Monday,
April 28Worked from home today in an effort to get the creative vibe rolling. Part of my job is editor and designer of our organizations newsletter, and for me this is a great way to hone some of my design skills that I learned in school and while doing the Off Camber print magazine. Feeling a bit stagnant all week creatively, so I decided a change of environment was in order so I stayed in the mountains. It worked...being creative is super fun when the mind coorperates. Frustrating as all hell when it doesn't. All part of the process to be the next David Carson.
When I look at magazines in the bike industry I'm pretty disgusted. The design sucks, the writing is stale and there is absolutely no soul. A good magazine can take you on an adventure while you sit in your easy chair. As of right now, there isn't a mountain bike mag that achieves this. While the newsletter I put out is only 16-pages and 2-color - making it tough to put out a lot of soul - I feel obliged to try.
Been taking a few days off the bike since Fruita, but plan on getting the game going again tommorrow with a double duty commute in and then home. It's not a bad gig - I can work 8 hours and still get 5 hours of riding in. To me, training through commuting is the only way to go. I have a lot more incentive to ride in the evening when the body realizes it's not going to get dinner until I get home!
Took the pups on a ski on Spencer Mountain. Not to belabor the point, but there is still a fuck load of snow in them-thar hills and in the woods. If it heats up and we get into a dry cycle, we'll be riding the Ned classics by June 1. If not, and the current weather pattern continues, add another 2-3 weeks to that. The high stuff, like Tennessee and Caribou will be closed at least until July 4. Rollins Pass will be even longer than that.
A reader from Maryland emailed me the other day with the in-jest subject "WINTER SUCKS." It brings up a good point though. A lot of folks deem Colorado as planet earth's mountain bike mecca. And while this is true to an extent, the season in the high country can be shockingly short. It's not inconceivable that many routes above 10,000 feet won't be clear until mid-July, and could close again with an October snowstorm. That's about 3 months of accessibility.
Personally, I dig it, but I also love to ski. For example, this spring I suspect we'll be supplementing 5 hour epic rides with 5 hour epic skis. The same adventure and comradarie, but still different. It seems that if someone only liked to ride singletrack all year long, this part of the Rocky Mountains might not be the best choice of residency.
A dark dark day in the Boulder Galaxy. The SOMA Space Lounge has shut it's doors for good. SOMA was a local dance club here in Boulder that pilots have spent quite a few nights in over the past few years. I haven't mentioned it much in this journal, but good electronica and dancing till 3 a.m. are passions of mine, not to mention a training supplement for those all-night 24-hour bike races. Lot's of good times at SOMA, including the pilots gathering before the snowy '99 IGSSC and after numerous Tour De Dewey events.
Not exactly sure why SOMA closed, since it appears to have happened rather suddenly. Maybe they got busted for some underaged drinking or drugs or what-not, or maybe it was totally done because the owners wanted to do something different. The fact of the matter is that there is a very strong element in this country, and locally as well, that would prefer to see the rave and dance scene disolve altogether. Which, whether you like to go out or not, is a scary-as-hell precedent-setter to let the government breach on our first amendment rights whenever they so desire.
Moving on, there is a new Intergalactic Single Speed Event: SINGLE DE MAYO, scheduled for May 5 appropriately enough. Not sure of all the details, but right now it sounds like some sort of urban assault, margarita, chille relleno induced shananigans that will take place in the evening around Boulder. More details as they arrive, or if you're really anxious you can email our our Single De Mayo coordinator directly.
Grand Junction endurance guru and Iditabike Champ Mike Curiak sent in a cool story about his experience at the World Solo Championships up in British Columbia last year. Pretty much sums up 24 hour racing. Check it out.
Finally, just wanted to fill folks in on an issue that really doesn't have a whole lot to do with single-speeding and adventure, but needs to get out there. It's a story from a good friend of ours about dogs, dog breeding, the humane society and such. I'll warn you...it's pretty grim...but unless you know about the bad in life you can't do much to change it.
