This will be interesting (not the moaning about the SPOT delivery, the actual race I mean). The Grand Depart had loads of snow and rain in the first couple of days, so you'd expect JayP's time to be significantly quicker for that stretch. But what happens further south? Is it thunder storm season in NM now?

Ollie was a Tour Divide novice, so that was a disadvantage, but he's a lot younger than JayP, so you'd expect his recovery throughout the ride to be a bit better.

I don't envy anyone riding this thing solo, even if it is the faster way to go.

That stretch of blue dots across 5 states (7 if you include the ITTs) is pretty cool to watch!

Looks like the difference between Ollie and the current lanterne rouge is something like 1,800 miles. Pretty amazing!

And congrats to Ollie: beating the record by this much while having a reasonable sleep every single night is nothing short of of spectacular! I didn't think it could be done.      

+1

Personally, I don't find sleep deprivation to be very inspirational. Ollies huge mileage with plenty of sleep is amazing!!!

Good luck to everyone still out there.

Ollie needs to ride through the night if he's interested in John Nobile's long-standing border-to-border GDR record (of 15:01:26). He made it to the US border in 1:07:54. Needs to be at Antelope Wells with a total time less than 16 days, 9 hours and 20 mins.

Weather for Silver City, NM
86°F
Clear
Wind: SE at 9 mph
Humidity: 14%

Thanks.   Shame about the wind.

Anyone know what the weather is doing in Silver City?

There's a pretty good chance Ollie will go under the 'projected time' of 16:06, but I'm wondering how close to 16 days he'll finish. Guess it depends a lot on the wind (and how long he spends in the city).

Before he started, he was hoping to crack 20 days.

Does anyone know what the amount of climbing typically is in the TD?

Somewhere around 61,000m.

Looks like there's just two major obstacles left for Ollie - a 1000+ foot climb in about 20 miles, and an ice cream parlour in the tiny town of Pinos Altos. Good luck Ollie!

Wow! That was a quick nights sleep in Milan for Kurt.

Craigs legs might be a bit blocked from the rest yesterday, but surely he's going to pull clear later on today?

Thanks Scott and Matthew for getting the sites up and running again!

Is it something like 2am over there right now? Garret and Kurt and still hammering along. About 40 miles to catch up with Craig. With plenty of altitude on their side, I'm thinking they could have that knocked off by 5am. Some sleep in Milan perhaps? All this speculation is fun!

Man! I hope Craig gets those new pedals on soon. 3rd and 4th place are still on the move - they'll be breathing down his neck if they keep going through the night. Allez, allez!

I agree. A team cat would be cool but it's up to ML.

We introduced a teams category to the Kiwi Brevet this year and it worked well. Didn't effect the results up front - all the fastest riders choose to ride as solos (including Ollie). Mind you, that event is a bit more relaxed about the rules (drafting allowed, fairings would be fine - no outside assistance is the main thing). It's more of a tour than a race.

I've had to swap a flat pedal in...I used some duct tape like the old Power bands.  Worked fine for a while.

One of the guys at the Kiwi Brevet did the same thing for the last 205 km (with a toe strap rather than duct tape). He caught me up about 30km from the finish.

This race ain't over yet.

Flat pedals could get him to Silver City, or all the way to AW if needed. He could even get a cheap pair of running shoes at Wal-mart to make the pedaling more comfortable. In a city like Grants he might not have much of a choice.

Maybe the Wal-mart is really out of stock. If he is laid up because he's not willing to consider platform pedals as a viable option, honestly, I think that's a little silly. I rode the entire 2,700 miles on flats. They're not useless.

Might be that his subconcious is telling it'd be a good idea to give his body a break in Grants while he mulls the problem over for a while. If Ollie had made a convincing break before they arrived in town (and Craig had been maxed out for several days) the pedal might just be the final straw.

Hope he gets it swapped out and is on the road soon.  

Before Stagecoach, Eszter told be she had a bit of gluten intolerance and tried to follow a Paleo-like diet when not endurance racing. I wondered how that would affect her during the Divide because it's not like those issues go away, and suddenly you can just eat a big stack of pancakes without feeling a little off. I understand as well as anyone how difficult it is to stick to a remotely balanced diet on the Divide, but still wonder if recovery would improve if one somehow could. I had this conversation with a Pacific Crest Trail through-hiker recently, a guy who was putting in big miles — 25 to 30 a day on tough terrain. He kept his diet really simple and mostly natural — oatmeal, rice, beans, nuts, dried fruit and the like — and claimed he felt stronger every day. I ate pretty much entirely candy on the Divide had felt the opposite — Increasingly run down, sickly, fatigued. I convinced myself diet didn't matter as long as I was getting calories — and still think calories are the most important thing — but now I wonder if daily recovery would improve if one didn't have to eat so much high-sugar, high gluten, processed food. Divide lore places heavy emphasis on how awesome it is to eat so much crap, but for me, the intensity with which I was craving vegetables toward the end speaks volumes about the importance of quality food, not just quantity.

But, yeah, giant burritos make me very happy, too, so I totally understand Eszter's mindset. I also think burritos fall into the healthy zone, at least they're balanced with actual protein and some nutrients. My problem was too many meals that consisted entirely of candy bars and Sour Patch Kids.

