First Place at the Last Best Ride

The first rule of creating a gravel event is you need a good name. The range of “good” is broad, so if you’re in the business of creating an event, put on your thinking cap and come up with something… good.

The Last Best Ride in Whitefish, MT successfully checked off that first rule. TBR is the brainchild of our good friends Jess Cerra and Sam Boardman. During our van trip during the summer of 2020, one of the absolute standout stops was in the “last best place”, Montana. It’s just so wild and expansive and magnificent, that it was a no-brainer when Jess and Sam said they’re creating an event and we had the free time on the calendar, we were going to make the trip happen.

Leadboat was the previous weekend which is what kickstarted this August trip. We took on the self proclaimed Family Leadboat Challenge, which consisted of flying to Colorado, driving from Denver to Steamboat, Laura and her friend Kristin going to Leadville for one night, racing Leadville early the next day, me attending rides, being part of some SBT pre-race busy’ness, playing with Hazel, Laura coming home late Saturday so that I could race SBT on Sunday. It sounds simple, perhaps in the grand scheme of life it is, but staring at the details it’s all a bit more complicated. Anyway, Laura raced Leadville and I raced Steamboat and we both got 12th, so that’s cute.

We then piled in the family fun wagon and drove 15 hours from Colorado to Montana. Hazel’s a champ and giggles, stares out the window, and cries if she’s hungry or just bored during long road trips. Yep, we’re lucky.

We got to town here in Whitefish on Wednesday which has been a great way to settle in since the race wasn’t until Sunday. Plus that gave us immediate time to appreciate that Whitefish is 3,000 feet lower than Steamboat — something us low landers seem to enjoy. Namely, breathing. Speaking of breathing, coincidentally, two days before SBT the smoke that’s plaguing the west coast cleared out of Colorado but moved it north to Montana thanks to the wind patterns. And then in the day or two before Last Best Ride, the winds shifted again and we got clean air, so that was terrific since I’m not much of a smoker.

There was rain in the forecast throughout LBR weekend, which puts everyone on edge, but since this is gravel and isn’t a downtown city criterium, who really cares?! It only materialized in some rain on Saturday which cleared the air, moistened the ground, and made for cool muddy photos afterwards.

What a rad weekend. I won, which is a fun reason to put your arms in the air. I’ll be honest, when I saw Howard Grotts on the start list and knowing that there’s a grizzly 5 mile climb to the top of the ski area near the end of the race, I figure the race was to second place. I stuck with him early on the climb, he then vanished into the fog for the next 45 minutes. But then at the very tip top, I could see a silhouette in the distance and caught him at the very summit. Then fast-forward to the finish and I won the dash to the line.

I got in a podcast with Sarah Sturm, chef Matt Accarrino made us an unofficially Michelin starred meal, Laura hung out with her sisters (which is how we pulled off this adventure; that is, Hazel could hang with her aunties while mom and dad recreated on bicycles), and then I got to clean some bikes. Fun day, fun weekend, fun bookend to a trip.

And now back to VT!