The Fucking Colorado Trail Yo-Yo

Illusive, and an obsession since 2018 (Wordy Letter of Intent)

2018 was my first big year of ultra-racing. I’d attempted (and both finished and quit) some events in 2017 as I dabbled in becoming an ultra-racer. It was back in 2015 when I first wandered onto an ultra-distance course (Tour Divide), and it was 2012 when I first learned about ultra-endurance bike racing. All this to say, it took me a hot minute to gather enough confidence to pretend I was a bike racer.

After a long time of other people telling me all the things that were wrong with my body while I competed in sports (middle school synchronized swimming, swim team, and track + field) and the powerlessness I felt around my food addiction, I knew that I was the furthest thing from being an athlete that there was.

I liked riding my bike a lot, however, and the Jimmy Johns days, paired with the cool factor of being a bike messenger, earned me some respect. That respect made me feel like less of an imposter. After a few long rides with those fixie friends, I learned I had something special in the “try hard” department. When my friends wanted to quit, turn around, or start walking a hill, I powered past and often made it to the top first. Not that we were officially competing, but I always wanted to try just a little harder than everyone else. So I guess that’s where I learned I had some competitive drive.

The 2018 Colorado Trail Race and the Birth of my Yo-Yo Obsession

I was planning an unofficial Triple Crown attempt in 2018. At the time, it was the Arizona Trail 750, the Tour Divide, and the Colorado Trail. I knew the Triple Crown Challenge rules dictated that you start with the Grand Departs of each of the races, but I was in the middle of my commitment to college and couldn’t get out of classes in April for the Arizona Trail, so I waited until the end of May and melted my face off on the Arizona Trail. I wrapped my ride early as the Kaibab was on fire and I didn’t want to detour as I was on my way to Banff for the Tour Divide. Looking back, I wish I didn’t quit, but the fire reroute, and the lack of planning on my extraction at Stateline made it even more tempting to hop a bus out of Flagstaff. So that’s what I did, missing the last 100-ish miles of the Arizona Trail. I went on to finish the Tour Divide, and was dead set on the Colorado Trail Race, not really knowing what it would be like.

And dang, it was harder than I expected. Way harder. I’d ridden some 600 miles of the Arizona Trail, which was the only reason I didn’t quit. The Arizona Trail is surely the most challenging of the U.S. bike races. However, I contemplated extraction at the end of every segment (I brought along the Colorado Trail Association Databook). I especially thought I was going to quit at the Highway 50 crossing. I’d found Richard there, and he was quitting. I decided to press on a little and found myself scooping peanut butter under a tree for a couple of hours, thinking about whether I wanted to carry on. I had NO clue how much harder it would get— we were Durango-bound that year. As I contemplated turning back to roll down the highway, Artec, Jim, and Isaac rolled up to me and asked how I was. I surely told them I was broken, and Artec offered me a weed gummy (which I ate) and watched them pedal away.

As I watched them leave, it occurred to me that I wasn’t as much of a piece of shit as I thought I was. As I was pitifully scooping peanut butter into my face, I was telling myself how slow and weak I was and that there was no reason for me to keep trying so hard. But as these fit-bodied men rolled up to me, it occurred to me that for the past few days, they had been BEHIND me. And that I couldn’t give up now. So I packed up my shit as fast as I could and sprinted to catch up to them. I turned off my brain and kind of kid-sister followed these guys. We pedaled up Fooses, laughing and sharing the insane ascent together. They shared so much beta with me, and we camped together at the top of Marshall Pass. I felt like I belonged in that space we created. Had I not shared miles with these guys, had they not been so kind and inviting, I may never have carried on racing. They weren’t intimated by my presence there; rather, they held me in a way I didn’t know complete strangers could, and I gained superpowers on the Colorado Trail that year.

Perhaps it’s this moment that made me fall in love with the Colorado Trail so much, with ultra-racing my bike so much. Perhaps it was all the mystery— I was still using a flip phone back then and had no concept of where people were sprinkled along the race course.

