Undeterred by the inclement weather, a few Bellingham cyclists headed south on Saturday, April 27 for the Cascadia Super Gravel, a 100-mile, 50-mile, or 30-mile bike race on logging roads and singletrack in Olympia’s Capitol State Forest.
Since its official inception in 2017, the Cascadia Super Gravel, or CSG, has earned notoriety for its hilliness, technicality, tricky navigation and often heinous weather.
Last weekend’s event was no outlier. Meteorologists were calling for between a tenth- and a quarter-inch of rain through the day, and even when it wasn’t actively precipitating, a shroud of moisture hung in the air, dripped from vegetation and accumulated in deep clay-colored puddles on sections of the route.
Cam Sloan directs the CSG as well as the Cascadia Dirt Cup, an enduro mountain bike race series that includes Bellingham’s NW Tune-Up Galbraith Enduro. He takes a perverse pleasure in the event’s reputation.
“One thing this race has never lacked is an abundance of opinions,” Sloan said. “Fortunately, feedback on this year’s showing was generally positive.”
Sloan said that with almost 130 miles of active road in play (the course is still open to other users, which can include anyone from target shooters to horseback riders to people collecting firewood), the most challenging part of the CSG is getting the course right and coming up with an effective safety plan.
“I think that people were able to separate the weather from the race, which as the promoter, I am eternally grateful for, and really just take it for what it is,” he said. “People spoke highly of the singletrack, the aid stations and the absurdity of the whole thing.”
I wasn’t brave enough to commit to the 100-mile event and opted for the 50-miler instead, but there were a few Bellingham riders on the start line for the long race, including local youth coach Eric Olsen, who chose CSG as his first-ever gravel race. He told me he’d been curious about the race for years based on the polarizing reviews he’d heard, everything from, “Best race ever!” to “I’m never doing that ever again!”
The CSG has been called a mountain biker’s gravel race, which may be why riders comfortable on Whatcom County’s steep grades and rooty descents enjoy the event.
Olsen was not disappointed.
“I’m glad I did it because it ended up being over 7.5 hours of mud, trail, route-finding, hike-a-bike, steep hills and beautiful misty views,” Olsen said. “I think when next year rolls around I’ll have forgotten the pain just enough to willingly do it all over again.”
He took second overall in the 100-miler. I placed first in the 50-mile women’s category and had to agree with Olsen’s assessment, especially regarding the beautiful misty views.
“Wrapping up the event with only positive accolades is an exciting feeling,” Sloan said. “I guess we found our audience.”
Full results of the race can be found at pacificmultisports.com.
Staff reporter Julia Tellman recently moved to Bellingham to spend as much time as possible on two wheels or two planks in a recreational wonderland. Reach her at juliatellman@cascadiadaily.com.
