🚵🏻 Bikepacking Triple Crown Attempt

Good morning, Stoke Crew. Whether you're crushing goals or just crushing snacks at basecamp, we've got the outdoor updates to keep you motivated (or at least entertained).

In today's report

• Tour Divide bikepacking race
• The next melanzana?
• Loveland Pass landslide
• Farmers market lineup for 2025

Today’s Stoke Story

🚵🏻 Bikepacking Triple Crown Attempt

The Report: Ski guide, rock climber, and all-around mountain athlete Karin Pocock has her sights set on completing the legendary bikepacking Triple Crown this year and she's already proving she has what it takes. The Triple Crown refers to completing all three classic American dirt bikepacking routes in a single year: the Tour Divide (2,700 miles), Arizona Trail (800 miles), and Colorado Trail (500 miles). A rule in all of these races is that they have to be self supported, it's a brutal challenge that only the most elite endurance athletes attempt.

The former Colorado resident kicked off 2025 with a win at Pinyons and Pines, a 333-mile Arizona route, then made the smart tactical decision to bail from Grand Loop in May to focus all her energy on preparing for Tour Divide, which started June 13th. The Tour Divide is a monster of a race, you have to be on another level to even think about attempting it. Starting in Banff, Canada and finishing at the U.S./Mexico border in Antelope Wells, New Mexico, we're talking 2,700 miles with around 158,000 feet of elevation gain. The women's winner typically finishes in 15-18 days, which breaks down to roughly 170 miles per day with nearly 10,000 feet of climbing.

Pocock brings serious credentials to this challenge. She completed the Oregon Timber Trail 300 last year and finished second in the 500-mile Colorado Trail Race in 2024, improving from her third-place finish in 2021. While racing Tour Divide as the opening act of a three-race summer requires different tactics than going all-out for a single event, anyone who knows Pocock's competitive fire can expect her to push hard and battle for the front of the pack. I plan to catch up with Karin after the race to learn more about her mental and physical journey. Stay tuned!

• Follow Karin on Instagram here
• Follow Karin on Tour Divide race here, she is currently at mile 584 with 27k of elevation gain

Local Stokelight

👕 The Next Melanzana?

Ram's journey from outdoor enthusiast to successful entrepreneur started with a simple frustration - he couldn't find outdoor clothing that looked good both on the trail and at social settings! After spending 15 years at Copper Mountain and leading the U.S. Ski Mountaineering Association, Ram was struck by inspiration during a 2019 drive to Wyoming - he wanted to create his ideal outdoor garment. Armed with nothing but old clothes from the closet, his wife's sewing machine, and a vision for the perfect mountain lifestyle garment, Ram spent 18 months developing his first SkyGOAT hoodie before launching in fall 2020 with friends and family as his initial market.

The brand's breakthrough came when his original fabric supplier discontinued their material, forcing Ram to partner with a new manufacturer to develop "GOATgrid" - a custom recycled polyester microgrid fleece that's become SkyGOAT’s competitive advantage. Now operating entirely from his basement headquarters in unincorporated Summit County, Ram has built SkyGOAT through pure organic growth and word-of-mouth marketing, already crushing his 2025 goals while expanding the product line to include jackets, half-zips, and upcoming women's items like skirts and changing ponchos.

Ram's journey from passion project to profitable business showcases how authentic community building and product innovation can compete with major outdoor brands.The brand's success through organic growth alone proves there's a solid demand for independently-made outdoor gear that understands the mountain lifestyle!

Check out SkyGoat here

Mountain Briefing

🪨 Landslide on Loveland Pass

Loveland Pass on U.S. Highway 6 remains closed indefinitely after a massive landslide hit the route just east of the summit early Sunday morning around 5:30 AM, creating a debris field that's approximately 100 feet wide and 15-20 feet deep! The slide occurred at mile point 226 between Loveland Ski Area and Arapahoe Basin, caused by material above the roadway becoming saturated from melting snow and sliding onto the highway. The closure affects the route between Loveland Ski Area and Arapahoe Basin, though A-Basin was able to operate its closing weekend by directing skiers through Keystone instead of over the pass.

CDOT is implementing a two-stage cleanup process - first clearing travel lanes of mud and silt, then assessing slope stability before tackling the remaining debris. The pass closure is also creating logistical nightmares for commercial truckers carrying hazardous materials, who normally use Loveland Pass since they're banned from the Eisenhower-Johnson Memorial Tunnels, but are now being escorted through.

Events

🥕 Farmers Market Schedule

I love a good farmers market, so here is the lineup for 2025!

Breckenridge

• Sundays, June 9 - September 8
• Main Street Station, Breckenridge, CO
• 10 am - 3 pm

Crested Butte (My Favorite)

• Sunday, May 25th - October 5th
• Top of Elk Avenue in downtown Crested butte
• 9am - 2pm

Dillon

• Fridays, June 6 - September 12
• Dillon Town Park along Buffalo and LaBonte Streets
• 9am - 2pm

Vail

• Sundays, June 15 - October 5th
• Vail Village
• 9:30am - 3pm

Boulder

• Saturdays, April 6 – November 16
• 13th Street between Canyon & Arapahoe, Boulder, CO
• 8am - 2pm

Golden

• Saturdays, May 31 – October 4
• Golden Public Library Parking Lot, 1019 10th Street, Golden, CO
• 8am - 1pm

Name That Nature

🔍 How to Identify the Lodgepole Pine Tree

🌲 Features

• 2 needles per bundle: long, slender, 1.5-3 inches / slightly twisted and slightly flattened / deep green to yellow-green
• Bark: orange-brown to gray / loose scales
• Cone: Green / turning brown at maturity / often in cluster of 2-3

📏 Plant Size

• 70–100 feet tall (in mature forests), often tall and skinny in dense stands
• Native to Colorado, can live for 100-450 years old

Trailhead Trivia

How many species of pine trees are there?

🔥 Share The Stoke

This newsletter is for mountain lovers, dirtbags, powder hounds, and people who base life decisions on trail conditions and snow reports. Basically, the kind of folks who think a summit beer counts as hydration.

If you know someone like that, forward this email or send them to thestokereport.com. Thanks for spreading the stoke — it seriously means a lot!

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