#thedamn

ONE FOR THE DAMN RECORD BOOKS

When we announced the return of The Day Across Minnesota, never would we have anticipated what is now being referred to as "The Best DAMn Ever". We think that this past weekend's perfect weather might just be a sign that Mother Nature wanted The DAMn to come back. The energy in Gary, South Dakota was electric on Friday night with 413 racers checking in at Buffalo Ridge Resort which is a new DAMn record! 395 brave souls started The DAMn 240 and 18 crazier souls started The Double DAMn 480. We saw a record number of smiles on the course too, which made us smile pretty big. Below are some finish line stats from the weekend that have our minds blown. We are in true awe of them and of EVERYONE who raced!

The DAMn 240

Open Men - Innokenty Zavyalov - 11:16:01 (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

Open Women - Claire O'Leary - 13:39:55 (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

Non-Binary - Pallav Kumar - 22:37:44 (COURSE RECORD!)

Youngsters (18 & Under) - Bode Nesler - 14:04:56 (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

Single Speed Men - Anders Hopkins - 13:15:04 (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

Fat Bike Men - Chris Nelson 16:47:33 (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

Fat Bike Women - Kate Coward 17:07:45 (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

Tandem - Nick Garbis & Alison Forney - 18:47:06 (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

Lanterne Rouge - Eamonn Casey - 23:24:49 (RESPECT!!!)

320 out of 395 Finished - 81% (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

The Double DAMn 480

1st Place Open Men - Cory Rood - 35:04:00 (THE OLD RECORD STANDS)

1st Place Single Speed Men - Corey Kronser - 39:13:00 (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

Lanterne Rouge - Joe Clark - 45:23:00 (MAD RESPECT!!!)

4 out of 18 Finished - 22% (NEW COURSE RECORD!)

The complete list of RESULTS are now posted if you're interested. Please keep in mind that our volunteers did their best on accurately capturing your finishing times. If you have a correction, please email us at [email protected] and we will look into it. 

A huge DAMn “thank you” to our SPONSORS and to our volunteers, Joel, Jackson, Jenny, Dave, John, Kyle, Carl, David, Hugh, Craig, Josh, and Abigail. Thanks to the kind folks of Gary, South Dakota and Hager City, Wisconsin. Thanks to all of the businesses along our race course, and thanks to all of the DAMn enthusiasts who live on the route who created such an incredibly supportive space for everyone! We don't know who you are or how you found out about us, but thank you for opening your farms and arms to everyone! That's some Minnesota grass roots gravel magic right there! Thank you to all of the support crews for taking the time out of their weekends to party with us. If you haven’t thanked your support crew properly, do it!

Some DAMn PHOTOS from Wark's Cycling Services just showed up. Check 'em out! There will be more coming later this week. The DAMn Store will reopen soon as well for one more round of jersey orders. More information on all of this will be hitting racer inboxes real soon. 

Each of you are what makes The Day Across Minnesota so incredibly special. Each year you all continue to inspire us and one another. This year we saw an 11 year old girl lined up at the midnight start. She raced her heart out until calling it at mile 121. Yes, an 11 year old girl crushed 121 miles of The Day Across Minnesota on her own bicycle. Her parents drove her to the finish line so she could tell us what she did. We don't always cry at bicycle races, but DAMn are we inspired by her... We are hoping to see her and the rest of you at the start in Gary, South Dakota and at our finish line in Hager City, Wisconsin next year.

500 STRONG!

The official roster for the 2024 edition of The Day Across Minnesota has reached capacity...in just over 4 hours!!! This is a new DAMn record and we cannot wait to see what other records will be broken this year. There is a waitlist, so if you're late to the game, we recommend registering soon and crossing your fingers. Our respect and admiration goes out to each and every one of you who will be joining us this year. 

Right now we have 475 registered for the DAMn 240 and 25 registered for The Double DAMn 480! Folks appear to be joining us from all over the United States! The official roster is available for your viewing pleasure here: https://www.bikereg.com/Confirmed/63805

Remember to keep an eye on those inboxes in the coming months and stay tuned to the-damn.com and our social media channels for updates as well. We cannot wait to see each and every last one of you on August 9th at check-in! Now, get on those bikes and ride!

