Road racing hasn't had the best press this year. There were definitely bright spots - Ryder Hesjedal won the Girod'Italia, an accomplishment that will always stand out for me. But the unravelling of Lance Armstrong, the legend, threw a dark cloud back over the sport so many of us love.
Rather than dwell any longer on the negatives, I'd like to turn the light back on some of cycling's lesser-known heroes and their competitions of choice. These are races that bring their own set of intense, gruelling demands and take place far from the media circus that surrounds the Grand Tours.
The first of these is the Tour Divide (tourdivide.org). Described by Outside Magazine as "what might be the toughest bike ride on earth," the Tour Divide follows the longest unpaved bike route in the world along the Continental Divide from Banff to the Mexican border.
The 4,418-km course passes through two Canadian provinces and five U.S. states. By the time riders reach the finish line, they will have logged more than 60,000 metres of ascent. Put in perspective, that's the equivalent of starting at sea level and climbing Mount Everest... seven times.
The Tour Divide is a single stage event, so the clock starts running when riders leave Banff and doesn't stop until they reach Mexico. In addition to their long days in the saddle, riders have to bivouac on the roadside in grizzly bear country, negotiate ever-changing trail conditions from deep snow in the high mountains to searing desert heat, and often travel for hundreds of kilometres between towns entirely unsupported. (Riders can use commercially available services like bike shops and motels while in town, but are not able to pre-arrange their own supplies or lodging.)
A competitive Divide time is considered 25 days for men and 29 for women, which means cycling an average of 177 km and 150 km per day, respectively. Even a cycling enthusiast like me has to admit that's a crazy amount of time in the saddle. New records for both male and female riders were set in 2012. Ollie Whalley, of New Zealand, completed the race in an astonishing 16 days and two hours while Colorado's Eszter Horanyi finished in 19 days and three hours.
The riders who take part in the Tour Divide aren't all professional cyclists, by any means. They include men and women with full-time jobs who simply love cycling and are prepared to take a month away from home, work and family to ride their bike through some of the most spectacular landscapes in North America.
From among these faces, Tour heroes have emerged: people like Matthew Lee who dominated the race for years and set repeated course records, and New Mexico's Mary Metcalf-Collier who dropped out with intense leg pain before resuming the race to become the first female finisher in 2008.
For more insight into what it's like to take on a self-supported, ultra-endurance cycling challenge of this magnitude, the 2010 Ride the Divide documentary is a must-see. Books like Paul Howard's Eat, Sleep, Ride and Jill Homer's Be Brave, Be Strong are also compelling reads.There are so many different ways to race on a bike; the more I learn, the more fascinated I am by the many ways cyclists challenge themselves.