On the night of my last sleep, I was passed a beer, well actually two, by some spectators and drank one with them, carrying the other to camp. After two beers, I was knocked out! I slept eight hours and decided that I wanted to savor the last 70 miles of the race. Meanwhile, Leigh had dropped down to get stitches, Liz had exploded her wheel, and I was only a couple of hours behind Ashely (I knew none of this). I caught Jim in the morning at Cascade Creek, and we so blissfully cruised the remaining miles together, taking breaks to look at the sights and smoking lots of weed during our rests. We giggled, and he pointed out the names of mountains that were new to me. I fell in love with the course so fucking hard. Regardless, finishing that first Colorado Trail Race in second place behind Ashely Carelock by fewer than three hours was my greatest accomplishment at the time. She was a real bike racer chick! And I had mad respect for her. I was wearing boots and jean shorts on a heavy-ass 27.5” bike with 3” tires. But most of all, I had a lot of fucking fun, and became obsessed.

After a two-night stay in a hotel in Durango, I decided that I wanted to pedal my ass back to Denver. It looked like the best way to do that was along the Colorado Trail. So, after texting with my homie, Justin, I decided that I was going to yo-yo. I was so green in this bikepacking thing that I didn’t really consider the scope of what I was about to attempt and pedaled out of town to camp at the Junction Creek Trailhead for a 4:00 a.m. start. I went a few miles up the trail and was so sleepy that I took a nap and slept a few more hours before crawling up to Kennebec. I was just not feeling race-pacey and crawled across the mountains. I camped at the yurt just before Spring Creek Pass on my second night. And by the third night, I no longer wanted to be tracing the same course I had before, so I peeled off route into Gunnison. I stayed at the hostel and meandered to Cottonwood Pass, eventually ending up in Buena Vista. I stayed with a guy I met; he was a fellow Native, and we discussed music late into the night. I went back to the course and eventually made it back to Denver in seven or eight days, quitting my yo-yo attempt. At the time, I didn’t think it was a big deal whatsoever.

I still pedaled back to Denver; I still had a great time. But what I hadn’t considered was that I didn’t do what I’d set out to do, and surely the Greats of bikepacking were watching and were intrigued. At that point, I was not woven into the community of bikepack ultra racers. And really didn’t take accountability for my proclamation or effort. In the years following, this “failure” weighed on my shoulders.

By 2020, Justin and I were planning our attempt. Except I was brokenhearted, and our friend-family had some heavy shit unfolding right in the middle of that effort. We invited Katie and Andrew to race us—Individual Time Trial style (ITT)—and both Justin and I quit our efforts. Katie and Andrew went on to finish, becoming the first people I knew of to race-pace a bike yo-yo on the Colorado Trail. It was epic! They crushed, and I was sad as hell I let someone else take my dream. This would be the first time I felt simultaneous joy for people I love while feeling a deep sense of loss and failure for myself.

The Bike-Hike Multisport Yo-yo

So, after that 2018 failure and the 2020 failure, I had planned a yo-yo attempt for the 2022 Colorado Trail, planning on racing to Durango and then turning around on a self-supported effort back to Denver. Except I raced so hard that I had ZERO desire to turn around by the time I made it to Junction Creek. I was so mentally fucked from not sleeping that there was no decision-making left in me. So here we are in 2024, and I am ready to try the thing AGAIN.

Except in the interest of trying something new, I thought I could walk back to Denver. Especially since I’ve been doing a lot of training this year to prepare myself for a 100-mile running race. I thought that perhaps the foot portion would set me up for success in the 100-mile Marji Gesick. So, after our foot expedition this year on the Superior Hiking Trail in January, I decided that I was training for this Colorado Trail thing and didn’t tell anyone because I was unsure if my body would cooperate. I’d never heard of someone completing a race pace effort of the thing in this style, so I got excited at the opportunity to set a precedent. However, I was not the first person to come up with this idea. As I type this, Hunter has completed his foot portion of the yo-yo attempt and is a few days into his bike effort on track to be the first person (I have NOT verified this) to complete a multisport (foot-bike) yo-yo of the Colorado Trail. I'm stoked for him, and I look forward to crossing paths with him somewhere out there.

I decided to bike first, as asking my legs to crank a singlespeed after a 500-mile hike seemed impossible. I’m planning to leave for my bike ITT of the Colorado Trail soon. I shipped my items to Durango for my hike return. I wanted to write down some intention behind my “why” for this effort, share some background and just overall announce the attempt, giving it the proper respect it deserves.

