2025 Moultrie Militia 177.6 Mile Gravel Raid Race Report

Last Updated on March 17, 2025 by Heather Hart, ACSM EP, CSCS

It all started – as many race registrations do – somewhere around New Year’s Day.

Geoff and I were discussing what our 2025 race plans would look like, and he mentioned the possibility of racing the Swamp Fox Gravel Fondo in lieu of our old standby: the Swamp Fox Adventure Race this year (different race organizations, always held the same weekend, and in the same area – “Swamp Fox” is a popular in these parts, a reference to Revolutionary War General Francis Marion, whom the local National Forest is named after).

For the past five years we’ve raced the Swamp Fox AR, but felt that it was starting to get pretty predictable – more of a “follow the leader” event rather than a true adventure race – and we wanted to give something else a try.

I looked at the Swamp Fox Gravel Fondo website, and noticed that the race offered three different distances: 27 miles, 50 miles, and 100 miles. But there was a fourth option, a 177.6 mile unsupported, overnight race that started at 11:00 pm on Friday called the Moultrie Militia Gravel Raid (MMGR). The part of me that will forever be engrained with the mindset of an ultra runner thought “OBVIOUSLY you want to get the most miles for your dollar” and suggested to Geoff that we do the MMGR.

He won’t mind me sharing the fact that he immediately shot down the idea. He didn’t think we were ready.

For those of you who may be new here: I spent the last 20 years focused on running, with the last ten years specifically focused on running ultramarathons (running upwards of 100 miles a handful of times). I very reluctantly got into cycling as a means to pursue adventure racing, but somehow managed to fall in love with riding bikes in the last few years.

Geoff and I raced a 100 miler – my first 100 on a bike – last March, and for a number of reasons that about destroyed both of us. He thought that the distance of the MMGR – combined with the fact that it was unsupported – would be too much.

I reminded him that I’ve spent the past year training on the bike, and I’ve become so much stronger than I as at the Gravelanche 100 last March. Plus, unsupported overnight adventures is what we do best: we are no strangers to multi-day adventure races where we have to pretty much fend for ourselves. At least this would be a marked course.

“Well…we’d have to buy some more gear for our bikes in order to carry enough water and food.” he said in a last ditch effort to convince me otherwise.

“You LOVE buying new gear for bikes.” I retorted. It’s true, that man loves to shop.

I finished my plea with letting my husband know that I was craving something stupid, something that pushed my limits, and an adventure with him. Since the day we met nearly 13 years ago, we’ve been each other’s #1 racing partner, and we’ve consistently pushed ourselves in various endurance events throughout the years. Our idea of a “date” isn’t dinner and a movie, it’s being utterly sleep deprived and filthy while cut off from the rest of society.

But circumstances in our life that popped up unexpectedly last October put a quick halt on our race calendar, and my heart and soul have been craving something like this for the last 5 months. We were overdue for something ridiculous.

Geoff understood all too well. We registered for the Moultrie Militia Gravel Raid.

A First Timer’s Recount of the Moultrie Militia Gravel Raid

As I sit here the day after the event, finally inspired to write something on this blog that has pretty much been abandoned for the last 18 months, I can tell you that this race was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done*.

(*As a full disclaimer: it’s been nearly 4 years since I’ve run a 100 miler, so in the classic “time heals all wounds” fashion, I may have forgotten).  

But it was not hard for the reasons you’d probably expect.

Sure, 177.6 miles is a long way to ride your bike, but we kept our effort in an easy Z1 and below the entire time.  So the “fitness” portion of this event was really not that bad. 

It was everything else. 

(I won’t lie – this recap is long. If you want to skip to the highlights, feel free to scroll to the very end where I cover “what went right” and “what went wrong”.)

Miles 1-60: Jenny I’ve Got Your Number

While there were nearly 450 people registered for the Swamp Fox Gravel Fondo weekend, there were only 16 of us who started the MMGR. After the race directors gave us our last minute instructions, we were sent off into the fray at 11:00 pm on Friday night.

Geoff and I were IMMEDIATELY – within seconds – dropped from the ENTIRE rest of the pack. We were dropped so fast I stopped seeing their blinking red tail lights after the first half mile. This didn’t bother me in the slightest, as my only goals for this race were to a) finish, and b) have a fun adventure with Geoff. The two of us alone would have more fun together anyway.

