Eszter Horanyi crushes Colorado Trail Race

“This year I played with sleep deprivation a little more”

Think you’ve been on an epic ride, try going on an epic ride five days in a row on four hours of sleep each night while camping out.
Team Alpine Orthopaedics athlete Eszter Horyani just got done with the Colorado Trail Race, covering the 470-mile long course in five days, five hours and 26 minutes, a full 24 hours and six minutes faster than her time last year.
It was her second title in a row. Horyani finished in fifth place among both men and women and set a new women’s course record.
The self-supported race starts just outside of Denver following the Colorado Trail whenever possible before finishing at Junction Creek outside of Durango. While some miles are spent on roads circumnavigating the Wilderness portions of the Colorado Trail, there are more than 300 miles of single track to be ridden, topping out at an elevation of 13,200 feet.
Despite suffering through torrential rain in the 2010 race, Horanyi set her sights on the 2011 race, vowing to return.
“I decided to do it on the last day of the race last year, thinking about how I could do it faster,” says Horanyi.
Horanyi came into this year’s race with a game plan that included taking in 7,000 calories per day and sleeping a mere four hours a night.
Her sleeping gear included a 40-degree sleeping bag, a bivy and an auto sunshade that she cut down to a three-foot by one-and-a-half-foot rectangle.
While shaving grams wherever possible on some gear, Horanyi was committed to a lighting system despite the extra weight to maintain a solid pace during the night portions.
“I had a 1,200 Lumen set-up that could run for 24 hours with a headlamp as a back-up,” explains Horanyi. “It’s enough to go downhill at a pretty good pace.”
Her daily caloric intake, while necessary, did have some negative cause and effect.
“My stomach went through a wide array of emotions,” says Horanyi.
This year, the weather cooperated with Horanyi as well as it possibly could, with sun or only a slight drizzle hitting her and only one serious storm out of the entire five days.
“I got incredibly lucky with the weather this year,” says Horanyi. “I had a little halo of sunshine.”
In addition, she managed to avoid any significant mechanicals, carrying a healthy pace as she hit the middle portion of the course. It’s at this point when things got weird for everyone.
Following the Silver Creek descent off Monarch Pass, the course heads into no man’s land.
“It’s big and intimidating,” says Horanyi. “From there until Silverton it’s a 200-mile stretch with no re-supplies. You also go through Sargents Mesa, which is haunted.”
It was there that Horanyi got a major scare, interrupting some much-needed sleep.
After settling into her sleeping bag at 12:45 a.m., Horanyi was startled 45 minutes later and decided it was time to get back on her bike.
“The ghosts woke me up and I was totally freaked out,” says Horanyi. “I had to get out of there ASAP. In hindsight it’s pretty funny but it was scary at the time.”
The two biggest grinds for Horanyi, and most everyone else, are the stretch from Breckenridge to Copper and the climb to the top of Coney Peak, the highest point in the race.
Taking a bike from Breckenridge to Copper includes hike-a-biking over the Ten Mile Range, hitting an elevation of 12,800 feet for close to three hours straight.
Coney Peak, another brutal hike-a-bike to 13,200 feet, has the bonus of summiting and Horanyi timed it perfectly.
“I got to the top of Coney Peak at sunrise,” says Horanyi.
The course ends with a stretch of trail from Silverton to Durango that Horanyi considers “the best trail you’ll ever ride in the states.”
When she finished, five days and five hours later, she felt much better physically than last year but a bit more worse for wear mentally.
“This year I played with sleep deprivation a little more,” says Horanyi.
While Horanyi missed her pre-race time goal, she doesn’t think it’s possible for her.
“I really wanted to go under five days,” says Horanyi. “In hindsight if I did x, y, z differently, I’m not convinced I could have done it a full five hours faster.”
Two things kept her going the whole time.
“It’s better than work,” says Horanyi. “All you have to do is pedal, eat and sleep. There’s something beautiful about that simplicity.”
Horanyi now has her sights set on an entirely different race, the singlespeed world championships in Ireland in two weeks. Following that she plans on returning to race in the Vapor Trail 125.