Letter of Intent

Here are the rules I will be following:

I am doing this effort self-supported in the bikepacking style, meaning that I have not planned to acquire resources from anyone along the route except for my neutral location, Junction Creek Trailhead, with support from Durango Cyclery. They will assist me with my bike and meet me at Junction Creek to take my bike for storage. They will bring my box of hiking gear, and I have shipped my hiking items to the shop, including a drop from Tailwind Nutrition, a sponsor for this effort. My intention here was that they (Durango Cyclery) would provide this option for future attempts by anyone so that this resource is available to everyone. I have not cached anything ahead of time, will not ask anyone for food, and will not get in a vehicle, completing the effort under my own power. I will use stores for resupply. I ask that friends, fans, or supporters not bring me food, goods, etc., during my effort as I don’t want to receive special treatment that someone new to these things may not have access to. I’m trying to complete this in a Good way; I want it to be fair for comparisons of our times. I am trying to move as fast as I can for the duration of the effort.

I am attempting this outside of the Grand Depart for the Colorado Trail Race, missing out on the first Grand Depart since my first effort on the Colorado Trail for two main reasons.

First, I was an emotional wreck last year while completing the Triple Crown Challenge because I wasn’t achieving at the level I felt I was capable of. This housed deep dualities of emotion to occupy a lot of my mental capacity— I felt immense joy for the ability and success of Katya, Ana, and a few of my other friends but a deep, agonizing disappointment in myself. I wasn’t sure how to hold both of those emotions at the same time, and the dissonance consumed my whole being. I removed myself from competing in the Colorado Trail this year so that I could simply hold joy for my friends racing without comparing myself to them while attempting something new (bike-hike yo-yo, previously imagined as a first ascent, for lack of a better word, but now following in Hunter’s path). I feel like removing myself from racing the Tour Divide and offering support at Brush Mountain as well as at the finish allowed me to heal a bunch of shit from last year, as well as truly see and celebrate what all these other racers had accomplished outside of holding complex emotions about my ability. I could see them, like really see them, because I understood what it takes to complete the Tour Divide and understand the racers as they shared insight from their efforts. I find deep joy in seeing people I love and respect accomplish incredible things, and I find deep meaning in celebrating that selflessly. And because I am a monster full of the fear of missing out, I couldn’t simply sit on the couch as the race unfolded, so I planned on leaving before the race, with a lofty goal of meeting the racers at the finish line. I hope I have the luck and ability to make it there in time.

Second, I am interested in trying something that I very well may be bad at (long-distance foot travel) and humbly join the community of fast-packing, entirely self-powered monsters. It’s good to be new, to be humble, and to be curious about one’s ability. I have no prior expectations to measure up against and could use a “win” to accomplish something that seems absolutely impossible to me. I am also curious about traveling through the wilderness areas along the Colorado Trail. I’ve developed such a meaningful relationship with the trail, coming back to leave bits of myself behind for the Trail. I believe that these routes and Trails get as much from us as they give to us.

I ultimately celebrate this effort as my last truly self-informed effort, as I’ve hired a coach to help me train for next year’s Tour Divide. We agreed that it might be too late to include Colorado Trail efforts in our training program so we start training together following this effort. I’ve been writing my own training plans ever since I started competing and have clung to the idea of being self-made; I did not want a coach to be able to take credit for what I’d accomplished because I’ve done it on my own. To surpass my perceived ability, I’ve asked for help. After racing the Grand Loop, I felt an overwhelming connection to Lynda; despite never meeting her, but traveling a course she had years before, setting a precedent for the record that I eventually lowered a little. I’ve asked LW Coaching (Lynda) to join me in the training process. This is a sign of growth to me and a true investment toward accountability, an acceptance of the fact that I don’t know everything, as well as an invitation to share in both my successes and failures. Again, I believe life is better shared.

So I go forward into the unknown, carrying joy from the Tour Divide, strength from my friend Karla, and curiosity about my body’s ability. I’m excited to have my own experience, informed by my internal motivation, not by my fellow friends and competitors. I hope to come out the other side a better, more whole human after letting go of some deep shit earlier in the season. I’ve mourned what was stolen and lean in toward living a life centered on joy for all the things I do have and the experiences I still get to share with people I love.

See you on the other side,

Grouchy