Made it

I rolled as close to the Mexican border as the gate would let me at 5:24 p.m. Monday, July 6, to finish the 2,700-ish miles of the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route in 24 days, 7 hours and 24 minutes. My parents drove down from Salt Lake City to meet me at the border, so even though the guard station was closed, I didn't have to finish alone. What an incredible experience. Feels strange to not have to pedal any more. Feels even stranger to be wearing clothes that I didn't just wash in the shower. I'm happy, healthy and still feeling strong. Despite a few mechanicals, minor injury and weather setbacks, I still kept my goal of finishing within 25 days, and still feel like I could go out again tomorrow if I needed to. Glad I don't have to, though. I took 731 pictures. More to come soon, I'm sure.

Free day

I groped my way out of Silverthorne this morning along a series of confusing bike paths. Just when I thought i was home free, I came up on the tail end of a large breast cancer awareness walk. For nearly 10 miles, I weaved through a parade of people wearing pink shirts and waving balloons shaped like breasts. At first I cheered them on, but after four miles, I began to feel herd weary. I blew through Breckenridge and ran into my third human traffic jam up Boreas Pass, with Sunday drivers and bikers crowding the narrow road.

I dropped down the pass into much more lonely country, wide open country without even a tree to pee behind. I was slammed by a couple heavy thunderstorms, dropping hail and mixing up mud. I was pretty muddy when I rolled into Hartsel, which was teeming with bicycle tourists traveling the trans-America route. Everyone was curious about my mountain bike and muddy state, so I spent more than an hour chatting with fellow travelers, including a vehicle-supported group traveling cross-country to raise awareness about affordable housing. They weren't very impressed when I told them I was averaging 100 miles a day. Sigh. Roadies just don't understand.

Still, human contact is a good thing. I returned to lonely country to climb a couple more small passes, and then dropped 3,000 feet into Salida on the most breathtakingly scenic road. Sunlight filtered through curtains of scattered showers over a skyline of 14,000-foot peaks as I buzzed around the narrow edges of sandstone outcroppings. When I reached Salida, I realized that I felt totally fresh, like the 115-mile day didn't even take anything out of me. It felt like a free day. I decided to soak it in and enjoy it, because I'm certain to not get any more of those. :-)

Sent on the go from my Peek

Good luck, bad luck

I was grinding up a loose gravel road, feeling lonely and tired, with a gorgeous sunset fading quickly behind me. I watched my headlight beam bounce off pebbles until it illuminated a sign announcing 10 miles of private land. No tresspassing. I wondered if I would just keep going. I thought i should.

After 10 p.m., I passed the Brush Mountain Outpost. I lingered a moment, envying its comfort and warmth, before continuing up the road. I was about 100 feet past when a woman called out my name. "You hungry?" she asked.

Inside the warm building, she told me she was a fan of the race. She had been tracking everyone and inviting them in for meals and beds. She made mw a quesedilla and fresh fruit. She told me about the things that were going on in the world. She asked if I thought i was doing well in the race. "Well," I said, "If your goal is simply to finish the race, I believe it's 20 percent perseverance and 80 percent luck. So far, I've been pretty lucky."

This morning I left my warm outpost bed to greet the rainy, cold morning. Fog moved in and the showers picked up in intensity as I climbed the Watershed Divide. The descent was rocky, severly muddy and becoming muddier. Patchwork repairs in Rawlins had left me with new front brake pads, terribly worn back brake pads and no spares. I knew my brake situation was sketchy, but I feared the wheel-sucking mud and I wanted to get off that mountain. What I didn't know was that my new front brake pads were rapidly disintigrating to black goo. I didn't find out until a particularly steep, rocky slope. I pressed down on the brake levers and nothing happened.

I panicked and leaned toward the trail, bashing my left knee on a rock amid a geyser of mud and screeching metal. Sharp pain was followed by blunt anger. That was an unlucky thing to have happen.

I adjusted my back brake enough to get it working again. The front was pretty much metal on metal. The rational side of me wanted to walk down, but a deepset fear of mud drove me to ride the back brake all the way to Clark, where I arrived cold, stiff and completely frustrated.

I spent and hour icing my knee, warming my body, and trying to motivate to make the run to Steamboat Spring. I knew I needed to get there quickly to get my bike repaired, but I struggled to find the courage to get back on my bike. My knee was swollen and stiff, and I was in full-on hate mode. Eventually I toughed up, walked around for a while to loosen my knee, hosed myself down and started a slow but painful pedal into town.

My first stop in Steamboat was the bike shop, and despite the late hour of 4 pm, they were amazingly helpful. They put everything aside to refurbish my rear hub, install new brake pads and a new front rotar and caliper, new chainrings, chain and cassette, and sell me a couple spare brake pads. My bike was finally running again, but my knee felt like crap.

While the guys at Orange Peel were working on my bike, I tried to work up the courage to head down the trail tonight. But the stiffness and persistant swelling in my knee combined with more gathering storm clouds convinced me to stay in town, ice the knee, dry my gear and continue searching for courage.

I think my knee injury is just a bruise. So I plan to continue on in the morning. Wish me luck.

Sent on the go from my Peek