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The 2021 ENVE Builder Round Up: Prova, Naked, 44 Bikes, Spooky, Retrotec, Argonaut

Reportage By: John Watson

The 2021 ENVE Builder Round Up: Prova, Naked, 44 Bikes, Spooky, Retrotec, Argonaut

Continuing on with our 2021 ENVE Builder Round Up coverage – we posted the first Gallery on Friday – today we’re featuring the show-stopping work of Prova Cycles, Naked Bicycles, 44 Bikes, Spooky, Retrotec, and Argonaut Cycles. Each of these builders brought something special to the showcase and a few raised the bar considerably in various ways. There’s a lot to go over here so let’s get to it!

Bikepacking The White Rim Trail: Touching the World Again

Reportage By: Cameron Sanders

Bikepacking The White Rim Trail: Touching the World Again

Getting There

Here’s a sentence that’s sure to resonate: It’s been over a year since I booked a flight and the idea of taking a trip was just a little scary. The last time I’d flown was another bike trip with my partner Cameron and close friend Yuhnke. Our flight back from the Baja Divide had been delayed due to airport shutdowns on the dawn of the pandemic.

Radar

ENVE’s Grodeo ride and Builder Round-Up Weekend is Set for June 25 and 26

Remember our coverage from the ENVE Builder Round-Up in 2019? Well, after a year-long hiatus, it’s back!

ENVE’s Grodeo ride and Builder Round-Up weekend is set for June 25 & 26. It kicks off on Friday at ENVE HQ with the Builder Round-Up and Open House (a mini-NAHBS of sorts) with more than 30 of the most renowned custom builders displaying their latest works of art. Meet the builders with live music, food, drink, and the chance to test your skills on ENVE’s Ogden Trackline Gravel TT.

The Grodeo ride on Saturday takes inspiration from some of the ENVE crew’s favorite gravel events, and travels the dirt roads and trails that the G Series gravel products were developed on. The Wasatch Mountains that cast their shadow on the town of Ogden are not for the faint of heart; the route will cover 92 miles and 8,500 feet of climbing with Strava-times sections along the way. Less race, more adventure ride, share the day with friends new and old.

Although the Builder Round-Up is open to everyone, the Grodeo ride is limited to 200 riders. The full course will be announced in June. Registration opens May 1st at 8 AM MST and is expected to sell out. Details and sign-up info here: https://www.enve.com/grodeo/

Full Circle on the Grand Loop: Part III – A Cyclocross Specialist Turned Ultra Racer

Reportage By: Kurt Refsnider

Full Circle on the Grand Loop: Part III – A Cyclocross Specialist Turned Ultra Racer

This is the third part of an ongoing series:
Full Circle on the Grand Loop: Part II – The First Modern Bikepacking Race
Full Circle on the Grand Loop: Part I – Trail Visions Ahead of Their Time

Back in the late 2000s, I was a geology Ph.D. student at the University of Colorado and a devoted cyclocross racer. I got up early and did intervals in the dark before class and I raced around in little circles every weekend from September to December, chasing other skinsuit-clad guys hopping on and off their bikes for rather contrived reasons. I flew around the country to some of the biggest race weekends, chasing UCI points and top-20 finishes. I was infatuated with the sport until I rather abruptly became bored of those little circles.

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FKT on the White Rim Trail (Funnest Known Time!)

While we understand the competitive nature of bikepacking races and fastest-known time attempts and records, we still love the chiller pace of bicycle touring and a different kind of FKT. Kody and company clearly set the record for the Funnest Known Time on the White Rim!

Check out a few stills from this video below.

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Ibis’ New Ripley AF is an Aluminum Ripper

To make a sub $3,000 Ripley, Ibis moved to an aluminum chassis, with a few geometry tweaks to make for a short-travel trail bike. Check out their launch video for the new Ripley AF featuring Pat Smage and some glorious Utah singletrack.

