Follow along with Rich on this map..
View Where's Rich ? in a larger map>Where's Rich ? in a larger map

10/4/09

EPILOGUE

Over the last 60 days, I have adapted to my vagabond lifestyle. The food, the chores, bike maintenance, have all become a routine- and it’s not bad. Always busy – never a free moment. It seems counterintuitive, but life in the wild is a full-time job.
The early settlers, miners and ranchers are people for whom I now have the greatest respect.
Just getting a gallon or two of water every day is something that is always in the back of your head.
Animal safety; getting the right camping spot (so that maybe there is some warming sun in the morning); setting up, so wind and rain don’t blow or float you away, are always on my mind.
Am I eating enough, drinking enough, peeing enough? Are my shorts clean – can I risk another day, so I can save some of my precious water?
It has been fun dealing with these simple tasks; simple compared to running a construction business.
Some people break down and cry when they hit the border. I didn’t, but I understand why they do. Relief that it’s over – disappointment that it’s over. Thankful, your gear held up – proud of what you’ve done – yet, humbled by the immensity of what you’ve seen, and the unfailing kindness of EVERYONE you meet.
I missed my friends, family and my wife. Tina made this easy for me. Her support and encouragement before and during the trip were the foundation upon which the undertaking grew and became a reality.
Dreams are nice, but memories are better!

Rich

10/4/09

TO SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT:
When Rich finished the Great Divide Route on September 29th at 9:30 PM, he then camped at the border. The next morning, the border guards, one of whom was coincidentally in Rich’s old Army Unit (1/64 Armor), explained the distance and dangers he’d face riding parallel to the border for 220 miles through the desert to get to Tucson, AZ. They stopped a Mexican shuttle that goes to Phoenix, AZ, each morning, and for $20, the shuttle dropped Rich just outside Tucson.
At first, Rich, who is stubborn about his plans, was disappointed in his decision to shuttle, but he soon realized that he can now visit old friends in Tucson, do some riding and running at Mt. Lemmon, and relax till he flies home next week.
Rich covered 2,730 miles on the GDR, a little more than the official distance. He thinks it’s because he can’t ride in a straight line. About 2,400-2,500 of those miles were off pavement.
It took him 61 days overall with 3 full days and 2 half days off. So, he rode 57 days and averaged about 48 miles/day; about 200,000’ of climb and descent.
In addition, he rode an additional 122.3 non-trail miles. This is mileage to towns to get food and water, lost miles, retraced miles, and some extra miles involving alternate routes due to mud.
So, his dream is now a valued memory!

Tina

9/29/09

GOAL HAS BEEN REACHED!!!!

……. so much so that he is going to attempt to ride across to Chiricahua Mountains to Tuscon, Arizona, and end his ride on Mount Lemmon outside of Tuscon.

Mount Lemmon at 9,156’ is one of several ‘Sky Islands’ in southern Arizona, called such because of their striking differences in temperature and vegetation from the surrounding desert.

An old friend of Rich’s has a place up there and Rich wants to surprise him.

9/28/09

9/27/09

9/20/09

9/19/09

Nice Google shot of the area Rich is in, Valle Toledo

Jim

9/17/09

Now we have clarification to this first SPOT from yesterday.  I just got to talk to Rich- very bad connection, but enough to understand:

This is the SPOT from top of the La Manga Pass on 9/14th.  If you zoom in closely you can see railroad tracks nearby.  That's the famous Chama railroad tracks.

Yesterday was a miserable riding day. Rich got caught in 2 hail storms and it was raining all night.

This morning (9/15th), he entered New Mexico about 9 AM- and was told not to use the trail he was riding if raining or when wet.... well, you could call it a learning experience:  it took him FIVE hours to ride 10 miles! He had to stop a lot to clean the thick mud off his bike and B.O.B., all the way to dismantling them. The mud was so thick that the bike just stopped.

He's so ready for a day off - but that will have to wait for a while... no major towns nearby.

9/15/09

well, look at this!  He has reached his last State -  he is in New Mexico!!!!  just got that SPOT :-)

Tina

9/14/09

INDIANA PASS

Rich has reached the highest point on the GDR, Indiana Pass. He has crossed the Continental Divide 17 times and is 1,945 miles south of his starting point. Now he is almost in New Mexico!

