Niche Bikepacking Tips 101: Carrying your bike through the Grand Canyon

The Arizona trail race is 750 miles long from the Mexico- Arizona border to the Arizona- Utah border. 24ish miles of those will be though the Grand Canyon. When I first learned that the route goes through one of the wonders of the world I was over joyed! I had never been to the canyon before and the idea of passing though it on my bike seemed too good to be true. And alas it was. The park service does not allow bicycles through the canyon which is a blessing and a curse for those wanting to ride the whole Arizona Trail. Many chose to ride around the canyon but those racing and wanting to push their personal abilities suck it up and throw their bike on their back. Crazy, right?

The hike takes you some 4,500 feet down to the Colorado River and then another 5,800 feet to get out of it via the north rim. I will be doing the whole hike in one push with the hopes of finishing it in around 15-20 hours. I am by no means running the trail but the goal is to keep moving forward no matter what.

Now on to the exciting part! How in God’s name do you do this? I have some ideas but, if you find a better way please let me know since I haven’t done it yet…

There are a few options on carrying your bike through the canyon. You can either

1. ship a backpacking frame of some sort to a post office right before the canyon that will give more support,
2. you can carry a pack with you from the start that will allow you to carry your bike on it (my choice)
3. Or you can be an absolute mad man and carry it through on your shoulder.

The Osprey Talon 22 is the go to pack for most bikepackers looking to use a light weight system that will be brought with them for the race and used to carry the bike. This will be my choice for the race because…

1. It’s light as hell! Seriously it’s very light when attached properly you can’t even feel it.
2. I hate shipping things ahead of me for trips. I have done this before with mixed results. Having to wait for the post office to open or missing a package are things I don’t want to deal with before I hike though the granddaddy of them all.
3. It offers lots of tie offs to attach my bike to.
4. Everyone else is doing it. I normally don’t like a piece of gear or practice just because others are using it but with such a successful track record I don’t want to fix what isn’t broken.

There are a few downsides though… The main downside being that with extra space comes the ridiculous need to fill every empty space. I will be working to reduce this need but we will see how it goes.

The nitty gritty of the setup is as follows.

• The front frame is attached as centered as possible on the back with the rear wheel still attached (This may change as the rear wheel has been lightly touching my leg on descents which is really, really annoying).  
• The front wheel is than strapped to the bike frame and pack through a series of ski straps and Velcro. This works pretty well and when centered right on the back does not affect the stability.
• The fork is turned sideways and my Revelate Sweet Roll is used to hold the fork from twisting while also adding yet another tie off to the bag.
• Inside the pack is my seat bag and lots of water, the rest of the bags stay on the bike.

This set up still needs some tweaks but overall it has been working out pretty well! I did have the weight too far to the right side for a few hikes which has led to some back pain but readjusting it has helped.

I will also be using hiking poles for the whole canyon as they help reduce muscle fatigue in the legs and give me something to focus on besides my legs.
​
Grand Canyon here I come!

-Dylan