Iron Butt Rally - 2013

[Alex]

It seems that time is creeping up on me. While it seemed like I had all the time in the world, this event is a little over 1 month away, and it seems like I still have months (or years) of prep to go before I'll feel totally ready.

The Iron Butt Rally is an eleven-day long-distance motorcycle riding event, held once every two years. The stats on it are sometimes hard to comprehend, but a good portion of the field will complete over 1000 miles per day over that time period. In the 2011 event, one rider eclipsed 14000 miles over that time (and finished third).

from their main site:

The Iron Butt Rally Concept

The Iron Butt is a fairly simple concept. The rally consists of checkpoints located around the United States. In order to be considered a finisher of the event, riders must be present at each of these checkpoints within a two hour window.

No consideration is given for bad weather (during the running of the Iron Butt, riders can expect to ride through rain, sleet, snow, severe thunderstorms, hurricanes and the occasional tornado). Temperature extremes routinely run 125 degrees or more in the desert Southwest in fact, in living up to the name, "World's Toughest Motorcycle Competition", event organizers intentionally route the rally through such places as Death Valley or the Mojave Desert during the hottest part of the day, to extreme cold at the top of mountains like Pike's Peak in Colorado where competitors may have to struggle up a muddy road to reach the peak's 14,110 foot summit.

Riders have the option of boosting their standings in an attempt to win a Gold, Silver or Bronze Medal by visiting optional bonus destinations located around the United States and Canada. "Bonus Hunting" as it is called, can be both fun and mentally devastating. Where else in the world do riders have to ride 11,000 miles in 11 days, while trying to find odd places like the remains of the Branch Dividian Compound, or stop by the Los Angeles County morgue to purchase a toe tag or take a hike in Lava Tube or perhaps visit the enchanted Guru Lane in the Black Rock desert in a remote section of Nevada?

Only on the Iron Butt!!

To get a spot in the rally, there are a couple of ways in. There are open lottery spots for new entrants, more slots for past rally volunteers, some slots for those who have placed well in it in the past, as well as a few special classes. One of those is "the hopeless class", where riders endeavor to attempt the event on particularly challenging machines, say a 30 year old rotary Suzuki, or a 40-year old Triumph Trident, for example. Finally, there are some spots awarded to those who place well in some of the shorter feeder rallies.

I've always enjoyed 24-hour rallies, and have placed well in a several of them over the years (search for "Cal24" on this site and elsewhere to learn about my favorite event). I had never considered doing multi-day rallies, as I wasn't sure (and am still not sure) if I had the stamina or willpower to do back-to-back-to-back thousand mile days while staying sane. So I had never applied. But awhile back, I was given the opportunity to apply for this year's IBR, based on prior Cal24 performances, was encouraged to do so, and I couldn't turn it down. Sent in my application, and I'm an official entrant in the 2013 event.

My rally bike at the time was a 2005 BMW R1200RT, which would have been 8 years old and 65K miles into its life by this time. So last year I bought a new 2012 K1600GT, and started to turn it into a rally bike. Multiple GPS's, integral heated gear, better windscreen, better seat, radar, audio and communication, etc. It wasn't complete, as I still couldn't find decent aux lighting setups, and I hadn't yet sorted out a fuel cell. But then I threw it down the road the 1st of this year (link to crash thread), the bike was totalled, and rally plans were in flux.



First, I needed to find out if I was going to physically be OK enough for the event. For a few weeks after the crash, I wasn't very hopeful, but there has been steady improvement and I'm probably back to 80% now. Next, I needed to choose a bike. I was lukewarm on the K for a number of reasons (primarily comfort, gadget availability / ease, tire wear, and fuel mileage), so I ended up going back to the old standby, and bought a new 2013 R1200RT. I bought it in March right before a weekend ride with my MSMC friends, and it really did feel like home being back on that bike. I've spent the past two or three months adding the required gadgets onto this new machine, and it's generally coming along well. Just this week I'm working on the fuel cell part of it, and that's the last major hurdle before it's reasonably ready.



