The last time Scott Thigpen had been on a bicycle, he was a 12-year-old kid with a love of Star Wars and Disney. Twenty-five years later, he was sedentary and rapidly gaining weight. Hello Couch, meet Potato. It was time for a change, for both his body and his mind. Determined to start moving again, Scott climbed on a bicycle one summer afternoon and started pedaling. By the end of the driveway, he was gasping for breath.

A year later, Scott was still trying to stay upright on a mountain bike when he watched Ride The Divide, a movie about an event so daunting, so exhilarating, so tough that few attempt it. But Scott couldn’t stop thinking about it. The Tour Divide, a nearly 3000-mile mountain bike race along the spine of the Continental Divide, was his new dream.

Known as one of the toughest races in the world, the Tour Divide is an unsupported off-road event. If your tire is flat, you fix it. If you run out of water, you must find more. If you’re caught in the middle of nowhere, exhausted and blurry-eyed? Find a spot to nap amidst nature and try not to bother the Grizzlies.

Starting from zero, Scott trained for two years while maintaining a busy family life and career. Scott was preparing for the ride of his life.

In June of 2013, he climbed on that bicycle again, this time to race against 167 other people from all over the world on a trek that would take him from Canada to Mexico in 22 days.

Captured through Scott’s vivid words and wondrous illustrations, this is the tale of one man’s quest to break free of the typical life and conquer his wildest dream.