Monday,
April 28Once again, the pilots raged at the Fruita Fat Tire Festival. A damned fun weekend of riding in the desert, lathering up in sunscreen, lounging in lawn chairs, eating bad food and all the other fun activities associated with this event. Some highlights:
- Pete Webber, the original pilot, coming out of retirement and fatherdom for a few days to win the Cruiser Crit in stunning fashion. Yes Pete brought his single speed and yes Pete represented.
- Meriweather, after taking a solid third in both the cruiser crit and 1x1 race, riding the decent down Horsethief Bench on his rigid singlespeed. This decent seems to be getting more gnarl every year, yet Meriweather again escaped unscathed. The legand grows.
- Saturday Afternoons ride, basking in the desert sun on Horsethief Bench and then continuing on the singletrack with a slight buzz. Without question, everyone rode better AFTER our beer stop than before. As Megan said, "I could get used to this!
- The pilots hunting down "breathe right" in Saturdays race, and for me, poaching the race ($50 dollar entry fee???) and bantering with the locals along the way.
- Andrew from NEMA's (he's from LA) humor and musical insight. Just in case you were wondering, Andrew is a honch rider and the real deal, so fuck da' corporate infrastructure and go NEMA.
- Friday at A-Basin on our way to the festival. Lot's of people and lot's of bullshit, but all worth it for about 45 seconds of the best turns in my life. Joey Klein, longtime A-Basin local and Montezuma's Revenge champ, took Meriweather and I into the backcountry. We rode Montezuma's Bowl, which, with it's wide open spaces, 13,000-foot perch and zero people made for a run that, at least for me, resembled something you'd see in the Chugach Mountains at the Banff Film Festival.
The ugly: A couple freeride fucks ignorantly going off the trail and damaging the fragile desert landscape. We (mostly Meriweather) tried to reason with them, but they were too stupid to be reasoned with. It's a shame, but there are a lot of idiots in our sport that desperately need to be slapped around.
Depite that, the weekend was a solid way to thrust oneself into another season.
Thursday,
April 24Planning is in full effect for Fruita, and many things are still up in the air. Some of the pilots are even debating whether they want to attend this event or not. I think this much is clear. While it is a bit of a pain in the ass to get gear together and figure out logistics, it's going to be a damn good time. Meriweather has proposed exploring the Flight of Icarus route, which is apparently the epic of all epics for Sunday. The race on Saturday - or ride if you so choose - will be awesome, and there is even some talk of hitting the fresh snow in the mountains Friday A.M. before going to Fruita.
Riding singletrack in the Fruita desert and road tripping with friends - I can't really think of anything I'd rather do. Basking in the sun and feeling the freedom of the wide open spaces. There will be a time in my life...maybe not today or tomorrow but someday...where this won't be an option. It's important to grap these opportunities when they are dangled in front of you.
It's fucking DUMPING OUT. Over a foot in Happy Valley and still coming down strong. The bus stalled out on it's way up this morning, so we had to catch a ride with a friend. I took over an hour to get down the canyon as accidents backed things up near the narrows. A real winter, and a real spring in the Rocky Mountains where you have to wait and be patient for singletrack. I love the incredulous look of people coming up on the bus from Boulder when they see that the West Mag trails are still BURIED and won't likely be free of snow until June.
Still looking for that winter fix? Check out these images from the recent Nebraska Hill expedition.
Evidently the gods on Monday were in a cranky mood. Got caught in a wicked thunderstorm on the top of Magnolia, got scared out of my mind, and ended up hitching to Nederland. The crowning moment was when I saw a bolt of lightning, started counting, and barely got to "1" before a boom of thunder clapped. It's not the first time I've been caught in lightning in Colorado, but it's a phenomenon you never really get used to.
More bizarre weather on this morning's commute as lightning was crackling at 7:50 a.m. in the foothills. I've never seen that before in Colorado. Right now, it's dumping and there is about six inches of snow here at Happy Valley. Yesterday, I was snowboarding at A-Basin at 13,000 feet and the surrounding peaks looked like Greenland. Got to love springtime in the Rockies.
