The spectator-friendly Blitz 2 the Barrel mountain bike race, originally scheduled for Wednesday, has been postponed, another sporting event falling victim to the raging Two Bulls Fire west of Bend.

Fire evacuation routes coincide with much of the race course, and Tetherow Golf Club, through which bikers race, was heightened from a Level 1 to a Level 2 pre-evacuation warning Monday, meaning residents there should be prepared to leave at a moment’s notice.

“We finally had to make a call, and every call I had, it was getting bleaker and bleaker,” said Blitz organizer Erik Eastland, who announced the postponement Monday afternoon. “It was just not going to be the right thing to do.”

Eastland said the race would be rescheduled for sometime this summer.

The Blitz to the Barrel, in its fifth year, starts at Wanoga Sno-park and takes some of the country’s top mountain bikers on a mostly downhill course along singletrack and into Tetherow. Large crowds gather at Tetherow to watch bikers fly off man-made jumps.

Riders race from Tetherow along Skyline Ranch and Skyliners roads and Galveston Avenue to the finish at 10 Barrel Brewing Co. That course largely overlaps designated fire evacuation routes.

“The police basically said, ‘No, you’re not going to run that event, not on that road,’” Eastland said.

Part of the race course also runs through trails that are currently closed, as the Deschutes National Forest has closed trails and forest roads north of Century Drive because of the fire.

“We are officially rescheduling,” Eastland said. “I’ve got to try to get it in before cyclocross season starts — later this summer. It’s still going to be great, just on another day.”

— Reporter: 541-383-0318, mmorical@bendbulletin.com