Kurt Refsnider

Listen to the latest call from this racer here!

Listen to the latest call from this racer here!

Hey, Kurt here. I am in Milan, right outside Grants. Couldn't quite make it past the Dairy Queen into Grants, Dairy Queen just looked too good. The ride here was a challenge, to say the least. Took me a few hours to get down this morning from where I camped last night, up above Abiquiu, through the Rainbow Gathering. They were all asleep still, so that was kind of amusing to see. There were a ton of cars, but nobody to be seen anywhere, almost. Got a little food in Abiquiu, and headed off for the 125 miles of pavement, or 120, or whatever it is. Had a tailwind for a little bit, then a headwind for a while, then for the last 60 miles I was in a large storm the entire time with a headwind until the very end. It just was pounding everything. I actually managed to stay fairly dry with my rain gear on, amazingly. Everything around town, to say the least, is flooded. The fields are flooded, I was crossing rivers that were flowing across the road that were as deep as my knee in places. A lot of water came down out of that, so I'm curious to see what the route down toward pie town is going to be like.  So I'm going to push on in a little bit here after I get some food and dry off. hopefully things improve a bit, I don't know, we'll see. Alright, later.

Hey y'all, it's Kurt, calling from my cell phone, high above Abiquiu. It's 5:00, I've been riding since five this morning, and feeling really good. Last night, I was worried about getting across Brazos Ridge and some of the sections around there that were supposedly really muddy. They were on the verge of being impassable during riding, but not quite. I was able to ride 'em, and was running hard from a storm that was coming in. Fortunately, I beat the storm just barely to the really rocky stuff. So I was able to ride all that wet stuff, but there were some nasty tracks from other people who had tried to ride it, tourists maybe, or Matt, and it looked like they didn't have so much luck. But that really wasn't that bad, and I slept somewhere up high in the northern New Mexico mountains last night, in some nice Aspen.

Had another strange encounter with a porcupine this morning that came flying out of the bushes at me. I think I startled it and it fell out of the bush it was in or something. It was... strange. Porcupines are out to get me, I think.

Up high on the south side of Abiquiu, it's just really nice up here. I'm loving it. Tomorrow, lots of road, road riding, so I'm trying to get psyched for that, but that's just tough at this time. But we'll see! That's the way it goes. Alright, later.

Howdy all, it's Kurt. I am up in Platoro at the lodge. It is pouring outside, and it's been doing this for about the last four hours or so, so it was kind of slow riding coming up, but the mud was decent mud and didn't really clog anything up except for one really short section down near town. Gary rode with me for the first 40 minutes or so, it was nice to have company for at least the paved section. The scenery is great up here, but it's kind of frustrating that you can't see anything because it's raining hard most of the time. I'm going to get some food here, and then press on. At least see what the mud at the New Mexico border looks like. No way of knowing without actually getting there. We'll see, hopefully it's not too horrendous, but tI don't know. Alright, that's all for now.

Hey everyone, Kurt here. I am in Del Norte. It's Friday morning at 5:30, I'm about to hit the road. I came down here from Salida yesterday over those three tall passes, and got hammered on... Cochetopa, I guess? Rained very hard, then hailed very hard, then rained very hard again. The rest of the day was pretty good until I was getting toward Del Norte, and then there was a huge storm off to the South that apparently was up where Matt was in Platoro, and he was getting pretty hammered by that one. Got into town just before dark, stayed with Patty and Gary at their place last night, along with a tourist named Dan who is coming up from the south and heading north. He like the person that Matt ran into on the trail said that the section Brazos Ridge down just across the New Mexico border is incredibly muddy, so we'll see how that is. I'll probably get to that later in the day today. Hopefully it's passable, but if not, I guess there'll be some walking. Until next time, take care.

Hey, it's Kurt! I'm in Salida. The last couple days have been kind of hard. Yesterday had some really challenging terrain in Gore Canyon. It took it's toll on both Chris and I, and Chris ended up going into Kremmling for the night last night. I pushed on and got all the way up to Ute pass around midnight and slept up there. My goal today was to get to Salida here, to the post office before they closed at five, so I pushed hard. Managed to make it from Ute pass all the way through Silverthorne and Hartsel to Salida here by about 4:00 or so. Now I'm at Absolute Bikes having some more work done on my bike - new tire, new bottom bracket, that sort of thing. Definitely this has taken it's toll on the gear, but it's holding up fairly well. Nothing catastrophic since the incident in Wyoming.  Next up is headed into the Cochetopa hills, which I'm looking forward to. Some familiar territory over there, and I really like it, so it should be fun. Alright, talk to you guys later.

Hey, Kurt here. Chris and I are just heading out of Steamboat. We got in here a couple hours ago and had a bunch of work done on our bikes at Orange Peel and got some tasty breakfast burritos. We're excited to be down in Colorado finally, and heading toward the place where the route comes the closest to where both of us live. So it's pretty exciting to be back kinda close to home. The weather's looking up, it's a little warm, but not too bad. It was a tough day, the headwind took quite a - really steep rollers in southern Wyoming, but made it through. The Brush Creek Lodge made it possible for us to get through the night, at least up to a place on the pass where we slept. Got some burgers and many cans of lemonade at the lodge which was amazing. Alright, that's all for now. We'll go to Silverthorne next, and then Salida! 

Kurt here, calling in from Rawlins, WY. Chris and I just pulled in here somewhere between 8:30 and 9. Got 40 miles in the day already, and yesterday we had a 170 mile day, just blasted across all the dirt in the Great Basin, Dave Harris style, hammerfest. Dave you would have loved what we were riding yesterday, it was great. We were watching huge storms to the south the whole time today, as we were riding in on the paved roads there was an inch or two of hail behind some of the bushes, so I'm glad we were not out stuck in that. That's all for now. Heading south into Colorado later this morning. Alright, until next time.

Hey - Kurt here in Pinedale! Bike held together with my massive number of two gears, pushing 12 miles an hour in the wind and rain the whole way down the highway from the Place Cafe. Dale here at the hardware store set me up with a new derailleur pulley and a new chain, and things look beautiful. Chris and I are going to go stock up on groceries, and then on into the evening, it looks like the rain has moved on and maybe we'll dry out a little bit, we'll see - I'm tired of being wet at this point, but I don't think there's anything that can be done about that. Alright, until next time!