Words by ambassador Delia Massey. Photos by Delia Massey and Mallory Noweles.



- The first snack stop, which was hidden in my friend’s Subaru in the Tiger Mountain parking lot, and consisted of a smorgasbord of pumpkin pie, cheese, and crackers, hot cider spiked with whiskey, Rainier, and Oreos, among other things.
- Retrieving a backpack of snacks and beer hidden in the woods just where a Department of Fish and Wildlife officer happened to be posted up on some doubletrack looking for people who might be breaking the law. We had to assure him we were just a bunch of hungry cyclists who needed our snacks, and that there was nothing illicit about our concealed stash. The officer was very nice about the whole thing, and I think he just thought our lycra-clad group was funny and maybe a bit insane.
- Riding through fresh snow near the top of Raging River to finish out our total elevation gain of almost 6,000 feet, and then getting to do an epic descent down the logging road past bemused mountain bikers.
- Taking a shortcut through the casino parking lot a few miles from the finish, which ended in a locked chain-link fence that blocked our exit out to the road. Everyone was cold and tired and unwilling to ride back up the hill we came down, so the only logical choice was to hop the fence. As we started passing bikes up and over the fence, a casino security van slowly rolled towards us, and we began throwing ourselves and our bikes over the fence as fast as we could. We escaped without any confrontation and made it back to our cars in the rain as it started to get dark.


