The Atlas Mountain Race miniseries – Episode 2

The last time we heard from the miniseries, Stephen and I introduced the crew heading to the Atlas Mountain Race. With roughly three months until the race kicks off we knew we needed an update. So we caught up with Ashley and David to hear how they are feeling. The conversation that followed is a good reminder that the road to Morocco (or any event) is not linear. Everyone has faced challenges in their preparation. Including, loading the wrong map, losing navigation and a lighting system, a hub disintegrating on the Kokopelli Trail, unplanned night rides with only headlamps, pulling the plug on a big ride, and reflecting on rides long past. In sum, this episode is a good reminder that being human means ups and downs are to be expected. Despite it all, it gives space to reflect and have resets, physical or mental, as well as new goal setting (like finding ways to enjoy riding at night) the crew is honing in on AMR!

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The Atlas Mountain Race miniseries

Kokopelli Trail Bikepacking

Much like a release of any thrilling docuseries on Netflix, the opening episode sets the stage– a cast of characters introduced, various pathways illuminated, but not yet explored. Similarities to the Netflix model diverge immediately. Unfortunately this miniseries will not be binge-able until much, much later… We are building the ship while sailing it, we don’t know if there is a satisfying conclusion to this story, the only way to find out is to press on!

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Stephen’s Atlas Mountain Race spec Traildonkey 3.0

Atlas Mountain Race Traildonkey 3.0 bikepacking setup

Words by Stephen Fitzgerald

After months of prep and a whole lot of hush hush, I’m excited to finally spill the beans and offer a full breakdown on the Traildonkey 3.0 that I’ve built up to race next week at Atlas Mountain Race in Morocco. This bike is a lot of things to me. It has layers like an onion. So to simply put up the photos and list some gear would be to short sell the effort and consideration that it took to bring this build into existence.

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