Heading over to Fruita this weekend for the Fruita Fat Tire Festival. It's always a fun time with some great rides, a bit of partying and the infamous Clunker Crit. The Intergalactic Pilots are the three time defending champions in this event, so there is a certain legacy to uphold.
Five minutes to blog before heading up the hill. It's cloudy and gray, meaning rain and snow up top. Should be interesting, or could be completely innocuous, depending on how the gods are feeling today. The highlight of the day. There's always a certain sense of dread on the days of the commute home up the big hill, and a lot of times, the anticipation matches the actual suffering. Still, this is a small sacrafice to pay for the cleansing effect that the climb has on the soul and mind.
Not much else to say. No blogging tomorrow as I'm playing hooky to go snowboard at the Basin.
Sunday,
April 20Rumors, rumors. I did not ride my single speed up Magnolia last week. That would be a my geared bike, spinning comfortably in the 24x32 range. Magnolia is rideable on a single, albeit less than pleasant, but I wouldn't recommend it until around June at the earliest. However, once the Switzerland Trail dries out, that makes a fine single speed commute - mellow grades abound.
Easter Sunday was sort of a mixed bag. DK, Josh and Meriweather got up bright and early for an adventure up Nebraska Hill, which is really not a hill at all, but an 11,500 foot mountain. Sounds like a blast, but I feel nervous about heading up sans avalanche beacon. I'd be putting myself at risk, and compromising the experience of others. Might as well bite the bullet and get a beacon today!
Bummed to be missing the big adventure, but I decided to make the best of it, and skied Spencer Mountain. Everyone has a favorite place. For some, it might be Times Square in New York, the French Riviera or even the summit of some 14-er here in Colorado. For me, I'll take Spencer Mountain. The mountain itself is rather unspectacular, and at just 9,650 above sea level, it barely registers as a mole hill in the Rocky Mountains. What does make Spencer Mountain special for me is that it literally sits out my back door - it looms outside my bedroom and living room window, beckoning me to explore. It's two and a half miles from my home in Happy Valley to the summit of Spencer Mountain, with a vertical rise of about 1,000 feet.
Spencer Mountain provides salvation for me on the days when the major epics are out of question. Last year, when I was cramming to finish up my Master's Thesis, my winter training consisted of running the dogs up the mountain and bushwhacking down. In this winter of snowboarding and nordic skiing, my girlfriend and I still managed to climb Spencer at least a couple times a week. In the dead of summer, I visit Spencer even more often, as it is the final decent on my commute home over Tennessee Mountain.
It's a mountain full of history, and in fact is the reason the town of Eldora exists in the first place. Gold was found in Spencer's bowels, and there are tunnels that burrow a maze through the mountain. Those tunnels are gated shut today, but I hope one day to explore these with some of my closest friends. The upper flanks of the peak are scattered with mines whose names - Enterprise, Blue bird and the caper TERROR MINE - evoke mystery. One wonders what horrors led someone to call something Terror Mine. Did a tragedy occur there, or was it simply a wise miner who figured fear was the best way to get people to leave him or her alone? Either way, curiosity is stoked.
A narrow trail, a bridge crossing Boulder Creek (photo) and a mining road leads from my backdoor to the upper flanks of Spencer Mountain. Off to the north side of this shelf road, I often gaze at various chutes that drop down and wonder what it would be like to snowboard down them. Someday soon...
It's odd that something so innocuous as a small hill behind my home could evoke such positive feelings. Spencer Mountain is far less spectacular than hundreds of other locations in the immediate vicinity, and it doesn't even hold any good singletrack. Nonetheless, I hope to frequent it's flanks for a long long time. There is a spot on this peak, that only one person knows about, where someday, hopefully a long, long time from now, I'd like to make my final resting place in whatever form that may be. Then, when people came to pay their disrespects, they'd have to earn it with a thousand foot ski, hike or bike, cursing me the whole way up!
In the meantime, those tunnels and chutes beckon.
