Race Report

John Nobile on the 30-mile railroad-bed hell-trail
outside of Big Springs, Idaho (2006)

Rain, hail, thunderstorms and deep mud continues to be the main topic of this years race.  Over the past few days, the weather has ceased to let up and has made for some very non-ideal conditions on the route.  Racers had to trek through nearly 70 miles of deep mud in the Centennial Valley from Lima (mile 878) to Red Rock Pass (mile 948) after the valley received 2 weeks of straight rain.  In Big Springs (mile 967), Matt Lee was forced to deal with quarter-inch sized hail, which is beginning to be a near-daily occurance for many of the race leaders.  Due to the weather, racers are likely wearing through their drivetrains much faster than previous years, which will likely cause many of them to have to pre-maturely replace them once they get into Colorado.   Read more »

Here are two more race replay videos, both generated using TopoFusion GPS software. They show the entire race up to this morning.

The first is of just the top 10 riders:

The second has all riders:

Thanks to Sue N for the suggestion of going with racer's initials instead of their full names. It makes it easier to see what's going on.

Once again, it will look like some riders are cutting the course! This is not the case -- they just didn't get SPOT points for a while.

There has been a lot more drama and bad weather greeting Tour Dividers over the past couple of days.  The biggest development thus far is speculation regarding the future of John Nobile's race, who was a heavy favorite.  On her blog, Jill Homer has used some fairly vague language that makes it difficult to tell if he intends to continue much farther:

Since day 3 I've been traveling with John Nobile, last year's GDR winner who was a contender for this year until his knee went out just north of the border. Now he's touring with me for a few more days. It's been fun to have a traveling companion, especially one who knows the route so well. We've come across four bears on the trail, and he always charges ahead to chase them away, so that's a benefit, too. (link)

If John does scratch, he will be joining Cadet Bryant and Kevin Hall as this year's first race casualties. Read more »

Since previous replay videos have been a little chaotic, this video features only the top 10 racers, according to the tracking system's split chart. This video starts at the beginning of the race and runs until this morning. The sleep/ride patterns, or as Matt Lee likes to say, the circadian rhythms of the riders are quite apparent. You can see how Matt Lee has gained his lead by riding later and earlier most nights.

Apologies for the lower video quality. Vimeo is having technical difficulties today.

If you haven't noticed the split chart, it's been a little buried at the bottom of the main leaderboard map. The chart is filled out automatically as the race rolls on. Try clicking on the columns to sort riders by arrival time.

We are happy to report there is a new crop of Divide media to check out.  Be sure to look at Marni Plesko's photo gallery of racer's at the start in Banff.

Also check out Joe Polk's latest Divide podcast over at MTBcast.  If you haven't already, be sure to donate to MTBcast and get yourself in the running for their Siren Bicycle giveaway.  Joe kindly donates a significant amount of time and resources to help make the call-ins and podcasts happen, so, if you are able, please help support MTBcast and keep it online for years to come.

Finally, Scott Morris over at Topofusion has put together another installment of the SPOT-powered race animations:

Alan Goldsmith hiking his bike through the snow on Richmond Peak (2008)

The past day has been another exciting one on the route.  Jay and Tracy have finally gotten back on pace after getting lost over the Whitefish Divide and have been riding with Chris Plesko, Joe Meiser and Kurt Refsnider up and over Richmond Peak.  Matthew Lee, who has been leading the race from the start, has developed a 5 hour lead over the chase group.  He checked in from Ovando (mile 486) at 11A.M. as the pack was beginning their ascent up Richmond Peak.  His lead grew in part from his early start, as he began his climb up Richmond Peak at 5am whereas the others did not start until 5:45am.  Moreover, Matt skipped going slightly off-route to Seeley Lake in favor of delaying his resupply 26 miles until he reached Ovando.  If the chase group goes to Seeley Lake, Matt will likely gain another 30-45 minutes over the group.

Yesterday's progress was certainly slower for many of the racers than anticipated.  A popular resupply point at Swan River (mile 354) was discovered to be burned down, likely causing a number of racers to go off-route to Big Fork.  Additionally, bad storms ripped through the Mission Range, dumping hail on Matthew Lee and forcing him to wait out the storms off his bike.  Chris, Joe and Kurt likely encountered the same storms and forced them to get off their bikes as well.

One of this year's favorites, John Nobile, has also been severely sidetracked by intense knee pain.  He also backtracked 12 miles to restart his border-to-border time.  Since his backtrack, he has been riding with Jill Homer, putting him over 115 miles behind Matthew Lee. Read more »

It has been nearly 40 hours since the beginning of the race and the race leaders are already pushing a record-breaking pace.  While we are still awaiting to hear our first call-ins, the SPOT narrative has been telling us an interesting story.  As the racers approached Elkford (mile 109), they were mostly sticking close together, although Matthew Lee (Sobe/Cannondale) appeared to maintain the lead almost the entire time.  Matt also decided to put in some night miles as he pushed into the new route addition in the Flathead Valley.  As many of the other race leaders, such as Kurt Refsnider (AZT 300 record holder) and and John Nobile (current border-to-border record holder) decided to sleepin Sparwood (mile 140), Matt pushed to Corbin.

This morning and afternoon, many racers pushed into and through the Flathead addition.  Unfortunately, Brunello Godio missed the turn toward Cabin Pass and lost a few hours as he approached the now-closed border crossing at North Fork Rd. Read more »