2013 Colorado Trail Race Tracker

Bikepacking Gear

For weeks, I have been meaning to do a post on the equipment I have been using on my overnights, and that I will be taking on the race. Better late than never.

Obviously, less is more when you have to carry the gear 500 miles, but since this is my first attempt at doing the race, and I don't expect to set any speed records, I'm opting for a little extra safety in exchange for having to carry a little extra weight.

Having said that, I spent way to much $$$ this year purchasing a new sleeping bag and bivy sack to shave some ounces on my kit. The bed roll is where the safety factor comes in. The bed roll consists of a lightweight REI bivy sack, Golite down summer sleeping bag, and a thermarest neolight inflatable pad. I wouldn't call it comfortable, but it's not too bad. The bivy sack makes the setup mostly water proof, so in addition to using it for sleeping, it could double as an emergency shelter if I got caught in an extended storm. I say it's mostly waterproof, because the top head area of the bivy sack is mesh. In a big storm I would have to turn the whole setup over, or use my rain jacket to cover the mesh. The bivy sack is the obvious green sack in the picture below. Actually, the sleeping bag and sleeping pad are in the bivy sack. I experimented with rolling all of it up together, and then quickly ( before the sleeping bag expands ) slipping it into the handlebar pack shown in the second picture. This packing method make it very quick and easy to pack and unpack. I just pull the whole thing out and get in. Then I blow up the pad, and nighty night. Packing in the morning only takes a couple minutes as well, and is much faster than packing the three items in separate stuff sacks. All together the bed roll is a little more than three pounds.

I won't bore you with a full list of everything else, but it's pretty minimal.

Clothing: ( Not including what I'm wearing normally )

• Down Jacket
• Thermal tights
• Long Sleeve wool shirt
• Arm and leg warmers
• Extra bike shorts
• Rain Gear (Jacket and Pants )
• Hat and gloves extra pair of socks

Gear

• Small first aid kit
• Bike repair kit
• Spot GPS tracker
• UV Water purifier
• Lights for night riding
• Sunscreen
• Colorado Trail Data Book / maps
• Extra USB batteries, ipod, camera, GPS

In all, this weighs in between 12 and 15 pounds depending on whether you include the gear I normally ride with.

I find it interesting that the gear only adds 7-8% to the total weight including rider. So while it slows me down, it's not bad. However, the added weight which is mostly strapped to the bike, adds more than 50% to the bike. So the bike feels very different when riding technical sections, and REALLY heavy when I'm pushing it up scree fields or over big rocks.

I use a number of different packs that you can see in the second picture. All of these packs with the exception of the backpack are made by Revelate Designs, in Alaska. The backpack is a Golite hydration pack. The "Sweetroll" is the front handlebar bag containing the bed roll. The 'Gas Tank" is the small front top tube bag. I keep my camera, batteries, and electrolyte capsules in this. The 'Viscacha' is the large rear seat bag. This bag caries most of my extra clothing, first aid kit and bike repair kit. I also purchased a 'Feed Bag'. This is a small cylindrical bag, similar to a climber's chalk bag, that is strapped to the handlebars and stem, and can be used to hold bite sized pieces of food, or even an extra water bottle.

I have not yet discussed the food that I will be bringing. That can add another 3 - 5 pounds. If I have time, I'll do a post on the food before the race.

Everything packed

Everything on the bike

Training Summary - Week 10

Week 10 was a reduce training load week, so we planned a family vacation to San Francisco this week.

We stayed in a hostel at the Marin Headlands which was cool but a little noisy. Mount Tam is close by, and is claimed to be the birthplace of mountain biking. Gary Fisher and crew started mountain biking the area, and of course Gary Fisher started building mountain bikes. Ironically, all the singletrack on Mount Tam is closed to mountain bikes because the wealthier hikers and equestrians had more influence than the dirt bag, stoner mountain bikers.

Sam had her bike, so I rented a bike and we rode up Mount Tam. Mmm, railroad grade, my favorite. The rear brakes on my $75 rental bike didn't work at all, so that at least added some excitement.

So I got a little riding in, and then we did a lot of walking around SF. So I counted that as 4 hours of training.

Training Summary - Week 9

Last week was to be the biggest training week of the program at over 28 hours. 

I was pretty worried about the IT band problems I had the weekend before. Because of my experience with IT band problems in the past, I knew that any serious flare up might mean the end of training and the race. I went to the doctor and she suggested that we wait on any steroid injections until the week was over, because the steroids can weaken the tissue in the short term, and won't provide much anti-inflammatory affect for two to three weeks. Since this was to be a high intensity week she didn't want to weaken anything.

During the week, the training volume was the usual. The weekend however was a long overnight. I have been trying to do the long overnights on the Colorado Trail to get to know the sections and because none of my local trails can provide the time required without doing laps on them.

I decided to go to Durango, and ride to Silverton. This would allow me to do a long ride without forcing me to ride back the same way to get back to my car. Instead I planned to take the narrow gauge train back to Durango.

