1200 Miles & a Cup O' Dirt & a little Mississippi Mud!

Take the year long challenge of completing a dozen or half a dozen dirty centuries and join the fun in December! Everybody who completes this challenge will be rewarded with a custom hand-made stoneware mug as well as be in a drawing for other prizes. Read the FAQ for details, and welcome to the fun!

I've increased the fun to give some more folks a shot at the cup - a bit 'watered down' - We'll have the 1200 Mile Cup O' Dirt and a 600 Mile Cup O' Mississippi Mud and new in 2008 is the 1/2 Liter O' Dirt - earned by completing 12 metric centuries in the year! A special award will be presented to anyone completing either a dirty century or metric century in each month of the year.

Thursday, August 06, 2009

18?! At one time?!? Are You CRAZY?

Yep.

Here's a little note from Joe Meiser - Trans-Iowa veteran... and now Trans United-freakin-States-via-the-freakin-Continental-Divide veteran - congrats Joe!
Dave,

Completed the Tour Divide Race on July 3rd. It's hard to say how many
centuries were in there for the 21.5 days that I rode. I know there
were at least three days under 100 miles, somewhere in the 50-85 mile
range. So I'll call it 18 centuries for the whole event, most of them
120+ mile days with some in the 140+ and three 170+ days. I guess I've
hit the goal...

Photos and info here: www.eojmeiser.blogspot.com

Feel free to use/post any of the Flickr photos that can be accesed via
the sidebar on my blog.

Thanks for putting this good fun on!

Joe

And this is from Nick in Ames:


Dave,

I saw you updated the site. It's good to know that there are other
crazy people out there trying for the cup! I did a sweet 165 miles on
Sunday last, riding up to Mallard, Iowa to see some family, then back
down to Humboldt along part of the Three Rivers trail. My girlfriend
thankfully picked me up in Humboldt so I didn't have to camp, but it
was a gorgeous day for such a long ride. That puts me at 9 full and 6
metric, exactly halfway for my projected three cup goal. I'm hoping
to get a full at the 24-hour race this year. Are you gonna be there
again for the fun? (maybe!-ed)

~Nick

Saturday, August 01, 2009

July Cup' Dates

I've been lurking - reading your email entries - and waiting for a little computer time to update the site - and as that little ride across Iowa came and went - I decided to do a cumulative update for July -there's been alot of riding going on!

Nick Wethington is A) enjoying his Cup (read on)and B) enjoying his bike. He's now racked up 8 full and 5 metric centuries - and only has a little road rash to show for it! He's been riding with Matt Maxwell and the two are exploring every dirty little nook and cranny of Story and Boone counties!

Dave,

Well, I just got my 2008 cup, and let me tell you, coffee tastes much
better from a mug earned than one bought. It's also inspired me to
continue my quest for at least two but hopefully three cups in 2009.
I got another century in three weeks ago. I rode out to Seven Oaks
from Ames, met up with some friends there and did a lap, then rode
back, switched to my gravel bike and rode down to Big Creek. I took a
short nap at Big Creek by the lake, then rode back to Ames to get
about 102 miles. It seemed more like a series of shorter rides than a
century, and the nap in the middle made it feel like little work at
all! I've also done two metrics since I last wrote, so that puts me
at 5 full and 5 metric. Now that summer is in full swing I expect to
get a few more under my belt before the weather turns cold again.
Thanks, as always, for inspiring to ride just a little bit more.

~Nick Wethington


From our friend in Mizzou: (this is an early entry - but I liked the story!)

Dave,

Put me down for another metric.

Last Saturday I raced in the Lumberjack 100, except for me it ended up the Lumberjack 50. I broke not one, but two spokes on my second 25-mile lap. I decided to DNF the race, but was still able to get in a total of 62 miles by riding service roads in the park. Plus I had five hours to kill waiting for by buddies to finish.

This wasn't the century I was looking for, but it was the most fun so far.

Have a great day,

Tim Riekena
Chillicothe, MO


And from Colorado, as Drew prepares to battle a 'race ready' Lance Armstrong:

Did my third metric of the year last Friday....a pre-ride on the Leadville 100 course from Leadville to Twin Lakes Dam and back. Eighty miles total, but 10-15 on pavement. A legit 62 or more on the dirt though...will try to post to my blog soon!?

