I've wanted to do the Crotona Midnight Run for the last four or five years. Each time the Saturday night rolled around I looked outside and something wasn't conducive to motorcycle riding. Either there was a few feet of snow on the ground, or freezing rain was falling. One year the temperature was nearly below zero. The though of spending the night dodging black ice did not make it a good night for riding. This year was different. The temperature was above freezing for a few days preceding the run and it had been dry. Saturday night was forecast to be clear, dry and around freezing. It was the best night for riding the Crotona Run in a long time. There was also something else running through my mind. There are three timed road events in our are. One is the Foggy Mountain Run, sponsored by Speer Yamaha, the next is the Ramapo Motorcycle Club's Fall Classic and the last is the Crotona Midnight Run. I placed second in the solo expert class of the Foggy Mountain Run and I won the solo class of the Ramapo Fall Classic. In addition to the good weather, I had something to prove to myself. How could I not take a shot at the 80th and last Crotona Run run by the Crotona Motorcycle Club? They are handing off responsibility for the run to the Ramapo Motorcycle Club.
The Saturday of the ride rolls around. The weather is perfect. I'm ready to go. This is the first ride like this that I've done in the dark. I knew that I'd need something to light up my route sheet and stop watch. I figured that I would take a Snake-Light and duct tape it to my handlebars. Point it at my map pouch and stop watch and be good to go. It seemed like a reasonable plan. I stuffed everything in my tank bag and left for Nathan's parking lot in Yonkers. I was one of the first people to sign in. I received number 8. My key time was eight minutes after midnight.
A timed run works this way. You sign in. They give you a route sheet, a starting time and tell you what speed to run at over the course. Everyone runs at the same speed, usually 30 miles per hour. This works out to one mile every two minutes. Your goal is to arrive at check points placed in surprise locations over the route exactly on schedule. You start with 1000 points. You lose two points for every minute you are early to a check point, you lose one point for every minute you are late. The goal is to not lose any points. At your key time you are released onto the course. After that you are on your own to follow the route and stay on schedule so when you reach a checkpoint you will be just on time. When you reach a check point, you stop, they get your number and mark down your time. Then you ride on, wondering where they will spring the next checkpoint on you.
The first part of the route went well. My light was working and I thought I was hitting the checkpoints pretty well. Then interesting things began to happen. The route had us going up NY 9A to the bridge that connects to the Circle at the intersection of US9 - US6 and US 202. The only problem is that 9A doesn't connect to that bridge. You have to get onto US9. The route sheet was missing some instructions. When I reached the 'wrong turn' I found a number of bikes riding back and forth trying to figure out how to get where they wanted to go. I knew where I had to be, so I got up onto US9 and headed for the bridge that connected to the circle. Now for the problem. The route sheet left out about 8 miles of road, so all of my average speed calculations are off. I know what time I have to be at the circle and there isn't any way I'm going to make it. So I do what I can. I ride a bit fast. From the circle, the route went West on US6 up to the Bear Mountain Bridge. As I tried to make up some time twisting up route 6 my light went out. I didn't have any time to mess with it, so I rode on hoping that I'd have a chance at the bridge to stop under a street light and check my time and where the route was going. I did. I was just a bit early, so I had a minute to fool with my light and get back on time. The route went up 9D to Cold Spring, then across NY301 to Carmel. Easy, roads that I knew, nothing complicated. My minute was up. I pulled out from the bridge on time knowing where I was going. The light was working, almost, so I was able to watch the time. There was another checkpoint along 301.
At the appointed moment I parked the bike in front of the Carmel Diner went in, sat down and ordered breakfast. It was about 2:20 AM. There was a two hour layover scheduled at the diner. Riders would be released starting at 4:15 AM. I ate, warmed up, talked with friends and fixed my light. 4:15 rolled around sooner than I expected and I didn't have any time to fill up the bike with gas. I had no choice but to line up to be released. You lose lots of points if you are late for your key time. It looked like I'd have enough gas to run the sixty miles back to Nathan's where the route ended. I come to the head of the line, the start says GO! I start my stopwatch and I'm off.
The route back was shorter, but spent some time on smaller roads. As I began to ride I noticed that it was quite a bit colder outside than before. What should I expect at 4 in the morning? Things went fine for the first couple of miles, then my light went out again. If I smacked it once or twice and it would come back for a few minutes. Just enough for me to grab a look at the route and my clock once in a while. At about a quarter of 5 in the morning things seemed to be getting a bit grim. I hadn't passed a check point, though I knew I was on the route. My right hand was getting really cold and my gas supply wasn't lasting as long as I had thought it would. I decided that I'd stop for gas when I passed a checkpoint. That way I'd have the most time to get back on schedule. Finally I passed the checkpoint. Now what about gas? The last bar of the gas gauge had disappeared, that meant that I had about 20 miles or so at normal speeds to go. This wasn't normal so I wasn't sure how long I could go or for that matter why I would even want to. You can begin to think dark thoughts when you are cold, tired and about to run out of gas. Luckily a Shell station appeared after about 20 more minutes. The bike was filled in record time and I was back on the route. After filling the bike I'm able to relax a bit. I hated the thought of running out of gas in the middle of nowhere during a road event. It just wouldn't look good. I'm still running in the dark, doing my best to stay on time. There were a few sandy roads, but nothing too bad after that and just one more checkpoint on the way back to Yonkers.
I reached the end point on time. It was just a bit after six in the morning and the sun was beginning to come up, I could feel things getting warmer too. I was tired and didn't want to hang around so I just headed home after checking in.
I was wrong. Brian Rathjen, my friend and Publisher of Backroads calles me to tell me that he just heard that I won the Solo class. I ask him say that again. He does. I'm quite surprised. I call a friend at the Ramapo club. He confirms it as well. I guess it was worth the night in the cold after all. One problem though, on my way home I was thinking, "OK, so I've done that, now I don't HAVE to do it again next year." I guess I do now.