-Trenton & Erik

IN CLOSING

We would like to take a moment to extend our admiration and respect to each of the 563 racers who signed up, to the 393 who made it to the starting line, to the 231 who became DAMn Champions by crossing our Hager City, Wisconsin finish line 242 miles later, and to the incredible 11 who became Double DAMn Champions by crossing our Gary, South Dakota finish line 495 miles later!  Our complete RESULTS are now posted, but here are a few DAMn stats:

The DAMn 240

1st Place Men - Chase Wark - 12:14

2nd Place Men - Josh Bauer - 12:43

3rd Place Men - Aaron Halfaker - 12:46

1st Place Women - Zoe Reker - 18:33

2nd Place Women - Kesha Marson - 18:51

3rd Place Women - Beth Rood - 18:53

Youngest Finisher (17!) - Patrick McCauley - 19:42

Lanterne Rouge - Dhaval Srirama Raju - 23:43 !!!

The Double DAMn 480

1st Place  - Nathan Wentz - 34:27 (men's course record!

2nd Place - Kimberly Breuer - 41:27 (women's course record!)

3rd Place (tie) - Kate Coward & Kyle Sobota - 43:30

Lanterne Rouge - John Jarvis - 47:45 !!!

When John Jarvis (our oldest finisher at 66 years old) crossed The Double DAMn 480 finish line Lanterne Rouge last night, he won a brand new TWIN SIX Standard Rando bicycle! John has finished The DAMn all 5 years, and blew our minds when he crossed that Gary, South Dakota finish line before the cut-off with a mere 15 minutes to spare. Congratulations, Johnny Gravel, you're one in a million!

A monumental “thank you” to our SPONSORS and to our volunteers, Joel, Jackson, Dave, John, Kierstin, Kari, Jess, Daniel, Zach, Kristin, Ellie, Jenny, Trent, and Chelli. Thanks to all of the communities and businesses along our race course for the hospitality and contributing to the excitement. We know that we ask a lot of each and every one of you and without you saying yes and following through for the past 5 years, The Day Across Minnesota would never have happened.

Thank you to all of the support crews for taking the time out of their weekends to take part in the madness. If you haven’t thanked your support crew properly, we strongly encourage you to do so.

DAMn photo galleries are starting to show up! Check out TMB IMAGES and JIM WELLBROCK’S galleries. All DAMn photos are free for you to download thanks to Todd and Jim. Expect to see more photo galleries showing up soon.

Lastly, we would like to thank each of you for showing your grit, leading with kindness, sharing your stories, and inspiring everyone this past weekend and for the past 5 years. YOU are what has made The Day Across Minnesota so special. Whether you crossed the finish line or not, we are in awe of each and every one of you and truly hope that The DAMn has planted something within you that you continue to nurture and grow.

Thanks for the DAMn memories - Trenton & Erik

SINGLE SPEED - STATE LINE DISTILLERY

The Day Across Minnesota is hard. Racing it single speed is probably harder. Though they think that all of our racers are incredible for taking on The DAMn, our friends at State Line Distillery are prepared to award several of our single speed DAMn Champions with bottles of their delightful American Gin when they reach our Hager City, Wisconsin finish line, so ride fast! This year, they even collaborated with us on a special recipe...yeah, it's called: 

The DAMn Single Speeder! Ingredients: 2 Ounces of State Line Distillery American Gin (the absolute best) 3/4 Ounces of Lime Juice (all limes must be carried in your jersey pocket from SD to WI) 3/4 Ounces of Simple Syrup (keep it SIMPLE...no derailleurs please) Directions: Freeze driftless region gravel stones. Fill a cocktail shaker with frozen gravel stones and pour in the gin, lime juice and simple syrup. Shake vigorously for up to 24 hours while making a fist with your other hand and muttering "DAMn Single Speeder". Serve and enjoy! We at The DAMn are big fans of all the single speed demons out there, and absolutely love that State Line Distillery plans to honor those who have boldly chosen a single gear to crush over 240 miles of Minnesota gravel. A high ABV thank you! to John and State Line Distillery for loving the cycling community and for being a proud sponsor of The Day Across Minnesota. Salut, Trenton & Erik

COURSE REPORT - PANARACER

The DAMn is just two weeks out and we love hearing from everyone who is getting out there, riding, and preparing themselves for whatever The Day Across Minnesota throws at us! We rode the entire DAMn 240 and DOUBLE DAMn 480+ routes a few weeks back and have written up this short course report for y’all.

