Eat, Sleep, Ride : How I Braved Bears, Badlands, and Big Breakfasts in My Quest to Cycle the Tour Divide

For Paul Howard, who has ridden the entire Tour de France route during the race itselfsetting off at 4 am each day to avoid being caught by the prosriding a small mountain bike race should hold no fear. Still, this isnt just any mountain bike race. This is the Tour Divide.

Running from Banff in Canada to the Mexican border, the Tour Divide is more than 2,700 miles500 miles longer than the Tour de France. Its route through the heart of the Rocky Mountains involves more than 200,000 feet of ascentthe equivalent of climbing Mount Everest seven times.

The other problem is that Howard has never owned a mountain bikeand how will training on the South Downs in southern England prepare him for sleeping rough in the Rockies?

Undaunted, Howard swaps the smooth tarmac roads of France for the mud, snow, and ice of the Tour Divide, fending off grizzly bears, mountain lions, and moose. Buzzing roadside fans are replaced by buzzing mosquitoes. Battling bad weather, drinking whiskey with a cowboy, and singing karaoke with the locals, Howard's journey turned into more than just a race it became the adventure of a lifetime.