Rodeo Labs has been supporting the development of a new bikepacking event in Armenia for two years now, and the race is set to have its first edition on June 25, 2023. In this episode of the Rodeo Podcast, Stephen talks with Tom, Tatev, and Jay P about the work done thus far, the “why” of the event, and what the goals are for it. Armenia is a beautiful, challenging, and welcoming country for bikepackers and bike tourers alike, and Rodeo is proud to help support the effort to introduce this place to more riders.
Photos by Samuel Fitzgerald, Sheldon Thompson, and Stephen Fitzgerald
It was near midnight June 06, 2021. Emporia, Kansas. I lay in bed restless before the Unbound 200 gravel race. Nerves were high, as is common before events like this, and sleep comes slowly, perhaps even not at all for some. Sometimes you push through insomnia like this and your body finds its way to let go and rest. Other times you push the home button on your phone, because you heard it vibrate. Not the double buzz of a text message, but the single buzz of some other random notification. In recent years I’ve actually learned to put my phone in airplane mode at night, because a single notification can easily ruin a perfectly good night’s sleep. This one did:
It is 11:34pm and my body is tight with anxiety. This is not an unusual state of being to find myself in – the sensation is nearly constant for me. But right now, approaching midnight, the sting of it is more acute. I’m laying in bed, I’ve just set my phone on the floor next to me, and I need to be awake again in five hours. Tomorrow I’m riding into the Rocky Mountains alone.
When Daniel graduated from UC Santa Barbara, the Tour Divide was not on his radar. However, shortly after Daniel discovered a new passion– bicycle touring. His first bicycle tour was to Columbia, it was a crash course on touring and how to maintain a bike over a six month trip. Daniel has not stopped touring. When Daniel discovered the Tour Divide, he was hooked. The first foray was touring the divide, but the the following two years he has raced it. Now Daniel is patiently waiting for next year. On the podcast, Daniel recounts his experiences from the event. Rain was persistent throughout, start to finish. In between, there were awed moments with wildlife, mishaps with bear spray and quickly fostered friendships on the trail.
What do you do when someone tells you that you are not mentally tough enough? Scotti’s answer was to sign up for the 2019 Silk Road Mountain Race as a pair with my husband Ernie, and take home the win. Since then she has set multiple FKT at Arkansas High Country, has unfinished business with the Atlas Mountain Race and it hot of a new FKT for Stagecoach 400.
I’ve never done research on a place I’m traveling to. I’ve never read the top 10 lists and taken notes or looked into the history or geography or culture. I’ve always followed my gut and shown up jet-lagged and blind and let the bike and whoever I meet along the way lead me through discovering a place. I don’t often regret not making it to the most known places. I’ve found stumbling through a place is how to really get to know it’s charm.
Most of the bikes we build here at Rodeo Labs are customized to one extent or another. Some minimally, perhaps with different component sizes or a decal color we don’t typically use. Other are maximally customized, like for instance this build we just completed for Jason.
Utah’s White Rim Trail seems to be enjoying a bit of a popularity boom in recent years thanks in large part to repeated attempts to set new Fastest Known Time records by a non-stop stream of world class riders. While those efforts are incredible from a human achievement point of view they don’t resonate much with me as it relates to my relationship with this beautiful and incredibly unique part of the world. I come to White Rim with slower times in mind, and with thoughts of long miles spent undisturbed by life’s complexities.
I’m just now entering the stage of the bike ride when the hang over moves from the head to the legs. The road has finally returned after dropping off sandy double track and the wind is soft as we climb into the mountains surrounding Anza-Borrego. The early morning light is splitting canyon walls and we pedal on. It’s day two of the trip and we’re already dancing with God.
In April of 2019 we packed up and headed to Sea Otter Classic for our first ever expo / trade show. Over the course of that week in Monterey we had such a good time showing our bikes, meeting owners and new people, and sampling the local riding. As soon as we returned to Denver we set out looking for which expo we would attend next. With such a large contingent of owners located on the East Coast the decision was made to look for an expo on that side of the country. It didn’t take long to single out Philly Bike Expo as the show to attend. Philly has been a show we’ve enjoyed reading about in previous years and the vibe always seemed upbeat and friendly from afar. We asked around a bit and our thoughts were confirmed. Everyone said that Philly was the show to be at, so we quickly registered and pinned it on the calendar.
We didn’t have a plan for what we wanted to show or talk about at Philly initially but as the show neared we started gathering our thoughts. The show’s date on the calendar coincided pretty well with the development of our next generation Flaanimal 5.0 and we set a target for having a prototype preview ready to show, and we also asked ourselves what would be cool to do with the TD3 as a concept build. Two bikes began to take shape in our minds…
Also taking shape was the design of the booth itself. After our experience at Sea Otter we left with the sense that a lot of companies are entering the gravel / adventure space to cash in on the growth and opportunity. If you’re a corporation with a primary objective to sell as many bikes as possible then that is fine but for Philly we wanted to bring a booth along that showed that we’re equally interested in bikes, culture, and community. We decided to build a booth around our library of photos that we’ve collected over the last six years of riding, exploring, and making bikes. We asked owners to send in photos as well and we combined it all into a visual backdrop for our bikes that told our story without using many words.
For the Traildonkey 3.0 that we brought we wanted to do an out of the box build in a way that we hadn’t previously built one before so we worked with Fox to spec out an AX 40mm front suspension fork. A PNW Coast dropper / suspension post in the back provides 40mm of travel in the rear for a balanced feel. We asked Archer Components if they could build a drop bar specific version of their D1x wireless shifting intermediary. This allowed us to combine TRP Hylex RS levers with a Shimano XT 12 speed drivetrain which would otherwise not be do-able on a drop bar bike. Exile Designs created special matching frame bag / top tube bag / and Fannie Packer with custom printed local Table Mountain Topograhy on the main panels. The finished bike is pretty bonkers and started a lot of fun conversations. How far can a gravel / adventure bike go before it becomes a mountain bike? That seems to be a recurring question these days but to us it doesn’t even matter. Bikes are bikes. To us pushing the Traildonkey 3 platform about as far as we could was a blast, and the eventual owner of this bike is going to have quite a party when they throw their leg over it. (This bike is now available for sale, but with a GRX drivetrain instead of the pre-production Archer prototype shifting. Shoot us a note if you are interested)
By the time Philly arrived we were extremely excited to preview the Flaanimal 5.0 prototype and we barely finished the frameset in time. It was built only 24 hours before the show just like those hot rod shows that I’ve seen on TV. I always wonder why everything comes down to the wire on those shows if they know that they have months to prepare for the show but now I get it. Developing a bike is difficult to begin with but developing a bike and trying to get it just right in time for it’s public debut is another level of difficulty entirely. This new Flaanimal we showed at Philly is a bike we are extremely proud of. We’re advancing the core Flaanimal feature set by integrating creative solves for tire clearance, strength, and weight and we are not leaving behind the adaptability that the bike was originally about in the process. If you’d like to read the full exposition of what is new with Flaanimal 5 then head over to the exclusive preview that they have posted here.
Flaanimal 5 will be available Q1 2020. The bike we showed is just a preview and we are making final tweaks and locking specs as I type this. I couldn’t be more excited to show the final product when it is ready.
Thanks to all the people who came out and said hi at Philly Bike Expo. We loved visiting the city, shaking hands, talking bikes, meeting Rodeo owners, and sharing what we do. See you in 2020!
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