DALMAC starts today. OK, so I should’ve posted about it in February when the sign-up happens, but, whatever, here’s props to the coolest bike event in Michigan!
It’s a decades-old multi-day tour that starts from Lansing and ends in Mackinaw City. It’s affordable and it’s been around forever. I wish I coulda been there. (I’ve done it a couple times.) Its popularity helps make the host club, the TCBA, one of the biggest in the nation. I think it’s the biggest all-volunteer run weeklong bike tour out there.
DALMAC has a uniquely mid-Michigan style. It’s cheap and it’s intense and all sorts of people do it, hundreds of them on each of 5 routes. It’s style is not as pampered as basically every other supported tour and the origination city (and first day of riding) aren’t what every tour-organizer would call desirable in every sense. Nope! DALMAC is special!
You basically start from where you live, or fairly nearby (many ride to the start) then ride up through farm country and farther and farther north until you see the terrain and climate change from maples to birches and pines. The routes are chosen for very good roads which lead you past a lot of top-notch scenery and coastline. It still costs under $200, I think.
You ride from school to school, 50-100 miles a day. Trucks bring your luggage ahead. So you get to the school of the day then set up your tent and take a shower in the school gym. You eat your dinner and breakfast in the cafeteria. It’s school-daze all over again! –Complete with Mystery Meat! …Then at 5:30 comes the sounds of tent zippers. Unless you’re wearing earplugs that’s your wake-up. Most folks are packed and dressed for riding, with their bike ready and luggage tossed into a truck, by the time they line up for the early prison-style breakfast.
They then hit the road at a fast pace. At least the faster routes do. A lot of fast pace-lines form and there’s not a lot of sight-seeing or fooling around or long rest-stops. It seems like most folks would get to the next camp by 2pm, I think many do. A few linger up to a half hour at places like the lunch stop. If you add more than one coffee or ice-cream or swimming break during the day, you’ll be among the last to get to the freezing cold showers in the children’s jail-like gyms. Feast your eyes on the benefits of a scenic tourist region with a low tax base and high percent of retired cottage owners! …But I’ve heard that part of the fast pace is to get to the showers while they’re still hot. Hmm, a hard way to justify a pitiless day, to me.
Quite a few of the pace-lines go faster than road-racing packs do, as strategy plays a role in real racing. If you’re looking for a low-budget race training camp for some sort of autumn race series, this couldn’t be beat. The pace-lines are often led by multiples of national-caliber tandem teams. Try drafting 3 tandems going 30+mph!
Now, I’ve heard that this is only how the classic 4-Day West route and the Century routes roll. The other routes are mellower. There are two 5-day routes and an eastside 4-Day that all might be more family-friendly. (One of the 5-day’s goes into the U.P. for its extra day, so maybe that’s fast , too.)
Now, the faster routes do include plenty of families. I’ve had 10-year-olds out-ride me here. And you’ll see quite a few triplet bikes. Just because she’s 14 and wearing tennis shoes doesn’t mean you’re not going to get dropped.
But I’ve heard the 5-Day routes start a bit later in the morning and have more lingering going on. Sign me up for that next time. Actually, I’d like to build up a base with our kids and include them next time. But they’d need to be around more kids when riding and our local clubs have no kids and a lot of receding or grey hair. Maybe a bit further into town would expose us to rides with more kids, to help get ready.
There are all sorts of fruit-stands along the way — PEACHES! (There’s a super one as you get close to Traverse City.) And you ride past all kinds of lovely swimming holes and gorgeous rivers and beaches. (You ride across the first cold, clear, northern river just about when you hit the northland proper. It’s the Muskegon, up by Evart. Who can resist? Not me!) Michiganders need to do this kind of thing every year or they just get out of sorts. There are a whole lot of “must do’s” on any DALMACkers list. …The Tunnel of Trees, Legs Inn, the Wall, Short’s Bar, Sturgeon Bay beach…
It seems like a goodly chunk of the intense riders are actually just kind of ghosting the ride. They sign up, I think, but they don’t eat the slop or sleep in the playground. They’re eating at restaurants and sleeping at resorts. I even bump into quite a few who aren’t even riding the route all the time. The event likes to wander into new area but some folks stick to some previous route they liked better. So there’s some diffusion to the social map here.
Now, you need to sign up in February or March to get in on any of this! These are limited rides and they fill up a few weeks after being announced (in mid Feb, I think). Every 5 years there’s a Quint Century route offered. C’mon, five hard centuries in a row! –That’s gotta be tough.
My radical idea is that it seems like it’d be neat to get the trucks outta the equation somehow. Why not have a self-supported DALMAC? –Where everyone carries their own stuff. Everyone seems so blazingly fit. You don’t need much to do it. You could credit-card it. But 20 lbs of stuff slapped onto your bike would be fine for a few days. …But then how do you get back from the Bridge? OK, maybe there’s nothing wrong with a bus-ride at that point. Full busses are pretty climate-friendly, I’d think. (Oh, the official bus-ride home includes a box lunch and is $40.)
The true old French way of doing a tour like this would be to do a fast first “transit” day to get to the scenic country then do 4 leisurely days, then 2 fast days home down the center of the state. That’s a whole week. I suspect the majesty behind the success of DALMAC has always been that it’s a major vacation goal, but it only takes 4 days. Southland Michiganders everywhere are riding more and more in the months leading up to DALMAC, then they get their quick blast of scenic fun, then they’re home.
After DALMAC? Sadly, SE Michigan roads empty out of bikers by half. …And, dang, there are MONTHS of even nicer riding still ahead. It’s more than a bit sad. But the reality is that SE Michigan bike culture is built around DALMAC. It’s great in its own way, and I know that nobody has much time — school is back in session and it’s getting darker earlier — but the riding is still SO GOOD. Then when the COLORS turn on, watch out!
Anyway, for the NEXT WEEK, it doesn’t get any better for fun in Michigan than…DALMAC! I wish I was there! Have fun, people!
https://biketcba.org/tours.php?pg=DALMAC
