{"id":72841,"date":"2019-08-01T14:00:01","date_gmt":"2019-08-01T21:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/?p=72841"},"modified":"2020-05-22T12:57:10","modified_gmt":"2020-05-22T19:57:10","slug":"the-wild-west-route-is-the-countrys-newest-bikepacking-epic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/cycle\/the-wild-west-route-is-the-countrys-newest-bikepacking-epic","title":{"rendered":"The Wild West Route Is the Country’s Newest Bikepacking Epic"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kurt Refsnider has ridden through the night as much anyone in the sport of ultra-endurance mountain bike racing. He has pushed himself for days on end: six straight in 2018 to set a new course record on the 750-mile Arizona Trail Race and just under 16 in 2011 when he won the 2,745-mile Tour Divide. He\u2019s also explored swathes of the world by bike, forging a 900-mile route through Patagonia in a month in 2017 and riding 800 miles across three countries in the European Alps in 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n

So it\u2019s a little startling when Refsnider said that the five-week stint he spent reconnoitering the new Wild West Route (WWR) bikepacking course\u2014by pick-up truck\u2014was among the hardest things he\u2019s done.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I started, I didn\u2019t think it was going to be hard,\u201d Refsnider said. \u201cBy the finish, I was sweaty and dirty and sleep-deprived and surprised at how exhausted I was.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Announced in April<\/span>, the <\/span>Wild West Route<\/span><\/a> is a 2,700-mile, mostly dirt-road cycling course that bisects the United States from the Mexican border near Sierra Vista, Arizona, to the boundary with Canada just outside of Eureka, Montana. The route is the flagship achievement of <\/span>Bikepacking Roots<\/span><\/a>, a not-for-profit advocacy group founded by Refsnider and Kaitlyn Boyle in 2017. In addition to the WWR, Bikepacking Roots has established three other shorter courses in the western U.S. and it has several more projects in the works.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Refsnider, who worked as a geology professor at Prescott College for years before going full-time as an <\/span>athlete<\/span><\/a> and cycling spokesperson, created the organization to meet the swell of interest in <\/span>bikepacking<\/span><\/a>. \u201cThis community has grown so quickly, but there\u2019s been no one advocating for it,\u201d he said. Per Boyle, also a <\/span>racer<\/span><\/a> and advocate, their organization stretches well beyond simply mapping cool routes like the WWR. \u201cWith so much growth comes huge opportunity to shepherd a responsible user group, develop routes intentionally and help bikepackers have a role in conserving the landscapes they ride through,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Nearly 70 percent of the route lies on public lands, passing through four states, 18 national forests, six national parks and monuments, four BLM national conservation lands, and two tribal parks. And, with the exception of a couple of day-use and overnight camping permits, it\u2019s free to traverse.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI know from personal experience how transformative a ride like this can be, and I also believe that helping people to have such an experience on public lands is one of the best ways to get them invested in these resources,\u201d Refsnider said. \u201cSo yeah, the WWR is a giant way to showcase public lands and, in the long run, hopefully help keep wild places wild.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Not to be confused with the <\/span>Great Divide Mountain Bike Route<\/span><\/a> (GDMBR), the basis for the annual<\/span>\u00a0Tour Divide<\/span><\/a> race, the Wild West Route sits farther west, running through Utah and Arizona as opposed to Wyoming, Colorado and New Mexico, and is a predominantly northbound complement to the GDMBR\u2019s largely southward flow.<\/span><\/p>\n

The popularity of the GDMBR was one motivation for the Wild West Route.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSo many riders have traversed the Tour Divide, and it has been life-changing for many of them,\u201d said Refsnider. \u201cThere was a definite desire for another long and challenging route.\u201d Whereas only 16 people lined up for the <\/span>premiere grand depart<\/span><\/a> of the Tour Divide <\/span>in 2008<\/span><\/a>, nearly 200 riders took part in this year\u2019s race.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt was conceived as a means of taking participation pressure off the GDMBR,\u201d said Matthew Lee, de facto organizer and three-time winner of the Tour Divide, who had early input on the WWR. The evolution of bikepacking was also a driving factor. \u201cAs equipment has improved, speeds and daily averages on the Tour Divide have gone up, and I think many of us were longing for less-traveled two-tracks,\u201d he added.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

While Refsnider stresses that the WWR is non-technical and accessible to bikepackers of different skill levels, he allows that resupply points are fewer and farther between than on the GDMBR, and that the terrain is more challenging. \u201cFast riders go out expecting to do 200-mile days on the GDMBR,\u201d Refsnider said. \u201cOn this route, you\u2019ll be doing well to get 50 to 70 daily.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"

The Wild West Route traverses the Snake River Plain in Idaho. Photo Credit: Kurt Refsnider<\/p><\/div>\n

