BRECKENRIDGE, Colo. – Karma was on Macky Franklin’s side – along with a whole lot of fitness and skill, of course – for Stage 4 on Wednesday.
After sacrificing his own race to help a fallen rider in Stage 2, Franklin threw down the stage of his life on the 42-mile Aqueduct course. Then he crossed the finish line with his buddy as if they were out for a leisurely pedal.
The 39-year-old Epic veteran rode steadily with fellow frontrunners James Kelly and Taylor Lideen for the majority of the stage. Historically, the final long climb on the Colorado Trail messes with his head. Not today. This time around, Franklin blew through it, pleasantly distracted by his social trio. With Lideen at his side, he was the first to cross the finish line, winning the stage in 3 hours, 26 minutes and 55 seconds.
“My goal this week is to ride similarly hard every day. It’s worked out well,” Franklin said. “Taylor and I have gotten to ride together a ton. That long climb out of Keystone, I usually suffer on that one and generally I’m nervous the whole time leading up to it. Today it was just so much fun. The three of us together rode hard, but not too hard. It’s just so much fun to ride with good people out here in this gorgeous place.”
Hop in line. Photo by Eddie Clark
Lideen gave Franklin a wheel’s lead across the finish, taking second as Kelly, still wearing the leader’s bib, got delayed at the aid station and ended up fourth (in 3:27:44) as Boulder rider Keegen Pelton sprinted ahead to round out the podium (3:27:39).
“I don’t think a lot of people know what Macky did on day two,” Lideen said. “So, it’s really good to see someone do the right thing and get rewarded today by absolutely riding his ass off.”
In Stage 2, Sam Brown, one of the Epic’s top contenders, took a bad crash early on. Franklin was among the first to come upon him and stopped for several minutes to help while Cassius Anderson also paused his race to find a medic. Brown reportedly suffered a shoulder injury and had to pull out of the race. Breck Epic founder Mike McCormack said both Franklin and Anderson’s GC times will be adjusted to account for the minutes they spent helping a fellow rider.
Regardless of how the GC shakes out, Franklin said in his eight years of racing the Epic, this is “by far the best.”
Residing in Los Alamos, N.M., Franklin and Lideen spent a lot of time racing enduro together. Franklin also made quite a name for himself competing on single speed, even bagging a couple of his Breck Epics on a bike with no gears.
“It’s a lot more fun with gears, and it’s a lot more fun with full suspension,” he said.
Aussie race leader feeling it in fourth
Although he lost less than a minute in Stage 4 and currently leads the GC by seven minutes, Kelly said Wednesday’s race was his toughest so far.
“I was exhausted today. I think it was probably the combination of the long, long climbs without much technicality that made it a bit harder for me. I sort of like when it’s a bit more undulating and a bit more steep bits and singletrack,” said the 31-year-old Australian. “Vomit Hill was super hard. Taylor and Macky got a little bit of a gap there and then I sort of worked to get back to them. Then we were just chilling, the three of us on that main climb, going at a decent pace. At the bottom of that main descent, Cory [Wallace] came out of nowhere, storming past. Then I got to the third feed station and my stuff wasn’t ready. Then Keegan came past me, riding really strong. I was chasing Keegan down the final descent. He could see me and kept pushing.”
Also racing in his first Epic, Keegan Pelton, 25, said the stage podium ranks among the highlights of his cycling career.
“It was great,” he said. “I passed Cassius on the big, long climb. Then I saw James at the feed zone and was like, oh, I got him. I slowly caught up to him and passed before the downhill,” Pelton said. “Then he lit a fire under my ass. I was sprinting for dear life on this last little section.”
Wallace has notched a few podiums in his many Epics, and was on a tear Wednesday before he mysteriously blew a tire on one of the smoothest parts of the course.
“We were just cruising down a gentle fire road and I hit something,” Wallace said. “I had to put a tube in, stop for like eight, 10 minutes. It was one of the weirdest flats I’ve had. We go through all this rugged chunder, and then, one calm moment in the race …”
The sky became ominously black late in the morning. The first few racers across the finish line stayed dry. The rest of the field wasn’t so lucky.
Distant cracks of thunder quickly progressed to a deluge, even to bullet-like hail for a few minutes, wiping the smiles off the faces of most finishers and streaking their backs with mud.
Mayles hits the high step once again, but the hammer came down to make it happen
Deanna Mayles was the only woman on course to stay remotely dry, firing across the finish line for her fourth straight win just as the rain picked up.
Splattered but smiling. Photo by Nate Abbott
Racing in her first Epic, the 32-year-old Colorado Springs resident clocked Stage 4 in less than four hours (3:58:47), adding yet another cushion to her lead in the GC.
Feeling good at the start of the race, Mayles was beginning to think she could take it down a notch when Leah Van Der Linden showed up and gave her a little scare.
“We were about six miles in and I thought I would never see anybody. Then I saw Leah and I was like, oh wow. She was having a really good day. I was like, I’ve really, really, really got to push it if I want to win today.”
The neck-and-neck action between Mayles and the 2025 Epic champion started on Vomit Hill. Slogging along handlebar to handlebar, Mayles managed to pull ahead, realizing there would be no relaxing for the remainder of the stage.
“I got a small, probably 30-second gap. I could still see her. I figured the only place I could really put in time was the long climb out of Keystone,” Mayles said. “I wanted to be alone. I get tired at the end. I think she’s so durable. She gets stronger and stronger throughout the week, throughout each day. That’s why I was like, I need an insurance policy.”
Sure enough, several minutes into the Colorado Trail climb, Mayles glanced back and finally saw no sign of Van Der Linden.
The Boulder rider bonked a little in Stage 3, but bounced back in force on Wednesday, crossing the line 3 and a half minutes behind Mayles to take second. Van Der Linden also pulled ahead in the GC, usurping Julie Momber, who broke a derailleur on Wednesday.
“That’s what stage racing is all about. You go up, you go down,” Van Der Linden said. “I felt super good today. I was trying to push Deanna a little bit. I know she’s a better climber than I am, but I thought yeah, I gotta push it.”
As racers crossing the finish line became progressively more waterlogged, the gaps became greater between riders. Erin Huck pedaled in for her second straight podium, taking third, but nearly 18 minutes off Mayles’ pace. Siri Krum came in five minutes later for fourth and Syd Schulz, who walked across Tuesday’s finish line wearing her tire tube, stayed intact – although soaking wet – to take fifth in Stage 4.
“The rain didn’t hit me until the final descent. I’m very glad it wasn’t before that. I didn’t have time to get cold. But still, the trail was already turning into a river and it was kind of hard to see,” Schulz said. “It’s really tough conditions out there at the end for everybody.”
Momber, who was third overall in the 2025 Epic and runner-up to Mayles in the GC coming into Wednesday’s stage, eventually made it to the finish line, but more than an hour off the winning pace. Van Der Linden now trails Mayles most closely in the GC, with almost 34 minutes to make up. As Momber’s unfortunate mechanical illustrates, however, the unexpected can strike at any time in six days.
“I’m tired now,” Mayles said. “It’s anyone’s day the next few days.”
Stage 5 Wheeler
The Epic’s shortest but famously most grueling stage, much of The Wheeler course sits on exposed scree above tree line. Most riders spend a good portion of the day pushing or carrying their bikes up the jagged rocks to the ridge line of the Ten Mile Range. The course measures less than 25 miles but involves more than 5,000 feet of climbing.
Overhead in the finish area:
“Done and dripping.”
“I took my glasses off and couldn’t see anything.”
“I left my glasses on and couldn’t see anything.”