A ‘crazy’ 3,000-mile bike race from Canada to New Mexico

Matt Miller knows it sounds a little crazy.

“I get that a lot,” the 50-year math teacher at Iowa City High said.

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Miller embarked Friday on the Tour Divide, a 2,745-mile bike race from Banff in Alberta, Canada, to the United States/Mexico border in Antelope Wells, N.M.

For the second time.

“Totally mentally stable,” Miller said with a laugh while sitting in The Eastern Iowa Airport on Wednesday, waiting for the first leg of his trip to Banff.

The Tour Divide is the “world’s longest off-pavement cycling route” that roughly follows the Great Divide on long dirt roads, jeep trails and steep climbs where walking your bike is a must.

It goes through Montana, Idaho, Wyoming and Colorado and climbs nearly 200,000 feet.

The literature promoting the race calls it “the longest — arguably most challenging — mountain bike time trial on the planet.”

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Oh, and you do it alone. This “bikepacking” adventure is a self-supported challenge, but “participants are encouraged to meet up, socialize and help each other” as needed.

There were around 230 hearty souls when the race started Friday.

And that aforementioned literature throws in this quote from Kurt Hahn, the founder of Outward Bound:

“There is more to us than we know. If we can be made to see it, perhaps for the rest of our lives we will be unwilling to settle for less.”

That, in a nutshell, was Miller’s response when asked “why.” Why spend nearly three weeks and 3,000 miles on your bike, sleeping many nights on the ground and battling whatever Mother Nature has in store?

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“I kind of wonder that myself sometimes,” he said. “It’s an extreme challenge.”

He called it 180 degrees from his alter-ego of high school math teacher.

“I like the idea of doing something totally out of your norm,” he said. “It’s a fun adventure ... and it’s crazy beautiful.”

Miller didn’t wake up one morning and decide he wanted to do the most extreme bike race in the world. He’s always enjoyed biking and discovered a passion for longer “tours,” once traveling from his home in Frytown to Winnipeg (800 miles). He took another bike trip to Washington, D.C.

Seeing the country from a saddle was something special.

“I fell in love with it,” he said.

This, though, is a little different, a lot more “extreme.” And it is a race, by the way. Last year’s winner did the challenge in 13 days and 10 hours, a record for the event. There are no designated stops or rest periods. The clock started Friday and is turned off when the last rider finishes.

Many don’t finish. The average time of completion is three weeks.

When Miller did this two years ago, it took him 22 days and 10 hours. He’s hoping to do it in 20 days this summer.

“I know what I’m doing now,” he said, noting he took a few wrong turns the first time and adding “it’s so weather dependent.” A rainstorm, he said, could turn a dirt trail into “peanut butter” or keep you in your tent all day.

Miller will take enough clothing — “you have to be ready for all conditions,” he said — a tent and other essentials for the trip. He hopes to travel about 135 miles a day, stopping to eat and sleep wherever he finds soft ground, a shack or a hotel.

He said the route does go through some towns and estimates he’ll sleep inside once every three days or so.

“I’ll take advantage of towns when I get a chance,” he said. “It’s a treat to sleep inside.”

He has no fantasy of winning this race one day.

“Oh, geez, no,” he said. “I’m just a 50-year-old math teacher from Iowa. I would like to be near the top of the 50-and-over crowd, though.“

Maybe Hahn is right. Maybe we shouldn’t settle for anything other than what some folks may think is a little crazy.

Life’s an adventure. Might as well have fun along the route.

Follow the race at: https://trackleaders.com/

Comments: (319) 398-5861; jr.ogden@thegazette.com