Iron Cross 2012, course recon

In my previous post I had decided to recon the 2012 Iron Cross course on my single speed mountain bike with ultra cross tires.  Well really I was riding the 2011 course which I assume will be similar.  And by ultra cross tires I mean a Continental 35mm Speed King cx tire on the front and a Scwalbe Marathon Mondial 35mm with double defense on the back (tubeless).

The Schwalbe Marathon Mondial setup tubeless was the tire that I was really wanting to test.  If it held well I plan to buy another for the race.  I also wanted to test my SS gear selection.  I went with 32x17 since I am new to single speeding and I wasn't sure how brutal the hills would be.

Overall I would say the course is generally tame but with a few fun and super challenging sections.  Maybe 45 miles tame and 15 miles of fun/tough stuff.  So maybe it is a "bad" course for a single speeder compared to something like Hilly Billy Roubaix which is almost constantly epic :)

There is a lot of paved road.  Then lots of well maintained gravel road with long, usually gradual climbs. So a tall gear would be great in those sections.  But then there is some Michaux single track where a shorter gear is good.

The course has some really nice parts.  The Lippenconte (sp?) trail section is classic Michaux single track with giant rocks and scenic woods.  In this video you can see me entering the trail and climbing a pretty technical initial section:

Other than this initial climb, there is one other dicey downhill section.  The rest of the trail is smoother single track.


Then after a long section of road including route 30, you climb a long gravel hill back into Michaux.  No extreme grades, just long.  And you find yourself at the reservoir (not the best video):

 Not too far from the reservoir is the killer run-up.  You have a semi-technical double track trail climb to get to it.  The first video is approaching it (looks like a giant wall in front of you).  The second video is me "hiking" it.

That run-up is going to really separate things.  And it is probably THE biggest decider in the race.  It is max heart rate action for well over 10 minutes.

That concluded day 1 recon.  Onto day 2 recon this time riding with The Goat (Greg Saylor).

There is a bunch of gravel road riding from mile 25 probably to 40ish.  That includes some more paved road.  Goat was on gears and was nearly sleeping as I spun out on my SS through this section.  Then we had a long climb on gravel roads again.  I made this video as we crested the top:

Then near the end of the course is a longish single track section that was so much fun i forgot to stop the video:

In terms of gearing I would say that 32x17 was too short. 32x16 is probably what i will ride if I do SS.  Decisions.  I'm probably not going to podium in the open.  And i risk hurting my CX bike on the single track.  I'll have a good shot for the podium in SS and there is less risk of mechanicals.  But the course is pretty tame except for a few great MTB sections.  I guess in the heat of racing the tame sections won't be too boring.  So I'll probably go SS.

To win this race I think you have to ride a cyclocross bike with fast rolling tires.  That was definitely not true at Hilly Billy Roubaix where it seemed that mountain bikes and cyclocross bikes were equal.

This recon ride would have been impossible without the breadcrumbs course feature in my Garmin 500.  Lifesaver! http://www.blog.ultracycle.net/2010/05/courses-on-the-garmin-edge-500

I'm looking forward to it!