The logistics of the rally this year are quite problematic for those of us on the west coast. The rally start is near Pittsburgh, PA. The first checkpoint 3 days in, is back in Pittsburgh. The 2nd checkpoint 7 days in is in Sacramento, CA. The rally end (final checkpoint) is back in Pittsburgh. So, that's 3k miles to get to the start, 10k ish miles during the event, and another 3k miles to get home. All in a little over 3 weeks. Should be fun! The 2011 event started near Seattle and finished near San Diego, which would have been quite convenient for me, at least comparably.

The riders don't find out any details about the routing or bonuses until right before each leg. There is a whole lot of planning and routing via laptops and GPS, but it can't take too long as that's time where the wheels should be turning rather than sitting in a parking lot. The top riders have the routing challenge down cold. The trick isn't just loading everything to Streets & Trips and hitting optimize, as there will be many, many more potential bonuses than are feasible to do in the time allotted. And some of them will have time restrictions where you need to be there at a certain time to get any credit. A rider needs to figure out what they can conceivably do, then ride that route to the best of their ability. Things like fuel capacity, tire wear, and general mechanical condition/maintenance of the bike make a difference for these long-distance events. Figuring out even what/when to eat, when to sleep, all play a part in making someone competitive/non-competitive, safe/risky.

Most riders, including me, will be running satellite tracking on their bike during the rally. One benefit of this from a rally standpoint is we no longer need to keep a fuel log and turn it in at each leg. Rally HQ will be able to track us en route. There will also be a public page where people on the internet can see a full-US picture of where all the riders are in real-time, without rider identifiers.

On this website, the only other member that is competing this year that I know of is @Gregg_VA. There are a few others that I know from the Cal24 events, as well as one or two on the BARF forum. I believe there are somewhere around 110 entrants. I will post up my further prep up in this thread from time to time. We're not permitted to have a real-time blog during the event itself, but I will almost certainly provide a write-up of the event once the rally is over.

The obvious question is: Why not on a Ninja 250? Well, there are certainly those who have attempted it on our favorite small-bore ninja (details here). But I'm weak, and need all the creature comforts of a long-distance BMW touring rig.

[ChaoSS]

17k miles... what tires are you using?


You have heated gear, but in the summer, do you have the cooling gear in place?

You know that on day two something catastrophic is going to happen to this forum, right?

[Alex]

I hope to be running Pilot Road 3's. I expect to start with new tires in Pittsburgh, and then will have to change the rear twice, and the front once during the rally. Will have to play it by ear. A good number of riders run car tires on the rear to make it 15k+ miles without worrying about tire changes. I was considering that on the K16GT, but the RT gets better tire life.

Most riders use LDComfort or similar clothing. The active cooling stuff is still a bit of a gimmick, but the passive cooling works well enough.

I'm sure the forum will be just fine. But yes - I will be incommunicado for 2 weeks.

[KawiKid860]

We'll miss you </3

The IBR sounds crazy though. Like something I couldn't do on a supersport lol. I wish I could even afford to go on a ride that requires multiple tire changes part way through! *sigh* One day... after college when I'm rich. Best of luck to you! Make ninjette.org proud!

Also you should make Jiggles admin while you're gone, I think he's qualified and competent enough to keep the website in one piece!

[Alex]

Some people do it on some pretty out there bikes. If you check the entries on the site for past years, you'll see some people on ZX-12R's, CBR1100XX's, and even some more pure supersports. Having myself done one 24-hr rally on a ZX-12R, and having done every other one on some form of comfortable BMW, I've learned there's really no reason to punish oneself. (in addition to the agreed-upon punishment of the event itself!).

[ChaoSS]

Multiple tires? Put some good metzlers on there and you can do the whole thing without a tire change.

[Alex]

Metzeler doesn't make tires that last terribly long on sport touring bikes. The Z8's get torn up quickly, with significantly less life than the PR3's. Here's a Z8 (playfully showing its cord) at 2,034 miles on my K16:



The hardest tire Metzeler makes is the ME-880, but it doesn't come in sizes that fit most modern ST's, and it handles like poo from its first mile to its last. Some people have run them anyway, but it turns out that even they don't work well in those conditions. A friend went through 880's in 4k miles on the back of his GS during the 2011 event. The rally kills tires for a number of reasons, but the obvious ones are running sustained high speeds, while heavily loaded, over at times very hot pavement. A touring tire is out of its element, and behaves and lasts worse than one might expect.

