Reminiscing: The 2022 Trans Virginia 550
About a month ago, my dad rode his bike from Washington, D.C. to Harrisonburg, Virginia. He was riding the first leg of an annual bike race that traverses the entire state of Virginia, from D.C. to Damascus.
I rode this route a year ago with my go-to bike buddy Cole Trudo in its entirety. Hearing about my dad’s experience inspired me to write up a quick account of my own experience from 2022. Given the length of the ride (9 days), and the fact that we completed it a year ago, I’ll spare you the blow-by-blow trip report. Instead, here are the major take aways!
Give yourself as much time as you need. 550 miles is a lot and we aren’t all David Landis, despite what we might wish. When we started at the Grand Depart at the Lincoln Memorial, it was hard to ignore the conversations we overheard in which our fellow racers discussed goals to complete the route in as little as three or four days. We finished in last place, in nine days, but we finished. Over half the riders scratched, so we were proud of this outcome.
Speaking of scratching—prepare for rain. I’m convinced most people who scratched did so because of the foul weather, and that the only reason we stuck it out was our prior backpacking experience in Maine’s100 Mile Wilderness. It gave us both the practical camping skills and the mental hardiness to stay as dry and happy as possible for several days of rain. It’s easy to let all of your gear get soaked and it’s even easier to get into bad headspace when this happens.
Party Pace for the win. By this I mean stop to rest, enjoy the views, and definitely indulge in a mid-day 32 oz Modelo during your gas station lunch break. We rode hard, but we were not so concerned with time we forgot to enjoy the ride. I totally understand the race mentality, but it’s not for everyone. I met a handful of folks on this route that seemed to bite off more than they could chew, making themselves misereable. I felt thankful we had predetermined we weren’t concerned about our pace because we were able to focus on simply having as much fun as possible.
Make friends! I did not expect there to a be a social aspect to this ride, but just by luck, we met another rider, Kevin Kaczmarski from Roanoke, VA. I think our steel bikes, tan sidewalls, and matching bags—or as another racer declared: our hipster bikes—drew us to each other. We didn’t only share bike aesthetics either—although he was a stronger rider than us, he shared our party pace approach to the ride. His chipper morale and extensive bikepacking experience surely contributed to our ability to finish this race.
DO NOT PACK TOO MUCH FOOD. I stupidly packed every meal. Not only did this make my bike extremely heavy in the early days of the race, but I felt obligated to eat my shitty freeze dried food, so I missed out on some delicious gas station meals.
Unfortunately, this is not my best video work. It took A LOT of energy just to ride each day, and filming the best moments was not at the forefront of my mind. I wish I got more b-roll footage of us at the camp site screwing around, but most of the time I was so tired I just wanted to eat dinner, drink a beer, and rest. When it came time to make the video, I realized I didn’t have as much of that footage as I would have liked to break up the riding footage, so it feels a little monotonous. I followed through with creating the video just to document the experience, so I hope it at least accomplishes that!