A dirty little bike touring blog. Mostly about bikepacking and rigid single speeds. By Montana Miller
Tour Divide
Last post on the Divide for a while, then I'll stop smacking on this dead horse meat. These are things I screwed up, that cost me time in the race. Knees The first day, it was snaining, cold, and I was wearing shell pants without any insulation. I was about ten minutes late for the … Continue reading Tour Divide: 5, Mistakes
I loved this route, and I hated racing it. It isn't a technical ride. There's almost no singletrack. But it is does go through the mountains, and it's best on a mountain bike. I guess whether that makes it count as mountain biking is debatable. The good stuff Even though the weather in Canada was … Continue reading Tour Divide: Part 4, The Route
Part 1 Part 2 Pack list I did another post about this right after I got back in July, but it was kind of half-assed and disorganized. Anyway, real techy bike geek stuff follows: Electronics Some people use GPS, and for style reasons, others don't. My opinion- it doesn't make much sense to race without one. … Continue reading Tour Divide: Part 3, Gear
Continued from yesterday. Part 1 Cost I saved about two grand for the race including travel costs, and it wasn’t enough. But after graduating, moving to Colorado, and barely making rent all winter, it was the best I could scrape together. Just one area where my friends and family deserve a huge amount of credit. … Continue reading Tour Divide: Part 2, Cost and Food
I've mentioned this before, but damn, what a hard race. It's not that it's technically difficult- if you can ride down a bike path you've pretty much got the necessary handling skills dialed in. It's just so long. 2750 miles is a long way by any standard of travel, and it's a really really long … Continue reading Some More Thoughts on the Tour Divide: Part 1
Also on the Dirt Rag I haven't been able to sleep- every night I wake up, thinking that I still have more miles to ride to the border. "No, Colleen already picked you up, it's over," I tell myself. Then the sun comes up and my legs are rubbery. Tour Divide was monstrously hard. I … Continue reading Tour Divide
"Adventure is a mark of incompetence." - Vilhjalmur Stefansson After being breifly detained and seached for the devil's lettuce at the border (again), Colleen and I made it to Banff last night. Tomorrow morning I'll start the long ride to Mexico.A bunch of my family and friends, as well as Wilderness Voyageurs and Aloha Mountain Cyclery … Continue reading Tour Divide 2014: the start