9/10/09

DAY 43 - Thursday, September 10th
The whole climbing thing is difficult to equate with our daily riding. Simply stated, no one goes out and climbs for 26.5 miles of their own free will. From the low point in Salida to Marshall Pass (7,060’ – 10,842’). About five miles of that could be managed in the middle ring; the rest is all small ring climbing for me. Only one section, perhaps ½ mile long, required pushing. The rest is just riding and dealing with loose gravel, rain and mud, ruts and washboard. It took me 6 hours and 58 minutes of saddle time, plus an additional 2 hours of breaks, eating and resting my sorry ass. This is a 4 mph pace. Relentless forward motion!
Makes for a long day of solid fat burning exercise. I try to avoid letting my heart rate get too high and I definitely want to avoid going anaerobic.
Marshall Pass is a busy place as it is a mountain biking Mecca. The standard procedure is to be driven from Salida to the top, do 12 miles of single track and downhill back to Salida. An absolutely super day of biking: lots of dropped jaws as I hobbled up the mountain as they barrel-assed down.
Since I left you (in Frisco, CO) I have done 58, 49.32 and 51.97 miles. I’m tired, but I feel real good.
Sorry, I couldn’t speak with you today, but the connection didn’t work. In fact, I had tried 3-4 times unsuccessfully.
It’s 7:31 PM and the sun is gone. I keep having to remember fall is coming and I’m moving into shorter days and lower latitudes.
Last night’s camping was very sketchy. I was climbing up a valley next to a stream, but everything was very sloped. An opening in the thick undergrowth presented itself, so I dropped the bike and went exploring. I found a great spot. Was able to wash my shorts and my own body, and was all tucked in when the rain came. I must say it was probably my best nights’ sleep on the trip. Very cozy.
The IPod is working well on the climbs; I keep the volume down so I can hear what’s going on around me. Downhill there is too much wind noise.

9/8/09

FYI: Rich had reached Boreas Pass on September 8th - now he's on the way to Indiana Pass :-)
BOREAS PASS
About 10 miles south of Breckenridge, Colorado, Rich has reached Boreas Pass (11,482’), his 15th crossing of the Continental Divide and 1,689 miles into his journey. The highest point of the route is still 260 miles down the trail at Indiana Pass (11,910’).
Tina

