When Zack Allison’s derailleur essentially exploded halfway up the final climb of the Tour of the Gila Stage 1—which started Wednesday in Silver City, New Mexico—the Elevate Pro Cycling rider didn't have a lot of options. His team car was several miles back at the foot of the climb, and walking the remaining four kilometers would mean missing the stage’s time cut—a disappointing outcome, considering he had been part of the lead group for most of the 92-mile stage before a dog in the road caused a group-wide crash.

Ultimately he settled on possibly the weirdest Plan B available to him: He grabbed a bystander’s early '80s Specialized Stumpjumper and used it to crush the final 4,000-foot ascent to Mogollon, New Mexico.

It wasn’t hard talking the mysterious spectator into lending him his old bike. (Allison says he regrets not getting the man’s name.)

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“He was rolling down the hill cheering on the riders and I quickly explained what happened and that I could finish the race within the time cut if I borrowed his bike, and traded him my road bike as collateral,” Allison says. “He said, ‘Oh yeah, sure thing! I’d be honored!’ so he took his bottles off and I put my bottles on like it was a normal bike exchange.”

Jonathan Neve | @jkneve

After a few stops to adjust the seat height, Allison says he made pretty good time on the old mountain bike and even caught up to a few other racers who were starting to crack. He felt good, despite road rash from the crash. But other riders seemed upset to see him making such good time—and no one really wanted to cross the line next to the guy on a badass old beater with a rack.

Initially, race marshals weren’t sure what to make of his dramatic finish, either—which easily fell within the stage's time cut.

"The officials were like, ‘Wait, did you just finish?’" he says. “They thought I’d found that old bike and was jokingly crossing the line again. I was like, ‘Yeah, I had a bike change, it’s not against the rules!' Maybe there’s some UCI rule about the wheel size, but they didn’t penalize me.”

Zack Allison crosses the finish line on the Stumpjumper. Bonnie Walker | AGR Technologies

Now Allison will probably go down in Gila history as the first pro rider to finish a stage on an old Stumpjumper—though he says he’s pretty happy to be back on a road bike for the race’s remaining stages.

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And he’s not the only one who came out of the day with a good bar story.

“The guy who lent me the bike was pretty cool about it and said, 'Now you have a story—and I have a bike that finished the pro race at Gila!'"

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