Влиятельный блогер преодолел 2400 миль по маршруту Great Divide, несмотря на потерю велосипеда авиакомпанией

Ryan Van Duzer logged into YouTube from his Boulder home on June 26 to upload the latest video on his adventure channel, Duzer TV. He wasn’t supposed to be there. He should have been on his mountain bike that day, somewhere around the neon, glacial lakes of Banff, Alberta, Canada. Five days earlier, the 47-year-old adventure influencer was to begin his long, grand “bikepacking” journey down the 2,700-mile Great Divide Mountain Bike Route as part of Adventure Cycling’s 50th anniversary. But on the way there, the airline lost his bike. In that 17-minute video, he conceded, “This route has tested my resilience every step of the way. On the other hand, this route has provided me with some of the highest highs of my bikepacking life.” Sitting in Amante Coffee in Boulder on Tuesday, Van Duzer said that initial setback, while monumental, transformed into one of the most amazing experiences he’s ever had. He had been planning the mega trek — one that should have taken him about six weeks from Jasper, Alberta to Antelope Wells, New Mexico — for an entire year. “That was the biggest bummer of this whole trip,” Van Duzer said. “I flew to Canada with my bike like I’ve done every time I’ve ever flown with my bike, put it in a box. And when I arrived there, this was the first time ever they said, ‘Oh, we don’t have your bike. But don’t worry, it’ll probably be on the next flight tomorrow or maybe even we’ll get it on another airline tonight. We’ll just deliver it to you.” Several days of back-and-forth communication yielded little result, with WestJet eventually admitting it could take up to 10 days to locate the lost bike. “I already had a lot of built-up anxiety before this adventure and so this, on top of it — I started thinking, ‘Is the universe trying to tell me something? Am I not supposed to do this?’ I hadn’t done a long trip in six years, since the last time I did most of the Great Divide in 2020. I just haven’t been as gung-ho about being away and grinding for 30-plus days at a time. Most of my adventures in the last six years have been a week to two weeks long, which is a lot more digestible.” ‘Important to be tested’ For the past 20 years, Van Duzer has made a name for himself in the outdoor adventure world, building up 206,000 subscribers on YouTube and 50,000-plus followers on Instagram. Outside of “bikepacking” — backpacking with a mountain bike in lieu of the usual hiking — he’s run ultramarathons at high elevations, survived in the Venezuelan jungle, and repeatedly run in his hometown Bolder Boulder race. His work has been featured in National Geographic, Root Sports, Men’s Journal and the Travel Channel, but he shifted solely to social media 10 years ago. And through it all, he had never experienced something like this. But, then again, challenges have been par for the course for him on a Great Divide Mountain Bike Route that always seems to have a headache waiting for him. In 2020, Van Duzer rode the trail from the Canadian-U.S. border to the Colorado-New Mexico border, but couldn’t enter New Mexico due to COVID restrictions at the time. The next year, he dropped in at the New Mexican border to complete the final 700 miles, and then his bike belt broke, cutting the trip short. When he decided to brave the Tour Divide race along the GDMBR in 2024, he suffered saddle sores and was later diagnosed with prostatitis. “I think it’s important to be tested from time to time and to be out of my comfort zone and really dig deep,” he said. “(I thought), ‘Why is this so important to me? Why do I keep on trying to do this?’ I could easily quit. I could be done with this and just do something else and be fine, but I was determined to do this and experience this beautiful route.” After returning to Boulder for a few days to regroup this time around, he contacted his friends at Priority Bicycles, who have sponsored him for the last 10 years. They shipped a brand new bike to Whitefish, Montana, where he dropped in on July 1 — a full 10 days after he was supposed to start his trek in Jasper. His original bike was returned to him in Boulder on June 27, but he opted instead to use the new bike that Priority shipped to Montana. The whole ordeal turned out to be more of a blessing than he realized. A freak midsummer snowstorm lambasted the Canadian Rockies and Montana when he would have been riding through there, had everything gone according to plan. From there, it was smooth riding, with “trail angels” coming out of the woodwork to help him at many stops along his expedition. He said that was his favorite part of the whole experience. One hot afternoon when he was in Pinedale, Wyoming, a woman in a white truck pulled up alongside his bike and handed him a cold bottle of water, screaming, “Ryan Van Duzer!” As it turned out, she and her husband were fans, following along with the tracker he was wearing. They had been watching his videos for years, and later that night, in an RV park nearby, they made him dinner. “Moments like that — and that happened pretty constantly all the way down, people coming out of nowhere just to help out — it really builds my faith in humanity,” Van Duzer said. “If you ask anybody what their favorite part of any bikepacking trip was, I bet you they would say it’s the people. “Once I started moving, all of the stress just melted away, all the anxiety. I felt strong. Every day, I built more and more confidence like ‘OK, I got this.’ I can do this. I’ve done this so many times. I can ride my bike 80 miles a day and find a place to camp and navigate and filter water and get all the food.” Not only that, but Van Duzer was continuously filming and staying on top of keeping his batteries charged. He mapped out the majority of the logistics ahead of his trip, but that, of course, couldn’t factor in anything the weather might throw at him. On July 21, he met up with a group of 25 fans and business partners at Priority Bicycles in Salida. From there, they rode the 500 miles down to Grants, New Mexico, and while that leg of the trip was filled with tough climbs and plenty of laughter, it didn’t come without a few hiccups. The buzz and the joy The trail angels were always there when needed. “We were riding in the Navajo Nation, and it’s sort of raining like crazy,” Van Duzer recounted. “There were flash flood warnings, and we were in a gas station. We were fine, but if we were out in it, then it would have sucked. (The other riders) all finished just in time and the skies opened. The elders of this community in Pueblo Pintado, it’s called, said we could camp in their community house and be sheltered from the rain. All these beautiful things happened right at the right time.” The group consisted of five women and 20 men, ranging in ages from 29 to 75. Connor Swegle, the co-founder of Priority Bicycles, made the trip from New York, where he’s much more accustomed to flat rides. He told the group daily that this was the hardest thing he had ever done. “I definitely have a bit where I complain about this stuff all the time,” Swegle said. “We came out of the gate (on Day 1), and we had an 18-mile, 4,000-foot climb to just below 11,000 feet. I mean, we went from, like 7,000 to 10,900 (feet) from Salida to the top of Marshall Pass right out of the gate. We were just sucking wind, walking. Even the fittest of the group were like, ‘That was an absolute humbling punch in the face.’ It’s arguably the most challenging section of the Divide, and people were coming from around the country and around the world together.” Swegle said that he took comfort in Van Duzer’s nonchalance and positive attitude, even as they faced eight tough days with little rest. He reveled in how the group gelled well and worked well together, from the first rider to the last. “Everybody came without any ego. We’re coming off of like four-hour climbs, and people are smiling and enjoying each other and spending time and appreciating the challenge of it together,” Swegle said. “Ryan isn’t always the most trustworthy, because things are so easy for him — not easy for him. He just knows what he needs. You’ll be like, ‘Oh, how hard is today going to be? He’s like, ‘Oh, it’s going to be fine.’ And then 12 hours later, you’re like eating your lungs going up a hill.” Van Duzer bid the group farewell with a dinner at Denny’s, then set out to reach the goal that his previous mishaps had deprived him of. He reached the U.S.-Mexico border fence in Antelope Wells on Aug. 2. Finally. When everything was said and done, Van Duzer had traversed about 2,400 miles of the 2,700-mile behemoth over 33 days. While he admits he’s disappointed he couldn’t complete the whole thing in one go, as was the plan for the past year, he’s proud of the trek he was able to make. “Where I broke my belt in New Mexico in 2021 was about 150 miles before the finish, so it was really exciting to actually see new stuff for the first time,” Van Duzer said. “Part of that was the actual Continental Divide Trail, like the actual single-track trail, whereas most of the route is on forest service roads and back by country roads. It felt amazing, because I didn’t believe I was actually going to get there until I could see it. It’s the greatest feeling of accomplishment I’ve had in a very long time. I still feel the buzz and the joy of like, ‘Wow, I did it. I really did it.’” As for what’s next, Van Duzer said he’ll spend the next few months editing his footage and producing 25 to 30 YouTube videos of the experience. He’ll make the trek down to Ecuador to lead a group trip in October, but from there, it’s anyone’s guess where he’ll pop up next.