Iron Mountain Racing takes 3rd in ALCAN 5000

From near perfection to barely hanging on, that was how it went Tuesday in the finale of the ALCAN 5000 for John Isenberg of Iron Mountain Racing.

Lined up for the last test of the rally, "I was waiting for my minute to come up, watching my clock and it was 56, 57, 58 and then my bike died. I left five seconds late, and then had to stop for a school bus, then had the bike die a couple times on the test, so it was kind of a cluster. I had to limp my bike in, and just barely got into Anchorage."

The contrast could not have been sharper as John had scored only one point on the test immediately prior. Low scores are the best scores in this type of event.

Things went better for John's teammates, and the team took third place in the team competition. Dan Watt, in the seat-of-the-pants division, took first. Oliver Andrews and Kacee Callahan placed second in their car division and third overall for the entire event. None of the team members had run the ALCAN before.

Dan's win was especially gratifying considering that a couple days earlier he had crashed and punched a 2-inch hole in his valve cover. He cited the repair effort (a circus!) as one of the rally's biggest highlights for him. Repairs were made with a pop can and cold solder.

"We did manage to keep Dan's bike going," says John. "The patch that we made pretty well let loose yesterday (Tuesday) and it went from a slow drip to a decent leak, so I don't think we would have gotten another day out of it."

John noted two of the highlights for him as the camaraderie of the contestants and the descent into Valdez on Monday.

"We drove into Valdez night before last, and that is just a spectacular place, unbelievable. You can stand in downtown Valdez and it's almost a 360 degree view of mountains. There's probably five or six glaciers all right there that you can see. It was by far one of the best ride days."

Surprises

Asked about surprises, John replied, "the length of the transits. Six hundred-mile days were harder than I was expecting them to be."

Other surprises?

"That you can fall asleep on a motorcycle. Coming back from the North Canol Road, we had gotten off the technical section and I found myself literally fighting to stay awake. In a couple places I kept scaring myself because I woke myself up and and had to stop twice and just nap on the bike, close my eyes for 10 minutes to try and shake the sleepiness. And it worked. I was able to, with just a couple quick little power naps, get back into town. There were a lot of late nights so there was a significant lack of sleep. As the days went on and those strung together it became more and more of a challenge."

Another surprise was the lack of wildlife seen in Alaska.

"I was disappointed in that, I came to Alaska expecting it to be sort of like the African plains where you can't help but see animals, and I didn't see a damn thing, other than a porcupine the night that we spent out in the woods."

There was one motorcycle competitor, however, who "actually had to stop because a moose wouldn't let him by" on the Denali Highway.

What's next?

John is definitely interested in taking another shot at the ALCAN 5000.

"You know, I think I will. I think, chalk this one up to a learning experience, then I'd like to come back and try again for a win."

He is also thinking about doing the winter rally, just to experience it. The ALCAN alternates between a car-only winter rally one year and an any-vehicle summer rally the next.

"Our understanding is that it's really, really pretty when everything is snow-covered. And the nice thing about the winter event is that they actually do some closed course speed competitions, some ice racing. I think we do 300 miles of frozen river, and that sounds like a lot of fun."

Notice the use of the word "we" there.

The winter rally is 18 months away, however, and in the meantime Iron Mountain Racing is looking at doing some rally motos. These are similar to the ALCAN except that the various tests or stages are speed competitions rather than timing competitions. John has talked with their sponsors about doing four rallys on the West Coast and then, depending on sponsor support, they may do some on the East Coast as well.

Sponsorships can be crucial for teams due to the costs associated with these events. In the ALCAN, Iron Mountain Racing's sponsors have included the following.