Thanks Peter for the pointer to the multipage table in the wiki.  I don't know how I overlooked that example.  However, I was still able to duplicate the problem with this sample table by including a page full of text before the table (see below).  

If the dorecurse is set to 62 or 63, the contents slightly overflow the first page text area and only the first row of the table is rendered on the second page.  If dorecurse on blah is performed 61 or 64 times, the table is rendered properly.

Any thoughts?

Cheers,
Mike

\starttext

\setupcolors[state=start]

\showframe

\def\blah{The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy stupid dog.}
\dorecurse{62}{\blah}

% setup for all cells
\setupTABLE[r][each][style=\tfx\it, align=center]

% setup table head
\setupTABLE[r][first]
  [background=color,
   backgroundcolor=yellow]
% setup table footer
\setupTABLE[r][last]
  [style=bold,
   background=color,
   backgroundcolor=green]

\bTABLE[split=repeat,option=stretch]% head on every page, stretch columns
%
% IMPORTANT: use \bTH ... \eTH to enclose the head|next cells
\bTABLEhead
\bTR
  \bTH  head1 \eTH
  \bTH  head2 \eTH
  \bTH  head3 \eTH
\eTR
\eTABLEhead
% 
\bTABLEnext % setup for next table head
\bTR [background=color,backgroundcolor=cyan]
  \bTH  next1 \eTH
  \bTH  next2 \eTH
  \bTH  next3 \eTH
\eTR
\eTABLEnext
%
% the table body (main part)
%
\bTABLEbody
%
\dorecurse{100}{% 100 rows
\bTR
  \bTC  body body body body body \eTC
  \bTC  body body body body body \eTC
  \bTC  body body body body body \eTC
\eTR
}%
%
\eTABLEbody
%
% the table foot
%
\bTABLEfoot
\bTR
  \bTC  foot1 \eTC
  \bTC  foot2 \eTC
  \bTC  foot3 \eTC
\eTR
\eTABLEfoot
%
\eTABLE

\stoptext