The tires at the top of the heap for most IBR riders are either the PR3's, or their predecessor, the Pilot Road 2's. One rider did manage to run the entire 2011 event on a single set of PR2's, but that's still a rarity. Some of the more competitive riders ship spare rims to the checkpoints, with tires mounted already, so they can just swap the rims quickly in the parking lot. I'm aiming for finishing, not winning, so I can deal with a few tire changes along the way should they become necessary.

[ChaoSS]

You can't fit a regular touring tire on an ST?

I have a K1200LT, and I haven't put enough miles on it to say anything about it, but I got it from my dad, and he consistently put over 15000 miles on a set of tires, and as for handling, all I can say is that the center stand is all banged up from being dragged a number of times. And while it isn't a sport tourer, it sits a bit higher than his goldwing and can do a better lean than it can.

And he runs his bikes with a passenger, and camping gear for two, with enough luggage for a 3 week trip, with no problems.

He doesn't do these types of rallies, but he does that many miles in similar conditions, so it should be a fair assessment.

I'll have to go look and see exactly which tire it is on there.


:edit:

Ok, it has ME880s, and I don't know how they feel on a different bike, but I'd disagree that they handle like poo, but I guess that's for each person to decide for themselves. These tires have held up to 15000 miles + of an 800 lb bike plus 400 lbs of rider plus gear, with never a handling issue, so it makes me wonder how someone manages to burn one out in 4k miles.

[Alex]

Originally Posted by ChaoSS

You can't fit a regular touring tire on an ST?

Most of the full-blown touring tires are aimed at the V-twin market, which is a different use case. Finding a touring specific radial in 180/55/17 or 190/55/17 is like that magical 4-leaf clover. Would be nice, but it doesn't seem to exist as of yet. The compromises from performance to wear to cost to weight requirements seem to be hard to balance. Of course everyone would want a tire that handles perfectly at speed on a powerful ST bike, wears evenly, and lasts 15k miles or more. At some point maybe we'll get closer to that, but we'll probably have 200+ hp touring bikes to balance out any improvements in existing wear. Tire choice (along with oil choice) is beat to death just about every day for the last 15 years on the LD riding lists. It gets repetitive there too.

In terms of "normal" riding vs. these long distance events, riding competitively at 1000ish miles per day while maintaining reasonable speed throughout is a different use case than leisure trips. It challenges the bike, it challenges the rider, and at times, it challenges the tires. Many riders need to change tires several times. Some do go that dark side (car tire) route to fix the problem for their rear tire at least.

The K-LT is a strange beast, requiring these reinforced rear tires for the weight rating, right? It looks like the ME-880 bias ply still is the tire of choice for long distance on that machine. (1 link on LT forums, another one) In the 2011 event, two riders were on K1200LT's, and one of them finished 9th. (results)

I checked to see where Andy had posted up his experience with 880's, and it was in a long-distance thread on BARF (link to his thoughts). Andy was a successful finisher in the 2011 event on his GS-A.

[ChaoSS]

Originally Posted by Alex

Tim - I'm not sure what you want me to tell you.

I'm just musing, and, as you probably don't have experience on every tire out there yourself, just giving you one more perspective. My dad doesn't ride competitively, but he does rack up the miles at a more than leisurely pace, so I think the experience is valid.


Do they post up the waypoints online when they let you guys know about them, if anyone felt like tagging along for a leg?

[Alex]

No, they don't publicize most of the bonuses during the rally. Sometimes they do post up a few of the larger ones, if they expect a good number of the riders to be at one spot at the same time (a bonus that is only open for 2 hrs, for example). They did that for the bonus at the top of Mt. Hamilton either 4 or 6 years ago, I forget. Annie and I rode up there to try and catch the riders, but we got our times wrong and missed them by a few hours.

[ChaoSS]

Well, I doubt I'd have time to do any of it anyway.


Hey, 7 days to Sacramento, maybe you can stop by at home to do your oil change.

