR Rider...

Originally posted on the FJR Forum...

It had been 11 years since I owned a bike. The last thing I did in 1998 was to ride my bike in the Minnesota 1000. I rode a 1000+ miles in that rally and managed to finish 10th in my class. It was a walk off grand slam for me. My wife was pregnant and said "I think you should ride less..." I hung up my leathers and helmet and focused on my family. So this spring I decided that my kids were old enough that if I did a fool thing they would at least remember me. So with my wife's... well not blessing, but not cursing either, I bought a nice shiny new to me Versys.

The very next thing I looked at were Iron Butt rides that I could take this year. It just so happened that there was a group in July that was doing the Great Lakes Challenge. All five lakes (2450 miles) in less than 100 or 50 hours. Now I knew I would not be up for the 50 hours, so signed up for the 100 hours. My buddy Michael, who had given up riding after a serious crash in Colorado decided that if I could do it so should he. So he went out and picked up a not shiny 80,000 mile ST1100.

All through spring I trained and slowly increased my daily rides from 400 miles to 750. For those not familiar with the Versys the stock seat is referred to as "Nad Masher", so I felt a great sense of accomplishment that I could do these long days. About 4 weeks before the trip we were contacted by another rider that was alone on the GLC, but was hoping to find someone to do the trip with. We’ll call him “Joe”. Joe rode a Harley and was in his late 60’s but had done a 1000 in 24 and had been riding since he was in his twenties. I sent Joe long emails about all the preparation that we were making and how cold it would be up along the Superior shore. I told him about Michael and my riding styles, our route plan, our stop strategy. I had a few phone calls with Joe, and was a little concerned that maybe he was in a little over his head, but decided that I would at least start the ride with him. He wsa an adult after all, who was I to tell him that he might want to rethink this?

So three days before the ride my wife went off to visit a friend in San Diego and our kids were in Peru with my folks, so I took off to finish my Wisconsin Rustic Roads quest (108 roads). I did 1500 miles in three days and picked up the last 50 roads that I needed. It was a great training run. Cold nasty wet weather, but I felt I was ready. I got home by 8 as Joe was riding up from Kansas and staying at my place before we headed up to Duluth to start the ride. It was very cold and wet that day with temps in the high 50s. At 8:30 I got a call from Joe that he was freezing in southern MN and would be late. He was about 90 minutes away, I told him eat something hot, and get in when he could. Inwardly I was worried because temps along Superior would be colder! And he was only riding 400 today; our first days ride was 780 miles!

He made it to my place 3 hours later. My worries were confirmed. Jeans jacket & pants, half helmet and half frozen, Joe put his Harley in my garage and hit the sack. Next morning we planned to ride up to Duluth and meet up with the other riders for dinner. Joe needed some cold weather gear so we made a stop at Fleet Farm on the way and picked up some Long Johns and a warmer jacket. I told Joe we would ride up I-35 till we got a little south of Duluth and then take a nice scenic ride through Jay Cook state park. It’s got a great motorcycle road, with lots of curves. “Yeah, Curves are my nemesis,” says Joe. “Umm…, what?” “Yeah I crashed this spring on a curve with some gravel.” Michael says “just go at your own pace, we’ll meet up at the end of the park if you fall behind.”

The next 120 miles to Duluth I kept thinking that Joe may not be up for this ride. We got off I-35 and headed into Jay Cook. My only thoughts were focused on Joe’s comments. Joy cook is marked at 40mph, so I entered my first turns slowly, knowing that Joe was bringing up the rear. My buddy Michael is behind me and is going slower so he begins to disappear as I go through the turns. After about a mile he’s no longer in my mirrors at all. I slow to a crawl. Wait… No Michael. OK… this is not good. It takes me 2 miles to find a turn around and I high tail it back.

There is Michael’s bike, stopped at the side of the road and Michael is off his bike next to someone on the ground. Joe hit a floor board on a curve and couldn’t get it slowed down. 2 ambulances, 2 fire trucks, highway patrol, tow truck and a conservation officer later they ship Joe off to the local ER. 3 fractured vertebrae. So we spend the afternoon helping Joe’s wife make arrangements to get to Duluth. The rider dinner is a blur and at the end of the day I felt like I rode 1000 miles not 150.

