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Niceville bike rider Talley finds love for long-distance races
Jennifer Talley had her first bike stolen. She was, as she put it, “a poor undergraduate student.” She couldn’t afford another bike for years.
Jennifer Talley had her first bike stolen.
She was, as she put it, “a poor undergraduate student.” She couldn’t afford another bike for years.
VIDEO: View a video of Talley training.
Then her car broke down one day, and she began commuting to graduate school. It was less about preference and more necessity.
Now it’s about choice – she and boyfriend T.J. Klausutis choose to ride 200 miles, choose to walk through 4 miles of mud in the mid-America summer heat, choose to start a race one day and finish the next.
Niceville residents and civilian workers at Eglin Air Force Base, Talley and Klausutis started the Dirty Kanza 200 in Emporia, Kan., on the morning of May 30. They finished 19 hours and 20 minutes later, on May 31.
“I think it was 1:30 in the morning when we finally rolled across the finish line,” she said.
That included two stops for food, two stops for water and a handful number of miscellaneous stops, such as a bathroom break. There were checkpoints at 78 miles and 158 miles each requiring a 10 mph pace and Talley and Klausutis both comfortably made it.
That’s not to say they were anywhere near the top of the field.
It was less about winning and more about finishing, a mighty accomplishment considering most people hesitate driving 200 miles. Yet Talley was among 1,000 people who signed up, started and eventually regretted the decision somewhere along the way.
“There’s always that point in a race when you want to quit,” said Talley, who has completed five 100-mile races. “Usually, that comes about three-quarters of the way in. This is the only time it came about halfway through.
“You’re thinking, ‘Why did I sign up for this? Why am I putting myself through this? I could be drinking right now.’ ”
This is a mountain bike rider who makes the rounds through the United States, even outside the continent, for annual long-distance competitions. Talley, along with Klausutis, will head to Colorado in August for the Leadville Trail 100 race, which winds through the high altitude of the Rockies. Then the pair will head to Costa Rica in November for their first try at the three-day, three-stage adventure ride called La Ruta de los Conquistadores.
“We try to take most of our vacation time in Colorado,” Talley said, “to get acclimated to the terrain.”
Sure, that helps. But the Dirty Kanza was a different monster – it had nothing to do with the lack of oxygen in the air, but the amount of dirtiness on the ground. Yes, there was some climbing, a lot of hills, but it was the miles-long mud fields that really took their toll.
“You couldn’t peddle through them because it’s too sticky and deep,” Talley said. “You couldn’t walk the bike through it, because it was too muddy. If you get mud between the wheels and frame, it could stop pedaling.”
The answer was hopping off the bike, hoisting it above the shoulders and carrying it through these mud patches, one even lasting 4 miles. At times, riders even had to remove the wheels from the bike, clean them and put the bike back together. If the mud clogs or breaks anything, the bike could become a single-gear operation or not operable at all.
“As much as we hated that,” Talley said, “we didn’t have a choice.”
So anything she does later this year will be far less demanding. Talley and Klausutis made a choice to go through one of the most brutal bike races in the world – and they came out the other side.