Race Report: Into Day 11

The weather has continued to torment racers and make for ride-ending conditions.  Since our last update, we have had seven racers drop-out, one announce his intention to cease racing and continue touring, and one disqualify himself.  The scratch list so far includes:

1. Kevin Hall
2. Cadet pulls out with a bad knee!
3. Bruce Giroux (Disqualified himself after missing a section in the Flathead addition but intends to continue)
4. Matt Thourot
5. Jeff Kerby
6. John Nobile
7. Kevin Dean
8. Steve McGuire
9. Josh Ficke
10. Jeff Naylor
11. Justin Kline (intends to continue touring the route)
12. Martin Rendl (Disqualified himself after skipping a section between Lincoln and Helena but intends to continue)

Of the original field of 42, only 30 racers remain.  While the attrition rate is not abnormally high for this stage of the race, we are noticing the weather is finally cracking the racers.  Racers have had to endure 50 mile-per-hour winds, hail and torrential rains through the Basin which will likely cause more drop-outs.

As of Rawlins, WY, Matt Lee was only 2:40 behind record pace.  Considering the daily storms he has had to endure thus far, this is an impressive pace to keep.  Luckily for Matt and the other race leaders, it appears they will be seeing a break in the storms as they head into the Steamboat Springs, CO.  With the break in the storms, it would not be surprising to see Matt to jump back ahead of record pace.

The Chase

Since nearly closing the gap in Lima, the chase group has lost some ground.  As of Rawlins, Matt's lead over Chris Plesko and Kurt Refsnider has grown to 17 hours.  That said, the hourly total is slightly misleading: presently they are less than 40 miles behind Matt.  As previously predicted, Jay and Tracey Petervary made up a significant amount of ground in the Basin and are merely 1:40 behind Chris and Kurt.  Given how close these racers are to each other, it would not take much of a slip for anyone to gain, or keep, the lead.

Race Media

Over the weekend, a number of fans were able to get out on the route and take photos.  Jay and Tracey have had a number of photos uploaded to their website.  Additionally, James Perdue snapped a bunch of pictures of racer's coming through the Centennial Valley (see page 2).  Finally, Andy Buchanan emailed in a set of photos from when he met up with Racers around Lima, MT, which I've attached below.