And we did.

I’ll be the first to admit that an 11 pm start is certainly rough, especially when you’re an old lady like me who likes to be in bed by 8 pm and values her sleep (my normal 4:30 am wakeup call for work doesn’t help).  Nevertheless, this was not my first overnight rodeo, and the excitement of what was to come kept me alert and awake.

As did the Tommy Tutone “867-5309/Jenny” song that was stuck in my head for the first 4 hours on repeat. Where did it come from? Your guess is as good as mine, I honestly can’t remember the last time I actually heard that song. But in classic Heather ADHD fashion, that one line stayed on repeat in my brain, endlessly, until the next song eventually came along.

(And that next song for those wondering would be “Under my Thumb” by The Rolling Stones, except I changed the lyrics to “This hurts my bum” – because: cycling).

The first 30 miles flew by. Despite a few immediate hiccups (Geoff forgot the GoPro batteries, forgot to start his watch and when he did, it chose the moment to update, and then he dropped some stuff that we had to stop and retrieve) we were cruising. The temperature was absolutely perfect – a balmy 60 degrees with light wind and a bit of fog/mist in the air when we were closer to the coast/Eastern side of the forest.

In addition to the fact that my cycling fitness has come a long way, it’s important to note that for this race, I finally put the correct amount of air pressure in my tires (turns out, 35psi is only ideal for my mountain bikes, who knew). We were feeling good and moving along well above our goal pace. Seriously, who knew 20 extra psi in your tires could make such a difference. And we laughed when the Ride with GPS route we were following was giving us an estimated finish time of 9:56 am – 11 hours into the race. Thanks for the lofty confidence boost.

We had every intention of stopping at the first gas station that almost crossed our path at mile 30 to refill our water, but as it would turn out, neither one of us needed anything yet. The extra half mile round trip it would have taken to get there and back on course didn’t seem worth it, so we continued on.

The Francis Marion National Forest – or “the Swamp” as we lovingly refer to it – has become one of my most favorite places on earth. And if you can believe it, it’s even more magical at night. We traversed down endless dirt and gravel roads that we knew both from our own training rides, from our years of Eagle Endurance ultrarunning days (now Palmetto Ultras), and from the past five years of Swamp Fox Adventure Racing.

Most of the roads were in prime condition for riding, fast and smooth. Some were a little sandier than ideal (Old Georgetown road, I’m looking at you) and others were the hilarious type of chaos I’ve come to expect from the FMNF. Like – like Forest Murrell Road – which is slowly being reabsorbed by the forest itself.

Miles 61 – 80: Who Cooks for You?

At mile 60-ish we hit our first snafu (or TARFU, as we prefer) of the night: about halfway down Hell Hole Road A (OF COURSE it was HHRA) – I somehow managed to drop my chain in a way that it got caught between the frame and the small front chain ring, taking huge chunks out of WHAT I HOPE was just the paint on the frame (here’s hoping it’s only cosmetic and didn’t damage the carbon fiber – TBD). The chain was so jammed in there it took Geoff at least 5 minutes to get it unstuck. 

Once the chain is freed and reassembled, we discover that the bike wont shift, so Geoff has to fumble around with the cables.

It is at this point in the adventure I realize that I should REALLY consider starting to learn how to fix this kind of stuff on my own, just incase. Meanwhile, we are on one of the most remote roads out there and while Geoff is literally trying to save our race, I’m off in the darkness with my Merlin app out trying to identify the owls yelling at us for being in their space (Barred Owls, in case you were wondering).  We all have our priorities.

Eventually my bike is fixed enough to get by, with the instructions of “just don’t shift into the small ring”.  It’s fine, save for overpasses and all the climbs to the lake’s dike roads ahead, it’s flat out here, I don’t need the small ring. 

Bike crisis averted, we get back on our bikes, and less than 3 minutes later I manage to fall pretty hard, as my bike slipped out from under me trying to go around one of the massive puddle-holes this little stretch of road is notorious for. I land hard on my side, but thankfully, just inches outside of the puddle, and not in the puddle itself. I’m considering this a win.