Now that Eldora is closed, it's time to find other fixes. Normally, this would involve long weekend rides exploring the trails , but since the trails are still buried under a significant amount of snow, this isn't really an option. Went up to Loveland Basin for some snowboarding, and encountered conditions that were downright mid-winter-like. It was dumping about 2 inches per hour, making things a bit dizzying in this above timberline ski resort. Despite feeling like a drunk scud, these were some of the best turns of the year. Odd to not be at Eldora, where the lines and routine are enjoyably familiar.
Today was my birthday. Fun stuff, although personally, I'm not a big fan of these days. While I definitely believe in the concept of celebrating ones existence on a regular basis (is once a year really enough?), I find birthdays and age tend to be used as limiting factor in our society. We're pigeon-holed into certain roles at certain ages, and it becomes challenging to buck these expectations. Even more dangerous, I've seen people actually make themselves believe they are old simply because some random date came around that signified they had reached a certain age. I figure you should be however old you want to be and how you feel, because if we didn't actually know when our birthdays were, these are the factors we'd base age on.
One bitching thing about birthdays - gifts! This time around I received the complete unabridged collection of Lewis and Clarks Journals. Their expedition is basically the basis for the imagination of a lot of the adventures we embark on, so this gift means a lot.
Now that we've gotten clearance from our lawyers, the infamous 2002 Tour de Dewey photos have been posted.
Friday, flyday and things are rolling. Kevin bailed on work to go skating. I bailed on riding this morning to eat pancakes at Annies. Not a hard decision - had a good week of biking and the snow was blowing sideways this morning. The weekend has arrived, and with it the usual assortment of adventures. Starting this afternoon: there is a hill behind my office that I stare at for hours every day. Time to summit the hill, and unveil its wonders. A good lunch time diversion.
A new feature. Meriweather and the crew are starting a new segment of this website, the Spot Blog. A bunch of our local riding posse also happen to encompass the Spot Offical Mountain Bicycle Racing Team, so check it out. For those of you who remember the old Ionic race team journal - well, this should be an entertaining new feature to say the least. You can link it from the Spot Blog logo on the left side of this page.
Speaking of which, Meriweather submitted a report from a little trek last weekend up to Eldora. Enjoy, and have a splendid weekend pilots.
Thursday,
April 17Ran into Jeremy HK and Heather this morning grabbing the obligitory warm beverage. Spent some time discussing various routes up into the hills, what's dry, what's still buried under snow. I remember not so long ago JHK lamenting how he "just want to ride his single speed around and have fun." A few years later, here he is as the NORBA National Champion. It's good to see someone who is blessed with that sort of riding talent actually follow through and make something of it.
Snow report: JHK reports that the route from Sunset to Gold Hill Road is passable, but the other side is buried and not worth the attempt. Sounds like a case for Timmy.
Moonriding. Had a stunning spin home last night from Nederland to Happy Valley. As I entered Happy Valley, a maroonish, big as all hell moon popped up, draping a shadowy cloak of dull light over the valley and surrounding Rocky-fuckin'-Mountains. An unexpected highlight of the day that sucked the post work blah out of the body.
Stormriding. Riding home tonight and they are predicting a storm. Climbing in a raging tempest is one of my favorite things to do on a bicycle. There's drama to the situation, as the mind evokes images of famous climbs in the Alps, Pyranees and other legendary mountain ranges scattered about the globe. Everything is simplified as chaos reigns in the sky.
Lost bike alert from Meriweather:
Hi everyone.
I'm hoping one of you has seen my old black Dunelt 3-speed bike around
Boulder somewhere. Is was made by Raliegh, so it has their head-badge i
believe.
I abandoned it when I moved out of the Spruce street house two years
ago...and the proper owner (my cousin) is
hoping I still have it so he can have it back.
Can anyone help me?
It is a classic English traditional triangle frame with fancy-smanchy
gussetts, 6-pack carriers on the rear (the racks that hang to the side of
the rear wheel), and in faded gold lettering "Dunelt."
It is a really rare bike here (i'm an idiot for abandoning it).
If you have ANY idea where it might be...please let me know and I'll buy or
steal it back.
