Pretty Lights-Color Map of the Sun- it's CO after all... 

Listened to this a lot on the AZT this year and lots of Lemon Jelly. Great stuff to trance out to night riding. Nice suggestion.

Sounds like you got it where I did... Just after Canon Plaza in Vallecitos. About 5 dogs packed up on me running out from a broken down house, no major injuries but they definitely dragged their teeth across my calves leaving gouges and ripped up my socks. The hill going out of town only helped the dogs stay around me for longer nipping at me.. And it was on my birthday!

Hi everyone,

I've got the start date for 2016 set at April 15th.

Going through my new maps, doesn't seem like there are to many changes.

Last years gpx included the single track detour after Elkford and adopted the new route in to Butte. I would expect that barring any last minute changes from Matthew it should be ready to go as is.

Yep, Chaco Alternate and Malpais Alternate are always TD legal alternates as stated on the Rules page. The official GPX track for TD does follow these alternates, so just follow the purple line!

Great video Iohan, finally got a chance to sit down and watch the whole thing. The only one making me look silly in it is me! I'm really glad we met that day at Hahn's Peak Roadhouse, keep me posted on your upcoming CDT adventure. I'm really happy to see you're going to be taking the plunge into bikepacking and I'm sure you are going to enjoy yourself and be in for one heck of an adventure this summer. Let me know when you get near Steamboat and lets rendezvous. Cheers from a kindred soul.

-John

I like the rule changes. Safety first.

I'd agree that having the 300 riders coming through was distracting, an hour earlier start for the 300 sounds right, I didn't think the 7:00 start needed to be earlier for the 750.

In regard to gates, I found so few left open that the 3 or 4 I came upon that were actually open in 750 miles I left open. I didn't see any that were left open with an "always close" sign.

Rode TDR last year on a pair of Maxxis IKON EXO 2.2's and they did great. The Maxxis Crossmark EXO's roll faster with a more connected center bead but are also a bit heavier. I'd roll it again with IKON's or Crossmarks.

I rode down the highway to Jacob Lake on April 19th finishing up the AZTR and the General Store and the Kaibab Lodge were both still boarded up and not opening until May 15th. Jacob Lake Inn had the nearest services(restaurant/general store/motel/gas station) at ~42 miles down the highway from the North Kaibab trailhead. It's still cool and quite soggy on the north rim with snow still around in the forest. The highway is quite desolate since it's gated closed at Jacob Lake. Cheers and have fun out there!

Congrats to John Fairbairn for finishing! Good work man!

Thanks much!

Way to go John!! You did it!! Payback complete. Thanks for all the call-ins, it was great to hear your trail accounts practically as they happened.

Thanks! I was thinking about that payback when things got tough out there. Thanks again for contacting Rich for me in Superior so I could get my phone back, and I'm definitely glad you enjoyed the call-in's. It was a fun time cheering for Cassi coming in with you at Picket Post.

And congratulations to Rich!!! dream4est and I were bouncing txt's back and forth all night last night while watching Rich make his run for Utah, it was awesome to watch. I finally fell asleep about 2:30am and woke up about 6am and saw on the tracker he had finished an hour or so before. Great job Rich, it was fun leapfrogging back and forth with you during the race and great to be able to share some laughs with you along the way.

Freeskier46 came down to greet Cassi at the finish, her mother was here as well. I'm camped at Picket Post tonight and got to join in the fun. It was excellent to watch her turns in the distance as she rolled in under lights. I believe freeskier46 said he'd post the action shots.

I see you already heard the news! Thanks so much for contacting Rich! I definitely owe you a beer sometime!! And thanks to Rich, too! Which I already expressed to him. Glad to hear a room opened up at the inn for Rich!

Bikepackers... Best people ever. All of you. And I mean that. Cheers all!

J

Hello all,
 Somewhere just before Picket Post today my phone ejected on the trail. I see Rich Wolf was not far behind me. Is anyone in contact with Rich to ask him if he saw the phone on the trail perhaps? Thanks.


J

P.s.-yeah, my wrong turn and resultant double climb up Gonzales pass wasn't fun. I gues that's what happens when you've been on the bike for 40 hours with about 2 hours rest. The queue simply says town is uphill, so I went uphill. D'oh.

The road to Pie Town smooth? Say it ain't so!

From the Tour Divide website:

http://tourdivide.org/start_list

"Tour Divide accepts letters of intent (LOI) annually, from Winter Solstice (12/21) until Grand Depart (2nd Friday in June). Prospective challengers are encouraged to declare, but may also simply show up in Banff on June 10th. To be published on the provisional start list, send us an LOI via the contact form."

There is also an unofficial google spreadsheet that has been mentioned in the 2015 TD thread here in the forums.

Here are the links to the spreadsheet:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AnV6xT65HkPRdEx5eUtMaTZmVWQ5TTVlUlNhaFg2RFE&usp=sharing#gid=0

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Q1UHjIKml475yatejXB3fSql5jZyEQEEhqPlvY6T_1c/viewform?usp=send_form#start=invite

Cheers.

Geez I am having issues loading the 300 gpx file onto my oregon.  I think it's because the track is over 10k track points.  I am on a Mac so Topofusion is not an option does anyone have any advice how I could split the track via base camp?

thanks,
Ben

You can grab the simplified version from Scott's GPX directory, it's already been simplified to 10k points and is ready to be loaded. Here's the link to the file that should be used for the 300...

http://topofusion.com/azt/gpx/AZT300_2014_v1_reduced_10k.gpx

You can have a look in http://topofusion.com/azt/gpx/ to see what files are available.

I'll second what Addy Marx had to say about Maxxis IKON EXO 2.2's, they're a great all around tire. Light, good tread life, great for gravel grinding and mixed riding. IKON's are definitely one of the go-to tires on Tour Divide these days. If you want something a little heavier but faster rolling the Maxxis Crossmark EXO is a great tire, too. Tour Divide was won last year on Crossmarks.

I run hydro on all my other mountain bikes except for my bikepacker. I ran mechanical brakes last year on the Divide, Avid FR5 levers and BB7 Caliper with fresh pads before I left. When I got Salida, I was expecting to spend some cash! ZERO! Mechanic told me everyone that was running hydros replaced their pads, most running mechanicals did not. Something to think about. I ran a 180 front and 160 rear, would probably run 180 front and rear if I did it again incase one or the other get bent. Got ejected down Fleecer and in the New Mexico mud at night once and was fortunate to never had anything with the bike go down on me, don’t know how, don’t know why. I think it’s because I LOVE my bikes. Give it some good parts based on durability vs weight an you should be fine too.

I ran Shimano XT hydro brakes on the Divide last year and had no issues and never replaced pads. Ran those pads for quite some time bikepacking after I got back, too. I saw plenty of riders with mechanical brakes replacing pads. I think it's six of one and a half dozen of the other. Pick what you like and feel comfortable with for whatever reasons and stick with it.

Nice bike Flagster, SB95c? Thanks for the reports.

Thanks Wahday, that was exactly the info I was looking for. I think I'll stick with the regular escape bivvy.