There were many many great cycling feats this year by both men and women.  I was constantly impressed by countless riders but I would say the overall title went to the rider who used his bike to re-socket his knee or hip and continued to ride for quite some time.  I wish I remember his name but am way too tired right now to look for it.

Eric Foster (Foster on this board)

I 2nd that!

Unicyclist Gen Shimizu made it to AW:

Awesome effort by JayP to smash my record by a solid margin! I followed with interest and a smile while the controversy was brewing on this forum, meanwhile he was doing his solo thing with panache.
His outspoken views have certainly ruffled a few feathers and I wouldn't be surprised if some of the contenders from this years race decide to have another crack at the record.

While some may view JayP's comments as an attack on the style I raced with, it is water off my back and I respect and admire his solo approach. I've experienced a relatively short durations of solo riding (~4 days in this years Kiwi Brevet) and I'm not convinced it is harder or easier either way, just different.

I'm certain that if the indulgent cultural experiences I had along the way in this years Tour were replaced with snappy stops the course could be ridden faster. But with the weather playing such a huge part, if it would be record setting is at the mercy of the omnipotent weather being.

One of the greatest things about the Divide for me was that it consumed more than a year of my life, with decisions and plans all revolving around the event. To back it up year after year in defence of a record could reframe the race from an adventure to an all-consuming obsession. Not sure if this is where I want to be.

So I'm in no hurry to get back on course, but as memories of the minor suffering fade and I finally regain some feeling in my hands, who knows what will happen!

Very classy reaction, Ollie!

You 2 are awesome!

Lots of different ways to pay for a race: sponsorship, personal savings, trust fund, credit card, spouse, friends, etc.

Personally, my strategy was to propose my "services" to the cute girls working the counters of various convenience stores along the route.

I almost died of hunger! 

did ollie do the new mexico section that is optional?

He didn't, but IIRC Jay strongly suggested he should have, so I would assume he would want to do it himself (it's a "purer" route)

I have been thinkin' the past few days about tellin' JayP he should turn around when he gets to AW and ride back to Banff? What do you think of that?? I think it would be the coolest thing ever! Although, I would be insanely jealous and of course would want to do it too!

The yo-yo route!

Talk about some out and back!  

It's very clear that a Spot provides a huge advantage to racers, and this can clearly be seen in this case: JayP did 550 miles in 3 days while he had one, and as far as I can see on Trackleaders, he hasn't moved at all since he's lost it!

 

Lucky for him, or I'd super fan stalk his ass, as I'm currently in Great Falls with nothing to do, but take a bike ride! (And the mermaid bar, obviously)

Can you get him his Spot?

If he was in Lincoln yesterday afternoon, that means an average of above 200 miles a day for the first 3 days. We might be witnessing something historic there. It would be really too bad not to have it documented, with the splits and all.

Or is there someone on the route that can get him a new one?

You'd have to meet him from the south, 'cause I doubt anyone could catch him from behind at the pace he's going. Plus, all that dust he's leaving behind 

Congrats to Jim and Tracy

Bears present a different concern than just tacoing my front wheel. I find that '80s and '90s music sung at high volume is pretty effective.

Try Celine Dion! Those bears are Canadians. They know, and they will run away!   

this question may have already been asked....but is there someone doing an ITT on a unicycle? I was up on Fleecer on Thursday and as I was descending on the road back toward I-15 I saw a guy cruising up on a unicycle. Unfortunately we passed each other pretty quickly so I didn't take a picture. He looked like he was geared up for something longer than a day ride. He may have also thought I was nuts as I was occasionally yelling choooooo hooooo! I had seen a bear on my way up and wanted to let it know I was coming back.

There are at least 2, but to my knowledge neither is doing an ITT. Just touring it!

Gen Shimizu is one. I think he's currently in Helena (going south) so I doubt he's the one you saw.



Here is his blog: http://www.greatdivideride.com/journal

A few days ago while he was nursing a sprained ankle near the border, Gen mentioned this guy, who passed him, so he's probably the one you saw:

Getting my knee back in caused pain I cannot describe.  I didn't really know what happened until I tried to stand up after wrecking. Once I realized my knee was out of place I reached for my SPOT and almost pressed the 911 button.  But then I decided if I could get my knee back in maybe I could ride and finish the race.  Plus I didn't want to pay for a really expensive rescue.  I was already delusional by this point.  First I had to align everything because of how out of whack it was so I did this in the fully extended position of the knee.  Then I slightly bent the knee after aligning it.  Then I tried 2 times to get it back in place putting my foot on the ground and wrapping my left leg on the anterior side of my right ankle for some sort of traction, held my quad while trying to use the other hand to pull the Tibia/fibula as well as forward pressure.  My foot kept slipping on the ground and I couldn't get enough leverage.  While going in and out of consciousness all at the same time.  To get it back in place I ended up clipping into my bike pedals so that I could get enough traction to get it back in.  Once I did that the knee went back in place really easily and I barely had to try.  Not sure if you can completely picture how I put it back in but its the best I can describe it.  I took 120 mg oxycottin, 40 mg prednisone, and iced my knee a couple mins...which it hardly swelled surprisingly by the time I rode another 50 miles.  2 days later the swelling was like a softball, most like due to the fact that I ran out of prednisone.

I highly recommend saving your medications from other injuries to take on these events, they are worth bringing and weigh nothing.  Just put them all in a plasic bag and don't forget which is which.  I brought every single old prescription I had as well as NSAIDs, aspirion, anti-histamines, general anti-biotics, diarrhea meds, etc.  Because you never know what can go wrong out there.

I did a write up about my TD ride on a blog I just started if you want to check it out.  Its a little more brief about the knee but gives a general overview of my ride.  

http://headwindsandhills.com/2012/07/03/tour-divide-2012/

Foster, by the powers vested in me, I hereby declare you Tour Divide 2012's Badassest Rider!

