Background, Information, and Countdown to 2012 Tour Divide

This is the first post using the new Google Group for public followers and a Cisco mailer for the netizens. The lists are a good way to ask questions and share knowledge. Be aware there are several people on the mailers; not just me. The Google Group is td12-ws . That is hosted at googlegroups.com. The Cisco internal mailer uses the same name. Special thanks to the moderators overseeing the lists while I am away, you know who you are.

I will check my gmail/pobox when connectivity allows. Please keep the emails small in size and short in length as dialup is still "fast internet" along much of the route.

The countdown to departure is on. It's quite the crazy schedule right now:
Monday - Receive last critical package, ship bike, work sendoff party
Tuesday - Last day physically at work for a while. I have some mental work for ride.
Wednesday - fly to Tucson, AZ and pickup bike
Thursday - Bus to Lordsburg, NM
Friday - shuttle to Antelope Wells, NM for 10am Mountain (local) start


Generally the first week is considered weed out. Most dropouts happen in the first seven days. It will take most of the first week for me to escape NM.

Some background on the event:
Tour Divide website: http://tourdivide.org/
Leaderboard for following the riders: http://tourdivide.org/leaderboard
Forums discussing the Tour Divide as well as other ultra cycling events: http://www.bikepacking.net/forum/index.php/board,2.0.html
Ride the Divide - a movie about the race and route
Wikipedia about the Great Divide: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Divide_Mountain_Bike_Route
Podcasts of Riders calling in with updates: http://mtbcast.com/site2
2012 riders: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ami9kLAhoE7GdHNKN2xQSTA4T0JiRmMxaUJlc01UbEE#gid=0

A bit of terminology:
Tour Divide - a route from Banff, AB to Antelope Wells, NM
Great Divide - a route from Roosville, MT to Antelope Well, NM - no Canadian Flathead
Spot - a GPS unit that sends location to webservice via satellite transmission. They are notoriously fickle. It is another area ripe for improved user experience.
Blue Dot - dots representing riders on tackleaders. People around the world follow the blue dots. The blue dot gives location and time of last update.
Divide - The continental divide.
SoBo - Southbound rider. Southbound is the traditional route.
NoBo - Northbound rider. The route was originally discovered by two brothers riding northbound.

What is it?
Wikipedia - "Following the Continental Divide as closely as practicable and crossing it 30 times, about 90% of the GDMBR is on unpaved roads and trails and requires basic off-pavement riding skills to complete."
TourDivide.org - "By route's end a thru-rider will climb nearly 200,000 feet of vertical (equivalent to summiting Mount Everest from sea-level 7 times). "
It's self supported. No checkpoints, aid stations, race officials, or chase vehicles. Take your bike and get yourself from point A to point B.



My gear, pictured above plus a few items already mounted on the bike, weighs in at 25lbs. That weight does not include food, water, or my bike. I have 12L of water capacity for the longest dryest sections.

I feel poorly prepared. January to April were physical preparation. May was mental preparation. That left June 1-8 for gear and route preparation and no time for altitude sickness. The 2K elevation of NM and 11K elevation at the passes are going to be interesting. Its going be a slogfest and I'm okay with that.

Finally, note that I am NoBo. I have no interest in the desert in July. I'm going to blame a teenage heatstroke and a painfully hot first ever half ironman. I have similar feelings about cold. I'm hoping snow melts on most of the passes and especially on the Canadian flathead before I get there. If I get there. Finally there is a full field of SoBo racers this year. Resources along the route are sparse. I'm hoping for less resource contention for the ~5 of us going northbound.

Fingers crossed for a successful first post and continued good fortune with final preparation.