Kyle Dempster is one of the top alpine climbers in the world. The 29 year old has pioneered new routes on some of the tallest mountains including Baintha Brakk in Pakistan and K7 in the Karakoram. He has won two Piolet d’Ors and several Golden Pitons, awards that recognize mountaineering’s greatest accomplishments each year. In 2011, he spent two months on a solo expedition, bike touring the backroads of Kyrgyzstan and climbing in its many mountain ranges. The video footage he gathered on the trip was recently turned into a short documentary, The Road From Karakol. I had the opportunity to speak with Kyle about his Kyrgyzstan trip, combining biking and mountaineering, the highs and lows of solo touring in remote and rugged terrain, the future of bikes in the climbing world, and much more.