Race Report: Day 12

Racers have now spread out over 4 states, and the field has slimmed out even more in since our last update. We've lost Jacob Johnsrud, who called in from Butte to drop and Ray Porter, who rode to Lima fighting the weather and mud and a cold night on Sheep's Creek Divide. After pulling into Lima, Ray decided to box up his bike and go home - only to slice his hand open and cut an artery and get rushed to Dillon and then Butte for hand surgery. We wish him luck with all of that. The race is now down to 28 racers this afternoon. We also lost ITT racer Dave Nice who pulled out Monday night near Steamboat Springs. He had made it 1,133 miles - furthest ever, on a fixie. He posted up on his blog about his drop and we wish him a speedy recovery.

Yesterday the racers perservered storms and cold throughout Montana reporting hail and rain from Fleecer Ridge all the way through the Great Divide Basin in Wyoming.

Monday Night
Monday night Jill Homer made it to Pinedale and is currently ahead of the record female pace as she heads into the basin. The next woman, Cricket Butler, is about 2 days behind her.

Campsite in the Great Divide Basin

Matthew made it to Lynx Pass Monday night, a nice little climb which put him 40 miles or so out of Steamboat. Kurt and Chris stopped a couple of hours earlier on the pass before Steamboat after restocking at the Brush Mountain Lodge, where Kristin is always hospitable to Divide Racers. This put them about 70 miles behind Matthew at the beginning of today. Not too far behind Kurt and Chris was the "Love Shack" tandem with Jay and Tracy staying at the Lodge.

Kurt and Chris in Aspen Alley - special thanks to Dave Nice for this photo.

Today, Tuesday
It looks like the leaders are covering some ground today, but are in high elevation country, so it sure isn't easy. Matthew made it through Silverthorne around 4:30 this afternoon and is headed towards Salida.

Boreas Pass

Chris, Kurt, Jay and Tracy all got into Steamboat Springs around noon and are on the way to Silverthorne.

Cannon, Blaine and Alan called in from Rawlins around noon today after having a great tailwind through the basin and are aiming to get up the pass towards Steamboat and make it to the Lodge.

We also heard from one of the call-ins that Pete Basinger is now time trialing the route and is on a good pace. I'm sure we'll hear from more of the racers as he passes them.

Looking Ahead:
With the race so stretched out, the conditions vary, but most of the route seems to share the chance of more rain in the coming days. It sounds, from the call-ins, like it's getting better, though. The leaders are going through a lot more climbing with the highest pass of the route coming up in the next day or two - Indiana Pass.

Matthew is past Boreas Pass and coming up to an open flat area getting to Hartsel (usually a bit of wind and washboard) then another decent pass before Salida and Marshall Pass (almost 11,000' elevation) after Salida. This evening the chase group (about 10 hours behind Matthew) is headed up Ute Pass (9524'.) 

Ute Pass

They will have a bit of pavement, all the way through Silverthorne until they head up Boreas Pass, which is fairly gradual but pretty high. Temps seem to be in the 40's to 50's at night with mid to upper 70's during the day, 7 to 25 degrees celsius of course :)

 The tail-end of the riders are approaching Lima in the next day.