9/9/09

Written on Day 41, September 8, 2009, Tuesday (leaving Frisco, CO)
TECHNICAL –Numbness in Hands
The matter of numbness in the hands comes up often when speaking with long distance riders on the trail. In fact, just north of Rawlins, Wyoming, I met a rider who said one member of his original group had to quit due to numbness, which slowly became a permanent state of affairs.
At this point (Day 41), I have two permanent numb thumb tips and two or three fingers that feel like the tips are asleep. The problem, of course, is the long days. They exacerbate the mistakes we make in bike fit, body position, upper body tension, stiff arms, tight grip and wrong grips.
BIKE FIT and BODY POSITION
If your seat is too high relative to your handle bars, a lot of additional weight is transferred to the arms and hands. That alone is unacceptable, but adds to the weight to movement of the front wheel over bumpy terrain, and your delicate hands, forearms, triceps, shoulders and scapulas become an extension of the front fork. Since you are leaning forward (unless you have a very strong core), you have no way of relieving the pressure on your hands. Rough terrain, pulling a B.O.B., or loaded down with Panniers, makes it difficult to let go of one side of the handle bar to rest that hand.
SEAT ANGLE
Often to relieve pressure on the crotch, riders will tip the seat forward. Even a few degrees of forward tilt will throw you forward on the bars. In fact, tipping the seat forward often lead to sudden, unexpected ejection over the handle bars. When you grab a handful of brake and your weight is forward (due to seat angle or the seat/handle bar dynamic), your body will rock forward in a manner that is difficult to arrest once it has started. The only real way to stop the forward body motion is to stop braking. If that is not an option, then an ‘endo’ is inevitable. One positive outcome of an ‘endo’ is you’ll probably forget your numb hands for a while.
Another cause of fatigue and strain on your arms and hands is tension in the upper body and arms. Let’s assume for a moment that your bike fit is correct. You can still approach a state of hand paralysis if you don’t relax your ‘death grip’ on the handle bars; drop the shoulders so they are rounded, not hunched up; bend the elbows; bring the elbows in and down; and make a conscious attempt to relax the scapulas, so they are laying relaxed low and flat on your back.
Watch the great riders – their upper bodies are completely tension free. Even their jaws are slack and there is no tension in the neck. They are not relaxing their upper bodies to avoid hard issues, but rather to conserve energy; but in the final analysis, the everyday comfort rider needs to mimic the great riders.
Pro mountain bikers don’t have stiff arms and a ‘death grip’. Elbows are bent and are in and low, and the hands are guiding the handlebar with as light touch as possible.
When you reach out in front of your body, your hands assume a certain angle relative to your arms and upper body. If your handlebars don’t accommodate that angle and your hands are cocked at the wrist to fit the bar angle, you could have a serious issue.
Above, I mentioned upper body tension and said let’s assume good bike fit. More realistic would be to assume incorrect bike fit plus upper body tension, a ‘death grip’ on a handlebar grip that is too large or small, and possibly at the wrong angle for your wrist and hand.
What chance do your hands have?
I’m neither a bike fitter nor sports physician. My astonishing experience has been that, as I’ve ridden these last 1,700 miles, I have asked anyone who would listen: ‘What can I do about my hands?” and then I have experimented.
Currently, I am on my third set of grips and I’ve come up with a program for myself, which is working much better:
1. Lowered my seat about ¼”;
2. Raised my handlebar about 3/16” by moving a spacer on the stem;
3. Decreased my seat angle, which had been tipped forward due to numbness, about 3 degrees. Got some pain from 3 degrees, so I dropped it back down 1 ½ degrees;
4. Purchased Ergo-Grips, which I installed with my normal bar ends, but I went about it differently. The Ergo-Grips are not completely tight. They are firm and don’t flop around, but I can move them by applying pressure, so as they move around the handlebar, I can get different angles during the day based on my body position or my desire to have my palms or fingers interact with the grip differently. My bullhorn bar ends are tight and hold the Ergo-Grips on the bar.
5. My bar ends are angled down more than originally to match my normal hand position;
6. I wrapped the transition from Ergo-Grip to bar end with handlebar tape to insure a soft, comfortable transition;
7. Throughout the day, I constantly remind myself (actually my hands remind me) to relax my grip. Change my grip, move to my bar ends for a while, relax my shoulders, keep my elbows in and down, and my scapulas relaxed, not engaged;
8. Take every opportunity to completely release your grip. If conditions allow it, slap your leg or shake your hand;
9. Each hour take a break and stretch the arms, forearms, triceps, wrists and hands.
Numb fingers can be a cumulative and long-term condition. Some riders report it taking up to two months to go away.
It can be caused by any combination of the above-mentioned factors, and time in the saddle is the big multiplier.
On a ride across America or the GDR, it is normal to spend 5-8 hours a day in the saddle gripping the handlebars. We can all expect hand issues. It’s the nature of the beast. Be analytical and make the adjustments suggested – maybe it will help you better enjoy the tour.

9/1/09

I was curious about elevation along Rich's route and found this chart:

For us non-metrics.... 4000 meters is 13000 feet. Rocky Mountain High!

8/31/09

Got some journal entries from Rich, via Tina. Here are Rich's comments:

DAY 31- Monday, August 3
Anatomy of a day of1st wind and hills. It took me 5 hours 57 minutes, let’s just call it 6 hours, to go 30 miles. Now, that’s elapsed time. Actually, pedaling was 4 hours 36 minutes. So, the wind, 20-35 mph, direct in my face, allowed me an average speed of 5.9 mph. Headwinds are discouraging! Now I’m at the Cont.Div. #15 and will change maps. I should be SPOT-ing you at 3:57 PM from 7,965’, which is Middle Wood Hill.
The wind blew so hard (gusted) at times that on flat areas in the granny gear, I couldn’t keep enough headway to steer. When there was a downhill, I had to take it slow in case I got hit by a gust that could have blown my over.
No fun!
Met a hiker doing the Cont.Div.Trail north to south. He walks about 20 miles each day average. Not a real friendly due, but, boy, walking six days across the desert wouldn’t make ME happy. I was surprised that he made it from South Pass City so quickly and he admitted that he took a couple rides … he felt ‘you can see just so much desert’. We discussed the fact that biking is a good speed to observe your surroundings. Walking is just too slow- I mean how long do you need to look at something? The only problem I see with biking is that you can’t do a whole lot of looking around cause you’ll surely end up in the ditch. Anytime I want a closer look at something, I stop and look (and, of course, drink or snack).
If people really understood what’s going on out here, they’d poop. Today I road 48.6 miles to get to a camping area that ain’t here. There is, however, a beautiful stream, so I unloaded and hiked down over the hill and set up camp. Talk about wild camping. Some big bird is having a fit that I’m here. I hope he or she gives up soon as I won’t be able to sleep with the bird zooming back and forth screeching.
Pictures are good, but the sounds and smells on a wilderness trip are important. As I was setting up tonight, a wild dog or wolf was howling; the loud stream is 10’ away; the mad bird is screeching. I mentioned once before how loud the insects are.
Today, I should say this evening, at 6:30 PM, I was getting pretty frustrated with the rolling windy desert. I came around a corner and there was a wall of aspen trees and within ¼ mile, the desert was forgotten. The smell was so strong – like vanilla.
What a day. Now I lay down to sleep with extra air in the air mattress. My beautiful little campsite is actually a rocky old creek bed with some dirt on it. So, sleeping will require some acrobatics, but I’m so tired, I feel I can deal with it.