[Alex]

I know - it is going to be painful being so close to home, with the strong likelihood that I won't be able to actually go home, unless my routing takes me close to it for some reason. I'm not planning on doing an oil change or any other scheduled maintenance during the timed portion, will take care of it right before the start and once again before heading back home across the country once off the clock.

I have a friend in Vegas who has told me now for months that I need to come through his place so he can mount new tires for me. It's a reasonable possibility, if my routing does take me in the that direction. He has one of those hydraulic mounting machines, and would be able to get things sorted even faster than waiting for a dealership.

[ChaoSS]

Originally Posted by KawiKid860

Also you should make Jiggles admin while you're gone, I think he's qualified and competent enough to keep the website in one piece!

This site would go from the friendliest, to the most pornographic 250 site on the net.

[wardie]

Alex my friend Bob Hall won it several years ago and you'll have your work cut out just doing successive 1,000 mile bacak to back to back days.

I'd look for the hardest compund rear tire I could find something like the Metzler Me 880.

Stay hydrated and have a crew waiting to change your tires.

Good luck livin' the dream...we all envy you best of luck Wardie!

[Alex]

Thanks Wardie! Looks like he won it on a R1100RT as well.

[Panda]

Originally Posted by Alex

Most riders use LDComfort or similar clothing. The active cooling stuff is still a bit of a gimmick, but the passive cooling works well enough.

Cyclegear is running a sale on its Heat Out gear - http://www.cyclegear.com/search/go#w=heat%20out&asug=

FWIW I bought a pair of long johns about a month ago primarily as chafe protection for my knee/shin armor. I liked it so much I bought another pair and two shirts. It's comfortable and keeps me cool.

[ally99]

I'm jealous! I've always wanted to do this, but I'm not capable enough in maintaining my ride to be able to. Props to you Alex! You're such a bad ass!

[Alex]

@Panda - hadn't hear of the heat-out gear prior to your link. The LD community seems to be a big fan of the LDComfort stuff, so I picked up a whole bunch of their gear for this event.

[kirk595x]

Preparation is everything for the IBR! 5 years ago I prepped my friends 1150RT with Side Car for this event as well as many other Rallies. I don't remember where he bought his aux tank but it was a bit unsightly..lol..did it's job none the less. Have you tried the Caliper mounted lights from Motolights.com? He used those for years.

Good luck and have fun!

[Alex]

I haven't used the MotoLights. Everything is going LED these days, so I went with the Clearwater Kristas. They are insanely bright at full power, but when dialed down work very well to improve visibility of the bike. Here's a link to my build / farkling thread.

[tnr4]

EPIC. What a cool adventure. I can see myself trying for this someday, but quite a ways in the future. Really looking forward to the writeup afterwards, Alex!

Good luck, and be safe.

[CycleCam303]

Avoid heat out like the plague. Seriously. I've been using it under my leathers and I used it once on the motocross track. It makes an ok under layer in twilight situations but it really doesn't breathe well but it isn't warm enough for night. The under armor knock off brand at target ( C9 ) is cheaper and does everything almost as well as under armor. Plus it helps with the budget because snagging cold and warm weather options won't break the bank.

[Panda]

Originally Posted by CycleCam303

Avoid heat out like the plague. Seriously. I've been using it under my leathers and I used it once on the motocross track. It makes an ok under layer in twilight situations but it really doesn't breathe well but it isn't warm enough for night.

I'm lost...it's not supposed to be warm.

[ChaoSS]

Originally Posted by Panda

I'm lost...it's not supposed to be warm.

Indeed. It's the freeze out stuff that is supposed to be warm, the heat out stuff is supposed to keep you cool. At least, it's supposed to help in the heat, but it isn't a real cooling vest like the ones you soak and put under your gear.

[CycleCam303]

Ok. Heat out should have its name changed to heat in. On the motocross track I need gear that will keep me cool because you're body is getting a pretty solid workout. But it makes me super hot as soon as normal temperatures arrive. So then you'd think it would work as a base layer during colder weather but obviously it really doesn't work in that situation. I'm just completely not impressed with its whick away a abilities or its breath ability under gear.

[Gregg_VA]

@Alex, see you in four weeks in N. Pittsburg for the start of this epic adventure. Oh, I disagree with ME-880s handling like poo. They are the only tires that I will run on my Goldwing.

