Murphology Podcast

Meet Taylor Nichols from the Bike Talk Podcast. Taylor is currently over 2,800 miles into a cross country solo bike trip from his daughter’s home in San Francisco to his father’s home in Michigan. He has his Surly Midnight Special loaded up and has been utilizing some great bicycle trails like the Pacific Coast, TansAmerican, the Lewis and Clark and is currently pedaling on the Northern Tier. I ca...

A new ride is coming to Eastern Iowa May 9, 2026, organized by yours truly and today I am joined by my co-host from The Just Go Bike Podcast to discuss everything you might want to know about the Pedals and Petals Women’s Ride. This 34 mile bicycle ride utilizes the Cedar Valley Nature Trail and takes riders from Cedar Rapids, through the quaint town of Ely to Solon where we turn around and head b...

Sherry Ott is back to talk to us about bike tours in other countries. You may remember her from a few years back when we did an episode highlighting her United States Capitol to Capitol by bicycle quest. That episode is listed in the show notes. Sherry is celebrating 20 years of Ottsworld, which is her travel blog that features her travels and small group tours that take tourists off the beaten pa...

If you are a gravel cyclist, or maybe gravel curious, mark your calendars for October 6-10 of 2026. It is the Arkansas Graveler and Brannon Pack is on this episode to tell us more about this fully supported multi day gravel bicycle event that takes riders on a north to south route across the Arkansas Delta. This event is organized by Ozark Foundation, a nonprofit that puts on dozens of outdoor rec...

Have you heard of a brand of bicycles called Priority? If not, today is the day! Co-Founder Connor Swegle is on this episode to talk all things Priority! Priority Bicycles is a small company with big dreams. They went from a Kickstarter 11 years ago to a company that has a full line up of bicycles that feature a belt drive system instead of your standard chain. This makes for, as they would say: t...

Meet Eric Paton, someone who did not consider himself a cyclist, watched a few YouTube videos that sparked the urge to ride his bike across Canada!! Eric went out and bought his first bike as he neared retirement and the planning, and training began soon after. He shares some of the highlights from his solo adventure. Upon returning he not only sat down and wrote the book: Live the Dash: 70 Days I...

Who wants to ride in North Carolina with me?? Today meet Chip Hofler from North Carolina Amateur Sports and Cycle North Carolina. What started in the early 80’s as an organization bringing the Olympic festival to the area, it is now host to some pretty cool rides including a mountain ride and a coastal ride. I am planning to do an epic tour with them in early October that combines both. It is call...

Registration is open for the 2025 Colorado’s Ride! Use code MURPH to get $100 off your registration fee. Occurring in mid August, Colorado’s Ride is an epic cycling adventure that immerses you into stunning landscapes of Colorado, and charming towns like Durango and Pagosa Springs. I completed this ride in 2024 and invited ride director Bill Plock to be on the podcast to talk more about this bike...

On this episode meet Amaiya Bearpaw. As a proud member of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, she was chosen to pedal about 950 miles in 2023 as part of the Remember the Removal Bike Ride, also known as RTR. The ride spans from Georgia to Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, Arkansas and Oklahoma over nearly three weeks. The Remember the Removal Bike Ride was started by the Cherokee Nation in 198...

There are many ways to enjoy a bicycle tour whether you join an event, pay someone to provide logistics, or you do all the planning yourself. On this episode meet Zach Ostrander from Summit Cycle Solutions. He started this all encompassing logistics company back in 2016 when he noticed a strong need for logistics specific to cycling. Summit Cycle Solutions does everything from full service, like o...

On this episode meet Meaghan Hackinen. She is an ultra endurance cyclist who recently completed the Tour Divide which is over 2,700 miles of self supported bike racing that follows the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route, from Banff Canada down to the US/Mexico border. Not only did Meaghan finish this grueling race 7th overall with a time of 15 days and 23 hours, she nailed first place in the women's...

Ever thought about riding your bike in Mexico? How about with a top notch bicycle tour company? BRAG is a non profit that provides quality bike tours including their signature tour called by the same name. BRAG stands for Bicycle Ride Across Georgia and that is a multi day bike tour across Georgia that has been going on since 1980! In addition to BRAG they offer other bike tours around Georgia. Th...

The Be Good Foundation was founded by Rebecca Rusch who among many things is an ultra endurance athlete, adventure cyclist, a world champion multiple times and the star in a film called Blood Road. At the Be Good Foundation, the bike is the center of their work as a catalyst for healing, empowerment, and evolution. They provide grant support to a number of organizations that use the bike in just t...

