Sioux Falls bicyclists take on coast-to-coast ride

A group of Sioux Falls men have been riding their bikes nearly every day since May 21.

That might not sound like a big deal. Until you consider they started their ride at the Pacific Ocean, and they’ll end it about 4,000 miles and a dozen states later at the Atlantic Ocean. And they are carrying everything they need with them on their bicycles.

The group of riders – part of the Sioux Falls Bikepacking Brigade, a social and recreational cycling group – has been planning this trip for the past four years. It’s the brainchild of Art Holden, who has long ridden his bike with his son, Josh, 18. At some point, they decided they would ride across the country when Josh graduated from high school. That happened this spring.

Matt Cook, 33, of Sioux Falls was immediately on board when he heard about the trip.

They hope to finish the ride in early August. As of Monday of this week, they had completed about 1,600 miles. They’re typically riding 50 to 60 miles a day, five or six days a week – and it’s completely self-supported.

The riders are Cook, the Holdens, Alex Gray, Jeff Steinberger and Manvel Karapetyan.

“You take everything with you on the bike,” said Cook, who is riding a Trek Checkpoint gravel bike for the trip. “You take your sleeping bag, your clothes, any tools you might need, chain lube and repair tools – which we have needed along the way – and food and water.”

They stop at convenience stores or grocery stores along the way, so the food just has to get them from point A to B each day. “What can you sneak by with,” Cook said. “Everything you carry is more weight on your bike.”

They have sent some things home that they started with – including cold-weather gear they needed for the first part of the ride in late spring. “It’s been a lot of 80 degrees and blazing sun across Montana and North Dakota,” Cook said.

And they’ve condensed along the way and combined some resources – think charging cords and spare tubes. “My towel has a case – I need the towel, but do I need the case?” Cook said.

The ‘why’ behind the ride

Cook wouldn’t have considered himself particularly athletic. But in 2017, he fell and broke his leg, requiring a plate and seven screws. Cycling was part of his rehabilitation – and he fell in love. It also helped him lose weight and gain strength. “I’m not a tiny human,” Cook said. “I do not fit the average look of a cyclist or endurance athlete, and that has its own challenges with finding clothing and gear. But I enjoy this activity so much. It has brought me so much joy.”

Cook’s joy is clear – he’s relentlessly positive, even on tough days on the bike. And in the local cycling community, he’s well known by his friendly face and kindness.

In 2019, he did his first bikepacking adventure with the Holdens.

“We rode from Peoria, Illinois, to Madison, Wisconsin, and back again,” Cook said. “I had no clue what I was doing. I borrowed all my gear – the bags, tent – but it was just a grand adventure.”

Since then, he has joined more self-supported bike rides, everywhere form the Ozarks to the Black Hills. “These are adventures I would have never dreamed of being able to do without getting on a bike,” Cook said.

But it was on that first trip that Cook heard about this journey.

“I was like, ‘cool, I’m in. Wait, what does that mean,’” Cook said with a laugh. “It’s been crazy. We’ve been talking about this adventure for so long. It was four years away, then three, then it was oh, we leave in 100 days. I’m on a one-way ticket to Seattle.”

Packing his bike for the trip he realized: This is my life for the next three months.

He said the daily mileage is doable – starting early in the morning and taking a break every 10 miles or so for a snack or water. The group starts together, meets for lunch and then regroups again at night. You can ride with each other or go your own pace.

“It’s not pedal as hard as you can as fast as you can,” Cook said. “I don’t like touring that way. I like getting to our destination and feeling enough energy to be like, ‘OK, where am I and what makes this place special.’”

On Sunday night, it was in Medora, North Dakota. “We went to a giant pageant musical last night with horseback riders and fireworks, and it was like, yes, please, more of this.”

But he also appreciates how the slow-paced ride enhances his appreciation of the landscape. “Put it into the perspective of a vehicle,” Cook said. “As you drive along, every hour you spend in the car is a day for me. We literally see the country at the speed of 10 to 12 miles an hour.”