This was, hands down, the hardest crash I’ve had to date. Confirmed not only by how it felt, but by the fact that Geoff immediately says “do you need to take a few minutes to shake that off?”. I tell him I’d rather ride it off, so that’s what we do.

Other than some missing skin on my leg, I was fine. Onward.

Eventually we make our way out of the forest and hit the small town of Bonneau, which is already starting to get busy. Our friend James Cooper, who has completed the MMGR a number of times before and was wildly helpful in answering our questions and helping us prepare for this race, warned us that the biggest concern in this stretch would be all of the fishermen flying down the roads towing their boats headed to the lake for the morning. He wasn’t wrong – it was wild how many were already headed towards the lake even though it was only 5:00 am.

As mentioned earlier, this race was unsupported, but we brought MORE THAN ENOUGH stuff (in fact, we way overpacked, but hey, first timers here) to make it to our first unofficial aid station around mile 82 – a gas station that had literally just opened for the morning.

I was craving Gatorade, which is not something I drink often, so I bought one, as well as a package of buffalo seasoned cashews. While I had been fueling consistently and regularly with 25(ish)grams of carbohydrates every 30 minutes, my body was clearly sick of the sweet stuff and craving fats and salts.

We took a few minutes here to refuel, I slammed down some gatorade and nuts, put on my leg warmers and full finger gloves (it’s colder by the water), and we carried on towards the lake.

Mile 81-100: Nobody is Coming to Save You

We hit Lake Moultrie and climbed onto the first section of the dike roads with zero issues. Around mile 90 the last 6 hours of gels and other endurance treats that I NORMALLY tolerate well seemed to have a standoff with the Gatorade in my stomach. I spend the next hour on the struggle bus wondering if I’m going to barf everywhere or poop my pants.  It feels one of the two is inevitable, and our pace creeps to a crawl.

Fortunately, neither happens.  Instead, we find a random park with open bathrooms, and Geoff shares some ginger candies he brought along.  Both are the reprieve I needed, but unfortunately the bubble guts hit Geoff at that exact moment too. We spend a solid 15-20 minutes here trying to get our shit together (literally and figuratively).

I’m reminded of the background my youngest son has on his phone’s lock screen that says “Nobody is coming to save you. Get up.” I laugh as I realize how incredibly appropriate it is for this moment. Because truly, no one is coming to save us. We were told upfront that in addition to this being an unsupported race, we had to have our own way out if we decided to quit at any point. The race directors wouldn’t be able to rescue us.

And our way out? Well I would say it was more “concepts of a plan” rather than a plan itself. We had a handful of people that we knew we could call that would most likely come and rescue us if needed – they just weren’t aware that they were a part of this plan. Like our old friend and former RD Chad Haffa, who lives sort of nearby. He’s the type of guy who would give us ENDLESS shit for having to come rescue us, and would never let us live it down…but he’d do it without question (love ya, Chad!).

Nevertheless, we’re both experienced enough in the ways of ultra-endurance events to know that upset stomachs are just part of the territory sometimes. Puke, shit, do what you need to do, but keep moving forward and eventually you’ll rally.

And…we do.

Eventually daylight starts to break through, my stomach calms down, and the 5 hour energy I took starts to kick in. Our pace creeps back up, and we’re flying* again on the Lake Moultrie Passage of the Palmetto Trail.

(*flying, for me, is around 15-16 miles per hour on gravel.)

This stretch of the course is breathtaking. I love birds, and if you too love birds, you should really go visit this place.  In a one minute span I watched a bald eagle grab some breakfast from the ground in it’s talons, while a massive blue heron watched from the shoreline, a pileated woodpecker flew overheard, and other various herons and ducks floated in the water nearby.  It was prime bird-nerding, and I was loving it.

Miles 101-140: Urban Adventures

Around mile 101 the route turns North and we head away from the lake. We’re on a long dirt road for a while, then we take a left onto paved roads, where we will ride for the next 15 miles.

Those of you who know me know how much I HATE road riding. It makes me nervous for endless reasons, not limited to the fact that seemingly every driver out there is distracted by their phones, and too many people close to me have been hit by cars.

