Weekly Newsletter: March 31st - April 6th, 2025

This week, we had date night at the Asian Market 🍜, Keith spent some time planning for the Tour Divide 🤔, and Keith also went on a monster training ride! 😅

Check out our new posts and videos 🆕 🎥 📝

A Day in the Life on the Camino: What to Anticipate

Keith and Lindsey fell into a natural routine along the Camino de Santiago. While most days looked somewhat the same, there was room for flexibility.

Keith and LindseyLindsey Huster

Date night at the Asian Market 🍜 🥠

We had planned to check out the Guroot Korean restaurant in Orem, UT. This unique, authentic Korean restaurant is located inside the Asian Market. Unfortunately, when we had arrived they had already run out of food for the evening. 😞 Thankfully, the Asian Market has a counter-serve restaurant option as well.

Yu Kitchen offers a selection of classic Asian dishes in a no-frills, counter-serve location within the market. Lindsey ordered the Shrimp Teriyaki and Keith ordered the House Special Lo Mein (w/ chicken, beef, and shrimp). We also ordered the gyoza and cream cheese wontons as appetizers. The restaurant also gave away two free eggrolls with each order over $20 USD. Needless to say, we had a lot of delicious food!

More Tour Divide prep 🚵‍♂️ 🤔

Keith was very busy this week with various Tour Divide 2025 preparation tasks. First up, Keith focused on lowering the base weight of his bikepacking setup. His main goal is to cut enough gear from his packing list in order to completely eliminate the need for a front rack.

Old Man Mountain Axle Pack

Old Man Mountain Axle Pack is unlike any fork mount adapter you’ve seen. Rather than trying to clamp to round or tapered surfaces and just hope it doesn’t slip or spin, Axle Pack is, you guessed it: Thru Axle mounted! Attaching to the axle makes it impossible to slip or spin.

Axle Pack is lightweight, reliable, robust, and rigid. With four mounting points you can also choose to run your gear higher or lower depending on your needs.

Mounted to one of our Fit Kits, the Axle pack is also easily swappable with any of our racks so you can pack the right gear for the ride.

Buy on Old Man Mountain

This is now an option for Keith thanks to the recent introduction of the Old Man Mountain Axle Pack kit. This kit will still allow Keith to pack some small bags and/or extra water bottles on his front forks without requiring all the extra weight and bulk of a full front rack. This approach will also bring the weight much closer to the center of the bike thus not disrupting steering control as much as a front rack.

Keith also spent some time combing over his packing list spreadsheet to see what all he could eliminate or replace with lighter-weight options. So far, Keith has been able to identify at least 5 pounds (2.27 kilograms) of weight that he could shed just by consolidating some equipment and simplifying his nice-to-haves. Every ounce counts when it comes to bikepacking so it is important for Keith to minimize his kit.

Keith also found that he could mount some of his heavier items, such as tent + sleeping pad, below his aero bars without affecting steering and control. This opens up the deck of the rear rack for carrying additional heavy items such as food and electronics that previously would have required the front rack. Weight distribution, ease of access, and carrying capacity all play critical factors in determining how and where to carry gear on a bike.

Keith's mid-week training 🏋️🚴‍♂️

Keith has been sticking to his goal of weightlifting at least once a week. This should help with injury prevention as it will continue to strengthen his muscles and tendons. Keith also found time to take on a challenging Zwift virtual course while maintaining a strong zone-2 effort. These sort of efforts really help to build Keith's endurance as he rides with a consistent power well above his planned Tour Divide power level.

Keith's big training weekend! 🏔️ 😅

The Tour Divide feels like it is just around the corner. Keith has been slowly ramping up his riding efforts and dialing in his equipment. This week was no exception.

Testing out new equipment mounting options

On Saturday, Keith added a heavily loaded bar bag to his cockpit to test rideability with that sort of weight attached directly to the steering system. Keith pedaled from our home to the local Valley Vista Trail System. His goal was to see how the bike performed under both long-distance pedaling efforts and flowy singletrack trails. To his surprise, the bike performed amazingly well! So much so that he actually set a new personal best on the Valley Vista Full Loop Strava segment. 🏆 This successful test set Keith up for a huge training ride on Sunday.

Climbing, distance, and duration practice

On Sunday, Keith waited for the temperatures to warm up above freezing before heading out for a seriously huge ride. Keith once again headed up to the Valley Vista climb in order to access the Bench Road forest service road. From there Keith continued north until he reached American Fork Canyon. Keith climbed three forks of the canyon; first up to Tibble Fork Reservoir, then up to the Granite Flats campground, and finally up to and past the snow fence on the Alpine Loop Scenic Byway.

While exploring the climbing options throughout American Fork Canyon, Keith also got some good hike-a-bike practice thanks to several miles of snow-covered forest service roads. This is important practice for Keith as there will be several sections of the Tour Divide that require pushing your bike up steep, unrideable terrain.

Keith then descended back down to the valley floor to have a frozen burrito and some peanut butter and jelly tacos at Highland Glen Park. After Keith refueled, he made his way around the Point of the Mountain and into Draper City. This was where Keith would face his final climbing challenge for the day; the road climb up to Suncrest.

The climb up to Suncrest is brutal! 🥵 It averages over 8% grade and climbs a little over 1,000 feet (305 meters). It's unrelenting and really tests your stamina as there are very few sections of reprieve from the steep grade. Keith successfully finished this climb only stopping briefly twice; once to refill his water bottle and once to photograph deer on the hillside.

After Keith crested the Suncrest road climb, he was awarded with a long, flowy descent back down to the Murdock Canal Trail, his paved route back home. All in all, this route covered 92.2 miles (148.4 kilometers) with 6,624 feet (2,019 meters) of climbing. Keith completed the route in 8.5 hours (moving time) / 10.5 hours (total time). Training rides like this will help set Keith up for success on the Tour Divide.

Upcoming posts and videos 👷‍ 👷‍♀️️

Lindsey is continuing her work on the post series from our three-week adventure along the Camino De Santiago, Portuguese Route! Those posts are being published as she has time. We also have several prior trips that we haven't yet shared, so be sure to subscribe to our blog if you haven't done so already.

We hope that you are enjoying our newsletters. Spring is officially here! Do you have any spring break plans coming up? Let us know in the comments section below.👇 💬