July 10th, 2021 - The gravel roads throughout the western part of the state was softer than usual. We noted that the few minimum maintenance roads in Yellow Medicine county were actually in faster/better shape than the maintained gravel roads. This was due to new gravel being distributed and many of the roads being graded. It’s been a dry year for us in Minnesota, so there will be no water crossing this year unless we get hit with flash flooding the day before The DAMn. There wasn’t a ton of washboard as we ventured east, however, it’s out there so stay loose and stay frosty. The single track section after Henderson is gonna be an adventure...especially for y’all choosing to run skinny tires...and the miles after that have seen some new silty / sandy river rock graded into the roads so surfaces were soft there as well. On the flip side, the Dakota and Rice county gravel was full on hero status, so you should enjoy that unless crews have opted to change the game on us last minute. The hilly Goodhue county roads before we cross the river into Wisconsin are a mix of hero and freshly graded so take it easy cornering on those descents. Double DAMn 480+ racers...read the above in reverse if you wanna know how the roads on your return trip are gonna look. Ask us “What width of a tire should I run for the DAMn?” and we will ask you back “How wide can you go?”. 

The Panaracer GravelKing is the official tire of The Day Across Minnesota, a tire that we firmly believe will serve our racers well as they traverse the varying Minnesota gravel from Yellow Medicine to Goodhue county...and back again. We look to the 43x700c GravelKing SK for its ride everything tread and extra puncture protection. We rode these during our pre-ride and experienced ZERO punctures. We love that Panaracer offers these tires in sizes ranging from 700x32c to 700x50c. There are 650b and 26″ options as well. 

Our friends at Panaracer have done something extra special and donated some tires to give away at check-in!!! However, before you get to Gary, we highly recommend that you install some new rubber to minimize chances of flats. You may also want to consider running tubeless...Panaracer has a tubeless sealant offering called Seal Smart. Thank you Panaracer for making the official tire of The DAMn!

TRANSPORTATION - 1UP USA

The Day Across Minnesota starts in Gary, South Dakota and ends in Hager City, Wisconsin. The Double DAMn...well, if you need to know, you know. Our racers are responsible to get themselves and their gear to the start line, across the state, and home from the finish line on their own or with the help of a pre-arranged support crew. If you or your support crew are in search of a quality bike rack to assist you with transportation, we highly recommend that you check out the offerings from 1UP USA. They make what many tout as the best bike rack in the business and can help you and your crew get your bikes to the starting line and home from the (knock on wood) finish line safely. Important Reminder: If a racer (or their bike) choses to quit while out on the course, The DAMn does not provide a SAG vehicle service. Given that sometimes things don’t go as planned, we highly recommend that all of our racers come prepared with a bail out plan…or at least an emergency cell phone. Ubers and Lyfts have been called in the past, but that probably shouldn’t be your “plan”.

Lastly, 1UP USA wanted to do something special for our racers, so they are donating some pretty big prizes to be given away at check-in. Thank you 1UP USA for being an official sponsor of The Day Across Minnesota!

DAMn FOOLS - BIKE BAGS

Holy smokes! It's our last episode of DAMn Fools, and we're taking y'all out in style. In this episode, "The Godfather of Soul", James Brown, encourages us all to treat ourselves. We also get some sage advice from gravel racing veteran and bike bag inventor extraordinaire, Banjo Brothers' very own Eric Leugers, on how to outfit your bike to carry everything you'd need to tackle a race like The DAMn! There's still time to prepare your body, bike, and mind for the adventure to come. We recommend you all keep on it. Happy Independence Day, y’all!

BANJO BROTHERS - YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOU

We are pleased to announce that Banjo Brothers are back with us this year in Gary, South Dakota for check-in on Friday, August 13th. Banjo Brothers hails from Minneapolis Minnesota where they are a pillar of the cycling community and specialize in tough, practical, affordable bike bags. They are also notorious for their presence at several of Minnesota’s most celebrated gravel road cycling events.

"You are responsible for you." Despite the fact that many racers will choose to bring their own support crews to help them out (up to 3 locations on The DAMn and up to 6 on The Double DAMn) we still need them to think about this. The DAMn is hard. The Double DAMn is harder. Prepare yourselves and prepare your crews to support you. When you're out there alone and something goes wrong, make sure that you have what you need to get to someone who can help. Unsure what to bring? Take a look at our checklist.

Tune into our next episode of DAMn Fools to learn more about how to outfit your bike to carry everything you will need for your DAMn adventure. Banjo Brothers' very own Eric Leugers will give us the run-down on how to do it. A massive thanks to Banjo Brothers! We are thankful to have them join us for their fifth year of being the official bike bag sponsor of The DAMn!