At 5:30 the next day Michael and I head out on our ride. Thoughts of poor Joe fill my head for the next three days. Michael and I finish our ride. We do it exactly on schedule at 65 hours and 8 minutes. We had some trying times, and some great times. At the end I felt like I would have been able to do the 50 hours ride. It is a ride I will never forget. I am very glad I did it and I am training for harder rides.

Joe’s wife had made it up from KC and we stopped by the hospital so see her. Joe was not doing well he had not regained consciousness after being transported to the hospital. A few weeks later I transported Joe’s bike to KC so that it could be repaired. At that time he was barely conscious and not responding to stimulus. So now its 6 weeks later. Joe is still in the hospital. He has regained speech. He finds it hard to move and is not doing great. His wife has to drive 400 miles to see him as he is still in Minnesota.

So you want to be an IBA rider? Honestly it’s not that hard to do a 1000 in 24 ride. But the rides beyond that are harder. Know your limits. Train! Prepare. You will fail at this if you don’t know what you are doing. Basically don’t be Joe. Moving from a SS1000 to rides like BBG is a hard move. The IBR is in a completely different league. Very few people can do it. If you look at the entrants for this year’s IBA you can tell they were not plucked at random from the 2000+ entrants they got. I am sure they looked at the rides that folks have completed and the rallies that folks have done and culled the unqualified riders. Tragedies like Davo are still possible.

To GPS or not?

A rider with no rally experience posted on the LDRiders forum if a GPS would help on a 5 or 10 day rally. Here was my response:

Friend, I have no experience on a 5 or 10 day rally. But I do have
experience preparing for a new challenge and completing it. You say
you have zero rally experience, so my first comment is that I would
say your are diving into the deep end of the pool and may want to try
the shallow waters of a 12 or 24 hour rally. Try it without a gps and
computer, see how you like it. If you have fun and are happy with your
performance then adding a GPS will not be necessary.

Are you trying to be competitive? Are you relatively technology savvy?
Are you there to place well or just have fun? If you don't do well and
have lots of routing mistakes, and wish you finished higher, then a
GPS might help the situation. It will not help every rider in every
situation.

I am a complete tech geek. I have a GPS and love it. I also don't
think it works for all riders. I have multiple map programs and have
been practicing entering in rally information. I think I have a good
system that will be tested early next month in a 12 hour rally. I'm
sure it will not work as well as I hoped, and the learning will be
incorporated into the rally after that (next year after the snow
melts).

A few things that I hate about the GPS:

1. It is not as good as local knowledge. I use it around town in my
car and there are many roads it wants to send me down that I know are
"shorter," but due to local traffic patterns I know are total time
sucks. So learning your area is still very valuable. Because I have
this knowledge in my home town, when I am in far off lands I adjust
its timing to leave room for this lack of local knowledge.

2. When it does something unexpected it can be a time waster. Have it
freak out in a rally and you may lose valuable minutes trying to
revive it.

3. If you become reliant on it you can loose skill with maps. Believe
it or not I was a cartography major in college. The more I use mapping
software the slower I become with the paper maps.

I strongly believe that a very competent map reader will beat an
average GPS user. However an average map reader will be killed by a
below average GPS user. If your not good at working with Maps a GPS
will help. However you do not want to be learning any of these skills
as you are handed the route sheets for a 5 day rally!

Here is what I recommend, right now the Resdez-vous rally has their
bonus listing on line: http://www.rendezvousld.org/2009/en/bonus.htm.
Go to the site and get it. Use paper maps and create a nice 12 hour
route. See how you do as far as points and time to create the route.
Next download Microsoft's free trial for Streets & Trips
(http://www.microsoft.com/streets/en-us/trial.aspx). Enter the bonus
locations and make a nice 12 hour route. Compare your points and
times. For me I do the computer version a LOT faster and get a higher
score.

After that exercise have a friend pick 12 local places within a 100
mile radius. Create a route on paper and ride it. Then pick 12 local
places, do the route on S&T and ride it. It should give you a feel for
if computer mapping will give you an advantage over paper mapping.

Good luck!

Howdy!

Ok, I am an avid motorcyclist and also have a lot of ideas (some would call them opinions). As such I'm on several forums and mailing lists and tend to have a lot of posts. Having a robust ego I think that some of my posts are very good. So this is a collecting ground for these posts; as I know that my words of wisdom should be saved for posterity.