8-1-10 Update: GPS Tracks and Cue Sheets are up! Couldn’t find a good way to get everyone back for less than 50 miles for the short course without pulling out the coolest parts of the ride. It’s a pretty ‘easy’ 50 miles, with about 30 miles of forest roads and not a lot of climbing. Believe me, you’ll be fine, just man up and do it.

7-28-10 update: got the ‘full’ course mapped out below along with the GPS track for download. Still working on a shorter version.

So you were all set on doing the Crazy 88 this year, and that damn fire put a damper on things.

Fear not, loyal endurance fanatic. I’ve mustered all the brainpower and trail knowledge I can come up with, and am putting together a sweet alternative.

Since the fire rained on our parade, we’re going to get a bit of retribution and take a tour (via some sweet singletrack and a smattering of forest roads) of as many burn areas as I can map out on the north and west side of the San Francisco peaks. It’s been appropriately dubbed the “Turn and Burn”.

Since it’s so last minute, this is more of a group ride than a race, but it’ll still be a good time (and I’m gonna have a few sweet prizes still as well, so we’ll come up with some deserving reasons that people should take them home, and if not, we’ll just raffle them off)

The camping area can be found by punching in the coordinates 35.36121, -111.74628 to google maps.

Basically, this is a big campsite about 6 miles from the south end of FR151. There’s tons of room for everyone who wants to camp, as this is basically a little forest road with nothing on it but a few awesome campsites.

Note: If you get directions to the site via google maps, it will send you up FR794, which is NOT a good road to drive (especially in a low-clearance vehicle). If you take 151, most passenger cars should make it with no problems whatsoever. FR 151 is a big horseshoe, with the south end hitting 180 just north of baderville (about 6 miles out of town). Coming in from the north end has a pretty steep climb and a couple big rocks in the road. You could probably do it in a passenger car, but I think the southern approach is better.

The course is around 65 miles for the full, with about half of that being (super-sick) singletrack and half being forest roads. The total climbing is right around 6500 feet.

The short course is 50 miles and about 4000′ of climbing. It’s exactly the same as the long course up to mile 50, where you hightail it back to camp a couple miles of forest roads, whereas the full course goes out for another 2500′ of climbing on about 15 miles of singletrack. You should be able to scope it out on the map below, just connect the dots where the full course starts heading south after crossing 180. Keep going straight and then take a left up to the campsite.

View Larger Map

GPS Tracks and Cue Sheets:
Note: There is only 1 gps track, because the short option basically just stays on FR794 after we cross back over highway 180, and heads back to camp, whereas the long version follows the full route. See the cue sheets for more info.
Full GPS Track
GPS Waypoints for Major Turns
PDF of cue sheet
Full Map (jpg format)

Note: all GPS tracks are in GPX format, right click to download and ‘save as…’. They are NOT split into 500 point segments for download to garmin units. Grab a copy of Topofusion and have at it.

I HIGHLY recommend a GPS if you have one, as I’m not marking the course this year. It’s not too bad to follow, up until the last 15 miles (of the full course), where there is a lot of jumping on and off forest roads. I will have copies of the cue sheets and maps printed on race morning as well.

There will be an aid station somewhere around mile 33 with refills on beverages and food to help you along the way (some courtesy of Hammer Nutrition, who has graciously donated some gels and Heed). We’ll have something salty, something sweet, some bananas, and anything else I can come up with.

As you probably expected, there will be a couple kegs of beer courtesy of New Belgium, and a keg of homebrew for the after-race festivities. I’ll be providing burgers, hot dogs, and some assorted other side dish goodies as well. I’ve even heard a rumor that the Bevinator may be making her famous cookies again as well……

The shindig will officially start at 8am on Saturday, August 7th at the camping/staging area, but please come out and camp on friday and saturday nights. It’s gonna be a great weekend to be out there!

P.S. If you signed up for the 88 via the old web form and haven’t told me you’re bailing, consider yourself registered. If you haven’t registered yet, throw a comment down below and let me know (or leave me a note or a question if you’re so inclined).