Loving the women's race! It's so great that for once, the women's race is competitive! Go pink dots!

I notice that Lisa Downing and Rosemary Lee have switched to touring mode. They're still great, and strong. Go Lisa and Rosemary!

Eric Nordenson, 75, is riding NoBo this year. He's in Pinos Altos tonight.

He's listed as scratched.

Is Jim Trumpey the oldest rider? I'm rooting for the 50+ women and the 60+ men. You show the youngsters of the world how it's done!

Too bad about Lisa Downing, but she and Rosemary Lee are still awesome to me.

He doesn't look like a turtle to me. He looks like another hare.

So Holland Lake Lodge or Hungry Bear are the choices there? The other two leaders went to Holland Lake.

Is there a restaurant where Seb Dunne and Connor O'Leary are?

The women's race is looking interesting. Lael Wilson is sick; I'm expecting Bethany Dunne to overtake her soon. And Alice Drobna and Jill Homer, both strong veterans, are not far behind.

I'm looking at the four 50+ women on the course. Lisa Downing and Rosemary Lee are ITTing northbound; wonder what happened to them just before Salida. And Tracy Burge and Carolyn McClintock are ITTing south.

Go 50+ chicas!

I just noticed the graph of cumulative distance as a function of time. That's great! It would be fun to have the ghost leaders on the graph. The cumulative distance graph shows how little the male leaders are sleeping. The female leaders are sleeping more.

The regular graph shows how very fast ghost Ezster is. She's ahead of most of the men, even though her race was harder than theirs is.

Joe Pavlik left the route in Sparwood. Certainly looks like he had a problem and intentionally left the route.  I hope it's nothing major.

An alternator is someone who didn't follow the route, I think.

Just south of Elkford, the bridge over the Fording River is out and has been since the floods. Is everybody just hiking down the steep section, fording, and hiking up again? How dangerous is that?

Lael Wilcox is flying. She's way ahead of Eszter's time.

Is the Union Pass alternate worth doing if you're not racing?

I know the route is changed around Rawlins because of the construction, but why the change around Union Pass?

I have a request for you southbound Tour Divide racers. When you get to New Mexico, you're going to have your bear spray leftover. You can't take in on a plane. So give those dogs who are chasing you a good snootful.

Thanks, from somebody who'll be coming along later and who isn't as fast as you are.

Other people I know claim that Summit is legal all the way through, and the Private Road sign should be ignored-- the road is private, but there's an easement.

Thanks.

I finished my prototype saddlebag, and I'm now testing it out. So far so good. It's staying on well. If we don't get rain this weekend, I'll take it on its first overnight.

I made it of 1000-denier Cordura, with XPac sides, and leno-mesh side pockets closed by drawstrings. To match the midnight blue bike with black parts, the bag is black with blue accents. It's shaped somewhat like a Carradice saddlebag, but with side panels shaped specifically for this rack and this saddle height. I wrestled over the idea of what stiffener to use, finally deciding not to use any stiffener other than the fabric, so this is a soft bag. The bag is two side pieces joined by the bottom/lid, which is one piece. The seams and edges are bound with one continuous strip of 3/4" grosgrain.

The bag attaches to the bike via velcro to the seat rail, and velcro to the back rack, as well as having two compression straps that wrap around the entire bag and hook around the posts on the rack. 

The top has a cuff of coated nylon closed by a drawstring, then a top flap lined in coated nylon. The top flap and the straps allow for over-stuffing the bag, as might happen if I just bought a lot of food, or I need to carry a lot of water for a day or two.

The bottom is reinforced with another layer of Cordura.

Proposed changes for final version:
* Use two velcro straps in the back instead of one. Sew on a loop of webbing between them to hold a blinky.
* Make the flap shorter.
* Move the compression strap attachments in the back down a couple of inches.
* Use a Microtex needle. The 100 Jeans I'm using punches right through the webbing, but it puts enormous holes in the XPac.
* Cut the compression straps shorter. I haven't gotten around to trimming the straps in the prototype.
* Sew the sides together wrong side to wrong side instead of right side to right side. I deliberately put the seams on the inside, to catch less mud, but with the seams on the inside the part where the flap joins the bag is a little crazy.
* Maybe sew on a stripe of reflective tape on the back. Or maybe not.