Please forward to all that ride cruisers...
thanks!
whit
I wonder. Who decided the standard for our society? Who decided that you have to work five days a week, get two days off for the weekend, and do this from your mid-twenties till you're gray and decrepid? Who decided that the average work week should be 40 hours? Why do people drive an hour plus in traffic to get to work? To get money stupid. To pay for a house, car, kid, etc. Yet is the joy of having a new Lexus, new Plasma TV, or for that sake, a new Moots, worth the bullshit we must deal with to earn them? Interesting questions, tough answers.
I do suspect this. The traditional atmosphere in most work places is not necessarily the atmosphere that would produce the best results, the most creativity and innovation and an overall happy workplace. We deal with it because we're afraid to present radical new ideas for fear of being scorned, hated or...even worse..."let go." I hope that in 500 years future generations will realize this, and marvel at how things are today, in much the same way that we marvel at the working conditions endured by the builders of the pyramids or the slaves.
A tweeked ride in today. A snowstorm hit Happy Valley last night, dropping a thick five inches of snow. Add to that a pleasant 50 mile an hour wind tunneling through the canyon, and you had a nice day for a 20 mile bike ride to work. I likely would have skipped out, but the posse had arranged a meeting time, so what was I to do. Friends make you a better person, and sometimes friends make you cold.
My home was a land of ice, snow and wind, so I needed inspiration. Today I chose Bjork, the - appropriately enough -Icelandic crooner in the I-Pod. There's something truly surreal about 2.1 inch tires rolling on three inch thick choppy ice with a 50 mile an hour tail wind, snow blowing everywhere, with Bjork blaring Icelandic gibberish at the edge of the human vocal limitations into your brain.
Contrast this with the arrival in Boulder an hour and a half later, where birds were chirping, scantily clad co-eds were jogging and flowers were blooming. The contrast of Colorado on full display this morning. Phenomenal world we live in. Let's save some of it.
Ahhh, twas a gorgeous ride in this morning from Happy Valley. A cool, crisp 31 degrees, nice sunrise, snow capped peaks. Nice to be out after being in jail for 2 of the last 3 days. They say a storm's moving in. Bring it on.
A number of pilots embarked on a pretty sweet little expedition on their way to the last day at Eldora. Inquiring minds want to know! Send the photos, send the words!
Finally, I think it's time to release the much anticipated Guatemalen Scud video. The Guatemalen Scud is none other than our good friend Berto. This clip is from a few weeks back. Basically, there was a big wind lip that we were all playing on off Chicken Glades at Eldora. Fun stuff, but Berto decided to hit it sight unseen with about four times the run-off of anyone else. A great air, but the landing was akin to deforestation. You'll see.
Technical stuff. To eliminate an endless scroll on this daily log, we'll be deleting early entires. Not to worry though. They're all stashed in the Space Journal – titled by month - for your snoozing pleasure.
Monday,
April 14Philisophical moment. The more I live, the more I realize that there's basically one thing that make a persons life crap. Insecurity. Insecurity makes a good person deeply concerned about protecting their own status/image/stuff, which in turn leads to jealousy, underhanded tactics and an all around bad vibe. I notice when I'm stressed about work or a race or whatever, the root cause is that I'm not 100% confident in myself. Of course, other people can help make you insecure, as part of their insecurities, but the truly confident person just doesn't give a fuck.
That's a pretty good motto to live life by - "Don't give a fuck," but the problem is, I do. I mean, theoretically the kid in dreds panhandling on Pearl Street subscribes to this theory, but I don't believe he's reached the pinacle. My motto lately has been something like "Live Young, Work Hard, Play Harder," but these things tend to change.
Girlfriend got sick today, and I owed her big time for nursing (or simply dealing) me back to health on Saturday. Stayed at home and played mom. Must have your priorities straight after all: family, friends, biking, snowboarding, music, writing, dabbling in various hobbies. Work falls in there somewhere around number four or five. How a person can place work before his or her family and personal welfare is beyond me. Of course, that dude will maybe make more money than me (maybe) and do far better on the upward mobility game (another maybe) but I'll outlive the fucker by about a million years. Whatever.
