On a day when the looming change of seasons became impossible to ignore, a weekend of stellar trail riding ended on a decidedly sour note.

We started our ride on Sunday just as an angry storm popped up over the mountains, a jack-in-the-box made of swirling clouds and lightning strikes. Even in Colorado it was startling to see the suddenness of the change, a skyful of churning darkness materializing out of clear blue, seemingly from out of the sun itself. One second I was chit-chatting with other folks at the trailhead about the beautiful weather – ‘couldn’t be better,’ they said as I agreed and grinned like a freaking idiot – and literally two minutes later the sky was a dark gray cauldron and we could see there would be no escape.

“Here it comes…” Heavy drops splattered the forest as we started rolling the first fifty yards of trail. Thunder ripped from the ridgeline above, where we were headed. The Old Man was not only rolling his barrel, he was blasting that thing apart with a sledgehammer. Violence in the air! Don’t exactly want to go up there. Then, like a last-minute reprieve from the governor, the rain quit and bright sun began to dry the dripping forest. Within minutes, the thunder was off rumbling in the distance like a distracted T-rex and steam was rising from the greenery, the dirt, and us. Some storms you dodge, and some hit you right between the eyes. This time we got lucky.

We would dodge a few more storms before ride’s end, but, sadly, this day wasn’t all fun and games and good luck.

There was another group embarking from the trailhead at about the same time we did. These three appeared to be fairly seasoned trail riders, and went off to tackle a popular 20-mile loop on Trail 800 while R.R. and I went to explore a different area. We rode for a long while and really took our time getting back as usual, so we were surprised to find this group’s car still at the trailhead. Then we noticed that the vehicles now parked on either side of it belonged to search-and-rescue crewmembers. A hand-written sign left in the window of one truck said “SAR mission in progress.” A radio left crackling in the cab of that truck allowed us to monitor a troubling situation while we stuffed our bikes into the Jeep.

Apparently, one of those three riders had been incapacitated somewhere on the back-side of the loop. Most likely he had crashed extremely hard and sustained a head injury; anyone who knows the trail could imagine the exact places where such a crash would be most likely to occur. Another undeniable possibility, on this day when multiple electrical storms scoured the area, is that he got nailed by lightning on one of many ridge-top sections. In any case, his condition was referred to as ‘critical’ several times. Four ground crews were en route from different starting points and there was a Flight for Life helicopter looking for some place to land.

The situation sounded bad on many levels. The crews were having a tough time communicating with each other and were clearly becoming frustrated. Some could not talk at all with others and needed to relay information through other crews. There was a lot of confusion about the various locations of crews, helicopter, and patient. Some of the EMTs were still moving to the patient with necessary equipment as he was being hauled in a litter by others to the helicopter, which was waiting at the closest suitable clearing nearly a mile away. To top it off, yet another storm had materialized and was trudging across the zone, and the entire contintent was about to go dark.

Imagine it. You just injured yourself badly – critically – in a crash on your mountain bike, deep in the rain-soaked woods. Luckily, you or a friend are able to call in help. EMTs, a helicopter. But it takes them an hour just to reach you. And then they’ve still got to deal with your injuries as best they can and haul you out on foot to the helicopter -- could be miles of rough trail, and another hour goes past. In the forest, decent spots to land a large chopper may be few and far between and the chances that you crash right next to one are pretty slim. The struggle to survive a critical injury is a war against time and you’re already in the hole. By the time you reach the proper medical attention it could very well be a moot point.

Sounds grim, eh? Really it could be far worse. It is unsettling to note that the viability of the scenario above, in which the downed rider eventually gets hauled off to the hospital, hinges on one thing: the cell phone. Without the cell phone there can be no rescue, period. If none of those three guys had a phone on board, they had to track down somebody or run into somebody who did. And their phone, of course, had to work, way up in the hills. Bottom line is the County Rescue doesn’t get moving until the call gets made. Now, if a mountain biker falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it …

I’ve never been all that excited about taking my phone along on trail rides. Hearing the play-by-play of this poor fellow’s drawn-out disaster has me retooling my thinking on that.

That’s where we left it, with the fallen rider being carried through the woods to the helicopter. We packed our equipment and drove out of there, feeling grim. We looked back into the latest storm and wondered if it would even be possible to fly a helicopter through it. So I can’t tell you how this one turned out. I hope he made it. I hope he’s sitting on his couch right now drinking a beer and thinking of his helicopter ride and the wild time he had in the woods the other day. Honestly, it didn’t sound good. I don’t know what happened but I do know it could have been any one of us out there.

Robert

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

So, what’s in your backpack?

I receive a fair bit of ribbing as well as puzzled looks for carrying so much equipment on trail rides. Even though I might not take a phone, I carry the bulk of what is necessary for a long ride in the high mountains of Colorado, where the weather changes suddenly, frequently, and with the occasional episode of unimaginable vengeance. Experience tells me I might, for a variety of reasons, be out well past nightfall – if things get really screwy I might even have to spend the night out there. That means in mid-summer my backpack probably contains:

Waterproof (well, sorta) shell
Expedition-weight top layer
Lightweight top layer
Thermal tights
Warm hat and gloves
Some water beyond what I can carry on the bike
Food
Tools, pump, patch kit, tube
Often some TriFlow
Compass, perhaps a map
Various talismans and sundries
A few matches
Phone???

Bigger rides demand bigger packs. The longer you ride, the higher you go, the more you need.

When the Storm Tubes of Vengeance come down on you at 11,000 feet, don’t come beggin to me for extra layers. Don’t be that guy. Instead, come prepared with your own bulky backpack of self-reliance.

An epic unsupported ride begins with the rider hauling some noticeable weight. If you’re not used to it (and most cyclists definitely are not) this can be quite uncomfortable; it may in fact produce the sensation of being choked by a pregnant orangutan. Carrying a full compliment of gear on all trail rides will help riders get used to the necessary challenges of riding with a backpack on longer rides.

R.H.

[Enlarge thumbnail: emptying the pack as the storm comes down.]