That's the beauty of chocolate milk and peanut M&Ms - some protein and fat with your sugar. I tried to stop for a cooked meal most days - a salmon omlette on day two was the best! All the same, I had a crook guts from just before Butte right through to the finish (and normally have a a pretty solid digestive system, regardless what I eat).

My in-laws picked me up from Antelope Wells. They were waiting when I arrived at about 5pm and had a chilly bin out with some fresh lettuce, tomatoes and fruit in it. I immediately scoffed the lot. Only found out much later that it was their dinner that they were about to have for themselves.

'brevet' as in randonneuring events?
Or something different on the other side of the globe?

The dirt brevets in New Zealand are inspired by the original European brevet concept and the Great Divide Race I did in 2008. Here's the one I organise:
http://www.kiwibrevet.blogspot.co.nz/

OK, I think I just found these lines. They're the Speed & Speed/Time Plots at the bottom of each Rider's page, right? Yeah, quite different for those 2 guys! If you toggle windows b/w the two it's easy to see. Hard to imagine they've been riding together. Craig's is hugely more ragged and tends to look taller but I suppose the lows are also lower. Are they yo-yo'ing? That's how I'd read it.

What is riding a Rohloff like? I think I tried one a few years ago, along with a bunch of other hub-gears, for a couple days, and they ALL seemed to be noticeably inefficient except for their one direct-drive gear. I was shockingly underwhelmed. I'd been hearing how good the new hub-gears were. Like, I wouldn't want to try to ride hard on a hub-gear due to resenting the work-loss -- felt like 1-2mph at 20mph. But I was mostly using one (forget the name) and maybe didn't give the Rohloff enough of a try. The R also seems heavy-ish (rear-heavy, anyway). ...I see that a R system weighs 1800 gr vs 1600 for derailer sys, but that's with a chain on both. Apparently belts are lighter than chains.

Gotta be carefull reading too much into those while they're in such choppy country. One pair of readings might be from a ridge to a valley (giving a high speed) while the other riders might be from halfway down the hill to halfway up the next. And the individual SPOT performance & placement on the bike will effect how frequently the readings come through. More frequent readings will give greater variation in speed estimates.

I really like the info about the different riders in the race. It's neat to kind of know something about them as your following along from home. I am really hoping to be there next year. Have been worrying about the bike I plan to use, a KHS Team carbon 29er hardtail., it's the one I have and can't afford another one. Bad choice or ok? Any opinions? Good luck to everyone still riding!

Pretty much any light 29er is a great choice.

Not to gross anyone out (though I am sure we have all seen much worse) but I'm just curious if anyone has dealt with this kind of blister-ish thing on their big toe while on the TD or other race of this nature. This is my rider's foot (Ryan Correy) and believe it or not, this is the source of most of the pain he is experiencing right now. Apparently when Ryan intersected Josh S. yesterday, Josh had the same thing, in the same spot. It's obviously a blister of some sort, but he mentioned it starting to look bruised. I'm wondering if there is something he could do to manage the pain better, as he can't put any pressure on it without a lot of pain. Pull up more on each pedal stroke? He's trying to make it to the B&B in Como tonight, but his feet are really bothering him (doesn't help that he has pre-existing foot injuries!)

 Vamtns, I'm sure this isn't the kind of stuff you were interested in learning about the TD riders, sorry! More in tune with what you are asking, here is a bit about Ryan. His very first tour was across Canada with his father when he was 13, and since then, has several races/tours under his belt (as mentioned in a previous post.. I'm a proud girlfriend, can't help it!). His motivation behind TD was to get back to his "touring roots". I think he found the solo, self-supported aspect of this race particularly alluring. It seems he was drawn to the challenge of a truly solo adventure.

Ouch!

Quick fix to relieve pressure would be to chop off the top of the toe area of the shoe.

If you can't bear to do that, check that the big toe nail doesn't need trimming. Also, if the shoe has an inner-sole, chop out the part beneath the blister. [sorry if these suggestions have been given already].

Another quote from the rule section:

"TD is a solo challenge, however, racing in the company of other challengers is tolerated. Again, no drafting, and each rider must maintain separate gear. "

Exactly. I mean, if the organisers were really concerned about the possibility of people riding together and spliting the cost of accomodation, they wouldn't have a grand depart at all. It'd be individual time trials from the start.

Nothing new in what the leaders are doing, it's just unusual to have two leaders so evenly matched (and enjoying each others company). But don't let the close proximity of the SPOTs make you think they are riding side-by-side all day. SPOTs aren't that accurate.

Given the growth of the field, from year to year we shouldn't be too surprised to see more riders of similar ability hanging out together. This is a good thing imo.

Teams riding would be an altogether different thing - drafting, towing, shared SPOT, maybe one rider acting as a domestique.

Gotta respect New Mexico. You think you're in the home stretch and the hard stuff is over but NM is tough.

True - gotta respect it, but once you get to Cuba the rest is pretty straight forward (thunder storms aside). 30% of it is asphalt. The psychology of it can be tough in the last couple of days. You realise you'll make it and then start to think you are done. Big mistake. Once at Antelope Wells, I couldn't imagine riding another 200 km the next day - it seemed impossible, but only because my brain said so.

If you swapped New Mexico for Montana, that'd be quite a bit tougher, I think.