Jay P Wins Alaskan Ultrasport 350!

I wish I could be posting some more surprising news, but Jay did it! Our hometown hero pedaled a blistering pace to finish the 350 mile leg of the Iditarod Trial Invitational / Alaskan Ultrasport. With a winning time of 3 days 14 hours and 20 minutes, Jay averaged around 4 miles an hour and came close to the record set in 2007 by Peter Basinger of 3 days 5 hours. Jay stopped and rested for at least 13 hours during the race according to the spotty news coming in from the Alaskan Ultrasport Leaderboard. It sounds like Jay arrived in McGrath at 4:20 am and will be resting there before continuing on to Nome. Before leaving, Jay told a standing room only crowd at the Fitzgerald’s Snow Bike Night that one of the hardest parts will be leaving McGrath and continuing on to Nome. A great majority of the field will be calling McGrath their finish line while Jay’s finish line is another 750 miles away! I would assume that Jay will get 6 hours or so of sleep, and leave McGrath late morning rested and stoked for the next leg. If this happens, he might not even see another rider arrive in McGrath.

OK, on to Nome. Here’s the deal, this part is fully self supported which means no aid stations with hot lasagna. Jay has a number of food drops (I think 11 for the whole race) that he fedexed to various village post offices and one food drop that was flown in by race organizers and left at a predetermined GPS coordinate. Jay plans on making it to one of these remote village at least once a day. This is when the race gets really interesting! Here’s how you can follow along for potentially the next 2 weeks!

Race Podcast - Jay will be calling in from pay phones to give updates.
Race Leader Board - Just the facts.
Race Trail News - similar info to the podcast, possibly updated more frequently.

Don’t forget to give a big hug to Tracey P and let her know you’re thinking about her too through all this! Go Jay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jay P is off to Nome, AK!

The Alaska Ultrasport / Iditabike Invitational started yesterday and our man Jay P took the first few pedal strokes towards Nome… 1100 miles away! It looks like Jay spent the night after breezing through the first 90 miles. Jay said before he left that he’d race to McGrath (350 miles) and then slow his pace on his way to Nome. It looks like 4 other riders left the 90 mile check point and kept pushing. Jay has always performed better with a good night sleep, so we’ll see if he can close the gap on those guys today. Maybe he changed his mind and decided to keep his body fresh for the extended race that most riders won’t be a part of after McGrath. Here we go folks… time to obssess over race updates. Here are the key links: Race Leader Board, Race Podcast (with updates from Jay all the way to Nome), and catch all the banter on the mtbr.com endurance forum. Keep in mind that this forum may develop new threads as the race goes on so keep poking around if you want more info. GO JAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Brian Sell’s Great Adventure Parts 2 & 3

Feb 1st,
so this is just a quick update since the library closes in 9 minutes. i am in leakey, tx about 100 miles east of del rio. i actually took 2 days of in el paso because i went climbing with the people i stayed with at hueco tanks, it was pretty awesome. the winds have been crazy the last few days, they changed directions 180 degrees just about every night so i have been fighting head winds and enjoying 20-30 mph tailwinds. it has been interesting! last night i was camping at a football field and the sprinklers went off at 5 and got everything soaked that i had outside my tent. my bike was frozen solid when i was ready to go and the wheels wouldn’t turn so i had to take it to a laundry mat and let it thaw out inside. it sure has been a trip so far. soon i will be in the famous hill country of texas which i am pretty excited about because i will finally see trees which i haven’t seen basically the entire trip. good weather, good roads and mostly good people.

later,
brian

Feb 3rd
so i am about 15 miles away from austin, tx staying at some really awesome peoples house. the riding has been great ever since i started heading east heading out of del rio. the views are amazing in the hill country of texas i the riding is really fun. there is little wind and there are all kinds of ups and downs. hills all over the place. it kind of reminds me of back home in PA except with the cccasional cactus and longhorns. inbetween el paso and del rio wasn’t the best part of the trip for sure. i didn’t have to much fun during that stretch because it is very desolate and extremely windy, i had some terrible heads winds a few days. i averaged 8 mph for an entire day because of the wind. it was the same type of riding i did today and today i averaged 12 mph. so it was not fun. but i am done with the desert and the winds have died down and the last 4 days have been the best riding on this entire trip yet i think. hopefully it will continue all the way to florida and then to pa. tomorrow i am taking a day off and heading into austin, maybe catch some music and definetly get some awesome bbq. hope all is well with everyone and the snow is still falling in jackson.

Brian

Teton Pass lands in Bike Mag!

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After 4 years of hard work, the Teton Freedom Riders gained national recognition for their efforts on Teton Pass. Check out the full write up about Jimmy’s Mom at TetonFreedomRiders.org.

Cycling Expo @ Spring Creek Ranch Thursday Feb 21st

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The night went great! Check out more photos HERE thanks to Matt from the Teton Freedom Riders.

Snowbike Night Recap

Jay Petervary packed the shop on Tuesday night when he led a slide show discussion about his upcoming Alaskan Iditabike Race that starts on February 24th. About 30 cyclists got the chance to ask Jay evrything they ever wanted to know about snowbiking, the gear involved, and his mental and physical preparations for this 1100 mile ride through Alaskan wilderness. For the first 350 miles Jay explained that the race will have a good level of support for the riders. After most of the racers stop in McGrath, however, the race becomes completely self supported for those pushing on to Nome. Last year only two racers actually saw the finish line in Nome. Jay is busy right now packing cardboard boxes, 11 in all, full of food, batteries, and chemical heat packs. These boxes will be FedEx’d to Inuit villages along the route and serve as his life line during the ride. One of the drops is only a GPS coordinate marked by a flag placed on the pile of boxes in case they get buried in snow before the racers arrive. It was fascinating to hear about all the international riders who show up for this unique event. Jay talked of one racer he met 2 years ago, when he placed second in the 350 mile version, who traveled all the way from Spain, “This guy got a grant from the Spanish government to be the first Spaniard to walk to Nome. Jay doesn’t get grants, Jay hangs drywall.”
Well, this year Jay did get a grant of sorts. At the event he was presented with the first $1000 Fitzgerald’s Team Scholarship to help the huge financial burden this event requires.
This event will have great web coverage so you can follow Jay for potentially 3 weeks of racing. Race updates will be posted on www.alaskaultrasport.com/latest_news.html and you can hear a daily podcast complete with racer phone reports at www.mtbcast.com.
We are so excited to hang on every report!
Jay ended the evening with the request to save your good thoughts more for his wife Tracy, “When you see Trace don’t ask her how I’m doing. Ask how she’s doing. The hard part isn’t going and racing up there, it’s sitting at home worrying about the person you love racing up there.” Good luck Tracey!

The Cycling world lost one of it’s best.

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I’ve been really busy with getting everything organized after a trip to Washington DC for a Smart Growth Conference. I wanted my next post to be a recap of that conference until I heard about the death of Sheldon Brown. Below is news story from RoadBikeRider.com. Sorry for the cut and paste… too busy for more than that right now. I encourage you to read about Sheldon.

Sheldon Brown, Ride in Peace

Says RBR’s Alan “Uncle Al” Ardizone, “I remember Sheldon walking the aisles at Interbike, always with a bunch of people hanging around. It was like seeing the Pied Piper in action. Those surrounding him were probably hoping that some of his genius would rub off and that a tiny crumb of his cycling knowledge would come their way. There are few like him left, the mechanic’s mechanic. Calling him Guru is proper, and the bike was his mantra. Now what are we going to do?”