It turned out to be an epic weekend both physically and mentally. 

I left work early Friday to drive down to Durango, but due to a fire I had to take a longer route. I arrived around 10:00pm, had dinner, and started trying to figure out where to stay. I wasn't thinking clearly, and wasn't sure where the trail head was. I also left my detailed guide book at home, so I called Mickey and gave her the name of the trail head, and she gave me directions. I headed out of town towards the trail head, and eventually found a camp site along the way. I set the alarm for 5:00 am, and decide to just sleep in the front sear at around midnight. Comfy!

In the morning I continued up towards the trail head. The road turned into a very rough jeep road that was probably too rough for my Subaru, and made progress very slow. This didn't feel right at all. I was getting way to high, and it didn't feel like I was in the right place. Finally I found a place to park and decided it would be easier to ride my bike the rest of the way. I eventually reached the trail head after about 1000 feet of climbing, only to realize that it was the wrong trail head. I was at Kennebek Pass trail head, one trail head out from the Junction Creek trail head near Durango. Continuing from this point would have eliminated the first 20 miles and 6500 feet of climbing from the ride, so I headed back to the car and drove to the correct trail head. It's now 9:30.

I start riding the section, wondering how my IT band will handle the weekend. I start to feel some pain, and decide to negotiate some mental ground rules with myself. This weekend ride is epic by any normal standards, and is bound to be really beautiful. I decide that if my IT band has a serious flare up early in the ride, I will turn back and probably not do the race. If it flares up past the half way point I will continue on and try to enjoy the accomplishment of this ride, and then probably not do the race. If it doesn't flare up I figure that my gratitude will make the normal suffering more bearable, and I will enjoy the ride into Silverton. Well, the IT band creaked and moaned for a little while and then went to sleep. I really didn't have an issue with it. ( My gratitude wore off pretty quickly and the normal suffering took over )

I slogged along up the first 20 miles to Kennebek Pass. The pace was slow. It seems to get slower each time I go out. Around 2:30 I got caught in a nice thunderstorm with rain and hail. Fortunately, I was caught just a hundred yards inside the tree line, and was able hunker down under a large bristle-cone pine. At tree line, the temps fall very quickly in a storm and I scrambled to get rain gear on. Being cold and wet sucks, but this was a good mental test. The storm passed and I continued up towards the pass.

A few minutes later as I was pushing my bike up a scree field, I saw two riders coming down, and I pulled off to let them pass. ( Only because I was pushing ). As they came closer, I recognized the first rider and said something dorky like "I know who you are. You're Kurt Refsnider". It's funnier if you imagine me saying it with the voice of Larry the Cable Guy, AKA Mater. Kurt won the Tour Divide in 2011 and was featured in the Mike Dion film, "Reveal the Path".

He didn't stop to give me an autograph so I continued to push to the pass. ( Where I had already been 8 hours ago ) There were some tents setup, and I got some water from some people providing support for a 100 mile mountain bike race going on.

For the next 5 miles I met a number of riders doing the race that asked me if I was training for the CTR. Many of them either were doing it this year or had done it in the past. I was always pushing my bike, so it was easy to stop and talk. Have I mentioned that I was pushing my bike, a lot. I find that bringing a bike along is only really efficient if you can actually sit on it and pedal.

Fast forward to 9:30 pm. I left the trail head 12 hours before, and have only gone 43 miles, mostly above 11000 feet. It's now dark, and I have been riding a traversing trail running below a ridge on a steep slope. There haven't been any places to camp in a while, so when an "almost" flat, obvious campground shows up, I decide to call it a day. I want to push myself hard, but I'm not sure when the next camp will turn up, and I'm not riding very well in the dark on this narrow, sloping trail. I make up for it by setting the alarm for 4:00 am.

I'm up by 4:15 and moving by 4:30. The first task of the day is to push my bike up a 12000 foot pass. Guess what the second task is? As usual my pace is slow, and I start worrying that I won't make it to Silverton in time to catch the train. But the last 8 miles to Silverton turn out to be nice and fast, and I make it with 40 minutes to space.

The train ride back is very cool, but it's an old train. It's jerky and impossible to find a position to get some sleep.

Back in Durango I ride back to the trail head to get my car, gas up, fail to find the Starbucks, and head out of town. My plan is find a hotel somewhere along the way, but it's so late by the time I get to the Salida area, that I decide to just pull over and try to get some sleep before I pass out and crash. I got about an hour and a half of sleep, and then pushed on to Bailey where I did another half an hour. I made it to Denver around 6:00 am, found a 24 hour fitness and took a shower. Another 40 minute nap in the parking lot, and I was ready for another day at the office.

I think this was the most tired I have ever been. I fell asleep on the couch around 7:30 and slept very well through the night.