See you later.

[dfox]

How do they space out the checkpoints? Is it such that if you we're to speed too much you could arrive too early and lose points? I was in a mini rally back in the day and that was the deal. Thankfully, after taking a few wrong turns, the speeding and wrong turns canceled out and I finished within like 2 min of the expected time for the day long rally, I won that portion of the race (despite having like 15 or 20 extra miles on the trip).

Sounds fun though. Ride safe!

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Gregg_VA

@Alex, see you in four weeks in N. Pittsburg for the start of this epic adventure. Oh, I disagree with ME-880s handling like poo. They are the only tires that I will run on my Goldwing.

Thanks, Gregg! Starting to get really stressed with the planning, but I'm sure it will work out. The 880's seem to work fine on some bikes (heavy touring machines), but don't get the best reviews on lighter bikes when ridden quickly. Both Meese and Andy said they were the worst things they ever put on their bikes, both handling poorly and not lasting any longer than much better handling tires anyway.

Originally Posted by dfox

How do they space out the checkpoints? Is it such that if you we're to speed too much you could arrive too early and lose points? I was in a mini rally back in the day and that was the deal.

This isn't a time/distance rally, where you need to get into many different checkpoints at the exact time, losing points if you're early or late. Think of it more like a scavenger hunt, with some checkpoints. Rules vary each time, but this year there are only 3 over 11 days; checkpoint 1, checkpoint 2, and the finish. You need to be at those checkpoints on time or you lose points/DNF, but there's no penalty for arriving early. Between the checkpoints there are dozens and dozens of bonus point opportunities, of varying difficulty and therefore point values. Some of them might not be feasible, even on their own, and it's unfeasible (by far) to do all of them. You don't get the information on those bonuses until very soon before the leg, and then you need to plan a route based on that info. The bonuses vary widely, but some of them do have time restrictions, for a variety of reasons. The store might only be open certain hours, the tide may only be amenable during a certain period, or it might only be able to get the picture in a certain light. Planning the route needs to take into account when you'll be able to get to that bonus. Easy when you're 2 hrs away. Hard to plan for when it's 2500 miles and 3 days away.

[Alex]

Just got word today that the shop has finished up my fuel cell install, along with a few other ancillary parts (Gerbing permanent heated controller / cylinder guards). Will be picking it up Saturday morning, and then working on some of the final bits and bobs. The next hurdle is to come up with a foolproof hydration system. Will probably end up just stashing a camelback in my tankbag, unless I get a better inspiration in the next day or two.

[CC Cowboy]

Originally Posted by Alex

Just got word today that the shop has finished up my fuel cell install, along with a few other ancillary parts (Gerbing permanent heated controller / cylinder guards). Will be picking it up Saturday morning, and then working on some of the final bits and bobs. The next hurdle is to come up with a foolproof hydration system. Will probably end up just stashing a camelback in my tankbag, unless I get a better inspiration in the next day or two.

Don't forget the hydration drain hose.

[Alex]

I came with that as a standard feature.

[ally99]

I'm excited to live vicariously through you during this adventure Alex! You're a total badass!!

[Alex]

I picked up the bike today. The fuel cell was installed, as well as the engine guards and gerbing power controller.



More pics in this gallery.

While I was at the shop, they noticed a small leak in one of the hose fittings, and they tightened it. Surprisingly, they hadn't tested the cell with any fuel in it at all, so that leak was just from opening the valve and having some fuel come back up from the main tank.

I got home, and started playing with things to make sure all was well. Sadly, that turned out not to be the case. I first noticed that the Gerbing controller was no longer working; the LED wouldn't come on and it wasn't providing any warmth. I next tried to hook up my autocom cable (hadn't tested it at the shop, kicking myself over and over again ever since), and it looks like something broke in the audio setup. I have no radio / ipod / main nav system coming through my headset. I'm reeling a bit, as there is no time to get all the way back to Modesto in the time that I have left for them to fix things, so I am going to need a favor from one of my local shops to fix whatever they broke.

