Duo at Old Pueblo

The hardest way to race 24 hours. 

The fine line between Character and Ego.

A man with strong character conjures images of cowboy hats, proud chests, set jaws, and a handshake that seems to wrap and squeeze entire bodies.  Yes, I spend a lot of time watching Westerns and my farmer Grandpa, while no longer here, still sits proudly atop a ’47 Farmall tractor in overalls and a hat, in my 9-yr-old memory.  Character.  Honor.  Men among men.  

Ego, well, that’s a dangerous one.  That fancy bit of identity not only gets me out of bed shortly before sunrise ready to take on the day but it also tells me that a black diamond trail, a 100-mile race, a multi-day international bikepacking route, or 24 hours of lap riding in the desert are all well within my reality.  Ego gets me to the start line.  It also sets me firmly on my ass with a cholla sticking out of my arm.  It puts me fighting for more with angrily gritted teeth instead of firmly set jaws.  Ego draws the ugly side of my competitive fire and turns casual pedalers out for a nice lap around the Sonoran Singletrack Sensation into nasty little demons who are simply in my way. 

Brian and I set our 24-Hr-Duo race strategy with character in mind and little dose of ego sprinkled on top.  The Parmesan cheese on our meaty lasagna of excellence.  Because the 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo is a 24 hour race and because any Duo strategy that stacked laps seeks only to allow for rest (read: sleep) then approaching the 2026 24HOP with any plan other than 1-for-1 lap exchanges was not for men of character.  No.  We will compete the full 24 hours, as a team, without any attempt to put to the sleep the dragon.  This is the pure way we told ourselves.  

Oh how we’d become intimately aware of how hefty a strong sense of character could be.   

So little time…

Our lap times got slower as day grew to night.  But, not by much.  While we pinned a few laps under an hour, the going rate of speed put each of us out on course for an hour and a few minutes on average.  Here’s the timeline of how things happened:

After an hour or so: I come screaming into the exchange tent.  I dismount, jog to our transition table, hand Brian a little wooden dowel, and let the volunteers know “Justin in. Brian out.” And off he goes, running to his staged bike and pedaling onto course. 

4 minutes later: I’m back at my van and look over my bike: tire pressure and drivetrain, and kick off my shoes.  

10 minutes post-lap: In the van I tear off my sweaty gear, put on dry clothes, chug some ReHab recovery drink, and prepare something to eat.  After uploading my individual lap data and heart-rate data, I check the live results online to see what time Brian went out.  

18 minutes post-lap: Simple math tells me I’ve got to set a timer for… dammit… only 28 minutes.  In just 28 minutes I need to get up and put on my cycling gear, grab the bike, and pedal to the transition area.  I haven’t even eaten my food yet! 

46 minutes post-lap: I’m out of my chair, grabbing a set of dry chamois (not the pair I just pulled off, no sir, they haven’t had time to dry and a well-cared-for-undercarriage is a happy undercarriage), lathering on a fresh bit of nut cream, alternating a pull of my socks with a pull of my caffeinated drink (coffee, Red Bull, Alani, Prime), and grabbing the driest of my two helmets.  

54 minutes post-lap: I’m leaning my bike against a cactus, tree, rock, or sign.  Its nose turned onto course and the left pedal crank rotated to 10 o’clock.  My Wahoo computer is in my hand and I circle around to the entrance of the transition tent threading my way through the throng of racers waiting for their partners to arrive.  I set myself on the fringe of the mob and double check that my heart rate monitor is snapped in and my Wahoo is primed to start our lap.  

57 minutes post-lap: My laser-focused eyes catch every detail entering the tent.  I’m looking for a not-quite-short but surely not tall speed demon who looks like a super-fit Cupid-like cherub with a surprisingly full, blonde mustache to come hot-footing into the tent.  The anticipation forces me into some half-hearted squats, you know, to get the blood flowing from my long rest.  

58 to 68 minutes post-lap: There he is!  I rip off my down jacket and toss it over the Lost & Found table, which has become our temporary closet, and grab the teeny tiny wooden dowel.  We exchange a marbled version of a word or two and I’m running toward my bike, tapping Start on my Wahoo, and expertly swinging atop my bike-horse.  A helmet-headed, spandex-clad, tattooed man of character is on course! 

And again.  

Again.

And again.

11 times actually. 

Once night came we also had to squeeze in charging our lights and addressing the bodily functions that come with trashy calorie consumption.

My rest timer moved around between 28 and 35 minutes but never any more.  The food choices went from robust to barely there.  I even entertained the thought of some fasted laps as my appetite disappeared sometime after the SpaceX rocket launch decorated the night sky.  With calories in being so critically important for the opportunity to have calories out I’d always find a way to cram a bit more down my gullet.  In order: Fruity Pebbles, leftover spaghetti, soda and chips, pizza, Fruity Pebbles, donut, popcorn and more chips, recovery drink, granola with protein powder, hot coffee and coffee cake, Red Bull and Nerds gummy clusters, plantain chips and popcorn, only the broth from some ramen noodles, more Red Bull and Nerds.  

People ask me if this sport is healthy?  

Yeah, most of the time. 

No, not in these times. 