But, I will give a massive shout-out to the people who live and travel the roads on the Northwest side of Lake Moultrie: the drivers could not have been more polite or respectful. There was a lot of traffic – it was Saturday morning after all – but everyone gave us plenty of space, and never left me white knuckling my handlebars, which was nice.

At mile 118 we stop at Henry’s Bait and Tackle to use the bathroom and buy some more water. The lack of sleep and distance covered is catching up to us, but the ratio of distance covered is greater than distance left to ride, and that has us in positive spirits.

That is, until we hit the dike road on the lake again.

Miles 121-131 are back on the lake. It’s a nice reprieve from the traffic, but we’re immediately hit with headwinds, and they suck the life out of us. Because my body loves a good joke, my stomach decides to start doing summersaults here again, and I hit a mental wall. I tuck myself in on Geoff’s back wheel, put my head down, and just go.

This is what I wanted: type 2 fun at its finest.

At one point we come across a stretch of the dike that is impassable, complete with a giant trench and a backhoe. We have to dismount our bikes, walk down a hill, walk a short 100 meter stretch, and climb back up the hill to the dike. Walking felt so ridiculously good, I was happy for the break.

Just before we leave the lake and head down for the last urban stretch of riding through downtown Monks Corner, the fog finally lifts and I’m able to strip off some layers. Feeling the warm sun on my skin is exactly what I needed, and it absolutely brought me back to life.

We hit downtown Monks Corner much later than we had hoped (so many lessons learned on time management and overpacking, but I digress), and traffic was nuts.  We ride carefully through downtown, but opted to walk our bikes up and over the grassy shoulder of the 4 lane highway bridge. It was a wise decision from a safety perspective, but in doing so, somehow Geoff’s entire rear wheel fell apart. 

Don’t ask me exactly what happened, but I’m fairly certain it somehow involves that random rubber o-ring we found on the floor underneath his Zwift trainer just the other day.

Once we got to a gas station at the bottom of the other side of the bridge, Geoff was able to reassemble everything, but this took another 20-30 minutes out of our race.

While he’s working on the bike, I head into the gas station to buy some more snacks – a Mountain Dew and some Honey BBQ Frito Twists is what we are craving. This store – Parkers Kitchen – only has self checkout options. As I scan the Mountain Dew, the computer screen beeps and says “ITEM NOT RECOGNIZED, PLEASE SET ASIDE AND WAIT FOR ATTENDANT.” The man checking out next to me turns to me and says in a friendly, joking voice “That’s the last thing you want when you’re out for a Saturday morning bike ride!”

I turn to him, and in that moment I suddenly realize how absolutely, utterly exhausted I am. I want to say “You have no idea. I’ve been riding my bike since 11 pm last night and I missed an entire nights sleep and I just pushed my bike up and over that bridge while massive trucks were zooming by at 60mph inches away and I’m missing some skin on my inner thighs and all I want is a sip of this Mountain Dew.”

But instead I smiled and said something like “haha, right?” Some things aren’t worth explaining.

Fritos and Mountain Dew acquired, I head back outside and notice the wind picked up considerably. So much so that I have to hold my bike up from wind gusts trying to knock it over. I looked off into the horizon and thought to myself “is the forest service doing more controlled burns? Why is the sky so hazy all of a sudden?”.

It didn’t take me long to realize that wasn’t smoke in the air…it was pollen.

Those of you who also live in the south know the pines usually pick a 24 hour period to spill endless bright yellow pollen into the air, in a way that the sky actually LOOKS like it’s full of yellow smog.  Everything you own, including your own skin and hair will have a thin layer of yellow pollen. It’s absolutely inescapable. And even if you don’t have typically pollen allergies, it will still affect you.

And as I would find out soon enough, I would be no exception.

Miles 141-160: For Better or Worse

We head out of the crazy traffic of Monks Corner for one last 4 mile stretch on the dike road overlooking the lake. The wind is strong, but is fortunately at our backs for this last little stretch, and I enjoy the hell out of every second of it. The sun is shining, the lake is beautiful, and while everything on my body hurts, nothing is getting worse. That’s a win.

