2007 Biking Across Kansas (BAK)

538.76 miles across Kansas | Official BAK site, for more information

More BAK Photo Sites: Craig Young's | Margaret Unruh's | Dennis Hardin's Blog | Carl Davis's

Watch my BAK music video online. It does require a high speed connection. Click Here...

June 8 - 16, 2007 I participated in a ride called "Biking Across Kansas" or BAK.

I took a chartered bus from Wichita to Tribune, KS. On the bus I sat next to Jack who had been doing BAK for 27 years. Too cool!

In Tribune, I met up with Erin Renard. Erin is someone I know from the mountain bike rides/races I have done since 2004.

Also in Tribune, was a road bike friend of mine named Jay Wright. We ran into each other throughout the BAK week and kept in touch about how it was going.

The first day in Tribune, we started out as a group of five riders. Jason Jenisch, Mike Burke, Ron Leiker, Erin Renard and myself, Paula Stout.

As it turned out, our group had very compatible riding styles and habits. We seemed to click really well from the beginning. We formed an excellent pace line ... and though Ron had to go back to work after two days, the remaining four of us maintained an excellent group for the rest of the week. I was absolutely blessed with having three other riders who were patient about my picture taking and how many times I wanted to stop to shoot what we saw.

I had been concerned that I'd get sucked in to a "Just get there" mentality and miss the whole point of traveling across the state seeing the sights. But no matter how many times I wanted to stop and wander through a field or antique store, my new friends were patient and more than willing to humor me. It was very cool. The trip would have been so much different if we hadn't all had the same approach to the cycling or the touring.

We're already planning to do it again next year.

The weather was perfect. Yeah a little too windy at times, but we really couldn't have asked for a better mix of sun, rain and wind.

I have more to write, and I'll update this site later, but I wanted to get the photos out there now.

As a bit of background, on these pages you will also see links to "Jason's GPS" information. Jason rode with a GPS system on his bike and recorded our mileage and climbing/descending. So his stats will vary a bit from my own, but you should be able to get a really good idea of what our ride was like based on this info. :)

Total Ride Time on GPS: 34:47:56 hours; 528.64 miles; 16,425 total ascend

Name	Date	Location	Mov Time	Dist	Mov Spd	Mov Pace	Elev Gain
BAK 2007 - Day 0	8-Jun-07	Tribune	2:03:19	32.88	16	3:45	588
BAK 2007 - Day 1	9-Jun-07	Tribune	2:48:29	47.42	16.9	3:33	1,213
BAK 2007 - Day 2	10-Jun-07	Scott City	2:45:12	55.86	20.3	2:57	460
BAK 2007 - Day 3	11-Jun-07	Ness City	4:20:33	67.33	15.5	3:52	1,443
BAK 2007 - Day 4	12-Jun-07	Hoisington	5:43:41	73.98	12.9	4:38	2,168
BAK 2007 - Day 5	13-Jun-07	Lincoln	5:27:46	80.16	14.7	4:05	2,678
BAK 2007 - Day 6	14-Jun-07	Clay Center	5:24:54	79.53	14.7	4:05	3,580
BAK 2007 - Day 7	15-Jun-07	Centralia	5:24:00	77.47	14.3	4:10	4,095
BAK 2007 - Day 8	16-Jun-07	Troy	0:50:02	14.01	16.8	3:34	200