Singletrack/MTB
Gravel/All-road
Dirt-road Touring
Fat-bike
Earlier this week, Abigail Snyder finished first at the 2025 Rockstar Challenge in Virginia, winning the overall race, the women’s race, and beating the previous fastest known time by nearly nine hours. Find a recap from Abigail and photos of her ride here…
Words and photos by Abigail Snyder, finish photos by Devin Cutter Photography
Apparently, there’s a script of things you shouldn’t say before starting an ultra/bikepacking event. Things like:
– I decided to do this two weeks ago.
– I’ve never ridden my MTB more than 80 miles.
– I’ve never bikepacked before.
– I didn’t bring cold-weather gear.
– I haven’t had an appetite all week.
– I have a saddle sore that won’t go away.
– I have a list of people I can call when I decide to quit.
As my friend (and experienced ultra/bikepacker) Kayla Hall will attest, talking to me at the start of the 2025 Rockstar Grand Depart included every one of these statements. I was confident of only one thing: that I had a handful of friends who would pick me up if and when I decided this wasn’t fun anymore.
The Rockstar Trail route is 270 miles with 35,756 feet of climbing, traversing the Blue Ridge Mountains between Harrisonburg and Roanoke, Virginia, primarily on singletrack. It encompasses some absolute bangers of backcountry riding. There are approximately 70 miles between refueling options, and various “country stores” (i.e. gas stations) are along the route.
Rob Issem, one of the creators of the trifecta of Rockstar routes (gravel, pave, and trail), is a good friend, and back in January had gathered a sizable group to do a “stage race” supported iteration of the trail route, which was the hook that put Rockstar on my race calendar for the year. Because it’s in my backyard, I’ve been Rockstar-curious but adamant that I didn’t want to weigh my bike down with gear.
Two weeks before the Grand Depart, I learned that Rob’s group had dwindled to just a handful of people, and simultaneously was calculating saddle time and realized that I didn’t want to spend four days doing this. So, I called another friend, Cameron Swengel, who completed Rockstar Trail self-supported a few years ago, and asked him what it would take for me to do it self-supported.
I primarily race cross-country marathon (XCM) and enduro events, so I’m used to spending long days on the bike, and I often do big backcountry rides as training. I knew that my pacing for 270 miles would have to be drastically different than when racing for 70 miles, but I also knew that some things would be similar: the need to keep eating, filtering water, riding backcountry at night, etc. I just didn’t know if I could string all of those things together over and over and over. In my mind, Rockstar wasn’t a race, it was an opportunity to build fitness for later “A” races, as well as a new kind of challenge: “Can I do this?” vs. “How fast?”
My plan was to ride the 155 miles to Covington, get a hotel, and then finish. I didn’t have any real comprehension of what my pace would be over that many miles, so I didn’t even set any kind of time goals, just determined to stay curious: “How far can I ride at once? I guess we’ll find out.” My other goal was just to have fun riding all the trails. Essentially, this was one big enduro: pedal chill on the climbs (or walk), and send it on the descents!
Ultimately, my decision to only carry an emergency bivy bag forced me to keep moving. No one told me that sleeping in a bivy is more of a “lie down and shiver” situation than an actual sleeping option. I think I got about two hours of sleep the first night, then determined that the only way to stay warm was to keep moving. So, I just kept pedaling.
By the time I reached Covington, I was completely cracked. I had a malfunctioning dropper lever, my left knee was causing me excruciating pain both walking and pedaling, and I was probably behind on fuel/hydration. But, I also now knew that I was the lead female rider–and though I hadn’t started this as a race, all it took was to know I was winning for the competitive switch in my brain to flip. I called Cameron and another friend and honestly told them, “I don’t know if it’s smart to push it with my knee–in fact, I don’t know if I can handle the pain–but now that I’m winning, I feel like I have to try and finish.” I bought some Tylenol at the gas station, loaded up on food for the next ~70-mile stretch, refueled with a combination of Red Bull and McDonald’s, and decided to give it a try. More curiosity: “Let’s just see how it goes.”
It also helped that the trails past Covington were (mostly) trails I had ridden before. On my top tube, I’d written the mile markers where each trail segment started, as motivation to get to singletrack. The closer I got to home, the more familiar those trails became. Somewhere along the ridge of North Mountain (more locally referred to as “Dragon’s Back”), I was beyond stoked at how gorgeous the weather was, how much I love riding Dragon’s Back, and that I felt surprisingly good (credit to the dose of Tylenol I took just before climbing up to North Mountain that had finally kicked in and relieved the persistent pain in my knee). It was at this point that I took my phone out of Airplane mode and texted Cameron: “What’s the women’s FKT, and when do I need to finish to beat it?”
The fact that I felt so good on North Mountain probably should have warned me that the bonk was coming. When I got to the second climb at Carvin’s Cove (Trough), not even the pizza, ice cream bar, and Red Bull I’d had at the Catawba Grocery could bring me back to life. I was fading quickly… and not even the promise of home and all the positive self-talk in the world could breathe pep back into my legs. But because I’d left my phone on, I could see the notifications from friends popping up on my Garmin: messages of encouragement, group chats trying to determine when I’d reach the star on Mill Mountain so they could meet me, momentary panic because my tracker hadn’t updated in a couple hours, etc.
When I finally came around the corner in downtown Roanoke to the finish at Texas Tavern, I was surprised to see an entire group of friends waiting to cheer me into the finish. Because I hadn’t considered this a race, I never dreamed that so many people were dot watching or even aware that I was doing Rockstar. To say it was rad would be a severe understatement… but I don’t know that I can come up with a better description.
Winning the overall for the 2025 Rockstar Trail Grand Depart and setting a new women’s FKT by 8 hours and 58 minutes were never even on my radar as goals. Though I might someday try a more relaxed version of bikepacking (maybe on gravel, so I don’t have to worry about weighing down my mountain bike?), I don’t think ultra is for me. And, sorry Rob, but Rockstar Trail is dumb. I 0/10 recommend. Absolutely go ride all the trails–they’re rad–but do it as a day trips. There is no need to ride them all at one time. LOL.
Further Reading
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