Once we turn off of the dike we have another 9 miles or so on pavement before safely tucking back into the forest. The headwinds are tough at this point, and it’s Geoff’s turn for a low. And this isn’t a regular “you probably need to eat more calories” low, it’s the kind of low I’ve only seen from him a handful of times during our nearly 13 years of racing together. Not even that one time we raced across Florida while he had the shingles did he hit a low like this.

Fortunately, we have a knack for rarely hitting endurance lows at the same time. And what I lack in physical strength I can make up for in mental strength, especially over super long distances. So I put on my positive coach hat, get in the front, and pull for the next hour or so, eventually getting us back to the safety of the forest.

We get to a point where I’m motivating Geoff by telling him we can stop for a minute long rest at every road intersection, which is usually every 2-5 miles. While it helps his morale, I won’t lie: I needed the breaks too.

Last fall I went and got a super in-depth professional bike fit on my gravel bike (shoutout to Jon Bisnette from Bike Cycles in Wilmington for the fit, who coincidentally was also racing the MMGR, but had likely crossed the finish line long ago at this point), and more recently finally found a saddle that doesn’t try to tear my undercarriage to shreds (it’s an Ergon, for those who care). So all things considered, things could have been MUCH WORSE after 150 consistent miles on my bike.

But, my rhomboids were super sore, my neck was constantly locking up, and while I was free from saddle sores – there was some considerable chafing.

So despite the fact that our finishing time on the Ride with GPS app kept getting pushed further and further out with each stop, I was not complaining about the breaks. We still had plenty of time to finish within the 16 hour cutoff.

Miles 161-177.8: That One Time the Pollen Tried to Kill Me

It starts gradually – the coughing and shallow breathing. I don’t really notice it at first, as it creeps in at such a slow pace that it almost feels like this is what I’ve been doing for the past 14 hours. It’s not until we hit a short but noticeable enough climb on Lottie road that I realize I can’t take in moderate, never mind deep breaths. Normally when feeling like this I could cough and clear my airway, but this was different, like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. It almost feels like my airways are inflamed, my trachea closing up.

And that causes me to panic, which makes breathing…you guessed it…even harder. Is this what an asthma attack feels like? It must be…and honestly, it’s pretty fucking scary.

Thankfully I immediately realize that panicking is only going to increase both my heart rate and respiratory rate, so I need to cut that shit out right then and there. I tell Geoff I need to stop and lay down, so that’s exactly what I do, in the middle of a dirt road, in the middle of the Francis Marion National Forest.

I realize that it’s most likely the pollen irritating my airways, and while this really, really sucks…it’s not going to kill me. I just have to stay calm and move slowly.

Once again, team HART reversed their roles, and now Geoff is pulling me through the forest, keeping me calm, and letting me know how very close we are to finishing. I’m watching our estimated finishing time creep closer and closer to the 3:00 pm cutoff, but I am so dizzy and unable to breathe, so I, too, must creep.

At some point on the last stretch of dirt road, we pass a clearing in the woods with a small, fenced in pen that we both SWEAR contained a giant tortoise. There were no homes nearby, this was not someone’s yard. It was just a random giant tortoise in a random pen in a random stretch of forest.

That, or we were both hallucinating.

But as a testament to the fact that I was really on the struggle bus – I told Geoff we couldn’t stop. And I almost NEVER miss an opportunity to stop and oogle at nature or wildlife.

The last four miles are paved as we head back to the same field we started in nearly 16 hours ago. They seemingly take forever, but the last few miles always do, no matter how far you are racing.

When we FINALLY reached the finish line, I was so excited, relieved, and exhausted, that I didn’t even have it in me to remember to turn on the GoPro, or cheer, or anything. Just…get me off of this bike and let me lay down.

We had 18 minutes to spare . We did it.

What Went Right:

If you’ve read this far (and thank you for that), let me sum this up with a list in no particular order of what went right for us during our first MMGR experience

• 55psi in my tires. What a friggin difference.
  
• Weather: By pure luck, the weather was nearly perfect. The temperature hovered in the low 60’s for most of the night, other than the fog/mist we stayed dry, and the wind didn’t pick up until the last handful of hours in the race.
  
