There are only a few constants in the Single Speed World Championship's 19-year history: Everyone rides a single-speed mountain bike, Beer is the hydrating beverage , of choice, and the winners, the King and Queen of the SSWC, have to go under the needle and proudly bear the winning tattoo as their podium prize.
Everything else is an ever changing, year-to-year secret.
It's never held in the same place twice, you never know the route until you start the race, and sometimes wiping out on a trail will earn you a bottle of scotch.
The SSWC, as it is so affectionately called, is a grab bag race that wouldn't be taken seriously by an outsider. Some of the rumors behind the madness are laughable. But alongside the hobbyist single-speed mountain bikers who make the pilgrimage, even Tour de France and other elite racers compete in this one-of-a-kind race.
It's a good thing this story about Mike Reardon and Justin Mace's trip to Italy won't publish until they're flying across the Atlantic Ocean to the French Alps, because Reardon's wife has no idea what her husband is getting into. "My wife? She's going to be in the spa. We're going to go ride and she's going to get a hot stone massage," he says.
"The less they know the better," agrees Mace. "We're definitely going to be partying it up while our wives are at the spa."
It's only 30 days before the race and the duo is preparing for their much anticipated trip to the Single Speed World Championship, September 5-7. Though Mace has raced in nearby France, Reardon has never been overseas before.
This year, the event is in Cogne, Italy, a small village in the Valle d'Aosta in the Grand Paradiso National Park. Last year, the race met in South Africa, and in years prior riders have toured Sweden, Ireland, New Zealand and the U.S. "I think we picked the best possible year to go, I mean, we're going to Italy," says Reardon, a dentist at Scenic City Dentistry.
Reardon once was an avid climber, but a hand injury and impending dental school turned him to cycling. As an automotive worker in the Chattanooga area, Mace, 34, met the owner of the Motor Mile Racing Team, and joined around the same time Reardon did. The duo, like the rest of the Motor Mile Racing Team, is competitive to the core-all while being supportive of each other, light-hearted about the race and really good at riding. Throughout the year, any given member could be competing and placing in the top percent in any race around the country.
Reardon and Mace have competed together in races in Ohio, Arkansas, North Carolina and Georgia. The two now share Saturday mornings on local trails for 4-hour practice rides of torture, and even then, it's a fun competition.
"Heck yeah, we're a group of hardcore racers! It's a competition to see who can put their bike in the bike rack first," Reardon says. "We go as hard as we do on any other race on the weekends."
"I mean, we'll just kill each other. We never take it easy," Mace adds. "We all want our team to win, but we want to beat each other."
That spirit will come in handy when the pair goes to Italy this month. Unlike other races the two have ridden, even Reardon's latest- a weeklong ride in Colorado-the Single Speed World Championship is completely unique. "You never know what you're going to get yourself into with this one," Mace says. "There's a schedule of dinners and get-togethers, there's an expo, and there's the race, but we don't know the route, we don't know the length, we don't know anything. No one does."
"Everyone's heard about the race. They've heard the stories," Reardon says. "But in fact, really the most we know is from Facebook." Of course, the Facebook page is mainly written in Italian, and sometimes organizers forget to offer translations. But they do post photos of points along the route or photos of picturesque Cogne.
That's a comfort to Mace and Reardon who are turning the three-day event into a weeklong vacation. They were lucky to register right when entries opened, as now the event is capped off at around 250 racers. There's a waiting list, and as riders drop out others are invited. Reardon and Mace are only two of 20 Americans riding. The rest are riders from all over the world who also cherish the single speed mountain bike and have to take part in this almost mythical race.
To even define the race as "organized" is a stretch. Each year, a new group from the determined host country is responsible for getting together a location, a route, sponsors, etc. Each year it's a miracle to get it pulled off, but to the dedicated group willing to travel for the madness, it's a must do, a bucket list race for the masochists. So it's perfectly suited to Mace's and Reardon's style.
"People get awards for nastiest wipeout, most stitches, you know, whatever they feel like," Mace says.
"I doubt I'll wreck though," Reardon says with a matter-of-fact smile. "I'll be tuned in. I'll be on edge ... I don't care, I'll go down 100 miles an hour!"
It's a special event, but there's no qualification to enter. As Mace says, "any old rider can enter," meaning, amateur racers share the trails with world-class elite riders. Each year, as the SSWC travels around the globe, it gains an almost exclusive status, reserved for the eager, passionate few willing to gamble and travel for three days of fellowship and competition. There's dinners, dancing and drinking.
"It's different, that's the exciting part," Mace says. "It's all about fun. There's definitely beer after. Maybe before and during, but definitely beer."
The race is competitive. Ignorance of the route and having all racers on a single speed bike levels the playing field. But there's a catch: the races are known for their quirks, different events throughout the route, different challenges. Everyone is strongly encouraged to dress up in a crazy costume. There's sometimes nudity. Someone is always drunk. No one ever knows what will happen.
"We've heard about beer shortcuts, where you have a shortcut offered to you, but you have to chug a beer first," Mace says. "We have to start the race with a beer."
The pair's costume for the event, they say, will be a play on their Southern heritage. Think camo, American flags and denim. Compared to previous races, it's probably a safe choice. Reardon jokes of men wearing minimal clothing in the races before.
Both Mace and Reardon claim they are more than prepared to ink up should one or the other claim the winning crown in Cogne. "There's one rule. They tell you if you don't want a tattoo, don't win. Every winner gets the tattoo. If I won? I'd get it as big as I could, right across my chest," Reardon laughs.
From a man in scrubs, this seems odd, but Mace grins in agreement.
"Man, I have never seen a bad (winner's) tattoo. They are cool."
Could Chattanooga one day host the Single Speed World Championship? It'd take a dedicated group of individuals who are ready to fight tooth and nail for the hosting gig. You see, the country which holds the race the following year doesn't just volunteer-there's an actual competition where teams of countrymen and women vie for the distinction.
"I think last year, in South Africa, they played a basketball game for the host country," Reardon says.
"I've heard about go cart races and drinking contests to determine who hosts it. I don't know if we'll be able to do it this year, we'd have to talk to other Americans about it," Mace says.
The race's website shows a three-part test spanning the three days to determine the SSWC14 location.
Maybe five years from now, Chattanooga could host the SSWC, Reardon says. While its only been hosted on U.S. soil a few times, Chattanooga is a perfect fit for the wacky race. "I think Chattanooga would be a great place to have this race. The biking community is so close-knit," Mace says. "We have a lot of good single-speeders here, and we could get some of the breweries to pitch in ..."
"Just in the past five years, trails have been built that I have never even been on. It's so easy to be an avid rider here because of that," Reardon adds.