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A pack of mountain bikers pound across the hardpack. [Photo: Grasslandextrememarathon.com]

Xiwuqi is a remote town in Inner Mongolia. The hills carpeted with wild grasses there were once roamed by Genghis Khan himself. But at the end of July, a different breed of adventurers came to these fields to do their version of battle.

The day before the races, vans with battered and shiny bikes adorning their tops and buses with their bellies full of them zoomed into town. Riders came prepared to race three times in three days, planning to hammer across the rolling hills which spread out towards infinity.

Each day had a long and a short course laid out to penetrate the depths of those hills. Riders of the long courses were prepared to cover over 200 kilometers of grass, hardpack and mud over the next few days.

On the morning of the first stage, the blue skies suddenly turned threateningly dark, and decisively began to pour down on riders and spectators just before the starting gun went off.

Riders grimaced and charged into the rain, anticipating the mess ahead that lay where the asphalt ended.

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