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Alexandera Houchin + Tour Divide


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38 minutes ago, bestbike85 said:

I wonder if sofaine lost his spot tracker or something. Can’t find him on the course. 

He scratched! Wow. That’s crazy to be the stead fast leader for half the race to scratching. 

A surprising development .. could be anything though - mechanical, frostbite, family illness - you never know on the TD!

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From Sofiane Sehili on facebook, six hours ago: 

 

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I got real scared up that pass, 3000m high, pitch dark, -5C, sometimes sinking waist deep in snow, unable to find the track despite my 2 GPS. 
You need to remember that I am just a city boy, not accustomed to extreme weather, with little to no knowledge of how to survive in these conditions. It's a good thing I was smart enough to turn back rather than keep pushing and getting lost in the woods where nobody could find me.

The Tour divide is tough race and the 2019 edition proved to be to tough for me. I know there is more snow coming and I don't to find myself in a dangerous situation again. It is just bike ride and there is no point risking my life for it.
On top of that, the front on the race is now unreachable. Going back at it just to finish seems pointless to me. It's actually harder to give 80% when your goal is out of reach than to give it 100% when you are keeping in touch with it. I know it would leave me with nothing but bad memories and regrets. It's not just an adventure, it's a race. And I came here to win.

It's never easy to quit but it's not all bad. I had a good run and realized I can break Mike's record. I will be back and I will break it Thanks for all the support. 

 

Edited by June Bug
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3 hours ago, TAF said:

I guess there are two kinds of people who race the TD -- those who race to win, and those who race to finish. Kind of like the EB, really.

Apparently Lael Wilcox was racing to win; she scratched in the last few hours. 

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23 hours ago, Ridenfool said:

Alexandera is a badass. Now first in Women's class and pacing the other two Singlespeed leaders.

Ii she's racing to finish, and she finishes first, well, I guess that's cool too. 😎

She is indeed badass.  I fully expect her to finish -- likely as first woman finisher and a good possibility of being the first single speed finisher!  I think there is some very high elevation stuff coming up for her in the next few days in the Colorado Rockies -- definitely 10,000' + the Tour Divide wiki notes that Colorado's Indiana Pass, at 11,910' is the highest point on the ride. 

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Alexandera is about 15 miles behind one other single speeder (Ryan Simon), between Frisco and Breckenridge, CO.  It doesn't appear that other single speeders have any chance of catching up with either of them.

One single speeder hasn't scratched, but has taken a side trip to the suburbs on the east side of Denver, so don't know what's up with that. 

Edited by June Bug
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Saw that Josh Kato seemed to have something serious going on.  Hope he's OK.  Went to the hospital first planning on getting checked out and continuing and then posted a short update that it was a bit more serious and he was remaining in the hospital and then transporting elsewhere.

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Ryan Simon is really stepping it up or Alexandera is slowing down a bit or slept (or both!). 

Ryan is now in Salida (!) and has about 50 miles on Alexandera. 

The route heads west into the mountains from Salida, and ends up going south to Del Norte.  Is this the section with Indiana Pass or is Indiana Pass south of Del Norte?  Whichever, it looks super challenging for the next few days. 

Hope Josh Kato comes out of this OK.  Please post up with details, if any are forthcoming.  There has to be something seriously wrong to be hospitalized these days. 

 

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Ryan appears to be at Sub Culture Cyclery in Salida.  

Trivia: Alexandera and Ryan about 28/29 years old, respectively. 

Update on Alexandera on the Tour Divide fb page  <facebook.com/groups/tourdivide/>, posted today: 

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From Greg Goodman (some can't see it apparently): Alexandera Houchin 1st place single speed women and 1st place women overall! She's going for the womens SS record of 19 days. Overall doing well. She said legs been a little heavy the past couple days. A little tired but at 6 pm she still was shooting for 50 more miles today! We talked about different parts of the race. When Koko Claim Crossing Creek, a 5 mile very steep, very rocky riverbed where you hike up with your bike at your side, came up Alexandera said she carried her bike most of the way. Picture below demonstrating her technique. Keep in mind it takes around 4 hours to get up this area. Of course when you have steel toed cycling shoes (steel toed leather work boots) you'd better be working! Had a blast talking to this incredible athlete!

Alexandera should be in Salida by late this afternoon or early evening. 

And this: Colorado's snowpack is 40 times normal after rare summer solstice dump

Edited by June Bug
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2 hours ago, June Bug said:

The route heads west into the mountains from Salida, and ends up going south to Del Norte.  Is this the section with Indiana Pass or is Indiana Pass south of Del Norte?  Whichever, it looks super challenging for the next few days. 

I believe Indiana Pass is just south of Del Norte. Then into the NM furnace, and I believe a considerable stretch with no water re-supply.

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She mentioned at her talk that she tried regular shoes with flat pedals and she got tendinitis in her heel.  Maybe Red Wing Shoes should be one of her sponsors.  That's a classic Red Wing-type boot.  (It's the Minnesota connection). 

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53 minutes ago, June Bug said:

She mentioned at her talk that she tried regular shoes with flat pedals and she got tendinitis in her heel.  Maybe Red Wing Shoes should be one of her sponsors.  That's a classic Red Wing-type boot.  (It's the Minnesota connection). 

Almost certainly the furthest a Red Wing has ever pedaled - they'd probably want to know all about it!

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Alexandera is rolling into Del Norte about now (5:18 pm Austin time), and the section from Del Norte to Abiquiu looks wicked bad in the good parts and brutal everywhere else. 

Ryan Simon is about halfway through to Abiquiu and Live Tracker shows his elevation as slightly over 11,000'.  Hard to tell but I'm wondering if some of this is single track.  He's climbing  up to  the 3500 m (11,482') contour now and it looks like he'll be at that elevation and a bit above for awhile.  It'll be damned cold once the sun goes down and there are some rain showers rolling around. 

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Found this post on bikepacking.net from Josh Kato about the incident that ultimately led him to abandon his Tour Divide attempt: 

Quote

I'm out of contention for the first rider to pie.  Since my encounter with a motorist who wanted to make a grave marker out of a cyclist on the Grave Creek Road after Eureka, MT I've been unable to properly race.  When the truck driver aimed at me I had no choice but to head off the road.  

Anyone that has been on that road knows that the right side drops a long ways down into Grave Creek.  Basically, to keep myself and bike from ending up at the bottom of the canyon my legs/feet were twisted in the rocks on the hillside.  There is only so fast a guy can go while eating Alieve and Advil like M&M's (plus I don't professionally recommend it at all).


My left knee took the brunt of the twisting and while I could occasionally go quickish things kept declining.  By the time I got just past Helena I couldn't go more than 10mph on the flats with a tailwind.


Lots of stuff can happen out there.  Dropping out because of a self-sustained injury like crashing in mud or pushing my body too hard would be painful but acceptable.  Ending my race, while feeling in the best physical condition of my life, because of an act of another person is unacceptable.  

This was going to be the last of my racing.  I've never been all about records or first place.  It's always been the journey.


Now...I'll be back

Kato

 

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