10 of 10 on the Badass scale!       

He is at home with a broken ankle. I don't know what happened but he seems safe. I hope he makes another go of it.

Yup, same here. Must be very frustrating to have to stop like this 2 years in a row, so close to the start.

I wonder if him and Jarral ever talked.

Dislocated my knee on day 2 and put it back in place, and continued to ride.  Noting I could really change or do about it except to continue to ride as long as I could.  Rested 3 days and made it to day 10 and another 600 miles after the injury.  Next year I will do everything the same except dislocating my knee.  No mental problems, in fact I was pissed that I had to quit (Last place was Butte).  I could not walk.  But once at the Denver airport and being pushed around in a wheel chair I had a realization that it was a good choice.  I still don't know how I pushed through the pain, but finishing the Divide became an obsession.  Once back it took me 2 weeks before I was able to ride my bike again.  See you all there next year.

Foster, the way you pushed through 85 miles of wilderness trail after dislocating your knee and putting it back all by yourself, then riding again for 600 miles, was nothing short of amazing and very much an inspiration.

If you get a chance one day, I'd like to hear more about the incident itself, how you put it back (I mean, I had to put back a dislocated finger once and that was hard enough - How do you pull that lower leg away from your body?), and how you did the next 85 miles to Whitefish. To me, it was just the most amazing story of this year's TD.

And I have no doubt that you'll make it all the way the next time you try! 

Louis here,
I am finally home after my journey and i must say, while i grossly underestimated what would be required of myself to complete this race and my time was not competitive...i did my absolute best and anyone who has a slight bit of interest in trying this race, absolutely should.  I faced every emotional demon on this course and constantly confronted myself on a day  to day basis in order to keep plugging along and the sensation of personal success i derived from it is immeasurable despite the 30+ days it took me to finish. 
congrats to everyone who took a stab at this and finished or scratched, it took a lot of courage to even attempt it.  As for the people along the route, thank you for making this exactly what it is.  the route is beautiful and immense, but the people you meet along the way are the only reason the Tour Divide is worth doing.

A big shout out to Iron Mel Liebling, Tyson Fahrenbruck, James Hodges and Aaron Hershberger as well as a big thanks to Matthew for the killer spaghetti and breakfast burritos and most of all the inspiration and insight that all of these people provided me along the route.

Congrats Louis, and all the others who finished, haven't finished yet, or didn't finish.

I think I've made up my mind on the use of cell phones to get race info like other racers' positions or moral support.

Basically, I don't care!

I don't think it makes enough of a difference one way or another, and even if it did, like Mark said, people who may not have friends to talk to might be able to talk to Zeus or whoever their imaginary friend is.

Too much potential regulation, too little impact on the race itself.

I see that Tony Cervati has started an ITT. For those who don't know, Tony attempted the TD last year but had to abandon on the first day when he encountered a bear and fell into the Spray River and nearly drowned.

http://type1rider.blogspot.fr/2011/06/statement-from-tony-cervati-statement.html

Tony is also a Type 1 diabetic, so along with Jarral Ryter that makes him the second rider this year with this condition.

Go Tony!   

Lots of people make our own bikes by assembling parts.  I simply assemble the tubes using a TIG welder...  It's not like I have a mine in my back yard and dig the ore out of the ground.

I will share one thing that I think *might* have been slightly questionable.  Some people might even consider this outside help.

Each day my friend would text me the position of other riders who I was interested in.  I was also able to call my friend from my cheap dumb mobile phone to ask for information about rider positions.  Was this cheating?  Was I using my friend to "help" me in a forbidding way?  My phone was a cheap flip phone model so I was not able to use any web surf myself.  Once I had my friend on the line I could ask him to look at the web page and give me information.  The information helped me motivate and helped me plan things a bit.

Was I cheating to have "information help"?  

The most important thing is that if you didn't think you were violating a specific rule, then you were not cheating. Period. Cheating involves consciously violating a rule to gain an advantage.

So the question is whether that violates the letter, or the spirit, or both, of the outside help rule.

I'll be honest: I usually have strong opinions on a lot of things, but I can't formulate one on this. I just have no idea.

One thing I'd say: when I broke my rear shifter last year, a friend of mine figured out where I could find one about 15 miles off route, and wrote that address on our local club's forum, which I read while being stopped for half a day in Platoro due to that broken shifter. By that time, I had already located that same info all by myself (using my phone). But I did tell him that he shouldn't try to help me this way in the future, as I was risking relegation if I were to use that info. I don't really know whether I was really breaking the rule, but I just didn't want to take a chance.

Ride solo, self supported, and don't ask for help but accept it if offered.  Seems pretty easy to interpret.

It may seem pretty easy, but just that "accept it if offered" statement has generated tons of Internet and in-person arguments about whether trail magic is indeed acceptable, and if so what amount and in which fashion.

It might seem a little dumb as a solution but if the hike-a-biking in the north was the problem, maybe starting from the south would be the solution.

That's because as most of the hike-a-biking occurs in the north, by the time you're done with it going NoBo, the finish line is right there and you can stop.

In other words, if the unbearable pain going SoBo started to occur on Day 5 after Day 1 to 4 had extensive hike a bikes, and you were on a 20-day pace, then going the other way you're on that terrain by Day 16, and after the 4 days of hike a biking you're now in Banff and can rest instead of having to pedal another 2 weeks+.

There are occasional hike a bikes in the south, but they are much shorter and are not done in the snow. You may however potentially have more knee problems as some of the climbs are steeper and longer in the south. You may also need to train at altitude as the elevations are higher, earlier (that will also make your call-ins while you bike even more hilarious!  )

Just a suggestion.