Split into nine segments of around 300 miles, the WWR\u2019s biggest appeal is its geographic diversity and wild feel. From the steep and lush mountain canyons of Montana and Idaho to the high plateaus of Utah and the parched grasslands and deserts of Arizona, 80 percent of the route is off pavement, largely on dirt roads and 4×4 tracks. Most of the segments have climbs of 3,000 and 4,000 feet, with some even bigger. Surfaces tend toward rocky and loose and are best suited to mountain bikes.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The itinerary is built around small communities, including a specially negotiated 100-mile stretch that provides a rare opportunity to traverse a portion of northern Arizona\u2019s Navajo Nation (backcountry permits required). The towns along the way make travel easier, though stretches of 50 miles between water and 90 miles between food resupply points are common. On one especially dry section in Arizona, it\u2019s 95 miles between water sources, a distance which could take riders two full days pedal.<\/span><\/p>\n

That might sound daunting, especially to those uninitiated in the sport, but Bikepacking Roots has a trove of information to ease the task. The organization provides a complimentary <\/span>download<\/span><\/a> of the high-res GPS route file for all of its 4,000 members; joining the group is free. It has also published an 82-page PDF guidebook which details water stops, campsites, resupply points, hotels, bike shops and medical facilities, and includes a vast overview of the trail\u2019s history, geography, weather and packing tips. There are also suggestions for shorter sections.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNot everyone has months to devote to a bike ride,\u201d said Refsnider. \u201cBut that doesn\u2019t mean you can\u2019t get out and experience the Wild West Route.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

A print edition of the guide will be available later this summer, and there\u2019s even a GPS-enabled app so riders can access all the minutiae in real time. \u201cWe wanted to remove the logistics as a barrier,\u201d said Refsnider.<\/span><\/p>\n

If riding the WWR sounds challenging, creating the route was more so. What started as an idea kicked around among Refsnider, Lee, Boyle and a handful of other bikepacking junkies morphed into a loose collective groundwork and then, after days and months of poring over Google Maps, a rough schematic. Once the general route was set, taking into account which target communities, national parks and public lands to pass through, Refsnider set out in <\/span>June 2017 <\/span>in his 2000 Tacoma to hone the details.<\/span><\/p>\n

For most of the journey, he had two or three side-by-side options to explore. \u201cI\u2019d often get deep into the backcountry and not know if the route would go through, or whether the road would be impassable and I\u2019d have to turn around and possibly run out of gas,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

The closest he came to disaster was scouting the Skyline Drive section in northern Utah, where he tried to skirt some snowbanks and felt the road giving away beneath him. He gunned it and made it through, but the experience drove home his isolation. \u201cMy bikes were the escape plan. I figured I could always pedal out if something went wrong,\u201d he said. \u201cBut I\u2019d never considered actually losing the vehicle with the bikes.\u201d In five weeks, he covered some 6,000 miles.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"

Doing reconnaissance to develop the Wild West Route. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Kurt Refsnider<\/p><\/div>\n

After the reconnaissance mission, Bikepacking Roots recruited 40 volunteers to ride stretches of the new route and flesh out the cycling-specific details. Most committed to partial stints, but t<\/span>wo volunteers, Clee Roy and Samuel Schlicht, independently rode the entire course before its release.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shlicht, who traveled from his home in Germany, tackled the WWR in 8 weeks. \u201cIt was a great challenge for me to ride in a foreign country, through landscapes I\u2019d never experienced. I\u2019d never been in a desert before that and never had to deal with wildlife like cougars or bears,\u201d he said, adding that Americans should take pride in the route. \u201cRiding the WWR is a way for everyone to help protect and conserve these public lands. These are some of the last wild places in the U.S.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kurt Refsnider has ridden through the night as much anyone in the sport of ultra-endurance mountain bike racing. He has pushed himself for days on end: six straight in 2018 to set a new course record on the 750-mile Arizona Trail Race and just under 16 in 2011 when he won the 2,745-mile Tour Divide. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":72853,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,685],"tags":[617,1127,727,1926],"internal-tag":[],"class_list":["post-72841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cycle","category-news","tag-bikepacking","tag-cycling","tag-latest-posts","tag-wild-west-route"],"parsely":{"version":"1.1.0","canonical_url":"https:\/\/rei.com\/blog\/cycle\/the-wild-west-route-is-the-countrys-newest-bikepacking-epic","smart_links":{"inbound":0,"outbound":0},"traffic_boost_suggestions_count":0,"meta":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","headline":"The Wild West Route Is the Country’s Newest Bikepacking Epic","url":"http:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/cycle\/the-wild-west-route-is-the-countrys-newest-bikepacking-epic","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"http:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/cycle\/the-wild-west-route-is-the-countrys-newest-bikepacking-epic"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2019\/07\/Central-Highlands-of-Arizona.jpg?resize=150%2C150","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2019\/07\/Central-Highlands-of-Arizona.jpg?fit=1200%2C800"},"articleSection":"Cycle","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Michelle Flandreau"}],"creator":["Michelle Flandreau"],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Uncommon Path \u2013 An REI Co-op Publication","logo":""},"keywords":["bikepacking","cycling","latest posts","wild west route"],"dateCreated":"2019-08-01T21:00:01Z","datePublished":"2019-08-01T21:00:01Z","dateModified":"2020-05-22T19:57:10Z"},"rendered":"