Experience Plus! is a premium bicycle tour company with a great past. Back in the late 60’s a foreign exchange student from Italy met a high schooler in Oregon. They parted ways but reunited, fell in love and married. They chose to live in the US but wanted to travel. To make ends meet they put up posters to get people to join them on a bike trip to Italy, and it was a huge success. Throughout the...

What the heck is DFL? Well, keeping it PG, it stands for Dead Freaking Last and at Mid South Gravel there is a celebration for the last rider to finish the 100 mile gravel course, a high energy celebration that I have never experienced before. Hundreds of people line up at the finish line and this year as Beth McBride crossed that finish line, people were cheering, the champagne was spraying and t...

Have you heard of the Florida 500? This is an ultra endurance bike race that starts in Jacksonville FL and Finishes in Key West, giving riders over 530 miles of some of the fastest and flattest stretches of roads in the world. You can race as a solo unsupported rider, a solo supported rider, or as a Team Relay with 2, 4 or 8 riders. Today on the podcast meet cyclist Dan Swenson. Dan is an ultra en...

The Iowa Gravel Series started in 2020 after Chris McQueen put on the Glenwood Gravel Grinder and decided to expand. Seven races now make up the Iowa Gravel Series, and it is a full season of events all over Iowa that take place from May to September. Races include the Glenwood Superbloom which is a unique and first of a kind women’s gravel race in Iowa and takes place in late September. In this e...

On this episode I chat with Jonathan Cain from TREE Fund. TREE Fund, which stands for Tree Research and Education Endowment Fund, is a national nonprofit that among many tree related things, distributes scholarships to college students who are going into the tree care industry. Their biggest fundraiser is the Tour des Trees. Each year they host this fully supported multi day bike tour for about 10...

TRIGGER WARNING: SUICIDE DISCUSSION. On this episode Dan Hurd, AKA Lt. Dan joins me, and we talk a considerable amount about the sensitive topic of suicide so please be aware. Dan himself has attempted suicide several times and lucky for him, and all of us, he found the bicycle and it changed his life for the better. He had only been on a few rides when he decided to join a friend for a long ride....

Frankie Holt wasn’t really into cycling when she had a life changing experience while on a bike trip with her sister. She was in her 40’s and that bicycle trip gave her new energy, new confidence and the realization that freedom came with cycling. She also realized she couldn’t find a cycling bag that was quite right for what she needed, so she went about creating her own and her company, Fierce H...

I recently spent a week riding my bike in Florida with the Rum Runner Tour and asked the tour hosts to join me on the podcast. Pat Mayben and Bill Plock both have a ton of experience as event organizers, and run this successful bicycle tour that leads riders through the Florida Everglades and down to Key West. The Rum Runner Tour will introduce you to really cool places that you might not find on...

Today meet an extremely inspiring person, Jeremy Raeszler. Jeremy had a motocross accident back in 2008 that left him with a spinal injury and paralyzed from the waist down. He was now a paraplegic and told he would never walk again and that was a pretty hard pill to swallow for Jeremy. Time passed and somehow the idea of riding a bicycle got into his head and he was determined to figure out how h...

Joy Ride: A Bike Odyssey from Alaska to Argentina written by Kristen Jokinen, is a new book available now! On the show today meet WORLD TRAVELERS, Ville and author Kristen, who are currently on a book tour zigzagging across the country promoting the book. They are on to talk about their 2 year, 18,000 mile journey from Alaska to Argentina on bikes! After hiking the entire Pacific Crest Trail they...

Today meet Jamie from Canada! He is a self proclaimed bagger who got deep into bike touring a few years back and hasn’t looked back. Last year he loaded all his gear onto his Surly Long Haul Trucker and took about 6 weeks to bike across Canada. This year his big adventure plan was to bike across Iowa as part of RAGBRAI. He decided to make it an even bigger adventure by riding his bike from Canada,...

Grassroots Gravel is a new entity and new event coming to Pueblo, Colorado this fall and Adam Davidson is back to talk about it. You can be part of this first year event and get 15% off! 15% off Grassroots Gravel entry for Murphology Listeners Registration Link: https://register.chronotrack.com/r/74848 Use code: MURPHOLOGY Adam was on episode 41 to talk about singletrack biking, trail building and...