The Duo format hurts not because of the riding.  It hurts because of the load of work done while not riding.  Around us teams of 4, corporate teams, and less competitive teams frolic about with their BBQ’s roasting wonderful meals, fire pits creating pleasant little lounges, and cracking cold drinks and sipping them with joy.  The others.  They really know how to have a good time in the desert.  

We nod to them.  For just a second.  Maybe even giving them a raised hand and a smile.  But we cannot stop.  We haven’t got any time to waste.   

But you CAN go faster.

Time never stops.  Every second matters.  That’s why it is called a race.  

And you can go faster.  

Faster on the flats, faster while climbing The Bitches, faster on the twisty bit of trail between miles 5 and 6.7.  Faster on the hard turns around The Whiskey Tree.  Definitely faster up the chunky climb to the High Point.  We can be faster running to our staged bikes and even quicker pulling the dowel out of our pocket.  With only a lap to race we can burn matches more furiously than the solo riders who will be pedaling the entire 24 hours and… because we are experienced racers we feel we have the mojo to out pace even the 4-man teams who enjoy longer rest intervals.  

Yes, we can go faster.  

So we try.  

Again, and again, and because Brian went faster on the last lap, and because this lap didn’t have bad trail traffic, and because we need to shorten the gap that 1st place is putting on us and because we need to be sure 3rd place can’t catch us.  Because it’s a race.  

We can go faster.  Less braking into that one corner.  A harder gear up that little punch of a climb.  Just a little faster in little ways. 

So we try.  

Improvements.  …for next time.

Dawn to Dusk MTB Adventures came to the 2026 24HOP to win the Duo category.  In 24 of the past 25 years riding 23 laps would guarantee victory (in 2024 Lachlan Morton and Taylor Lideen pulled off a heroic 11x11+2 strategy that had them set the record and win the entire event as a Duo.  They are an anomaly.) so we set our goal at 23 laps.    

We rode 23 laps. 

We got 2nd place.    

There are no plans for a “next time”.  This was my 3rd 24-hour race as a Duo, I’ve also done Solo, and I’ve done a handful of 4-person teams.  Duo racing for 24 hours, with a 1:1 strategy, and trying to win is the most challenging way to spend a day racing bikes.  Harder than ultra-distance events and far more taxing than shorter, max-pace race events.  There are no plans to demonize our 2nd place finish, or tack on the highly-motivating label “Unfinished Business” and make plans for February 2027.  I couldn’t be more content with the effort given by Brian and I.  I couldn’t ask for a better Duo partner.  That guy can just flat out race and carries the ferocity of a wolverine and the grit of an ol’ timey miner.      

But if we did…

Here’s what we could change:

1. Have a crew.  Brian’s parents came to 24HOP and always lent a smile, a check-in, some killer photographs, and a timely hot pizza delivery, but they weren’t taxed with being our crew.  As experienced VanLifers and racers we are competent enough to take care of our needs between laps however, that takes a lot of precious energy: physically and mentally.  A crew could take care of our bike should things get wonky, have our food prepped for us so we could eat immediately after our laps, and give us those oh-so-critical “attaboys” in the wee hours of the night.  They would stage our bikes and help us organize our gear while we were out on course.  Courage is admitting when we need help.  We could’ve used help.

2. Fuel on the bike.  The critical minutes outlined above are just that, minutes.  In that short window we were attempting to fuel our bodies for a 2 hour interval.  25 minutes of eating for 2 hours.  We simply ran out of time.  Our strategy had us on course without any fuel in our bottles.  In the course of my 12 laps (about 195 miles), I had exactly 2 sips of plain water while on the bike.  Racing at full speed around a twisty course that dances perilously close to cactus with the ability to literally jump into your skin requires both hands on the handlebars nearly the entire time.  I should’ve used those rare moments of straightforward pedaling to drink a high-carb mix from my bottles.  A little eating here and there adds up over time.  Just ask anyone with an addiction to soda.

3. AirTags.  I’m not sure how this impacts the spirit of the event but there were a few laps where I made sure to be prepped in the transition tent and found myself waiting for 5-10 minutes.  Again, time is precious.  Those minutes would’ve been better enjoyed sitting in my van with my fat face into some calories.  Having a teammate capable of sub-1-hr laps at any point in time is awesome for the race, tough on the anxiety.  Stick an airtag on that speed demon and I could maximize my downtime.  

4. Get faster.  Dissecting the details of our effort must always start with the biggest component: ourselves.  It was so famously said many moon ago, “it doesn’t get easier.  You just get faster.”  

The 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo guarantees a memorable story for every team, every time.  Chasing a category win, ripping your very first nighttime race lap, playing bikes in the Burning Man of MTB, and embracing the heckling at the infamous Rock Drop tug the heart strings of any cyclist.  What’s the best way to spend Valentine’s Day?  Racing bikes with your dirtbag buddies in the desert.  Don’t believe me?  Just ask my wife.  

Lifetime 24HOP Results:

2020: 5th Place 4-Man (20 laps)

2022: 2nd Place 4-Man (22 laps)

2025: 1st Place 4-Person SS (21 laps)

2026: 2nd Place Duo Men (23 laps)