Sue's story: Solstice Gravel Grinder

BaseCamp athlete Sue Hageman shared her experience at the 2025 Solstice Gravel Grinder bike race in Nebraska.

Well I/we survived!!! Galen and I did the 2025 Solstice Gravel Grinder. It is always a tough ride! There is always either, heat, winds, storms are all of it! This was by far my toughest. Winds 25-35mph with gusts of 50mph. The temp expected to be 101 high. Thank goodness the event decided to start an hour earlier and encouraged people to drop down in mileage if they couldn't finish by at least noon. Glad we decided to move to 37 instead of 67. The tailwinds first thing was a delight! Galen and I got separated and frankly thought something happened so we lost at least 10 minutes. Then we went south and battled headwinds and gusts for 16 miles. It was brutal. It was a challenge to just stay upright when the gusts came about every 30 secs. We managed to finish before 10:30. The last 1/3 of the race it was getting hot.

Thanks so much to BaseCamp and to Menachem Brodie for getting me ready for this. I felt stronger in upper body and core to manage to stay upright without falling!!!!

This ride will be talked about for years to come lol.