Going to Kyrgyzstan

 

I’ve been making an effort to do more living in my time alive, and so, I submitted an application to race in the Silk Road Mountain Race 2023.

The Silk Road Mountain Race has fascinated me since I heard about it in 2018. I know that the Tour Divide is probably a more natural fit for me, especially since I can ride to the start, but I am attracted to the unfamiliar, and Kyrgyzstan is way less familiar to me that the Divide route, and there lies its appeal.

Testing your limits for 1880 km of remote mountains sounds to me like some of the most fun that one can have on a bike, and so I am eagerly anticipating participating in this race. There is definitely risk, but my experience and training, as well as my generally cautions nature should go a long way to mitigate that risk.

Unlike real bike racers, I work as a bike mechanic in a shop. I can fix nearly anything, and I plan to draw on my skill to make riding a full-suspension bike more practical. I have added several items to my bike to make fixing it less likely. There is always the chance that something fails catastrophically, but I am willing to ride my bike a fixie with sacked suspension if that is what it takes to finish the Silk Road Mountain Race.

When I get back, I will be posting a few articles . Whether I succeed or fail, I feel that my perspective will be much more clear when I am done. You can follow along at this site on maprogress which shows a me-centric view of the race.

I’ll be lined up at the start, at 9am local time on August 12th, watch me then!