Specs:
-29” Wheels⁠⠀
-130mm front travel⁠⠀
-120mm dw-link rear travel⁠⠀
-2.6” tire clearance⁠⠀
-Aluminum front and rear triangle⁠⠀
-Available in four sizes S-XL, fits riders between 5’ and 6’6⁠⠀
-Frame weight of 7.45 w/ shock⁠⠀
-Complete builds starting at 30.5 lbs / 13.04 KG⁠⠀

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The Bikeraft Guide: The Ultimate How-To Guide, History Of and Wild Adventure Stories About Bikerafting

Remember all those wild Reportage reports from bikerafting in Colorado and Utah with Four Courners Guides we’ve posted over the years? Well, Doom and Lizzy have launched a fantastic project born from those endeavors and more:

“We launched the IndieGoGo Campaign December 21st (soft, unofficial for all our fans and followers). You can start pre-ordering the book now through January 29! What is The Bikeraft Guide? It’s a community multi-media storytelling project that will ultimately result in a comprehensive book on bikerafting. It will be the definitive guide on the sport, and includes a comprehensive history section, “The Pirates of Bikerafting” Anthology (a collection of stories from 15 of the world’s best bikerafters) and a how-to section, mostly by Steve “Doom” Fassbinder, but also including interviews with various experts. It will also have a safety section by the “packraft safety guy” and author of the Packraft Handbook, Luc Mehl, a repairs section by Alpacka Raft repairs manager, Ben Phillips, and a Positive Impact Ethos section contributed by Bikepacking Roots.

In addition, this project includes our new The Bikeraft Guide Podcast, and short films in the The Bikeraft Guide enewsletter, on the IndieGoGo Campaign page, on @TheBikeraftGuide Instagram page and on the Four Corners Guides blog.

Our goal with the IndieGoGo Campaign is to raise $20-$30K through pre-sales of the book and “Perks” donated by our sponsors. This will pay for printing, distribution, contributors and editing. We’re really relying on you – aspiring bikerafters and people who love great adventure stories – to help us make this dream a reality.”

Head to the IndieGoGo to support this project!

Please Vote

Radar

Please Vote

We romanticize the outdoors here at the Radavist and this election, many of our favorite places in the Western United States are under the scalpel for oil and mineral extraction. That’s just the tip of the iceberg too. Civil rights, liberties, Covid-19, and the list goes on and on. A lot is on the table this election. Most importantly, the vessel for change lies within local elections too! Your local voting is just as essential as the presidential vote.

Please, VOTE! Head to Vote.org to find your local polling place. A lot is on the line and even if it doesn’t affect you directly, it does for many others.

Thank you.

Dzil Ta’ah Adventure’s Navajo Youth Bikepacking Adventure Series: John’s Canyon

Reportage By: Josh Weinberg & Jon Yazzie

Dzil Ta’ah Adventure’s Navajo Youth Bikepacking Adventure Series: John’s Canyon

Recently, the Navajo Nation reinstated a 57-hour weekend lockdown due to the spikes in COVID in several communities. This put a hold on our first official Dzil Ta’ah Adventures youth bikepacking series outing in Nazlini, which was originally slated for September 26th. Once the lockdown is lifted, which we hope will be soon, we will proceed as planned with the Dine Composite participants. With the postponement of our first trip, we felt like this was an opportunity to leverage the extra time and continue to shape our mentorship program and build more of my team’s dexterity with an outing in John’s Canyon, Utah, at the southwestern base of Cedar Mesa.

Desert Pack: A Group of Women on a Solo Mission – Bikepacking the San Rafael Swell

Reportage By: Sofia Jaramillo 

Desert Pack: A Group of Women on a Solo Mission – Bikepacking the San Rafael Swell

The hot desert sun beats down on us. Sand whips around as the wind picks up speed. We follow a narrow path that hugs the base of prehistoric cliffs with contrasting sandstone layers, each representing a different geological epoch. Birds fly in and out of small “huecos”, holes carved into the rock high above. Glove Mallow flowers sway in the wind. My friends Franny Weikert, Torie Lindskog, Suzy Williams, and I are approaching the steepest climb of our bikepacking trip through the San Rafael Swell in Utah. We’re weekend warriors and set aside a few days to bike the route. We fled to the desert in hopes of a break from the stress of our everyday lives. What we thought would just be a 3-day bikepacking trip and a chance to make some new friends, turned into an unexpected adventure full of memories we’d never forget.