Hey everyone, for those of you who don’t know me, my name is Rachel Gutish. I primarily race the GNCCs in the WXC (women’s pro) class as well as the Women’s class in EnduroCross and the X Games. I also make the occasional appearance in the American Extreme Enduros like the Tennessee Knock-out and the King of the Motos. In addition to all of this racing back home, this is my 4th year representing the United States in the International Six Days Enduro.

My first ISDE was back in 2012 when I was 16, held in Germany. Though I got hurt and didn’t finish, I’ve continued coming back, and actually managed to finish 7th among the women in 2013 (Italy). I have a bit of a personal link to the ISDE – my father raced it on a club team back in the day. I was 6 years old at the time (I think), and I remember being furious that I didn’t get to come too, and ride my bike with him (back then dad and I went to a lot of local hare scramble races together, and I just didn’t get why this one was any different). So I decided that as soon as I was old enough – 16 – I would try to qualify.

Rachel Gutish competing at the 2015 TKO Enduro

This year, I am racing in Slovakia [at the 2015 International Six Day Enduro] alongside my teammates Mandi Mastin and Jamie Wells against women from seven other countries. The ISDE is always an exciting event, both on and off the bike (170 mile days through trails like you’ve never seen before and will most likely never see again, trying not to give yourself a concussion with a tire iron while changing mousse inserts at the end of day four, rally-racing the rental cars, run-ins with foreign police officers, trying to duct-tape, quick-steel and safety wire various broken pieces of your bike back in place, unusual foreign food, and above all the honor of representing the great US of A along the best riders our country has to offer – you get the picture!) Although the event doesn’t get the support from sponsors, the way one would expect, considering this is pretty much the Olympics or Tour de France for Enduro/Cross Country riders (most riders foot the majority of the bill themselves, or do some serious fund-raising beforehand), I feel like it is one that people back home care about and are at least marginally interested in.

Knowing that Brian is a pretty cool dude (I mean, just look at him) and catching his show whenever I can find the time, I asked if he’d be interested in doing something. Since you’re reading this now, you can probably guess what his answer was. So yeah, check into Seat Time every so often next week to see what’s up. Since I’m a women’s team rider, that’s probably most of what I’ll be talking about, but if something interesting happens that isn’t about us, don’t worry, it will be mentioned. I make no promises, but it’ll be probably be worth your while to keep up with this one.