Early Bird Van Island Bikepacking

James and I kicked April off with an early season bikepacking trip: seven days, no set route, more dirt than pavement. We picked Southern Vancouver Island mostly out of convenience. I had a cat sitting gig in Courtenay lined up for the end of March, plus spring arrived a little earlier on the Island than […]

Covid-19 Comeback: My RAD 400 Experience

The westerly gale socks me. I tuck low into the aerobars and concentrate on forcing power through my legs. Dig in. Just a few more kilometres, I promise myself. I should be approaching Denmark’s west coast, but under an overcast night sky, the midnight darkness swallows me whole. An inky landscape reveals few hints to […]

Mallorca 312

The Jersey In 2019, Stacey Welsh loaned me her old Mallorca 312 jersey for the NorthCape4000, a self-supported 4,000-plus kilometre bikepacking race from Turin to North Cape, Norway. I wore Stacey’s jersey to shreds that summer: through Italy, Switzerland, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and then some. I wore it for […]

The Buckshot

June 15-16, 2021 I roar out of Kamloops on Valleyview Road on my bicycle, shot full of adrenaline. On a quest to cover 483 kilometres of rough, rolling terrain before sundown tomorrow. After a quick latte at a friend’s place where I park my borrowed Prius, I’m off and rolling east toward Barnhartsvale, grinning to […]

Big rides in the okanagan: 2021 Roundup

2021 didn’t shake out as planned. Yet, for all that went wrong—ask me about the joys of a cross-border romance in an era of travel restrictions—I discovered the thrill of off-road cycling, and for that I am extremely grateful. Below, I’ve compiled eleven awesome local rides from the summer of 2021, including bikepacking overnighters, epic […]

The urban edge

October 21, 2021 Ready for Battle By 10 pm, the disorderly chaos of Lycra, tools, and groceries strewn about the living room of James’s apartment has been tamed. It is Wednesday October 13, 2021: the eve of our self-supported 24-hour ITT (individual time trial) attempt at Sauvie Island, and we are sharpening our axes and […]

Playin’ It Cool: How I Survived the 2021 BC Epic

July 23, 2021 The number one question people ask me regarding the 2021 BC Epic 1000 is How did you manage to ride through the heat? I actually gave my heat strategy a lot of consideration—both in preparation for the event, and in execution. I definitely didn’t roll up to the start line without a […]

Everesting Knox Mountain (Round Two)

June 25, 2020 “Fiendishly simple, yet brutally hard. Everesting is the most difficult climbing challenge in the world.” —Hells500 Everesting has been trending in the Covid-19 pandemic, when race cancellations and lockdowns wiped events from our schedules. Thankfully, all you need is a hill to Everest, which explains why the challenge has seen a boom […]

Excerpts from a Cross Canada Bike Ride (2010)

May 22, 2020 Game Plan?! (May 22, 2010) Surrey, British Columbia I like to tell people that I’m biking to Newfoundland. The common response is something like, “What? Why would you want to ride your bike there?” and I’m like “Why wouldn’t I want to?” I guess part of the reason I want to ride to Newfoundland is because […]

Sea to Sky: Up Up & Up Haleakalā

February 21, 2020 Watching sunrise from the peak of Haleakalā is at the top of every Maui tourist’s bucket list. Tour companies even offer visitors the chance to bus to the peak of the dormant volcano to see the sunrise, and ride down on a bicycle. Some of us, on the other hand, prefer the […]