So I figured I'd test the fuel cell just in case. I siphoned most of the fuel out of the main tank, and added a few gallons to the cell. And it started leaking like crazy from one of the fittings. Not fun to have gasoline going all over the back of the bike! I took the whole cell back off, tracked down which fitting, and tightened it up much snugger than it was before. I was worried about overtightening, so I tried to be as careful as I could. The good news is that it looked like it fixed the problem. I then put the cell back on, reconnected everything, and filled the cell up to the top with gas. I opened the valve to let her rip, and it successfully drained quite quickly into the main tank, with no noticeable leaks. I'll plan a check ride next weekend to make sure things stay in place on the road.

Quite worried about the electronics problems, and will plan to be at my local shop early Tuesday morning, begging them for the the person who initially installed all of the audio setup to take a look again to see if he can find the fault. Never fun having more than one shop look at the same stuff, but the other shop had just completed an identical fuel cell for a friend, and I wanted to take advantage of their recent knowledge/experience. A small issue now is the protocol of what I do with that shop. I don't have time to get back there for them to fix their mistakes, and will certainly have to pay my local folks to fix whatever is necessary. Do I ask the first shop to pick up the cost of what needs to be re-done? The most important part is that the bike is A-OK by the rally, so I am focusing on that first before worrying about blame or recompense.

[ChaoSS]

Generally, it's bad form to ask them to pay for something to be repaired at someone else's shop, especially if it should have been noticed before you left.


Could you call them and ask them if they could walk you through some troubleshooting over the phone?

[Alex]

Finding the problem once everything is out in the open probably isn't that challenging. The switch to control the audio was rotated a bit for the Gerbing knob to be installed. It's likely that one of the wires came loose. Troubleshooting is probably no more or less complicated than re-mounting that switch and confirming wire continuity from the front of the bike at that switch back to the audio system in the tail. The problem for me is getting to the back of that panel. It requires taking a good part of the left side of the bike apart, which is why I thought having them add this last component while the bike was already apart would be a low risk way to get things together. For the Gerbing failure, it's a bit more curious. It was working at the shop, and yet wasn't an hour later. The most likely two options are that the power wire came loose, or the unit had an internal failure. The first would be an installation goof, but the second would mean that parts do simply fail from time to time.

[choneofakind]

Ahhh, BMW's and their overly complex nature. Who needs fancy electronics?

[ChaoSS]

Fancy electronics are nice. It's nice having more than one bike too, sometimes the simplicity of the ninja is nice, sometimes having a bike with more stuff on it is nice too.


It wouldn't be such a big issue if the timing wasn't so bad, he already had a bike almost set up for the rally months ago when he dumped it and had to start all over again. If that hadn't happened, I'm sure he'd have all the gremlins worked out and not be worried about this stuff right now.

[Alex]

To be fair, none of the issues I'm having are related to anything that comes stock on the bike. Adding bits and bobs is always a trade-off for added functionality, with the risk that added complexity could be less reliable over time. Hoping I get it all sorted out.

The current failure is between the built-in BMW audio system, and the autocom comm system. There is an output from the BMW system that goes to that switch, and it is directed to either the built-in speakers on the bike, or the autocom. Something is futzed up with that switch, so it now goes to the speakers, or to nothing. This means that I can't get Sirius radio, sound from the main nav system, am/fm/weather band, or from my ipod. The autocom is working fine, so the things piped directly to it are still functional, like my radar detector, other GPS, and cell phone. If I can't get this working and time gets short, I'll just run the ipod cord directly to the autocom for some music, and then just need to figure out how to keep it powered while on the bike, while accessible to be able to pause/skip.

Overall reliability is a concern for all bikes when you're going 15k+ miles at a time, but there's really not much I can do about it other than making sure the bike is in reasonable shape at the start. It's basically new, it has the right fluids, no leaks, and has proven itself capable on a few long rides. If I have a final drive failure halfway through the rally, it would be terribly disappointing, but the likelihood is low and there's not much I can do about it either prior or during, so why worry.

Off to the hardware store to pick up a bunch more zipties, and some pipe insulation to put something soft around the fuel line fittings.

[choneofakind]

Relax Tim, I'm just teasing Alex about riding a bike that resembles something of a cross between a space shuttle and a LazyBoy.

I get why it's an issue. This amount of planning and prep is why I'd never be able to undertake an IBR.