Clearly, I've been pent up too long. Tomorrow, we'll cleanse all this theoretical crap with a fun sub-freezing commute the natural way...Gods Way...down the hill. Maybe bust out a loop on Batasso before heading in, maybe not. The trails are at least a month a way from ridability, and as Timmy proved today, taking the road less travelled offers it's own perils.
Looks like it's going to be a spring of mining roads. Fine with me. Keeps the masses away, and besides, I like reminissing to the times when the old strong men and women trekked the very same mining roads here in the Rocky Mountains in search of gold, fortune and a brighter future.
Speaking of which, all you map freaks need to make your way down to the Map Gallery with fourteen bucks and pick up the "James McConnall 1894 Colorado" State Map. Apparentely some guy was cleaning out his attic a few years back and found this gem. It shows about 75 ghost towns which historians didn't even know existed, old mountain passes and the rail routes. One of the coolest archives I've ever seen.
I'm including a gratuitous shot of my dog and fellow explorer, Yeti. Yeti's aging with grace. Still strong as hell and seems to look more regal by the day. He's got at least three more years of serious tromping ( I just read a dog of 11 years old pulled a sled from Barrow, Alaska to Hudson Bay) at which point he'll have earned full time lounge in the sun status.
Dan - 11:25 p.m.
Served as a poster child for Pepto Bismal yesterday, as a sudden 24-hour stomach flu left me incapacitated to the extent that walking across the living room was akin to walking from my home to Winter Park through six six-foot drifts. Being sick sucks, but they say you should look for the good in everything. For me, the good was that I got to take a whole day off doing absolutely nothing physical. It was sort of fun for about 12 hours, but I definitely wouldn't want to make it a habit. A body in motion...blah, blah, blah.
Things improved drastically today. Managed to bust up to Eldora this afternoon with my girlfriend Suzie for a fun afternoon of carving through the slush. Today was the last day Eldora was open for the '02-'03 season. It's always a bit melancholy when winter ends for me. The passing of season, the passage of time. I'm honestly not ready for winter to end yet. I love the Saturday/Sunday routine of getting up early, downing a Yerba Matte, meeting the crew, catching the first chair, feeling the chill and vibe of mountain, battling the wind to make it over to Corona, dancing with the trees, hitting the left side, doing it over and over, bailing at noon, heading to Annies for pancakes, going home, napping and playing PlayStation, hiking Spencer Mountain with the pups, cranking up the fire, spinning some records, going to bed, doing it again. The good life. Here's hoping for lots more of it.
Dan - 10:20 p.m.
Friday,
April 11Tired legs from commuting up Magnolia Road home to Eldora the past two days. It's a hard ride, that climbs about 4,000 feet when all is said and done, but it's a killer way to morph from work mode to play mode. It also makes it fairly easy to get a 2-plus hour ride in with a ton of climbing on a daily basis. I have to say, the quality of my life has greatly enhanced since I started commuting to and from work on a regular basis. In addition to being great training for Montezuma's and such, it gives you a certain mental and spiritual clarity that would otherwise be lacking. I'm sure I'll wax poetic on the benefits of commuting in future entries, so beware.
Dabbed last night with this pretty cool computer software that makes 3-D topographical maps. For those of you who don't know, I'm something of a map fanatic. Beyond allowing my inner geek to come out, I view maps as a window to adventure. Look at a map, plot out a route and do it. Anyhow, this software called Map Render 3D makes these super psychedelic rave flyer type topographies. Click here to see the one I made last night. This is looking south from about Laramie across the Front Range. Note the low ground in the middle - this is about where Boulder sits.
Catching the 12:10 bus up to Eldora for a little corn snowboarding. Those bastards at Eldora are closing this weekend, so I feel the need to cram as much in as possible before this biking thing starts full bore.
Dan - 7:59 a.m.
Got the following memo from a distant source in the Australian Galaxy yesterday. Start saving your pennies pilots.
Pilots,
Hope you can make it to 03 SS Worlds - Melbourne, Australia - November 8-9.
