Payson, Nichole, Lael, Rue, and Chris recap their first day of riding, which encompassed 90 miles and included a glacier, an arctic fox, a feast of blueberries, headwind, tailwind, and a hot spring at the end. They share their highlights of the day and preview day 2.

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Payson, Nichole Baker, Chris Burkard, Lael Wilcox, and Rue Kaladyte join us from their hostel in Ísafjörður for their first nightly dispatch from Iceland. They discuss their bikepacking route, first impressions of the Island, and highlights of the day, and preview their ride. 

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In preparation for our upcoming daily series following Payson’s bikepacking trip of Iceland with Chris Burkard, Nichole Baker, Rue Kaladite, and Lael Wilcox, we’re replaying some of our favorite moments from Payson’s previous conversations with Chris about the country. He’s been to Iceland 47 times and traversed it in just about every way possible by plane, car, and bike. This episode features stories from three interviews with Chris, one from 2019 where he talks about his love of being immersed in a location and why cycling is the best way to achieve this, one from early 2020 after his completion of a record setting 850 mile ride around the perimeter of the country which he did without stopping, and one from a 2021 interview with in which Chris is joined by Rebecca Rusch and Gus Morton to discuss their fat biking winter expedition across the island.

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Pete Stetina raced in the WorldTour for ten years before transitioning to gravel racing in 2019. During that time, he raced in the Tour De France, the Giro D’Italia, and the Vuelta Espana. Since moving to gravel, he has featured on the podium at many races, including winning the Belgian Waffle Ride during his first year on the gravel scene. More recently, he won the inaugural Leadboat, a two day challenge that combines the Leadville 100 and Steamboat Gravel. 

In this conversation, he and Payson talk about how he fits into the gravel scene, the work that goes on off the bike now that he's a privateer, and why he’s happier now than he was in the WorldTour. They also address the current controversy in gravel racing surrounding the use of male domestiques by some of the top female riders, and how he's hoping to level the playing field at his own race, Stetina's Paydirt next month. He also talks about the crash he suffered in 2015 at the Tour of the Basque Country, which threw his future into doubt and nearly led to a leg amputation. He tells about the four day ordeal of returning to the US after leaving the Spanish hospital, the grueling rehab process, and his triumphant return to the WorldTour that same year. 

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Rue Kaladyte is a photojournalist and videographer. She started out in journalism, working for the Anchorage Daily News in Alaska, where the pressures of the 24 hour news cycle led her to seek longer form projects, including one that introduced her to her wife, Lael Wilcox. Following the closure of the newspaper, she began working full-time as a photojournalist capturing stories from ultra-endurance bike events. Now, she and Lael travel all over the world highlighting some of the most wild and challenging bikepacking routes. 

In this conversation, Rue and Payson talk about why she prefers living in Lael’s shadow even though she is integral to her success, why she would never have chosen to leave newspaper journalism, and why they still haven’t enjoyed a real honeymoon. She shares about the opposition she and Lael have faced from the bikepacking community about documenting events, and the hurdles they have had to jump through to show footage of Lael’s achievements.

Rue also talks about a lesser known side of her story. She was born in a small village in Lithuania and moved to Chicago with her mother and sister as a child. While she returned to the country to visit family throughout her childhood, it wasn’t until college that she reconnected with Lithuania through a journalism project. In that process, she uncovered a painful story about the country that ended up hitting much closer to home than she expected. She talks to Payson about how her identity as a Lithuanian affects her work, and the trip she took with Lael to visit her father and grandfather in 2018. 

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Chris Blevins returns to the show to talk about competing at this year's Olympics in Tokyo. It was a different experience than the one he anticipated in 2019, when he visited the city to test ride the course before he knew he would make the Olympic team. Since then, the event was delayed by a year and transformed by the pandemic. Chris talks about the bittersweet feelings of competing in his first Olympic Games without his family by his side. Complications with travel, isolation within the cyclist's athlete village, heavy security, and daily covid testing featured heavily. But other things stood out too, such as the moment it really sunk in that he was an Olympian, the Czech shot-putter he sat next to on the flight over, and the seemingly bottomless wardrobe he and his fellow Team USA members were provided with upon arrival. He also talks about the race itself and how he and his coach set their sights on a personal goal to avoid the pressures of such an historic event.

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Neil Beltchenko has competed in some of the most infamous bikepacking races for nearly a decade, including the Iditarod Trail Invitational, which he won in 2018, and the Arizona Trail 300, which he has won multiple times and where set a course record in 2016. In this interview, he joins Payson just days after winning the Colorado Trail Race. He has ridden and completed the Colorado Trail six times, and set a course record in 2016. In spite of these accomplishments, however, he tells Payson that he never starts a race with a win or a record in mind, nor does he expect to be the fastest. He talks about why he keeps returning to the CT, the moment in this year's race that he almost turned back, and the off-the-bike physical preparation to which he attributes his consistent success and surprising lack of long term injuries. He also gives a detailed gear list run down, and offers a few nutritional hacks that he's learned over the years. 

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Jeff Garmire is an ultrarunner and thru-hiker who holds the unsupported running FKT for the Colorado Trail, which he completed in nine days earlier this year. He specializes in unsupported efforts, carrying all the food and supplies he needs from beginning to end, including any trash he generates along the way. He has also held the FKTs on the Arizona Trail, the Long Trail, and the Pinhoti Trail. In this interview, he talks to Payson about his unusual trajectory to ultrarunning, having started as a thru-hiker on backpacking routes such as the Appalachian Trail and the Pacific Crest Trail, and then moving towards shorter distances and faster times. He also talks about running out of food on the second-to-last day of his Colorado Trail FKT, and why, in spite of this, it was the second day that was the hardest. 

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Today on the show, Payson sits down with Fred Dreier, editor-in-chief at VeloNews. They talk about the changing face of professional cycling, the decline of American road racing, and the rise of the athlete influencer. Fred also talks about the parallel evolution he’s seen in journalism, both in cycling and in more conventional media spaces. During a hiatus from VeloNews, Fred graduated from the Columbia School of Journalism and wrote for The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and The New York Times before returning to the cycling beat. They discuss where they think cycling might be headed, and how amateur riders have more influence over the future of the sport than ever.

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Haley Batten burst onto the elite World Cup scene this year, taking the podium at back-to-back races in Nové Mesto and Albstadt, and securing herself a place on Team USA for the upcoming Tokyo Olympics. Haley joins Payson from her training camp in Italy to talk about the whirlwind of success she’s achieved during her first year out of U23. They talk about why her first podium came at a moment when she was beginning to doubt herself, how her mindset has changed since she made the Olympic team, and what it’s been like to race against longtime friend Kate Courtney. They also talk about her life off the bike, most notably her choice to pursue higher education. She explains why getting a college degree remains so important to her, why she chose an unconventional approach to education, and her experiences going to university in Canada. 

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YouTube: Payson McElveen

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