Little waterfall

Columbine

Free bike wash

Survived the lightning, rain and Hail

Final hike-a-bike to Kennebek Pass

Indian Trail Ridge ( I think )

More waterfalls

Molas Pass Panorama

Train ride back to Durango

Training Summary - Week 8

This concludes week 8 of the training plan, 4 more to go. 

I have been mostly mountain biking up to this point. I'm getting bored riding all the same trails, so this week I decided I would mostly ride the road bike, and arranged to do a 100 mile ride with my friend Ron on Saturday. We did the Copper Triangle, a route that goes from Copper Mountain, to Leadville, Minturn, and back to Copper. We extended it by starting and ending in Frisco, which makes it the Copper Lollipop.

The big, and not so good news of the week, is that during the above ride, which was not that long or difficult relative to the other rides I have been doing lately, I developed some significant soreness in my left IT band. The soreness is continuing off the bike, and is the first significant issue I have had with my IT band since I had surgery to correct the problem over 7 years ago. Obviously the timing of this is not good, and I need to make it go away very quickly. I'm starting some IT specific stretches and I'll probably try to get a steroid shot early this week. I'm crossing my fingers.

This coming week is the largest planned training volume of the program at 28 hours, 18 of which will be during a long overnight next weekend. I'm still figuring out where to go. These overnights are difficult to plan because I have to end up back at the car at some point.

Ron, always texting

View heading up Fremont Pass

Bridge near Minturn

Training Summary - Week 7

As I mentioned last time, I was in Orlando most of the week for an important trade show. I was hoping that I would be able to train in the evening either in the hotel exercise room, or at a local 24 hour fitness. Unfortunately with long days working the booth followed by long dinners, I was only able to get a single, one hour workout in on Tuesday evening between 11:00 pm and midnight. Fortunately, most of the weeks training was scheduled for Friday through Sunday.

I flew back to CO on Friday morning. Mickey and Sam met me in Denver for an early Father's Day lunch because Sam was going to be at a mountain bike camp, and I was going to be spending the weekend on a two night training ride.

After lunch I headed to Buena Vista where I planned to start my weekend riding two or three more segments of the Colorado Trail. Nothing was really going right. I couldn't find my iPod, or my bike computer. My rear tire wouldn't hold air, and it took me over an hour to unload my car, pack and get going. I found a bike shop to put more sealant in my rear tire, but it didn't work. I had to keep pumping it up until the next day I finally gave up an put a tube in my tubeless wheel. Saturday morning I checked my spot GPS tracker and noticed that the low battery light was on. I had told Mickey that I would bring spare batteries ( Which I forgot to do ) so that there would be almost no chance that I would lose contact. So I was forced to ride by to Buena Vista to buy batteries, and then drove my car back to the Mt. Princeton parking lot to continue where I left off.

Towards the end of segment 13, I ran into Pete, another rider training for the CTR, who had also finished in 2011.

The CO trail in this area runs along the front of the Collegiate peaks. Looking at the elevation profile, the area doesn't look terribly daunting, but I found the trails difficult. The trails had lots of short steep climbs with loose sand and rock. I spent a lot of time pushing my bike, and getting off and on over and over. I keep doing the math in my head to figure out how long this race is going to take me, and the answer is not good. I'm in the best shape of my life, and I'll be luckyif I can just finish before I have to go back to work.

Relaxing Friday night

Shining my Niterider bike light into a water bottle made for a nice camp light.

Rise and shine in camp 1

Meadow near the end of segment 14

Training Summary - Week 6

I have to admit that after last weekend, as good as it was, I found myself high in fatigue and low in motivation. I started asking myself why I must choose goals for myself that are ridiculously hard, and considered changing my goal to set the world record for most pounds of Cheetos consumed in a single day. OK, enough whining!

The above, combined with a big software release at work, resulted in my first training week where I really missed workouts, and didn't get the hours in. I did finish the week out with a strong weekend, but ended about 5 hours short. Next week I'm in Orlando all week for a trade show, so next week will be even more difficult.

It has been two weeks since I attempted to ride Fall River Road in RMNP. I attempted it again today, and except for a couple of snow fields at the top, it was rideable. So I rode it twice.

The second time, I locked my bike to a very secure, sun bleached road marker pole, and walked the final snow field to the plowed road near the top to the visitor's center. ( Both shown below ) After a snack, I did some obligatory hiking around the soaking wet alpine tundra for an hour or so.

As I headed back past the visitor center towards the snow field, a conscientious park employee pointed out to me that there was a sign that said "No pedestrians or bikes beyond this point". I may have snapped at him a bit when I said "THAT'S THE WAY I CAME UP, AND MY $7000 MOUNTAIN BIKE IS ACROSS THE SNOW FIELD, AND THERE WAS NO SIGN ON THE WAY UP SAYING THAT I CAN'T GO BACK". Apparently my argument was compelling since no park rangers arrived to arrest me.

Alpine Visitor's Center

I walked the final snowfield to the visitor center. The visitor center is just out of view on the other side of the snow field.