• My lamps: I ran the Fenix BC30 v2.0 bike light and the Biotite 800 Pro Headlamp, both on medium settings, and both lasted throughout the night without needing batteries replaced/recharging. I was very pleased with that.
  
• Bike Troubleshooting: As our bike mechanics will tell you (hi Gary and Keith!) we are rough on our bikes. Probably unnecessarily so, routinely dragging them through knee deep swamp water and whatever other nonsense we stumble across. So, it’s no surprise that we both had mechanicals. But Geoff was able to troubleshoot AND solve both, at least enough to get us to the finish line.
  
• Course Reconnaissance: this again, is mainly thanks to Cooper. KNOWING exactly when to expect potentially sketchy traffic, potentially brutal headwinds, and other intricacies about the course was incredibly helpful in feeling prepared for what was to come.
  
• Positive Mental Attitude. Even seconds before the start when Geoff said “Oops I forgot to bring the GoPro batteries” I did not crack. I wanted a tough adventure in the woods, and I know that with adventures comes adversity and lows. When those bumps in the road hit (literally and figuratively) I rolled with it. We both did. We never even bickered, not once, during the entire 178 miles, which our adventure racing team will be shocked to hear.

Lessons Learned (aka What Went Wrong):

Like I tell all of my running athletes tackling ultras for the first time: it gets easier with experience. Each race, every adventure, you learn something new that you carry on to your next event. Here’s where we went wrong with MMGR:

• We forgot the GoPro batteries. I’ve been on a kick of video editing and creating YouTube content for our channel, and that definitely put a damper on my post race video recap. Hence this super long blog post instead.
  
• We carried way, way too much stuff. I had a feeling this might be the case at the very start, when I saw we were the only ones carrying so much stuff. Being cold is my absolute kryptonite, and I’ve heard rumors of how brutal the headwinds can be on Lake Moultrie. So I packed a ton of extra layers that I ended up not needing.
  Geoff – a true adventure racer at heart – brought his typical mandatory kit including first aid gear. I’m surprised we didn’t bring PFD’s and paddles just in case.
  
• In addition, we overpacked our nutrition as well. I’d say both Geoff and I returned home with about half of our nutrition uneaten. This is partially because we did cutback on fueling intervals when our digestive systems started to protest. But also, in retrospect, the overall effort and energy output for this was NOT as high as it is for something such as ultrarunning, adventure racing, or even our effort at Hell Hole Gravel Grind (70ish miles). According to my Garmin, I spent 77% of my time in Zone 1, 1% in Zone 2, and 22% below Zone 1. I didn’t need to fuel like I was pushing. Which brings me to my next point:
  
• I definitely could have pushed a bit harder in the beginning. But, as I mentioned at the very start, my ONLY goal was to finish, and I notoriously get ahead of myself and go out too fast. I didn’t this time, so in many ways, that’s also a win.
  
• Training: I hesitate to put this one here, as I wouldn’t say training was “wrong”, but rather that it could have been changed slightly. For a number of reasons, we both spent the last few months putting in some big volume on Zwift / our direct drive trainers. And speaking for myself, it has made me A LOT stronger. But our outdoor rides have stayed around the 50 miles or below range. And there’s a lot physical nuances between indoor and outdoor rides that matter over the course of 178 miles…that probably would have made my neck and shoulders a lot less sore than they are right now.
  
• The non-moving time. While I think the majority of it was inevitable for this experience, there was a 2 hour and 10 minute difference between our elapsed (race) time and our actual moving time. That leaves a ton of room for improvement.
  

In short (hah, nothing was short about this post) I am so incredibly glad we took a chance on ourselves and signed up for the Moultrie Militia Gravel Raid. It was everything I hoped it would be, and then some. I was able to prove to myself how far I’ve come in the sport of cycling, but also open up my eyes to all of the room I still have for improvement. It hurt. I pushed through the hurt. And it left me feeling alive in a way I have still not figured out how to describe after all of these years, you just have to experience it for yourself.

I’m out of practice when it comes to writing and blogging, and therefore I have no meaningful nor motivational way to wrap up this post. So instead, I’ll share this last bit of wisdom I learned this weekend:

Chamois Butter is far superior to Squirrel’s Nut Butter.

The end.