The good, the bad and the muddy as an old man races Mohican

If you’ve never camped in the rain, then you’ve probably never camped. At least that’s what my own life experience has taught me. Gathering my tent, sleeping bag and all the other assorted gear it takes to make a reasonably comfortable go of it in the outdoors is as powerful as a full-blown Hopi rain dance.

The moment the universe knows I’m headed out, it starts aligning barometric highs and lows to shake the clouds loose right about the time I’m swinging the mallet on my first tent stake. This happens with such regularity that I am considering a retirement gig as a traveling rainmaker in arid regions of the world. I’d bet the Saudis would let me pitch a tent for a night or two if they got a look at my resume.

While a soggy campsite has never fully sank my plans, it can, admittedly, sap a bit of my enthusiasm when the reason for the excursion is actually a mountain bike race the next morning. It’s one thing to burrow down into your sleeping bag and fall asleep to the sound of raindrops on the nylon tent roof, but it’s entirely another to wake up before dawn and ride out into a mulch of mud that’s destined to coat you like a body cast in the first few miles of the race.

I haven’t boiled down the weather stats across the 16 years I’ve been participating in the annual Mohican 100 Mountain Bike Race, but memory strongly suggests it’s rained nearly every time. Still, I and buddies, rivals and hundreds of other similarly-minded kooks from across the continent continue to willingly line up under a big banner strung across Main Street and wait for the suffering to begin.

For me, the race has become an annual litmus test, the point of which is to prove I’m not too old to still act like I’m young. If I arrive at the finish line six or seven hours after the gun to crack a joyfully bewildered smile through an exoskeleton of dried mud, then I have accomplished my task. Once my battered knees and bloodied elbows heal a few days later, I immediately commit to doing the same darn thing all over again the following May.

This year the rain actually stopped a few hours before midnight the night before the race, and we emerged from our tents in the morning to a forecast containing none but the smallest chance of precipitation. That’s both a “good news” and “bad news” proposition — the good news being you’re less apt to drown in the saddle and the bad being the mud you’ll be wearing after the first few miles will remain with you throughout the day.

A mid-race rainstorm on a mud-covered day can actually prove both refreshing and advantageous in that aside from the brown pulp that’s filtered the whole way into your shorts, you stand a fair chance of being washed clean for a moment or two.

I did catch a single rumble of thunder as I pedaled my way through the backwoods of Mohican Country on race day, but I wasn’t quite lucky enough to make it under the single brief shower that passed through. It was just as well, as at that point I was already plodding toward the homestretch with a trail-spattered smile and big plans for next year’s race!

Kristin and John Lorson would love to hear from you. Write Drawing Laughter, P.O. Box 170, Fredericksburg, OH 44627, or email John at jlorson@alonovus.com.