I'll let you know when more info is available on lodgings etc etc etc
Email me on atomic_industries@hotmail.com or shifter @hn.ozemail.com.au if you want, don't if you don't...
When I pull my finger out, there will be updates at www.atomic-industries.com
Cheers,
Dan-O
Wednesday,
April 9Beautiful day in the neighborhood. First commute home of the year coming up in about 2 hours. This consists of a 20 miles, 3,000 foot climb home up Magnolia Road, which is one steep ass mo-fo road. Fun stuff when you're in shape, but the first few definitely hurt.
Commuting to work via bicycle is something of a religion to a bunch of us. There's a group of about 5-6 who probably ride to work 200 days or so. And then there's Timmy. You see, Timmy is from Minnesota originally, and appparently doesn't give a fuck what the weather is. Timmy's morning commute is about 2 hours long and consists of a ride down the aformentioned Magnolia Road. No big deal in the summer, but Timmy rides pretty much 365 days a year. Needless to say, he encounters some ugly stuff on the desecent. By the way, Timmy is strong as hell - he once road the Magnolia Hill Climb race on a singlespeed and cracked 2 hours. Not too shabby. Anyhow, this photo on the left is of a commute of Timmy's this Monday. For more Timmy adventures check out his website.
Apparently Eldora is closing this weekend unless they get good attendance. So get yer ass up there for some corn snow fun dammit, and keep the dream alive another week. In the meantime email them and tell them that you want them to stay open until April 20.
Received the following email from Iditabike Champion and endurance legend Mike Curiak. Read 'em and weep:
"Kokopelli and Grand Loop races" Anyone interested in racing long distances? [NL]Don't want to go in circles and see the same terrain repeatedly while doing it? [PARA]Then consider these two classic desert races this spring. [PARA]The single-day Kokopelli Race runs 146 miles from Moab, Utah to Loma, Colorado, starting early Sunday morning, May 25. [PARA]The 360-mile Grand Loop covers the Kokopelli, Paradox, and Tabeguache trails of western Colorado and eastern Utah, and it starts on the evening of Friday, May 30th. [PARA]Both of these events are UNSUPPORTED. Just some of the most gorgeous country in the lower 48, with no checkpoints, no course markings, no water drops, nothing more than a start line and maybe some root beer at the finish. If you finish. [PARA]Navigational and survival skills are not always needed but are highly desirable. [PARA]The events have been scheduled in close proximity to allow many of you (who are traveling great distances to get here) to do both races in one trip. [PARA]If you plan to attend, or would like more info to make a decision with, drop a line and I'll get you up to speed. [PARA]I can help with maps, camping, and gear selection, and I can even send some pics of sections of the course. [PARA]Hope to see you out here. [PARA]Mike [PARA]mikec@bwn.net
Dan - 3:51 p.m.
Tuesday,
April 8OK, sorry for the delay in getting this posted. The slideshow of the Kokopelli trip is up.
Dan - 11:09 a.m.
This is just a quick update. The Stein-Dubba-Vardamis Kokopelli Trail expedition was a success. We completed the entire 140-mile trip Saturday afternoon after three grueling days on the trail. We didn't run out of food or water, and we didn't freeze to death, but we did encounter 50-mile per hour head winds and a blizzard the last day heading over the La Sal Mountains. Basically, it was the most epic adventure I've ever embarked on. As far as we know - and if someone knows different please tell me - it was the first ever singlespeed, completely un-supported, no-gear-stashed successful attempt of the Kokopelli Trail.
We'll have a full web slideshow up this evening and a story to boot. Time to catch up on 450 emails.
Dan - 10:01 a.m.
April Fools Day. Prepping like mad to get ready for the trip. This is my least favorite part - sorting through food, searching for missing gear, etc. We leave tomorrow at 4 p.m. for Fruita. Ride Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Hopefully arrive in Moab before sunset Saturday. Wish us luck - we're going to need it. The aprehension before a big mission before venturing into the unknown has arrived.
Time to rest up. I'll try and post something tomorrow, but if not we'll have the full story up Saturday night or Sunday.
Dan - 11:50 p.m.