DAY 30- Sunday, August 30th
It took me 58.5 min. to go 13.69 miles with strong tailwind and then 3.18 hours to go 23 miles with headwind on fairly flat terrain. Headwind slows one down and demoralizes.
Awoke this morning to quail and pronghorns. It amazes me that this desolate, waterless prairie can support so much life. In the last 100 miles I’ve seen pronghorns, wolf, elk, mustangs, regular cows and longhorn cows, armadillo, plovers, hawks, ants, rabbits (mostly dead), and other small creatures … very few humans.
Today I had fun playing with a thunderstorm with which I was on a collision course. I kept slowing down and it eventually passed in front of me. When I got to Rawlins, the locals said it was a bruiser – short and severe.
Murrays’ Bike Shop was my destination as I’d forgotten it was Sunday – the owner, Mary Jane Daniels, came right over and we worked on the handlebar set-up. Very nice, desperate lady, left with a huge burden.

DAY 28- Wednesday, August 26th
It’s been a long day, 68.10 miles total; of that 66.2 on the trail. The extra miles come from riding in from the Lake of the Woods to the trail again.
Ran into my first bear in the trail today. He (or she) was about 100 yards in front of me, right in the road. I stopped, reached for my camera and ‘Yogi’ heard me and ran off. I snapped a photo, but missed. Check the photo for his big, hairy ass. I guess I showed him – rang my bell, blew my whistle and off he went! No gun required. I will admit, as he watched me fumble for the camera and almost fall off the bike, he probably didn’t feel threatened.
Shortly thereafter, I met a local guy looking for wolves and coyotes. The night before one or the other kept me awake, but I didn’t know which. He was explaining that wolves howl and coyotes yowl, but I couldn’t tell the difference. The big positive is they don’t usually attack people. On the other hand, he thought camping in the area was ill advised. Maybe I’m having good luck, but I am following the rules, and so far, so good.

DAY 17- August 15th
Well, that was a tough one. The flat map gives you no indication of the difficulty and the ‘profile’ map is a general guideline. It is very helpful, but is sort of smoothed out, lots of small hills, rollers, etc. not shown and at the end of the day when you’ve planned on a smooth quick descent, it is aggravating.
Jim seemed interested in statistics, so I decided to keep track today to give him a flavor of a typical ride:
Today, there were two major climbs. The first from Helena to an unnamed pass was 6.56 miles of uphill (maybe ¼ flat or down), and I ate up 1 hour
34 minutes, climbing approximately 1,500’, from 4,100’ to 5,600’. The descent went quick in 23 minutes. I went 4.95 miles and lost about 850’ of my morning work.
So, I’m back at 4,750’, and now I climb for 13 miles (maybe ½ mile flat or down) to 7,400’ in 3 hours 33 minutes – that’s 1,650’ of climbing. The last 2 miles of the climb were at the limits of what is humanly possible. Riding was out of the question and pushing extremely difficult. I had to rest every few steps and then get things going again with a burst of energy.
Crossing the top of the mountain from which I SPOT-ed at approximately 3 PM on 8/15th, was a series of rollers that racked up another 200’ of ascending.
The ride downhill was difficult. In fact, the 1st mile was a lesson in B.O.B. physics that my friend, Alan, will experience tomorrow. At supper on the 14th, we discussed some upcoming ‘very’ steep descents and how we would handle them. Well, it is clear now, the B.O.B. needs to be unloaded and the baggage carried down the mile or two, and then the bike needs to be walked down separately with the empty B.O.B. behind.
I lost control of the situation a number of times today. Both wheels on the bike were locked, but still sliding and the B.O.B. at that point takes over and pushes the back tire around, and then collapses on itself and pulls the bike over. You now have a jack-knifed trailer on an almost un-walkable rocky slope (I made some photos). Remember, I’m pushing the bike at this point, not riding.
So, the physics are now clear. I’m sure Alan, an engineer, will see the danger of the situation and deal with it.
I used it as an experiment and the results were not good, but as so often is the case, I lucked out.
The descent from the mountain, including the experimentation, took 1 hour 53 minutes, and covered 15 miles and a descent of 2,000’.
So, I started the day at 4,100’, climbed 3,000’-4,000’, descended a couple thousand and ended up in Basin at 5,400’! All I know is, my legs are sore.
As you can see by the SPOTs, we have been building our base altitude each day. Eureka was the low point at 2,600’, and now our low points are 5,000’, so we are definitely ‘movin’ on up’.

