The Dark Horse Invitational is the brain child of SS bike pack racing extraordinaire Chris Joice. This "not a race" 😉😉😉 takes place in the vast expanse of the Cherokee National Forest (Reliance, Coker Creek, Tellico Plains area). In its 3rd year, Chris upped the ante by having a 3 day event, where you could just do the main event on Saturday or the full pull. As the name applies, you must have an invite to "race." Those who raced the prior year get an automatic entry and can extend an invite to newcomers. The "not a race" is staged out of Fireside OutPost, owned and operated by Kim Murrell, the infamous creator of the Tennesee Gravel's ITT series, as well as the Three Rivers Way Vista 316/Mountain 430 bikepacking races.
This is a team event (teams of 2-3). I teamed up with Lisa Randall and extended an invite to Dave Jolin, who teamed up with John Switow and Justin Hunter. While the forecast leading up to the event had me questioning my life choices, it changed enough to take it from Type 3 fun to Type 2.
DAY 1: Friday Night Time Trial
For the full pull, only one team mate needed to ride Friday and Sunday. But Lisa and I both wanted to experience the entirety of Chris' madness. The fastest time of the team would be scored. I pre rode this the week prior and boy was I glad.
Think of a back country cyclocross course on a decommissioned forest service road with downed trees and washed out roadbeds as barriers and saplings growing up in the roadbed that you had to weave through. Now do this at night and after rain had fallen the previous day. Yep, super spicy 6 mile TT!
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| 📷: Graham Skardon |
We took off in 30 second intervals. Lisa started behind me, but caught up when there was a bit of a rider pile up at the road wash out, where we had to descend down, cross a creek, and then hike back up. Overall, Lisa and I managed a win for the team, as she had the fastest time. All that adventure racing paid off!
DAY 2: Check Point Race
This was the big day out in da woods. Think PMBAR, but on gravel bikes. Using a map, passport, and experience, you had 10 hours to collect 3 mandatory CP's and 3 bonus CP's. The passport, which contained rules of travel and the check points was not given to us at the start. Instead we were given a boarding pass to the Hiwassee River Train.
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| 📷: Graham Skardon |
This was so freaking cool! A 6 mile train ride to start. Which meant 6 less miles to pedal and warmth for 15'ish minutes. The boarding pass contained information regarding 2 checkpoints, 1 of which would have our passports. The 2 CP's were the bridge at the Powerhouse and Kimsey Mtn/Piney Flats intersection. So for those 15 minutes, my mind went back and forth between which CP had the passport. If I chose wrong, then it would cost us extra miles to head back to the other CP. In the end, I figured heading to the Powerhouse was the lesser of two evils. Most teams chose to go this way. Most times when I have a 50/50 guess, I end up choosing wrong. Well, the statistic gods were with me today, hoo-ray!
Once we arrived at the PowerHouse and grabbed the passport, we quickly plotted the CP's and I chose to head in a CCW direction, starting with the Kimsey Mtn/Piney Flats CP. The roads were wet and sloppy in spots, made worse by the fact that it was opening weekend for bear hunting, so all the Bubba's were out in their trucks driving the roads at breakneck speeds. Think bass fisherman, but in Tacomas!
Lisa was on fire early on, as she dragged me through Piney Flats and then up Kimsey Mountain. Not having any troubles snagging the second mandatory and then the bonus CP at Deep Gap TH, we motored over to Ditney Mountain. I began to question my route choice when several teams came down Kimsey, going in the opposite direction as us. Did I miss something in the rules of travel? Perhaps 2 pages got stuck together and there were more CP's than we thought? While I had this internal struggle for a few minutes, Lisa came through and assured me, even though she had no idea where she was, that I was going the correct way. Later that night, at the campfire, as we exhchanged our route choices, those teams took the more arduous route up Smith Mountain.
Ditney Mountain Road was in the best ... shape ... ever! Like a highway almost, it had been graded and compacted. We made exceptional time going down to Farner. A short descent on Hwy 68 led us to Shuler Creek Road. This was also in amazing shape, dry and fast! We came upon Chris Joice and Rachel Woods, the photog. We stopped briefly for a water refill and some candy. Chris told us that Ali's team was just up the road.
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| Smoke Signal Photography |
That lit a fire under me and I had an amazing climb up to Unicoi Gap. It also helped that the sun came out and allowed me to thaw out ... again. The previous 5 hours of riding had been super cold and I had experienced no fewer than 4 freeze/thaws of my extremities, between the climbing and descending.
