Inspiration & Blog

Specialized’s all new Adventure Dispatch documentary series follows four riders on inspiring bike trips across the US and beyond… prepare to be stoked.

Is there a proper way to train for a 2,745 mile self-supported bike race? Josh Kato, last year’s record breaking winner of the Tour Divide, thinks so… and it involves hair metal, donuts, and nary a single trip to the gym.

No drone footage. No music. No shaky GoPro video. No slow-mo. Just 24 frames per second and the pure goodness of multi-day backcountry mountain biking… feel the mountains in this awesome 100 second film from Scott Secco.

The norm seems foreign when you are out of your element for extended periods of time. An eagerly anticipated visit to the local bottle shop—post East Africa—proved that hypothesis.

Follow two riders as they hop on a historic narrow gauge train, to bikepack 80 miles of the best high altitude singletrack in Colorado. Right now the area is covered under several feet of snow, but it’s not too early to get inspired. To do the same weekend-friendly trip, check out our Trail Notes below for this segment of the Colorado Trail.

In Search of The Storm is a film that documents a fat biking expedition that took three guys to the very edge of the Indian Himalayas… in the dead of winter.

Sometimes it takes an act of misfortune to find someplace meaningful…

In our third installment of Rider’s Lens, we present Panthea Read and the first ever (that we know of) bikepacking comics. Read her thoughts on process, and check out her four new comic strips.

One of three short films commissioned by outdoor co-op REI, Fast Forward is a beautifully shot account of Divide record holder Lael Wilcox’s attempt to race the Arizona Trail. But more than this, it’s an insight into her philosophy on life, her motivation to ‘ride fast’, and an inspirational story that will doubtless have you reaching for your bike, whether it’s to race, or explore the world.

A photo essay from a sub-arctic snow bike trip through Alaska’s White Mountains.

On a recent trip to Colorado, we checked in on Monty and Lane Willson, of Oveja Negra, and asked them a few questions about bikepacking, their business, and their inspirations.

Two-wheeled exploration often unearths interesting and obscure places that might otherwise go unnoticed, be they historical, architectural, or even artistic. In our series ‘Found’, we report on such discoveries… ones that can only made possible via slow, methodical movement through off-the-beaten-path corners of the world. Enjoy the first installment; if you’ve made a discovery of your own, and have photography to support it, then drop us a line.