Did it solo in about 7.5 hours....too bad those fast guys do the whole hundred in that time or less! Rain threatened most of the day but never materialized in any major way. Should be stacking them up with a bit more regularity through the rest of the year between events and training.

Hope everyone is well in Dirty Cup land. Would love the opportunity to hook up at Cheq if the schedules permit!

Drew Miller
Buena Vista, CO



And Pete Lira is knocking off centuries left and right down in the heat and hills of Kansas:

Hey Dave,

Had some great fun this weekend in Madison Kansas. The Flint hills Deathride was 81 mile this year. What is great about this ride is that it is different each year. This was my 6th trip down and I still found myself on new gravel.

Pete Lira


Up in NE Iowa - David G is cranking out mile after mile - and kilometer after kilometer - he's up to 20 metrics this year - I'm so proud of that boy!!!!

Ben Shocky isn't asleep either - as he's taking advantage of a broken frame and getting a full hundy in. (what? His race bike broke - so he decided to ride a long gravel ride since he couldn't race... - We're sorry to hear about your bike!)

And a whole group from Des Moines had fun on the chase:

Dave,

Congrats on the tri yesterday! Still, you missed out on a pretty fun ride. Sedore, Oakley Rob, Kurt Benson, Fuller, Joe from BW West, and myself took off from Legends on 60th and Ashworth and the crack of dark Saturday night which equates to roughly 10:20 PM after some food and liquid fueling. Heading west on EP True we went baja style riding through the dead end past Jordan Creek and eventually worked our way down to Booneville road and over to Booneville proper by 11. We briefly debated the first beer stop of the evening, but eventually bypassed the Waveland in favor of heading to the Cumming Tap for our first round of the evening. We hit the tap somewhere need midnight and split a pitcher between us while Kurt also thought it was necessary to bolster our spirits with a round of Red Bulls as well. Most everyone chugged theirs down, but I wisely packed away that gem for a later pick me up.

From Cumming we decided to try for last call in Martensdale. A mile or so out of town we had our first flat of the evening on Joe’s trusty La Cruz. Now here’s how you can tell you’re in Iowa. Here we were at 1ish in the morning, a group of 6 guys standing around working on a bike and 2 separate cars happened to roll by, both checking to make sure we were good to go and offering to shine their headlights on the situation to help. We got the flat repaired in time to make last call. After another pitched split, we headed back from whence we came. Somewhere about halfway back to Cumming we decided to stop and break out some food. I think we were all feeling a bit punchy at the time as the stop also included a rousing game of duck-duck goose played in the midst of the gravel road in the wee hours of Sunday morning. We wound our way back through the Booneville loop and made our final break at the Waveland west where we enjoyed their great hospitality. Of course they weren’t actually open at 4 in the morning (who knew?), but we did find the patio furniture to be quite inviting. After a bit more snacking on processed meat sticks aka Slim Jim’s, we headed back towards town only to stop for the 2nd flat of the evening.

Rather than run through the bigger rollers on Booneville road, we opted to head back out to Grand and roll it double file paceline style clear down to Raccoon River Park to let the heckling and shananigans begin for the Hy-Vee Tri. All told, I showed 68 miles and change with 3000’ of climbing for our overnighter along with more laughing, fun, and folly than I can remember having for a long time. One punctuation to the evening was experiencing flying down the various hills at 25+ mph in the pitch of night which was thrilling and terrifying at the same time. I finally rolled back home and to bed around 10:30 after having eclipsed the 26th hour of awake time before dropping like a ton of bricks for a few hours nap.

Thanks,

Rick


Adding to that - Fuller wandered around with some friends for dirty hundy with some friends while the rest of the state was gathering in Council Bluffs for RAGBRAI -

Went on a little Death Ride with Guitar Ted, David Pals, Jeremy Fry,
Craig and Doug on Saturday morning. Left West Union around 7:00 AM.
Got back quite a while later. Camped out, drank some beers, rode some
flats, climbed a few hills, enjoyed the conversation and scenery, and
had damn good time. 118 miles, 9994 feet of climb. Route link: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/9148382

Steve Fuller


Finally - one thing I suck at is mailing stuff - I've got Cups headed to Cedar Falls via the State Road Race, Dubuque via the mail and to Mr. Never Rest via the mail - sorry it takes so danged long - but the Cups are like a fine wine - better aged!

Peace all and safe riding! - Dave