The Carnegie Chicago Hubble Program VI: Tip of the Red Giant Branch
  Distances to M66 and M96 of the Leo I Group
  We determine the distances to the Type Ia Supernova host galaxies M66 (NGC
3627) and M96 (NGC 3368) of the Leo I Group using the Tip of the Red Giant
Branch (TRGB) method. We target the stellar halos of these galaxies using the
Hubble Space Telescope ACS/WFC in the F606W and F814W bandpasses. By pointing
to the stellar halos we sample RGB stars predominantly of Population II,
minimize host-galaxy reddening, and significantly reduce the effects of source
crowding. Our absolute calibration of the I-band TRGB is based on a recent
detached eclipsing binary distance to the Large Magellanic Cloud. With this
geometric zero point in hand, we find for M66 and M96, respectively, true
distance moduli $ {\mu}_0 = 30.23 \pm 0.04\text{ (stat)} \pm 0.06\text{ (sys)}
$ mag and $ {\mu}_0 = 30.29 \pm 0.02\text{ (stat)} \pm 0.06\text{ (sys)} $ mag.
