The Radavist

It is hard to avoid the bodies of water that surround Seattle. I have always loved the water, from childhood summers spent swimming in Greenlake, to building illicit rope swings in high school, to having a first date on a small strip of sand my family long ago dubbed “Secret Beach.” As I grew up, I learned my friends had their own secret beaches, small access points bordered by tall trees and houses, strips of pebbles off Lake Washington Boulevard with a view of Mount Rainier, and rare sandy beaches touching the icy waters of Puget Sound.

Continue reading below for Conor Courtney‘s two-wheeled explorations of Seattle’s secret beaches…

With numerous high summits along the Continental Divide and over a dozen 14,000′ peaks, the Sawatch Mountains are the heart of central Colorado’s alpine riding. Below, Hailey Moore shares a 340-mile bike touring route that circumnavigates 14 of the 15 Sawatch peaks by linking together a few of the region’s classic high passes and resupply options in iconic mountain towns. Read on for Hailey’s inspiration behind crafting this classic Colorado cyclo-touring route, detailed information for each section, and an optional extension that loops around Mt. Holy Cross to make the route a complete circumnavigation.

This is a continuation of Ryan Wilson’s Altai Traverse Reportage. Read part one here: The Altai Traverse: Finding Tracks in the Mongolian Countryside

In a remote corner of the Mongolian Altai, about 40 kilometers from the border with China, I set off toward a desolate valley from the small, windswept, and dusty village of Bulgan. My next resupply point, about 125km down the road, was, confusingly, another town named Bulgan. I never quite got the hang of the Mongolian naming schemes in my time there, as it was quite common to find a handful of towns and villages across the country with identical names on any given map, and sometimes each town had two or three names they might be referred to by depending on which map you’re looking it, which sometimes makes it tricky getting reliable information.

You know those weekends whose arrival you count down for months, to clock out of work, load up your bike, road trip 1,200 miles, and then readily acquiesce to stunts that question your health insurance coverage? Welcome to Single Speed USA.

Two common ingredients create this one-of-a-kind recipe; bicycles with only one gear, and a guaranteed let-loose atmosphere. This year, Kansas City hosted the annual gathering and it was a surprise to no one that that the weekend proved to be for the books (if you could even remember it, that is).

Registration: optional. Length of course: unknown. Number plates or organized timing: none. Prizes: gold placard bricks. Trophies this year included: “DFL thanks for making us wait,” “Well that was both brave and stupid,” “Never Stood a Chance,” “First to finish? Well f*ck you!,” “Captain No Fun” and “The highlight of SSKC was the sewer I fell in.” This is where the fun begins.

When Karla and I arrived at Básica Studio’s workshop in México City, one of the first things I noticed was a yellow bicycle parked on its kickstand standing a little apart from the other ones on the rack. A complete set of fenders and heavy-duty racks made it clear this bike was intended for fully loaded touring, and the letters on the down tube, F. Duarte, spelled a brand I hadn’t seen before. We soon found out this bike belonged to Juanito, one of the mechanics at the shop, and I knew I had to see this bike and this guy in action.

One month in, 1,000 miles ridden and with Montana in the rearview, Kurt Refsnider shares stories from his progress so far riding the entirety of the Continental Divide Trail. As Kurt tells it, it’s been slow going but he hasn’t yet once questioned his desire to take on this monumental backcountry route.

“I walked off the Alaska Airlines jet and into the tiny Kodiak, Alaska airport on a classically rainy day in May with a wide grin on my face. For as transient as I’ve been over the past five years—calling Maine, Alaska, Hawaii and Vermont all home—there is something both bittersweet and utterly lovely about landing at an airport that imbues that nostalgic feeling. As I waited in the cluttered baggage claim area I giggled to myself at the familiarity of all manner of luggage rolling out on the baggage carousel. Everything from rifle bags and tackle boxes, to coolers with red and white stickers emblazoned with “FROZEN” stickers to standard-issued Coast Guard bags arrived before my REI duffle and bike bag. I wheeled them out to my friend’s waiting truck thinking to myself: ‘Now the adventure starts.'”

Continue reading for the rest of Gretchen Powers‘ recap about her experience riding in Kodiak Crab Festival‘s Pasagshak to Kodiak Bike Race, which is quite possibly the smallest organized bike race in the US…

The Northern New Mexico Continental Divide Trail, or CDT for short, is a popular route for bicycle touring. Singletrack and overgrown double-track compose most of this true-to-form high-country route, where beautiful campsites and natural water sources abound. Yet, it can be a challenge to pick up the route’s thread season after season, as deadfall and weather-related changes obstruct wayfinding. John and a group of six friends recently rode the 93-mile section, and he documented the scenery with his 35mm rangefinder camera and a 35mm focal length lens.