Sharing the route

The group chose their route based on some published routes, some bike trails and some research. Art Holden is the “master navigator,” Cook said of their custom route. They rode part of the Olympic Discovery Trail across a large amount of Washington and will have more trail in Minnesota and New York. But the routes aren’t always so straightforward. They’ve found themselves riding on gravel roads and along the interstate.

“When you are in the western United States, there are gravel roads, but they don’t connect to everything. You can get to places, but you can’t get through places, so sometimes the interstate is the only option,” Cook said. Interstate riding isn’t legal in every state. When they had to do it, Cook was surprised that it was better than he expected. “Cars with bikes on the back will give us a friendly honk.”

“Our least favorite highway has been Montana State Highway 200,” Cook said. “It’s literally just a highway that runs east-west across the entirety of Montana. At times, the shoulder is nonexistent, and the posted speed limit on the two-lane highway is 70 mph. It was nerve-wracking.”

Various social media posts from the riders showcase the challenges.

“I needed a good day, and today was a good day,” Art Holden posted earlier this month. “Tailwinds and long gentle downhill stretches go a long way to lift one’s spirits.”

Or posts about a welcome shower, a campground or the occasional Airbnb with a washer and dryer.

“I rolled out of the tent this morning … looked around at the ragged guys I was riding with and thought, ‘Yes, there is a point where cyclists turn feral.’ We play it pretty fast and loose with the term ‘clean clothes,’” Art Holden posted. “The amount of personal hygiene necessary to appear in public has become a pretty low bar to achieve.”

Because the group gets spread out, riders sometimes spend a lot of their ride alone. And while they have collective resources, they also have to be self-sufficient in case something happens and others are far ahead or behind.

“I’m OK being by myself,” Cook said. “Sometimes I’ll listen to music, sometimes I’ll just listen to the crunch of the gravel.”

It’s a lot of crunching. Gray estimated the journey will include 1.5 million pedal revolutions.

And then, of course, Cook needs to find time to work. He’s still on the clock for part of his day. He works for a small web company and has his laptop along in a waterproof case.

“In our current era of remote work, home is wherever you have an internet connection,” Cook said. “Why be on my couch when I can be in the Badlands of North Dakota?”

But he recognizes that everything had to line up just right. “The chances to do this are so fleeting,” he said. “I’ve been thinking about this trip for four years. Anything in those four years could have snatched it away.”

The journey takes them through Washington, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, then up into Canada and around Lake Erie, then into New York and through Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.

They’ll end at the Nubble Lighthouse.

For Cook, he’ll visit five new states on this trip.

A long trek

It hasn’t always been easy, Cook said. The day they rode over the Continental Divide was particularly challenging. They went up and over Rogers Pass and had to deal with truck traffic. Then on the descent, it began to rain as they navigated roads that were more ATV trails. Cook found himself walking with his bike over some of the rougher terrain, and when he did get back on, he crashed into a pothole.

“It was funny, and then we get going again, and you have to go uphill. I was just like, ‘no, this is the Continental Divide! Everything should be downhill to New Hampshire.’ So we hike up this craggy gravel again, and then I crashed again. I’m tired and frustrated and exhausted.”

He sat on the side of the road and yelled out his frustration. “I felt beat up and scraped up, and my bike is a muddy mess.” He got back on his bike and made his way into Wolf Creek, Montana. They found a restaurant, got some sleep and woke up ready to ride. The next day brought them along the Missouri River on winding lovely roads.

It’s part of the beauty Cook notices along the way.

“I love taking photos of the wildflowers. I love growing flowers and seeing flowers. The day I was coming down from the Rockies, I saw this beautiful purple flower wet with raindrops, and this moment of beauty in the absolute muck of my day was so wonderful.”

They’ve had their good and bad days, and Cook chronicles it in what he calls field notes on his blog, adventureandbike.com.

“Even in those moments when you think, this is tough, you just realize how incredibly fortunate you are to do this,” he said. “The support system from back home has been incredible.”

And, of course, every time they tick off another state, it’s another step closer. “It’s a week to Fargo, and then it’s halfway,” Cook said.

“In some ways, this is a father-son journey, and the rest of us are just ‘cool, we’re coming along,’” Cook said.