8/17/09

How do we capture a photo of Rich? With a local WEBcam!

Jim: Tina, There is a webcam in the town Rich is in. If he stands in front of it you can see him and capture a photo!
Tina: left the man a message to call you and explained the web cam to him
Tina: I'm on the phone w him right now....
Tina: he's at the camera now
Tina: he's on the picture right now, but far away. He's driving to that storage place across the street to get closer right now
Tina: Rich in Pinedale on web cam RIGHT NOW :-)
GOTCHA, Here's Rich!

this from one of Rich's biking buddies;

"Dominique sent this to me and I LOL.  I can't get it out of my head and I thought I should share it with all of you.   This way when I sing it around you, you don't think I am any crazier than I am!!!  
Kathy"

8/23/09

8/22/2009

Rich almost to Idaho, at a place called Red Rock Lake. Here's a view from there:

8/16/2009

Talked with Rich in Helena. He sounds like he's having a good ride. I found some good links to his trail; here's an overview of the Great Divide Trail:

And this shows a Google Earth View of the trail with topology:

8/14/09

Rich has made it to Helena, where's he's enrolled in the John West bear defense camp in preparation for his continued adventure.

We hope Rich won't even see a real bear out there on the trail. Jim

8/7/09

yeahh!  finally a little info from Rich- through a buddy of his, Eric, who happened to start the ride together with him in Banff and they've been seeing each other in between off and on-  AND even a PICTURE!!!  sent with Eric's Iphone or Blackberry- I also got mail from Rich today, which I'll be sorting out, together with a little chip full of pictures.  Rich also just a few minutes ago had cell phone reception somewhere in Montana at a bike shop (at 'mile 101' on his GDR map), where he went for fitting- wants everyone to know that he's doing fine and averaging about 43 miles a day so far. (Tina)

8/6/09 A cool feature of Google Maps is we can see photos others have taken at the same location. Rich is now at Red Meadow Lake in Montana.

And this is the view, courtesy of another traveler:

Of course Rich won't have a truck to use. He's gotta pedal his butt to the next vista! (Jim)

8/5/09 So far Rich has traveled about 180 miles, about the distance a bicycle would do for the Trek Across Maine, a significant distance on any terrain and even more so where Rich is. Rich sends his location in daily via GPS connected by satellite and I update my Google Map to show where he is. There's a link at the bottom of the page "View Where's Rich in a larger map" so you can follow along and see terrain and satellite images. We haven't had any communication from him yet. Will add that when we hear from him. (Jim)

7/31/09 Rich has started the Great Divide Route. Shown on the attached Map is his starting point in Banff, Alberta, Canada.

From Adventure Cycling Association website:
LONGEST OFF-PAVEMENT BIKE ROUTE IN THE WORLD
The Great Divide Mountain Bike Route is our premier off-pavement route, crisscrossing the Continental Divide north to south. This route is defined by the word "remote." Its remoteness equates with spectacular terrain and scenery. The entire route is basically dirt-road and mountain-pass riding every day. With the exception of the Great Basin in Wyoming, you will be either gaining elevation, or descending, for the entire route. In total, it has over 200,000 feet of elevation gain. All of this climbing gets the rider into visually spectacular places and incredibly fit shape.

Rich will check in with me by satellite each evening and when he reaches either Boreas Pass (11,482’), which is 1,689 miles south, or Indiana Pass (11,910’), which is 1,945 miles south, I will send you an update.

Tina Cromwell