Find the most current, mostly singletrack route of the Northern NM CDT below, along with route notes and a wonderful gallery that captures the vibe of this stunning section of bike-legal trail below.

In one of the most creative trip reports to grace this site, Vaughn Dice shares the story of acquiring a 1985 Airone x Cinelli Rampichino, the first Italian mountain bike, then taking the bike back to Italy for a tour on its original proving grounds. Read on for Vaughn’s lively retelling of his time retracing this bike’s origin story through the Piemonte Alps.

A reggae legend once told me, ‘the hardest part is the start!’ But let me tell you, Johnny Osbourne never faced the world of long-distance cycling. The start may be tough, but stopping, oh, stopping is a beast of its own. It’s like vertigo, a swirling chaos that leaves you dizzy and disoriented, a sailor back on solid ground after weeks at sea or a diver breaking the surface after a deep plunge. Everything becomes surreal, nothing makes sense, and you yearn for something to hold on to, but there’s nothing, just an immovable void.

For fourteen relentless days, I pushed forward, covering at the very least a hundred kilometers a day, as landscapes, faces, and weather slowly morphed around me. From scorching 43-degree heat to 10-degree cold which by then felt like -10! I rode on. My journey, a long bike ride from my new home in Portugal to my old abode in Belgium, driven by a selfish urge, wrapped in a cloak of nobility.

Forty-five riders, 280 kilometers with 900 meters of climbing, and two countries. Sleeping out in two (nearly) wild campgrounds, stops at two awesome cycling cafes and one well-timed heat wave. All the fruit pies, ice-cream, coffee, shared snacks and supermarket sweeps. Brightly-colored kits, wild swims, hardpack, ankle-deep sand, cobbled streets and everything in between. This is the story of the Lowlands Rally, a bikepacking weekender hosted by the European clothing brand, IRIS, in collaboration with komoot, and documented by renowned photographer, Ashley Gruber. If you couldn’t tell already, it was a weekend we won’t soon forget!

The Arna Westfjords Way Challenge is an ultra-endurance cycling race that traverses the seaside perimeter of Iceland’s Westfjords region in four stages over five days with 600 miles of mixed surface riding and 37,000+ feet of elevation gain. The route was originally established by accomplished endurance cyclists Lael Wilcox, Chris Burkard, Payson McElveen, Nichole Baker, and Rugile Kaladyte and formatted into a stage race by the team at Cycling Westfjords in 2021. Now in its second year, the event features a variety of innovative aspects that make it unique in the world of ultra cycling, which benefits the local communities and also the riders’ experiences. Josh Weinberg was on the ground covering this year’s event and, below, shares an insightful event recap and massive image gallery from this strikingly beautiful part of the world.

Traveling to Mongolia has been a dream for Ryan Wilson since he first got into bike touring. Vast open spaces dotted with interesting geographical features, dirt tracks as far as the eye can see, and a history and culture that runs incredibly deep all contribute to making this east Asian country a dynamic experience. Sandwiched between Russia and China though, Mongolia can be tricky to access and, as a result, it often seemed to get pushed down the list of places for Ryan to visit, but when he finally had a chance to spend a summer there, he jumped on it…

As you read this, the last remaining dots on the 2023 Tour Divide are probably still trickling towards its southern terminus. Meanwhile, Kurt Refsnider is gearing up for a parallel but far more ambitious adventure of his own. An adventure that only three other humans have ever completed on bicycles. The Continental Divide Trail, like the Tour Divide route, runs from Canada to Mexico and tracks along the Continental Divide. But unlike the Tour Divide, the CDT is almost entirely singletrack.

This article will be the first of many that Kurt will be sharing about his ponderous trek. He starts by outlining the route, telling us where the idea came from, and detailing the years of planning that got him ready to take the plunge. Stay tuned. We definitely will.

Today we are back with part two of Spencer Harding‘s ENVE Grodeo and Builder Round-up coverage. If you missed the builds featured in yesterday’s post, we’d recommend going back and giving them a gander—3D-printed parts (most ti but some steel, too!) seems to be the unofficial theme for the year but there’s plenty to see across the creative spectrum! Today, we finish up with the remaining frame builders in the showcase—with a few more overseas features—then we head out on the weekend’s main event, a 92-mile gravel ride on some of the best dirt in the northern Wasatch Mountains. Let’s dive in!  

Every summer, ENVE Composites hosts a massive open house at their HQ in Ogden, Utah with an accompanying gravel ride. The 2023 ENVE Grodeo, which went down just one week ago,  featured an impressive list of 24 frame builders from around the world. Spencer Harding was on the ground documenting all of the beautiful bicycles and riding festivities and, below, he presents Part One of his event recap with a stacked gallery of bikes, some snapshots from the builder ride, and Trackline time trail at the Grodeo. Let’s get to it!