Griffin Easter’s first experience stage racing in Colombia in 2017 earned the ‘hardest ever’ label, and his first experience at Transcordilleras doubled down on that.
I caught up with him at the finishline of stage 8 to talk about his thoughts on the race, what he brought with him, and what he’d do differently next time.
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Griffin Easter K eloro Champions Trophy congratulations hey thanks Ben winning trans qu jar 8 day brutal brutal we talked a bit yesterday about how difficult it is to encapsulate everything that is Columbia everything that is in scordis but I’m still going to ask you what was it like
Well it was i’ so I’ve been down here in I came down here in 2017 and I raced L wela Columbia um and it would that race was one of the hardest races I’ve ever done but it was Road Race Road stage race road stage race yes just just just
Happened here yeah yeah so that I thought was one of the hardest races I’d done which best however after doing trans cordier uh we weren’t on the road we were on the dirt roads and it’s like it’s a completely different ball game so I would I would say this is probably
Like the hardest racing I’ve ever done what in particular cuz it’s it’s been this is my first time here I just did 3day it’s been interesting to see my friend’s reactions to the stats on straa because just the raw numbers are pretty impressive yeah of just the altitude
Game yep I’m like that’s you have no idea yeah that’s got nothing to do with it no no like the fact that there are 47,000 Boulders on the climbs and then even worse on descent i i before I came here I thought I used to like I thought
I like going downhill on dir then I realized not not necessarily yeah the I found myself enjoying the climbing more yeah because you could well twofold because for once you could actually get into a rhythm mhm two there was a rider here who was in second overall a Christian and he was on
His mountain bike yes so we would all be together in the group like the top five guys and we would finally Crest the climbs and then you’d have it was it seemed like it was anywhere from an hour to sometimes 2 hours that we would be descending these gnarly dirt bouldery
Chunky roads yeah and he would just like just like sit up like mountain biker and he would just take off and so we were we were pushing our bikes our gravel bikes like Way Beyond anything that like I’ve ever had to push it to so you’re just getting hammered with all the chatter
From the terrain and trying to keep up speed not crash and it’s not just a straight down Road it’s like the road is never straight so it’s these just like you’re coming into these gnarly 180° turns sometimes it turns into like corrugated cement so it’s like even
Steeper into the bank turns and like you got I mean these guys grew up in these roads and in these terrains and so they’re like you’re going so fast into these gnarly turns and you’re just hoping that your tire you’re like your position on your body is okay cuz you’re
Just like hanging on through the turns and like but you get out of these descents and you’re just destroyed like your upper body is just getting pummeled like the whole time so MH I think that was hardest part and that was just like day after day after day that that was
Happening so it wasn’t just like one day and then it was relaxed or it was an easier course it was like from stage one to stage four it was the mo the hard like we would all we all said the same thing you would finish a stage and you’d
Say that was the hardest day on a bike I’ve ever had in my entire life and then six more coming up yeah next day we said the exact same thing every day so that’s uh it was just it’s no joke the Andes are a very rugged andies don’t play they
Don’t play yeah so I just looking at your bike car looks like schelby G1 Overland yes is that a 42 or 45 up front where these uh 45 front front and rear okay yeah so these are the G1 Overlandsummers the happiest I’ve ever been on a set of tires like the the Schwab is new for us this year and so I hadn’t raced on them and uh they like superseded any expectation I had didn’t run inserts uh just stands sealing inside and I’d set it I would like At
First I set it with like 34 I think I set it at 40 at the first day yeah and then it would just like slowly just kept going down lower and I would just kind of give it a squeeze cuz sometimes you just didn’t have a pump or yeah yeah
What did you pack for gear did you feel like you were overprepared or underprepared like what what was dialed and what was like un what are you going to change for next year so I was overpacked Big Time Russell too uh we had decided to bring puppy jackets and
It’s 94° it’s 94° sweat just sweating like somebody’s pouring water over your head and that just even knowing that you have a puffy in your in your pack is just demoralized like you’re like you’re looking over at the locals and they have nothing on their bike they like
Especially the mountain biker he had like tiny little bags so you learn a lot after the F the first bike packing I’ve never done one before so uh I had toilet trees that was actually like the biggest noncycling thing that I had yes was like my toiletries uh which would go up here
In the front um as well as like like uh electrical cords like an iPhone charger uh USB for the Garmin um and then like a multi block that you put in the wall um two bottles of mini like mini mini bottles of stands yeah and I had to
Carry this so if you a lot of people are putting it in their pocket but the rule is if you lose the what’s the name it’s the fox the fox or like eloro eloro eloro if you lose aoro you’re disqualified from the race so I actually
Was packing it inside cuz I didn’t want to lose it cuz I lost my wallet at the race I’ve lost almost everything at this race lost my bottles every day so I was like I got to put it in the bag so yeah and then back here this was like my gym
Like I just had like a pair of Lululemon shorts uh like a dry fit shirt socks uh I brought two two bibs two jerseys um two pairs of socks but the puffy you don’t I don’t want to bring a pu I brought a pretty thick rain jacket
Too yeah that also was not needed like if anything just a very lightweight jacket like a yeah something like that but yeah then tools was in this this pouch area here um this looks like a lot of tools it was actually quite a lot
Like I had uh chain lube on there too so y I would I’d like to I we want kind of wanted to air more on the side of heavier tool and then I learned that maybe less clothes cuz like if you had a there’s like it’s so rough the terrain
You want to have everything you might need to fix problems cuz they were you’re a long way out of something sideways long yeah exactly yeah so for the record transort it says a bike packing stage race but everyone stays in hotels so you’re not bringing a sleeping
Bag or a baby Sack or anything like this but everything but the sleeping Necessities yeah is on your bike there’s also some folks doing a supported version uh but they were not part of the race former world champion Olympic champion animic van Luton was out here
Falling out but not part of the race was having her stuff carry so that’s why there’s a lot of stuff on here but not a lot of stuff on here yeah no sleeping bag though but yeah I’m just yeah this race was uh I wish you would have come
For the whole eight days so you could have really seen just these the descends like the three days that we did they were gnarly and then but the four days I wish you could have also seen those I think you got to do the eight day I’m
I’m Keen I’ll tell you I’m Keen to come back yeah for more days but not necessarily more days of racing I want to come back for more days of riding and my wife and my daughter are super eager to get here so I think that’s our plan
For next year I recommend anyone one who has never been to Columbia by all means come check it out the culture is fantastic the food’s fantastic it just the everything about everything about the writing is so hard but everything else is so easy easy like people have been like so welcoming and
Accommodating and patient yep it’s been a treat yeah it’s been awesome congratulations again well done sir thanks Ben good to see you good to see you Griffin [Applause] [Applause] Easter [Applause] To eloro
1 Comment
Great insight; thanks!