The Dirty Kanza, which is a challenging ultra-distance bicycling marathon event covering 200 miles of blacktop, gravel, and dirt roads through the scenic Flint Hills of eastern Kansas, ran on May 31st, with a field of 66 riders.
When the race finally ended, over 20 hours later, 42 riders had crossed the finish line, which is a remarkably high percentage for such a grueling event.
The race was won by Cameron Chambers in a record time of 11:58:32. Averaging nearly 17 miles an hour, for 12 hours straight, over some of the roughest and hilliest roads in the state, is an incredible pace, and beat the old course record by a significant margin.
The top five was rounded out by Dan Hughes (of Sunflower Outdoor and Bike), Tim Mohn (High Gear Cyclery), Jim Cummins (High Gear Cyclery), and Matt Gersib (Salsa/Monkey Wrench Cycles), all of whom finished in under 14 hours.
Endurance cyclists love to share their stories, and here are a few you can read for yourself:
- kcdirtbikeracing (Cameron Chambers) #1
- TheDirtBlog (Matt Gersib) #5
- Cornbread (Corey Godfrey) #7
- thediscerninghobo (Joshua Stamper) #8 (#1 SingleSpeed)
- Stay out of trees (Stephen Goetzelman) #12
- Cycle City KC (Joe Fox) #14
- The Life of LeLan (LeLan Dains) #16
- EnduroSnob (Christopher Cronin) #20
- Velo Soiree (Mike Beck) #22
- Hiawatha Cyclist (Micah Bicker) #30
- Zen Biking (Steve Fuller) #36
- Meetzorp! (Michelle Davis) DNF
- 9TOES (Randy Gregorcyk) DNF
Read more: full results, MBTR discussion
Congratulations to everyone who participated in this epic event — wish I coulda been there!
Another DK200 write-up: Salsa Cycles