Finishing 37th in the Ski to Sea race is a moral victory

"In case they needed to identify my body," I said.

I was only sort of kidding.

As it turns out, the mountain bike course I had so dreaded turned out to be survivable Sunday, even for me. But I did manage to gum up the works for Team Sehome Diner, one of more than 400 squads of eight masochists, each struggling to cover the 90 miles from Mount Baker to Bellingham Bay.

We got off to a bang-up start. Our team ranked in the top 10 in our "mixed recreation" division of 68 after Emjay, my wife, cruised the 8K cross-country ski course, snowboarder Andy Murray made a sterling ascent/descent of Pan Dome, downhill runner Diana Robinson burned up the 8.5 miles of knee-pounding Mount Baker Highway, and cyclist Lisa Kaufman ably handled the 38.5 miles of roadway to Everson.

Our canoeists, Sandi Mitchell and Tim Jollimore of Vancouver, expanded on that success, blazing 18 miles down the Nooksack River in just over two hours. When they handed off to me in Ferndale, we still stood ninth in our division. And that's where things slowed down just a bit.

OK, a lot.

The first mile of my leg was easy. Then came the hayfield — about a mile of what looked like carefree riding over mowed hay, but in fact, for a big-galoot rider like me, was like riding through a sand trap, thanks to the soft earth. I struggled just to stay upright in the jet wash of smaller, lighter riders blowing by me on both sides.

Only two miles into the 14-mile course, my legs were screaming. None of my training had prepped me for that Not Great Sahara experience.

The rest of the race is something of a blur, punctuated by three words that will burn in my brain all the way until next year: "On your left!" I'm not sure how many people passed me. At some point, I stopped counting and went straight to mumbled apologies.

But, being in this race just to finish, I paced myself and tried to smile through the worst it had to offer: Curbs, blind-alley turns, and protruding blocks of concrete along back alleys in Ferndale. Long stretches of soft single-track, laced with saplings, deep sawdust and other obstacles.

And then the real soul-sucker: A two-mile stretch at Bellingham Airport marked by a swamp full of shin-deep mud, in a grove of alders only shoulder-width apart, followed by a rolling grass field studded with bone-jarring root clumps from waist-deep grass. Having little pride and wanting to live to profusely sweat another day, I dismounted and carried my bike through parts of that.

A half-mile from the finish came the coup de grace — a quarter-mile section of abandoned railroad tracks, where the fill material between the ties had long ago sunk into the mire. Imagine, if you will, riding over what feels like a long line of broadside 4-by-6s on open ground.

My sunglasses whapped up against the top of my helmet from the impact. My brain rattled and my vision blurred. My arms went numb and felt detached from my body. But truthfully, I was so drained at that point, it almost seemed comical: like the homestretch of the Three Stooges Invitational.

Eventually, unmercifully, it ended, and, after a literal crawl up a six-foot bank of slimy clay, the finish line loomed right around the corner. I summoned the last of my resolve to bring it home fast, finishing in just over 90 minutes. Our sea kayaker, Ken Wallace powered across Bellingham Bay, bringing team Sehome Diner in at 37th place in our division.

The ugly truth: The top riders did the mountain bike course in 42 minutes. If we'd had even an average Joe in my spot, our team would've finished top-15 in its class.

But I'll take the moral victory. I finished. I wasn't last. And my teammates, bless them, were thrilled with the day's events. That's the kind of race Ski to Sea is for most people — a free-spirited event that gets ordinary folks out training on the mountains, streams and horrifying mountain bike obstacles that we like to call home.

If I ever do it again, I'll do two things differently.

One, remember to unlock my shock fork before the railroad tracks.

Two: On my back, above my race bib number, I'll affix a sign with lettering that would make thing easier on everyone involved:

"JUST GO AROUND."

Ron Judd: 206-464-8280 or at rjudd@seattletimes.com