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| Unicoi Gap CP |
After snapping a selfie, we descended down and stopped at the Coker Creek visitor center for a quick pee break and bottle refill. As we pulled in, Ali's team was just heading out. I was shocked, as I had not expected to catch them. Ali had brought some heavy hitters to this adventure, what with the likes of Amy and Chelsea, who between them, had multiple national titles and at least one world title. And Ali is no slouch, as she represented the USA at UCI Gravel Worlds.
We might have had a bit of an advantage on the descents, as we were on mountain bikes and they were on gravel bikes. But, now that there was a lot of pavement left, I did not expect to be able to hang with them or even catch back up to them.
The next CP at the junction of Epperson Road and CR 631 was a bug a bear to find. We knew we were at the right intersection, but could not find the CP. It also didn't help that while the Nat Geo map listed county road numbers, all the road signs were names. I was looking for a white bag, figuring it was similar to the one at Kimsey/Piney Flats, since we had to grab a sticker as proof. But nothing! In the end, a couple walking up the road, helped us to find it, as the lady saw a tiny post with a red reflector that had never been there before. Sure enough, that was it, along with a tiny note saying, "Take a pic." Come to find out, there were some hooligans playing shenanigans with this CP.
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| Epperson at CR 631 |
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| with a little help from our friends |
We had plenty of time left on the clock at this point and headed over to Witt Cemetery for the final bonus CP. Arriving at the cemetery, we could earn an additional 1 hour time bonus if we took a pic of the oldest readable headstone. We found one from 1878 and snapped a pic. As we began heading back to Fireside, we had to contend with a pack of dogs. No less than 6 papillons began squeaking at us. Seriously?!? 😆😆😆 All it took was an aggressive pedal stroke towards them and they skedaddled.
We finished up our adventure a little after 4:30 pm: 76 miles and 8300 feet. Along with Ali's team, we were 1 of 6 teams to get all the CP's. Chris had warm Peppo's 3 pound burritos (I had the burrito bowl) awaiting our spent selves.
DAY 3: Short Course "not race" Race
A frosty cold morning greeted my bike hangover. Today's ride was a 9 mile neutral roll out, followed by a 33 mile timed segment. We were escorted by a moto dude (sorry, but forgot your name). On our way, we had an amazing road find. Not a discarded tool, not a dirty diaper, not a shoe, but an AR-15!
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| Spring Creek Road treasure! |
We regrouped at the fire station. I opted to ride my gravel bike today. Lisa stuck it out on her SuperCaliber with the wibble-wobble rear wheel (she broke a spoke yesterday). I knew there was no way I was going to make up 18 minutes on Ali's team, but I was still gonna go hard because that is just what I do. The timed segment was about 50:50 gravel:road.
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| The hangover was real. 📷: Smoke Signal Photography |
As we got rolling, Dave and I settled in with each other. He had some gas left in his tank from yesterday and did not have the route loaded. So that gave me extra incentive to push the gears, so he could follow my lead. Despite my fatigue and the 29 degree start, I loved this course. Towee Pike --> Fingerboard --> Ivy Trail --> Bullet Creek --> Starr Mountain --> Hwy 315 --> Spring Creek Road. Compared to yesterday, the gravel bike felt fast, and the gravel roads were in spectacular shape. Slowly it did begin to warm up and I dropped a layer at Chris's vehicle on Bullet Creek Road. Dave and I rode well together and I was super glad to draft off of him on Spring Creek Road. As soon as we crossed the train tracks on Spring Creek, the fog rolled in and the temperature must have dropped 15 degrees. And that wind! I tucked in tightly behind Dave and rode his wheel to the finish.
Lisa and I ended up second behind Ali, Amy, and Chelsea for the full pull. I need to give Avah Cherry and her team mate a shout out for Saturday's main event. Despite having rarely ridden this area, they acquired 5 CP's and did not have any "wandering and wondering" moments.
Despite the freezing conditions (for me), I had an absolute blast. Coming from a mountain bike background, I appreciated the "spiciness" that Chris added to this gravel "not a race" race. While I do like to ride gravel, sometimes gravel races can be a bit boring to me.
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| Saturday Podium |
The vibes all weekend were amazing. It was so much fun to engage with others during the neutral roll outs and afterwards around the fire. I loved hearing about everyone's day and route choices. I told Chris this was my favorite gravel race because it combined adventure, competition, and camaraderie. And huge props to Rachel Woods for capturing the weekend on film. She was everywhere and managed to take over 2000 photos!
If you are interested in the 2026 Invitational, let me know and I will send you an invite when the time comes.
