Beth's story: The Bad Astra

BaseCamp athlete Beth Huffaker shared her experience at the 2026 Bad Astra bike race in Kansas.

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It was a muddy mess out there at The Bad Astra gravel race yesterday! But I didn’t melt. 😁 I got to see Diesel, the bike shop dog, before the race and was lucky I still had all my fingers since I was holding the donut a little too close! He really likes his donuts!

I was the oldest woman in the race by a range of 10-40 years! I was moving along pretty well until the two mile hike through the very muddy bean fields! The kids handled that better than I did. I finished 7th out of 25 women, not what I was hoping for, but I was happy that I could carry my bike for parts of the hike, thanks to my added strength work over the last few months! And the Vermont camp with my BaseCamp crew definitely flattened out some of those Kansas “climbs.” 😏 One more race to go this year, hopefully with no mud included!